But Typhoid Mary could help.
“Typhoid,” he said after the obligatory cuddling, “I need some help.”
“You sure do,” she said. “It takes ten of you to equal one man.”
“There’s something you can do for me, and make some moolah too. My problem is, my popularity is fading. I’ve been in the pen five years, and people have short memories, and there’s a lot of people who hardly even heard of Mugs Birdsong. Unless I do something quick, my fifteen minutes of fame are up. And that’s where you come in. Typhoid, baby, we’re going to restore my image worldwide.”
“You’re no good in bed,” she said, “so that won’t be easy.”
“How you wound a man who’s been in jail and had nothing by way of romance but a few knotholes, Typhoid. Here’s the drill. You’ll print all sorts of new Wanted Dead or Alive posters, and also some Ten Thousand Dollar Reward posters. I’ll autograph some, and you can sell those at a profit, by putting ads in the Tattler. But most of them should be shipped out to sheriff departments across the country. Stir the pot a little.”
“So who’s going to pay for all this?”
“I already have, baby. Coochie coochie coo.”
“I should print my own Mugs Birdsong posters. Man Wanted.”
“How you do sting me, Typhoid. Here’s the scoop. It happens that I remember most of the lawmen who were chasing me from one county to another. Like Harold Nussbaum, down in Carson City. He wanted me for extortion, bank robbery, and littering, and he offered a reward. So we’ll just revive it. Print me up some dodgers that say Two Thousand Dollar Reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Mugs Birdsong, and sign it Harold Nussbaum, sheriff. I’ll sign a few for you to sell to fans, and you ship the rest across the country, so it gets pinned up in post offices and all that.”
“What for?”
“I want to bask in fame the rest of my life, Typhoid.”
“You’re not famous with me, Mugs. I’ve done better.”
“You’re the best, Typhoid. You’re a lulu. Now here’s what I want. Wanted for Felony Arson, Sheriff Burt Baumgartner, Rapid City, South Dakota. Wanted for Kidnapping and Extortion, Sheriff Willard Bonack, Billings, Montana. Wanted Dead or Alive, Murder, Assault, Rustling, Cruelty to Animals, Failure to Register as a Mob Boss, Sheriff Wayne Wank, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Got that? We’ll start with those and up the ante when these wear out. I’ve got a lot of worse ones if you dig a little.”
“That’s not very impressive,” she said.
“Well, I plan to start small and build.”
“That’s how you always start,” she said.
There was no dealing with the woman. Mugs got out of the sack, dressed, and left, while Typhoid grinned.
It was time to come up with a curriculum. After all, the lawmen would be arriving the next day, and he needed a plan of instruction. He also wanted them to have a good time, so between crime talk there would be lemonade and cookies, and introductions to society ladies, and directions to the opium parlor on the south side of the tracks.
He decided that the first sessions would be devoted to theft of various sorts, and the later sessions would be devoted to assault and murder and kidnapping, though he wasn’t sure whether kidnapping was a theft or an assault. It didn’t matter. By the time he was done, these lawmen would have an intimate knowledge of all manner of crime, taught by an expert.
He’d start with something spectacular. The bank robbery would do just fine. He’d let J. J. Jones know that the heist would happen at nine the next morning.
He drifted down to the Union Pacific station, a wooden structure on the mainline, and waited for his pigeons to arrive. Most of them would arrive on the afternoon West Coast Limited, and the rest would drift in on other trains. It sure was a fine day, with lots of sunshine and a good breeze. He could teach outside. There was nothing worse than classrooms full of sweaty armpits.
The train huffed in only ten minutes late, a miracle by UP standards, and sure enough, first off the Pullman was Oscar “Bull” Arbuckle, the toughest lawman in West Texas. Bull was famous for shooting the notorious gambler Rafe Routinger after Rafe had knocked him flat on the floor and threatened to kick the sheriff to death. But Bull had rolled sideways, kicked his legs up, and shot the gambler using his holstered revolver. The episode had been trumpeted by the Police Gazette.
“Welcome, Bull,” Mugs said.
“Well, well, well,” Bull said.
Next off the car was Cannonball Moses, bull-necked sheriff of Prescott, Arizona, and friend of the Earp boys. Cannonball was famous for his physical prowess. He scarcely ever used a firearm, preferring to wade in and plant massive fists into the middle of whoever he was dealing with.
“Welcome to Rock Springs, Cannonball.”
“Well, well, well,” Cannonball said.
His handshake was so massive that Mugs worried that his fingers were broken.
Next off the sleeper car was Whispering Winger, sheriff of Jim Jones County, Texas. Whispering was the sneakiest lawman in the profession, with the ability to make himself almost invisible. He could stand on a sidewalk as a pure nonentity, hearing crime on the winds, and corralling the culprits before they were getting to pay dirt.
“Mugs Birdsong, well, well, well,” he whispered.
Mugs was getting bored and though he would be better off in some other profession, but he had chosen an academic life, so he felt he had to proceed, and give these lawmen their money’s worth. Or rather, their taxpayers’ money’s worth, since none of them were schooling themselves on their own dime.
One by one, they stepped down to the gravel platform. There was Walker Wall, the last Civil War veteran still operating as a peace officer, and Seamus Bullwinkle, one of only two easterners this time around. He was a police captain in the Hell’s Kitchen precinct of New York. And of course Andy Apple, the banjoist in a lawmen’s quartet called Sing Sing. Mugs liked Andy, even though Andy had sent Mugs up the river for seven months back in eighty-nine.
They drifted in on the next three passenger trains, including one from California that brought mustachioed Hernando Growler, the scourge of Chinatown. Growler had been Mugs’s nemesis three times, and accounted for thirteen months of Mugs’s lifetime accumulation of seventeen years.
Mugs steered each arrival to his room in the orphanage, and invited the lawman down to the dining room for the opening reception, which was presided over by Sally Sortelege, madam of the local palace of delights.
As the evening wore on, and the lawmen got mellow, Mugs spread out some fresh Wanted dodgers and signed them. They had congregated in the orphanage dining area, but some of the bottles lining one table would never have been opened for orphans. It was time to welcome the lawmen.
“Gents,” he said, “welcome to Rock Springs, Wyoming, home of the Mugs Birdsong Academy of Crime. We’re going to lead off tomorrow with a special event, a heist at our local bank. Its president, J. J. Jones, has eagerly cooperated in the enterprise, and the cash drawers will be stuffed with fake two dollar bills, courtesy of the Tattler printing outfit. Now, we need to divide into two teams. The robbers and the lawmen. I will instruct the robbers in the fine art of knocking over a bank, and the lawmen will congregate in the offices of our sheriff, Mr. Stoopnagle, who is here this eve, and it will be up to the lawmen to stop the crime, and recover the boodle. Remember to use blanks. Anyone who uses real ammo will be flunked and sent home. Remember: blanks only.”
They all looked mighty cheerful.
“Now, I have prepared some souvenirs for you to take home after completing the course work. On the table there are several Mugs Birdsong Wanted dodgers, which I have autographed. The proceeds go to my favorite charity. They are only two bucks each, and you’re gonna take several, and give them to your children and relatives for Christmas. Sally, here, will take your pocket change and give you a receipt and a brass token good for a half-price quickie at her palace of delights.”
It all went smoothly. Mug
s sent word to J. J. Jones that his bank would be knocked over at nine, following the pancake breakfast, and Jones replied that he’d be delighted. Mugs collected the ten bank robbers and issued instructions. One was to keep watch on the sheriff’s office, and if the lawmen in there erupted, he was to signal the rest of the robbers with three rapid shots. Mugs had fast getaway nags ready, and some canvas sacks for the loot, and a string of Chinese firecrackers for diversionary purposes. The lookout was to set these off a block away.
“Now, a lot depends on the tellers. You’ve got to scare them into emptying the cash drawers fast. If they put up any resistance, you’ve got to get into the cage and hogtie them. If the lawmen show up, it’s necessary to take them hostage. You’ll need spare horses for that. Don’t cut them loose until you’re free and clear of town, and not until you’ve pulled ahead of the posse.”
“Who’s playing the tellers?” Hernando asked.
“They are themselves. Be sure not to wound them, or J. J. Jones will be unhappy.”
“What’s this supposed to teach us?” Hernando asked. “What’s in this that we don’t already know about heists?”
“Experience,” Mugs said. “You’re going through the whole drill, and planning the heist from the get-go.”
“I think I’m gonna want a refund,” he said.
“If you’re not entirely satisfied by the end of the term, you can apply for a refund,” Mugs said. “No one leaves the academy unrewarded. Over in the sheriff’s office the lawmen are studying how to respond to the heist and collect a posse and go after you.”
“Big deal,” said Hernando.
They worked out the heist well into the evening, and then had a nightcap with the lawmen, and went to their orphanage rooms, which were pretty small cubicles.
Mugs went to Typhoid’s cottage feeling dissatisfied. This whole bank robbery deal wasn’t working out as well as he had hoped. He figured he would have to come up with something that would surprise both the robbers and lawmen, but he couldn’t imagine what.
The next morning, after a fine pancake breakfast, the students split into the two groups, and the robbers prepared to knock over the bank, while the lawmen prepared to stop them.
Mugs went along to coach the robbers, but they really didn’t need any coaching. They posted a man near the sheriff’s office; they lined up the getaway horses around the corner from the bank, and they pulled on bandanna masks and barged in at the stroke of nine.
No sooner did they enter the lobby than a pail of water splashed over them, half a dozen lariats looped out, lassoing them, J. J. Jones began firing blanks from an old Navy revolver, the two tellers jabbed the robbers with billy clubs and refused to fill up the sacks, and then the law contingent arrived with the lookout and the horseholder neatly hogtied, and all the getaway horses under their control.
Worse, the town’s merchants arrived and started a fistfight in the bank lobby, and Hernando lost a tooth. Cannonball bloodied a lip. Whispering cracked a skull. After that, the sheriff, Stoopnagle, arrived with two deputies and pinched all the students for disorderly conduct, and hauled the whole lot to the jail, smiling to beat the band. All twenty students paid the two-dollar fine and then hit the saloons.
The Rock Springs Academy of Crime was off to a rocky start. But maybe things would get better.
Chapter Five
Mugs Birdsong soon discovered he didn’t have much to say. In fact, once he stood in front of some savvy lawmen he discovered that they knew more than he did. When he tried to demonstrate purse snatching, the peace officers soon were bored. They knew all that stuff.
“Tell us something we don’t know, Mugs,” one yelled.
“I’m working on it,” he said uneasily. The course wasn’t going as planned.
When he began to discuss burglary, and break-ins, the lawmen knew more ways to bust into any building than he did. In a way, that rescued the day. He had little to teach them, but they had plenty to teach each other, and all he had to do was get them to talking, and exchanging experiences. Mugs was a quick study, and he soon was inviting members of his class to step up and talk about the cases they had busted: how to spot cat burglars at work, or how to thwart jewel thieves, or where to lurk when nailing a mugger in a park.
Pretty soon, all those sterling coppers were teaching each other. All Mugs did was start the ball rolling, and then the lawmen plunged in, each with a story that outdid anyone else’s. Hernando told about how he caught three whores drowning a drunk in a hot springs spa, and Whispering told about how he saw a robbery of a post office about to happen, and thwarted it by swinging a mail sack at a crook. Cannonball recounted the time he saw some vagrants in an alley behind a pawn shop, saw that two of them were about to slit the throat of a banker, and chased the two into a carnival, where they tried to hide in a brown bear’s cage and got mauled.
Good stuff, and every man had contributions to make. Mugs never saw such a happy bunch, exchanging war stories hour after hour. Maybe his Academy of Crime would be a success after all. They did that for two weeks. Men who were strangers when they first gathered became old friends. They bought each other drinks when the class shut down each afternoon.
But Mugs knew it wasn’t going to last much longer, certainly not the month he had allocated for the course work.
So he simply shortened the term.
“Gents, we’ve covered everything I planned to teach over the term, and now it’s time to give you your diplomas. Tomorrow we’ll do one last drill; a train robbery. I’ve arranged for an engine, an express car, and a caboose to be run onto the siding just outside, and we’ll figure out how to rob the express car.”
“Hot diggity,” said Whispering.
“I’ve always wanted to blow a train wide open,” said Hernando. “Man, this makes the academy worthwhile.”
“The express car’s almost impenetrable,” Mugs said. “And so is the safe inside. These days, train robbers can’t simply bust in and ride off with a bundle of greenbacks. But your task is to find out how to do it.”
“We’ll need some powder,” said Cannonball.
“I’ve got all that,” Mugs said.
Sure enough, Wolfie was as good as his word. Early the next morning, the engine and cars backed into the siding and parked in front of the orphanage. A bored engineer and fireman sat in the diamond-stacked old freight engine, and a couple of Union Pacific brakemen snoozed cheerfully in the caboose.
The heist was set for nine in the morning; at ten, the class was to gather and discuss what went right and wrong, and draw some conclusions.
Mugs just smiled and nodded. “This is your final exam, gents. Do it right and you all get an A.”
“And what’ll flunk us?” someone wanted to know.
“That train’s due to pull out at 9:15. If it goes, with the express car door closed, and the safe untouched, you all flunk.”
“Whooee,” said Hernando.
At nine, several lawmen crawled up to the express car, laid powder against the door, fused the powder and lit it, while two others climbed into the cab intending to open the valves and empty the steam, but the UP men met them with coal shovels and beat them back. Two more lawmen jumped the caboose, and were invited to coffee by the brakemen. Then the powder blew, but it didn’t budge the express car door. Instead it knocked out seventeen windows in the orphanage. The engineer threw the engine into action, and it began pulling out of the siding while the fireman threw shovel-loads of hot ashes at the bandits, burning the faces of three lawmen.
After that, the sorry lawmen collected in the newly ventilated orphanage for a recap of the crime.
“You gonna flunk us, Mugs?” asked one.
“Give yourself a grade,” Mugs said.
“It ain’t easy, a life of crime,” said Hernando.
“I’ve got to admire you, Mugs,” said Whispering. “Crime’s a lot harder than I thought. I always supposed it was lazy buggers did these jobs, but it’s hard work, and trouble all the way. If I learned any
thing from the academy, it’s that crooks work a lot harder than I do. Than all of us do. Man oh man, I’m not fit to be a crook.”
“Me, I learned how tough it is to be a crook,” Hernando said. “I got burnt, clubbed, beaten, and defeated. Criminals, they’re some kind of geniuses, or they don’t survive. No wonder so many go straight. They don’t cut the mustard.”
“Well, then, you’ve learned something,” Mugs said. “I’ve been preparing for a life of crime from the day I was born. Even before I could read and write, I was learning the art, mastering the techniques. By the time I was seven, I’d stolen a grand piano, and by the age of twelve I had sold four women into white slavery. By the time I was twenty I’d robbed twelve banks and blown open six railway express cars. It took courage, skill, dedication, and a lot of faith to become the greatest crook of all time.
“And that’s what you’ve learned here. Being a crook is a calling, something profound and idealistic. Now you’ve seen for yourselves what goes into becoming a legend.”
“Yeah, man, you’re the master, all right,” said Bull Arbuckle, with admiration.
“You are all going to be Masters of Crime,” Mugs said. “The course ain’t long enough to turn you into doctors. So here’s your diplomas.”
He handed each lawman a diploma. “Fill in your name. I don’t spell so good.”
It was wondrous to behold. All those lawmen sat down and began penning their names into the diplomas, looking mighty satisfied.
Cannonball Moses spoke for all of them. “Mugs, this has been the most valuable and important two weeks of my life. Thanks to you, I’ve gone from being a local sheriff to someone who’s studied with a world renowned master criminal, up there with Jack the Ripper. I want you to know, we’ll be talking this up, insisting that every lawman in the country attend your academy, and learn at your feet. I speak for all of us in wishing you every success. You’ve transformed our lives.”
“Amen,” said those dedicated lawmen.
Mugs Birdsong's Crime Academy Page 3
