The clerk forgot to call us until nearly two o’clock, when we hastened into our clothes and made for the bank. Here we were again delayed, and it was not until nearly three o’clock that we were able to get an opportunity to slip into our office unobserved. Lighting a cigar, I crawled up through the tunnel, followed by Shinburn. By cigar light I worked the combination, while Shinburn again put the front door lock out of kilter, and we were soon in the vault. An inspection of the work that had yet to be done on the paying teller’s safe convinced us that we could not succeed by drilling in the short time left at our disposal, and that we must employ other means. Consequently we decided to call the fire department to our assistance. So I slipped across the street to the lookout, and told him to go, in about twenty minutes, to the window in the toilet room, watch for the signal, and as soon as he saw it to turn in a fire alarm. Then I went back to the bank, fortunately not having to wait my chance. Shinburn and I at once set to work with wedges and copper hammers to make a seam between the jamb and the door of the safe so that we could insert explosive. Finally everything was ready, the charge was connected with a battery which Shinburn held outside the vault, and the vault doors closed. I pulled the signal string and then we waited. By and by we heard the rumble and gongs of the fire carts; and just as an engine swept by the bank, Shinburn turned the switch, the charge went off, and as we returned to the vault, we found the safe door lying on the floor. We made short work of gathering the contents of the safe, which we crammed into the teller’s trunk kept there. As we left the vault, I dropped a package containing two hundred thousand dollars in gold notes among the debris, where it was found later by the bank officials. This seeming carelessness on my part, and of which the daily press made much, picturing the chagrin the looters would feel when they learned of what they had left, was the fulfilment of a promise I had made to Taylor. He did not wish the bank to be forced into insolvency, and had insisted that this amount should be left in order to enable the bank to meet its clearing house obligations on the morning succeeding the robbery. So, while it went against the grain to leave so much good money, as well as to have the reputation for such carelessness, yet I kept my word, and the bank met all its obligations that day. We lowered the trunk through the tunnel and went down ourselves, having relocked the vault and taken the other steps to obliterate all signs of our mode of ingress. Shinburn remained in Kohler’s office, on guard over the trunk, while I went to the ferry where my carriage was to be.