“You have surely heard of Red Leary?”
“I can’t recall his name.”
“George Post? Louis Ludlum? Pete McCartney? Miles Ogle?”
“Don’t know them.”
“Perhaps,” sarcastically, “you don’t read the papers?”
“Yes, I do, and I have a good memory. I can say without boasting that I have on my tongue’s end all the professional, literary and artistic names in America, and many in Europe. In my library I have many biographies, but none of which a burglar is the theme, nor do I recall the name of a celebrated criminal, unless,” pleasantly, “he has been hanged.”
“Yet there are famous names in our profession,” persisted the young burglar, somewhat sullenly.
“Oh, yes,” admitted Mr. Braithwait, taking a small drink of claret. “Literature has preserved Claude Duval, Jack Sheppard, Dick Turpin—all hung—Fra Diavolo, who was shot, and even our own James and Younger boys; and I have heard vaguely of one Billy the Kid somewhere out West. In a general sense, literature and the drama are saturated with bandits, brigands and outlaws, sometimes comical, sometimes heroic, but you will excuse me if I maintain that you stand on a different footing. Those fellows always had a poetical backing; somebody or something had driven them to their illegal calling, but you can scarcely make a similar claim.”
