“Ah,” said the official, “We have new evidence against you, Rube. We know that Mrs. Allen Burrow visited your father’s, and through her you sent a message to Rube Burrow that you wanted to see him; and we know that Ann Eliza brought the answer from Rube that he would meet you in Fellowship church-yard. We know just where you met before the robbery, and we know you parted at Demopolis, Ala., after the work was done.” This information, which was literally true, was adroitly given Rube for a purpose, and convinced him that the coils were tightening, and that additional evidence had, indeed, been secured. Rube Smith, though not as old in crime as his copartners, was not a whit less bold and desperate. While in jail at Meridian, pending his trial at Waynesboro, he had been discovered in a plot to kill the jailer and liberate himself and others. He had not been at Jackson thirty days before it was developed that he was scheming to make his escape, and for this offense he then wore a heavy ball and chain. Bold and unscrupulous, he was ready to take the life of any man who stood between him and liberty. He was, however, very secretive and self-possessed, and up to this time he had not, from the day of his arrest, spoken a word which could be used as evidence against him. Jeff. Moody, a convict from Itawamba County, was on the eve of being liberated, having served his time. Smith, in his desperation, sought Moody as a medium through which to communicate with friends on the outside, through whose aid he hoped to make his escape. After cautiously canvassing the matter, Smith unfolded to Moody his plan of escape, commissioning him to take letters to his father, who was requested to buy pistols, which Moody was to bring to the prison; and as all the guards were withdrawn from the walls of the prison at night, under Moody’s guidance Jim Barker was to scale the walls and hide the pistols in a drawer of Smith’s work-bench, and at the tap of the six o’clock bell the succeeding night, after the guards had been called in, and while the prisoners were being conducted to their cells, Smith expected to furnish Brock, and a fellow convict who had been taken into the scheme, a pistol each. The inside guards were to be “held up” and disarmed, after the fashion of train robbers, and thereby they would effect their escape. As the letters show clearly the bold, bad character of the man, they are herewith given literally: Aug. the 24, 1890. _Dear Father_: