- Obvious spelling and punctuation errors have been corrected.
- Spelling variations have been kept as in the original.
- The cover has been created by the transcriber from elements in the book and has been placed in the public domain.
RHINELANDER WALDO
Commissioner of Police, New York City
THE GREAT
TAXICAB ROBBERY
PREFACE
There are several reasons for thislittle book, but the best of all is themain reason—that it is a crackinggood story, and right out of life. Thecharacters will be found interesting, andthey are real people, every one of them.The incidents are full of action and color.The plot has mystery, surprise, interplayof mind and motive—had a novelist inventedit, the reader might declare itimprobable. This is the kind of storythat is fundamental—the kind Mr. Chestertonsays is so necessary to plain peoplethat, when writers do not happen towrite it, plain people invent it for themselvesin the form of folk-lore.
But apart from the story interest thereare other reasons.
8When the New York police departmenthad run down all the threads ofthe plot, and accounted for most of thecharacters by locking them up, they hadbecome so absorbed in the story themselves,as a story, that they thought thepublic wo