The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-12-21
AsTUTE MIR. PHILLIPS.

There was no room to doubt that MT. James Phillips was astute. He had been told so by his employer, by his fellow clerks in the bank and by two or three detectives with whom he had come in contact. In fact, he had rooms in the same house with detec- tive, and they were on such intimate terms that the sleuth let him in on some of his cases, and on several Oc- casions had said to him:
 Phillips, you would have made a great detective. You have the natural astuteness of a Vidocq."
 There were times when the bank clerk really thought of resigning his position and taking up detective work as a profession. He had almost made up his mind in earnest when brilliant thought came to him.
 He was young man of 26. earning a salary of $20 per week. Until further
 promotion should come he could not
 hope for any increase. The place he aspired to was years away, and there
 was no way of adding to his income and getting married and living as he wanted to live.
 The brilliant thought that flashed
 upon him one evening was to turn his
 astuteness into criminal channels and , reap the profits. He did not intend 1 murder nor highway robbery, nor bur- glary, but simply to beat the public in some easy way. As he was a good pen-
 man, and was well acquainted with the
 ways of banks, it was natural that he should decide on forgery as his line. The astute MT Phillips did not rush into the new business in day nor month"; 1t was a whole year before he
 was ready to move. He first called up all the cases of forgery that he had head of in connection with banks and
 went over them one by one in the
 most methodical manner. Some had succeeded, and he satisfied himself as
 to why others had sent men to prison.
 Then he borrowed the detective's scrap book and purchased the published rem- iniscences of two or three others, and read every line connected with forgery. His deductions when he had finished
 were that nineteen out of every twenty
 men arrested for the crime were bur-
 glars. They had been careless; they
 had left loopholes; they had neglected
 the most ordinary precautions. In some cases they had lacked nerve-a
 thing he knew he possessed to a Won derful degree; in others they had taken alarm when there was not the slightest
 cause for it. Forgery. he decided
 after studying every phase of it for a
 year, was the very safest game in the catalogue.
 When MT. Phillips had fully and firmly made up his mind to enter into
 business he jotted down the follow ing points in his favor. He had always
 borne 8 good reputation; he was con- nected with a respectable house; he
 could initiate any mans chirography; he knew scores of men who banked at 1 institutions outside his won; he was
 an adept at disgusting face and voice;
 he was. a comrade of a detective who
 would keep him informed of what was going on, and his friendship with the officer would serve to Hull all suspicion.
 It was plain sailing to success.
 It was said that there are plenty of IT en who would beat a bank out of a | thousand dollars and yet hesitate to take ten from any other source. Per- sons of wealth will beat the customs | because Uncle Sam is considered fair game. The criminal who gets ahead of a bank or other corporation does
 not feel that he has broken the law as | if he had robbed a private house. MT. Phillips intended to pay all his atten- tion to banks and none of 1t to private individuals. Had any one suggested | that he beat a corner grocer out of $50 by some gum-game he would have been highly indignant.
 The detective had told the bank clerk that more criminals came to grief through confederates than in any other
 way There is honor among thieves i only up to a certain point. They stand
 ready to sell each other out at any
 hour when it seems that they can per-
 sonally benefit by it.
 MT. Phillips natural astuteness warned him to go it alone and trust to no man, aand therefore when he got
 ready to put his programme in mo- ton no living man shared his secret. There had been certain preparations
 to make He was allowed an hour for lunch. He had been in the habit of going to a certain place patronized by other bank clerks. He purposely raised a row with the proprietor that he might have some excuse for going
 elsewhere. He would need to be dis guised, and he ha1 to make the | changes. There must be safe place for his money and he found it by renting a second room half a mile from
 the other. To both landlords, and to
 account for brief stops, he claimed to
 be a detective.
 MT, Phillips was in no hurry, and he
 did not propose to leave any loose ends He went over his plans time after