True Detective Stories from the Archives of the Pinkertons

During the following days and weeks untiring efforts were made to recapture him. The swamps were searched for miles, and soldiers were sent out in all directions. Mr. Gaylor believed that Crawford succeeded in making his escape into Guatemala, which was only thirty miles distant. He was undoubtedly assisted in his escape by the fact that people in the surrounding region sympathized strongly with him and would have done anything in their power to conceal him from his pursuers. At any rate, the man was never recovered.

Seven years have passed since Crawford's escape, and all this time he has been left undisturbed in Central America, where he has been frequently seen by people who know him, and where he seems to be thriving. At last accounts he and his brother were engaged in business on one of the islands in the Mosquito Reservation of Nicaragua, where they were regarded as dangerous men by the government, likely to incite revolution. So strong was this feeling on the part of the Nicaraguan officials that some years ago advances were made to the United States government to have Crawford surrendered, the Nicaraguan officials declaring that they would gladly give him up if a demand for his extradition was made by the proper authorities in Washington. For some reason the demand has never been made, and probably never will be.

Immediately after Crawford had made confession, the American Exchange Bank, realizing that there was no longer any doubt that the robbery was committed by one of its employees, voluntarily refunded to the Adams Express Company the forty-one thousand dollars that had previously been paid to it by the company, together with interest thereon for two years, and a large part of the expenses. Therefore the only complainant in the case now available would be the bank officials, who, for some reason, have seen fit to let the matter drop.

Mr. Pinkerton's theory of the way in which this robbery was committed is that Crawford had an accomplice who had previously prepared the bogus package, and who, by previous appointment, was standing on the stairs in the express office when the two messengers arrived. It has always been a question in Mr. Pinkerton's mind whether the old man Dominie Earle told the exact truth in his testimony before the bank officials. Not that he suspected Earle of having been implicated in the crime, but he has wondered whether Earle might not have been simply negligent to the extent of leaving Crawford in sole possession of the valise at some time after they entered the office. There is no doubt that Earle was very anxious to catch a four-o'clock train at one of the New Jersey ferries, in order to get home early. He may, in his haste, have allowed Crawford to go up-stairs with the valise unaccompanied.

This would explain how Crawford found opportunity to open the valise and make substitution of the bogus for the genuine package. Assuming that the accomplice was standing at a turn of the stairs, which are winding and rather dusky, it is perfectly conceivable that such a change of packages might have been effected with scarcely a moment's delay.

But consenting that Earle told the exact truth, he admitted that he lingered behind Crawford a little in ascending the stairs, and in so doing he may have furnished sufficient opportunity for the substitution. An old man going up rather steep stairs naturally bends his head forward to relieve the ascent, and in such position he might fail to see what a man close in front of him even was doing. The trouble with this theory is that it supposes the label on the bogus package to have been a forgery.

There is still another theory suggested by Mr. Pinkerton to account for the presence of the bogus money package in the valise when the two messengers reached the counter of the receiving department. It is that Crawford's confederate had provided himself with a second valise, similar in all respects to the one used by the bank, and that in this had been placed the bogus package with a forged label, making the substitution a matter of merely changing valises, which could have been accomplished in a second. It has also been suggested that Crawford might have managed the whole scheme himself, by having prepared a valise like the one he carried daily, arranged with two compartments, in one of which was placed the genuine package received from the paying-teller at the bank, while out of the other compartment was taken at the express office a bogus package previously placed there. What makes it the more reasonable to suppose that Crawford accomplished the theft single-handed is the fact that when arrested in Honduras the bulk of the stolen money was found on his person, while it was known that, in addition to the thirty-two thousand dollars then recovered, he had previously spent considerable sums in various ways. His voyage, for instance, must have been expensive; and it was found that he had given at various times to members of his family sums ranging from twenty to fifty dollars. This would have left out of the original forty-one thousand dollars a very meager remuneration for a confederate.

Perhaps the most reasonable explanation of the robbery lies in the assumption that Dominie Earle, honest, but simple-minded, did not go up-stairs at all with Crawford, but left him at the foot of the stairs, influenced by his eagerness to get home. Granting this supposition, what would have been easier than for Crawford, left alone at the foot of the stairs, to have turned back with the valise and gone into the back room of some neighboring saloon, or other convenient place, where he could manipulate the label and substitute the bogus package? There is reason to think that the bogus package had been prepared weeks before, which would have accounted in a measure for its worn and slovenly appearance. The time occupied in doing all this need not have been over fifteen minutes, which would not have been noticed at the bank, especially as the robbery occurred after banking hours. It is highly improbable, however, that Crawford could have accomplished the substitution on the stairs of the express office; for, while these are winding and somewhat in the shadow, they are by no means dark, and are plainly in view of clerks and officials who are constantly passing. Besides that, Crawford could not have carried the dummy package concealed about his person without attracting attention, for the original package was quite bulky, being about twenty inches long, twenty inches wide, and fourteen inches thick. The bogus package was not quite so thick, and more oblong, but could not easily have been hidden under a man's coat. Finally, even supposing Crawford did carry the bogus package with him in some manner, he would never have dared to expose himself to almost certain detection by cutting off the label from the genuine package, pasting it on the bogus package, placing the latter in the valise, and hiding the genuine one in his clothes – and doing all this on the busy stairs of an express office where at that hour of the day a dozen men are going up and down every minute.

The sum of all these theories is, however, that, in spite of the fact that the author of the robbery is known and the bulk of the money has been recovered, the manner of the robbery is to this day a mystery.