ty to relieve some traveller of his purse, and as for
snatching such a thing from some shopper, it was Sunday and the women
who would have been an easy prey on a bargain-day carried neither purse
nor side-bag with them. I was in despair, and then the pealing bells of
St. Jondy's, the spiritual home of the multi-millionaires of New York,
rang out the call to afternoon service. It was like an invitation--the
way was clear. My plan was laid in an instant, and it worked beyond my
most hopeful anticipations. Entering the church, I was ushered to a pew
about halfway up the centre aisle--despite my poverty, I had managed to
keep myself always well-groomed, and no one would have guessed, to look
at my faultless frock-coat and neatly creased trousers, at my finely
gloved hand and polished top-hat, that my pockets held scarcely a brass
farthing. The service proceeded. A good sermon on the Vanity of Riches
found lodgment in my ears, and then the supreme moment came. The
collection-plate was passed, and, gripping my two pennies in my hand, I
made as if to place them in the salver, but with studied awkwardness I
knocked the alms-platter from the hands of the gentleman who passed it.
The whole contents and the platter as well fell at my feet, and from my
lips in reverent whispers poured forth no end of most abject apologies.
Of course I assisted in recovering the fallen bills and coins, and in
less time than it takes to tell it the vestryman was proceeding on his
way up the aisle, gathering in the contributions from other generously
disposed persons as he went, as unconsciously as though the
_contretemps_ had never occurred, and happily unaware that out of the
moneys cast to the floor by my awkward act two yellow-backed
fifty-dollar bills, five half-dollars, and a dime remained behind under
the hassock at my feet, whither I had managed to push them with my toe
while offering my apologies.

[Illustration: "THE WHOLE CONTENTS AND THE PLATTER AS WELL FELL AT MY
FEET"]

An hour later, having dined heartily at Delsherrico's, I was comfortably
napping in a Pullman car on my way to the Social Capital of the United
States.

II

THE ADVENTURE OF THE NEWPORT VILLA

There is little need for me to describe in detail the story of my
railway journey from New York to Newport. It was uneventful and
unproductive save as to the latter end of it, when, on the arrival of
the train at Wickford, observing that the prosperous-looking gentlema