They claim that it interferes with the
ends of justice. What they really mean is that it brings ridicule
or censure upon them to have the public know that they do not catch
every thief, or even most of them. They would like that impression
to go out, for police work is largely a game of bluff. Here, then,
is an opportunity for the "beats" I speak of. The reporter who,
through acquaintance, friendship, or natural detective skill, can
get that which it is the policy of the police to conceal from him,
wins. It may seem to many a reader a matter of no great importance
if a man should miss a safe-burglary for his paper; but reporting
is a business, a very exacting one at that, and if he will stop
a moment and think what it is he instinctively looks at first in
his morning paper, even if he has schooled himself not to read it
through, he will see it differently. The fact is that it is all a
great human drama in which these things are the acts that mean grief,
suffering, revenge upon somebody, loss or gain. The reporter who
is behind the scenes sees the tumult of passions, and not rarely
a human heroism that redeems all the rest.
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