“I’d been drinking for three days and didn’t know what I was doing last night,” young Carter said this morning at police headquarters. “I was out of a job and didn’t have any money to speak of. And, say, I’m kind of responsible for Wilson’s getting into this, too. It was my scheme to hold up people.
“I’ve been a little wild, but I’ve never been in trouble for holding up people. Say, this’ll be hard on my wife.”
“I’d never have dreamed of robbing people if I hadn’t been drunk,” he said. “Carter thought it would be an easy way to get some money and so we went and borrowed a gun from a negro that he knew and went to holding up people. I’d hold the gun and Carter would search them.”
Both men were shaking and wild-eyed this morning. After their continued drinking of whisky for three days, their nerves were far from steady.
....................................................... . See now how real life beats the reel life every . . now and then. Here, for instance, is the strange . . history of The Man in the Black Mask, as acted upon . . the stage of Kansas City’s streets in the deserted . . hours of the morning when everybody slumbers except . . holdup men, belated wayfarers and policemen. . .......................................................
Ed Wilson, alias E. Harry Miller, known in the family album at police headquarters as a “gunman,” fares forth very early this morning with a companion to make his living. At 2:30 o’clock at Thirteenth and Charlotte streets, they meet a man and begin their pleasant labors.
“Don’t do it, gents,” says the stranger, “don’t do it. It ain’t perfessional. I’m one of the same. Here’s my gun and here’s my black mask. See?”
“Excuses,” says Spokesman Ed. “Have ’em back. Luck to you.”
Frank Mathis, one of those belated wayfarers who afford occupation to holdup men, is held up half an hour later at Thirteenth and Charlotte streets by two men. By the illumination of an arc light he observes the two closely. So does Timothy Dalton, policeman. Timothy comes up rapidly and the two flee, bombarding the air, Timothy doing the same. The robbers escape.
Mathis then furnishes Timothy descriptions of the two, which Timothy, in turn, furnishes police headquarters, which, in turn, furnishes them to whatever policemen can be reached by telephone.