Page:Memoirs of the United States Secret Service.djvu/89

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72
UNITED STATES SECRET SERVICE.

was concerned, whereby he could obtain or contrive an apparent advantage in the forthcoming ordeal arranged for him, and he entered Court, with able counsel, to meet the charges against him with the same defiant spirit that had on similar prior occasions marked his conduct before the tribunals of justice. But on the first day of this trial, he discovered that he had a different style of opponent to battle with from those he had previously encountered.

The new chief had woven about the guilty man a web of evidence he had not counted upon, indeed! And Biebusch quickly saw that for once he had "reckoned without his host." He fled as we have stated, and a week passed ere he was recaptured. Chief of Police McDonough, of St. Louis, went for him, and aided by U. S. Detective Eagan, the skulking criminal was tracked to a retired spot near St. Louis, above Bissel's Point, known as Cabaret Island. With a dozen armed men this place was surrounded. Shots were freely exchanged, and a after lively hunt and skirmish, Biebusch was smoked out of his retreat, and taken once more into custody.

The occasion of his jumping his bail a week previously to this last arrest, was found in the fact that Col. Whitley produced as a witness against him the noted Bill Shelley, one of his confederates. When Biebusch saw this man in Court, whom he fancied he had "fixed" for certain, the criminal wilted. Detective Fayman submitted his evidence, and U. S. District Attorney, Chester H. Krum, of St. Louis, was bound to convict the man who had so long persecuted the community there, since he was convinced that he had positive evidence that rendered this a "dead-sure thing," on Biebusch, this time.

On the second day of the trial, Biebusch did not appear. The Marshal called him, in open Court. The lawyers