XI. A COLOSSAL BANK BURGLING ENTERPRISE 232
XV. MY PATENT SAFETY SWITCH AND JIM IRVING 303
XVI. HARD WORK UNDER GREAT DIFFICULTIES 319
XVIII. DISPOSITION OF OCEAN BANK LOOT 341
XX. TALL JIM MOVES FROM COLUMBUS PRISON 368
XXI. JIM BURNS AND HIS CONGRESSMAN PAL 380
XXII. WILLIAM HATCH, ESQUIRE, DAY WATCHMAN 403
XXIV. THE PERFIDY OF CAPTAIN JIM IRVING 440
“Here I am back again, Ellis, my dear boy!” I said to my clerk in the Central House, as comfortable and inviting a country hostelry as the average man of travel would want to make an occasional visit to, if I do say it myself.
“Glad of it, Mr. White,” returned Ellis Merrill, as he reciprocated my hearty hand-grasp. He had been with me in the hotel business for some time, and I rather fancied him. And he was a most trustworthy young man too.
I glanced at the register on the desk, as any hotel proprietor is apt to do after several days’ absence.
“Ah,” remarked I, as my eyes fell on two names--“Wyckoff and Cummings. They came yesterday. Are they together?”
“Yes, Mr. White; and they seemed to be mighty well stocked with cash. Up to date they’ve been very prompt in paying their bills; in fact, have paid for everything in advance.”
I glanced over a file of business papers. Then I said: “It seems they’ve hired one of our best teams for three days, paid for it, and will return to-morrow. That’s good business, Ellis.”
I gossiped more about my guests,--as to what business they might be engaged in, and the like.
“Mr. Wyckoff told me that he’s a United States deputy marshal. As to his companion, he didn’t say anything,” said Merrill. “I allowed him to have about the best team we had in the stable, on the representation that he was a government official.”
This was in the spring of 1864, when there was much reason to believe that the war between the North and South over the negro was drawing to a close. I was a resident of Stoneham, Massachusetts, and, after a fashion, felt pretty well satisfied with myself and surroundings. I was the owner of a hotel, a large livery with a fine stock of horses and vehicles, besides a grocery business in which I employed several clerks, and a goodly interest in Towle & Seavy’s wine house at 21 Congress Street, Boston. Also, I had a few parcels of real estate in Stoneham, which were increasing in value. In these days of colossal fortunes, the total of my worldly possessions then would be of no account; but I, the holder of thirty thousand dollars and a happy home, surrounded by a happier family, my father and mother still living, and I barely thirty, with the spirits of youth, felt, as I have just said, pretty well satisfied with my life and the world generally.