his confidence, the position explained,
the proposition to rob the bank broached, all possible co-operation in
the way of leaving safes unlocked and doors open, or what, of course,
amounts to the same thing, of furnishing keys and information to open
everything, promised, and then Irving was asked if he could find men to
carry the job into execution. New York in those days was well supplied
with such artists, but the right men to carry out so momentous an
operation had to be sought. The difficulty, however, was not great, and
Irving promptly assured the honorable president that he might
confidently count on the right men at the right time.

Among the professionals who twenty-three or four years ago were
considered "valuable" men at Police Headquarters were Mike Hurley,
Patsey Conroy and Max Shinburn. These were the men whom Irving instantly
determined to employ, and whom he forthwith set about to find. That not
being a matter of any difficulty, the same night the three men met
Irving at his own house, and were delighted over the revelation he made
to them.

One would like to know with what sentiment a man occupying an honorable
and responsible position, a Sunday-school superintendent, the head of a
great financial institution, well known in the money world and respected
in society, slunk to a midnight meeting with burglars.

Did no feeling of shame crimson his face, no sinking of disgust oppress
his heart, as he slipped into a house, where, although he kept aloof
from actual contact with the ruffians, the details of an enormous crime
of which he was the author were debated and settled?

Prudential reasons doubtless kept him from forming a personal
acquaintance with his agents. The risk of exposing himself to future
blackmail must not be incurred, and one may well believe that he shrank
from clasping the hands of these men, who were eagerly awaiting him.
Whatever were his feelings, his desperate position suffered no halting.
The storm was ready to break at any moment. In an instant he might be a
wretched fugitive, with terror before him and infamy howling behind. But
one way led out of this labyrinth. He had resolutely planted his feet in
that way, determined to tread it to the end. He did tread it to the end,
and he came out victorious.

If the suspicions of any afterward pointed toward him, no syllable of
the suspicions was breathed. Who dared suspect that an honorable citizen
had ever, in the dead of night, crep