the professional criminal is a type little understood by the vast majority of people. most people imagine him a type of man inherently and thoroughly vicious, with no saving grace in his character. the criminals i have known are not of this kind. be it understood in writing of “professional” criminals that i mean the one known to the police as the professional man, the man who steals in some shape or another for a living, not the murderer or the ravisher, not the bigamist or the assaulter of women. these crimes are as foreign to the professional crook as they are to the average man.
the underworld can be divided into two principal classes, those of settled dispositions, preying in the locality in which they reside, and those whose methods take them[pg 58] about the entire country and world. the former class is the less numerous. it is characterized by particularly petty acts. working in the majority of cases under the protection of the police or some ward heeler, these men are seldom apprehended. in this class is found the petty “dip” (pickpocket), who makes the street cars and the markets his specialty. the confidence man who has seen better days, making his hangout in some second-class hotel, picking up a few pennies here and there with the connivance of the police, is another type. the receiver of stolen goods (a fence), with his little store as a blind, belongs to this group. then there is the second-story man domiciled in some cheap lodging house, from whence he makes his nightly excursions into the realms of “chance.” in the city residing from year to year is also found the “stool” (informer). the police, knowing them to be incapable of big work, allow them to prey within certain restrictions for the information they bring to them. the stool never or seldom leaves the city. his chances of returning would be[pg 59] slight indeed if the fact were ever found out. the stool is a big asset to every police department. through him the police are notified of the presence in town of any of the big men of the profession. living in the underworld, he has means of getting advance information of some job to be pulled off. he does work for which he receives in pay the supposed friendship of the police. the petty tricks that he pulls off pass unnoticed. if, by any chance, he should find himself within the clutches of the law, his friendship with the police, in most cases, is sufficient to have the case against him dropped. of course the stool is not known as such among his companions of the underworld. he remains a stool, pulsating with life, only because he is successful in blinding his pals to his hypocrisy.
in that class which makes the world its field are found the big men of the profession: the counterfeiter, not the maker of silver coin, but the fellows whose specialties are notes from a hundred up; the keen, quick-witted forger, the well-groomed and[pg 60] affable “con man”; the bank thief, nimble and light of foot; the badger man and woman, heartless and cunning in their scheming. among the rougher workers are found the yegg, nerveless and cool in the face of danger, the stick-up man, with his stealthy tread and ever-ready “rod,” the “prowler” (burglar), and a host of others. in this class are found the “wanted” men of the profession. by railroad and boat they travel over the face of the earth. living with their kind, ransacking the world in search of plunder, they live their life.
it’s a life of chance, this life in the underworld. the crook plays with it daily, toys with it in his every endeavor. he has anticipated arrest for so many years that the actual culmination of his fears hasn’t the shock in it which it would have otherwise.
