I said to him, 'Here!' and I pulled
open my table drawer, and took from it a small envelope full of English
coins, which I had been left stranded with on several returns from
Europe; the inhuman stewards had failed to relieve me of them; and as I
always vow, when I have got through our customs, that I will never go to
Europe again, I had often wondered what I should do with those coins. I
now took out the largest and handsomest of them: 'Do you know what that
is?' 'Yes,' he said; 'it's two shillings and sixpence--what we call a
half-crown.' His promptness restored my faith in him; I saw that he must
be what he said; undoubtedly he had been in the penitentiary; very
likely our name was the same; an emotion of kinship stirred in my heart.
'Here!' I said, and I handed him the coin; it did not seem so bad as
giving him more American money. 'They can change that on the ship for
you. I guess you can manage now till Monday,' and my confidence in
Providence diffused such a genial warmth through my steam-heated
apartment that I forgot all about his overcoat. I wish I could forget
about it now."

We felt that we ought to say something to comfort a man who owned his
excess of beneficence. "Oh, you mustn't mind giving him so much money.
We can't always remember our duty to cut the unfortunate as close as we
ought. Another time you will do better. Come! Cheer up!"

Our friend did not seem entirely consoled by our amiability. In fact, he
seemed not to notice it. He heaved a great sigh in resuming: "He
appeared to think I was hinting that it was time for him to go, for he
got up from the lounge where I had thoughtlessly had the decency to make
him sit down, and went out into the hall, thanking me as I followed him
to the door. I was sorry to let him go; he had interested me somehow
beyond anything particularly appealing in his personality; in fact, his
personality was rather null than otherwise, as far as that asserted any
claim; such a mere man and brother! Before he put his hand on my
door-knob a belated curiosity stirred in me, which I tried, as
delicately as I could, to appease. 'Was your trouble something about
the'--I was going to say the ladies, but that seemed too mawkish, and I
boldly outed with--'women?' 'Oh no,' he said, meekly; 'it was just
cloth, a piece of cloth,' 'Breaking and entering?' I led on. 'Well, not
exactly, but--it came to grand larceny,' and I might have fancied a
touch of mounting self-respect in his confe