The Green Forest tribune., 1907-05-03

They rented these houses; then they put in velvet carpets, elegant furni- ture, pianos and so forth, which they insured. As soon as they had their policies, they would move out the furniture. Then they would light a two-hour candle, and at two o'clock in the morning the house would burn down with complete loss. In this way they had got hundreds of thou sands of dollars ou. of the insurance companies.
 When ] was called into the case 1t had been pretty thoroughly gone over by Pinkerton men, who had To- cated the suspects. The difficulty was to get legal evidence. Jim French, who later fled to Honduras, after hay ing served his first sentence, which I got against him, was the leader of the gang.
 The difficulty in all such cases is to uncover the tracks of the crimi- nals while avoiding direct methods Instead of going out to induce some of the marked men to come to the front with confession. I went to them under the name of Williams and to]d them that I had been sent by the insurance companies to inves- tigate the detectives that had been working on the case who were ac- cused of misappropriating their ex- pense money. While carrying on this special investigation I was able to gather around me all the gang. From them l selected the one man who, I thought, could give me the evidence. This fellow, John Rudd by name, never knew until the day that he was called into the grand jury room that he had been aiding in the apprehen- sion Of the inoendiaries.
 Suspected Infcnner Killed.
 When all WAS ready I went before the grand jury and explained the case The insurance agents told their losses and then we called in Rudd and ex- plained to him his part in the case After indictments had been brought in there was terrible uproar Some member of the grand jury told the gang that a man by the name of Burns had come before them and told the whole story. No one knew Burns l had been going under the name of Williams, but the following night one of the gang was suspected by his fellows of being Burns and was shot dead in saloon. They never knew until the first day of the trial who I was.
 Marshal Mcdonald was trying the case. l was sitting beside him. When Rudd was on the stand he was asked. on cross-examination, to whom he had first told the story.
 ITO man who called himself Will Hams, he replied
 Do you know his true nane?'
 "1 understand now that it is Burns
 "'Oh, this mysterious MT. Burns. How long is it since you saw him last?' H
 "Jnst now
 Is he here Eow?'
 "'Yes.
 Tn this room?'
 He is sitting beside you,' was the answer.
 This was the first that Jim French and the rest of the gang knew of the part l had taken in the inyesti- gation."
 AS Burns sat at his desk telling the story, he had the appearance of a banker explaining deal in stocks. He is as far from the dime novel de tective as he is from the wonderful MT. Sherlock Holmes of Conan Doyle's novels.
 Chief Wilkie Of the secret service once remarked to me-" said Heney. that Burns was man with a sixth sense, who could tell as if by instinct when a man was telling the truth, and when he had told all he knew. My experience with Burns bears this out. Once in the Oregon land fraud cases l thought witness was hold ing something back. Burns said he had told all he knew, and Burns was