THE RING-TRICK.
A CURIOUS COINCIDENCE.
Some four years ago I was one of the many hundreds of somewhat aspiring youths who were seeking positions as Civil servants under our government. In order better to work up for the very difficult examinations which it is necessary to pass in order to gain these positions, I had joined the evening classes of a well-known London college. These classes were held twice in every week, and it was on my way to one of them from my home—I live in a northern suburb of the metropolis—that the events I am about to relate took place.
I had alighted, at about five o’clock on an autumn evening, from a train at the King’s Cross terminus of the Great Northern Railway, and was proceeding along the Euston Road, when, having half an hour to spare, I turned off to the right to enter Euston Station. As I passed under the heavy stone portico just to the south of this immense depôt, I observed a man about two yards in front of me, who, just as I noticed him, came to an abrupt halt and stooped down. So suddenly, indeed, did he do this, that I stumbled over him, and tendered an apology for what was not my error. As he regained his vertical position, he spoke to me, and said in a confidential tone: ‘Did you see that?’
I asked him what he meant.
‘Why, this diamond ring. I nearly trod on it. Just look here.’ And he showed me what was apparently a gold diamond ring; and then went on to say, that if I had seen it, I should have my share of the find; or that, as he was a poor man, and as it might arouse suspicion for the ring to be found in his possession, and since, as he could not get rid of it, it would be useless to him, he would sell it to me for a trifle.
I was not at that time—owing, I suppose, to my ignorance of London ways—so cautious as I am now; and thinking, from the various government stamps upon the ring, that it was indeed a valuable one, I told him I would think about it, if the diamond were a good one.
‘Come up here,’ said he, pointing to some back street, ‘and let us see if it will cut glass.’
I walked with him in the direction he indicated, and with much coolness he tested the stone upon a shop-window. Surely enough, it made a deep incision in the glass.
‘Well,’ I said, feeling now tolerably convinced of the genuineness of the ring, ‘I would give you ten shillings for it, but I unfortunately have a few pence only in my pocket.’
‘Ah, that’s a pity. Do you live far from here?’
‘Yes,’ I replied; ‘some twelve miles at least.’
‘Ah, well, there you are, you see; that’s a pity, because you are a gentleman, and the ring would be all right with you; but I am only a poor messenger—at this moment I am on one of my errands—earning a pound a week, and if I tried to sell it, people would suspect me. However, since you say you have not enough money, I will keep the ring and attempt to get rid of it. At anyrate, we’ll part friends. Come and have something to drink with me.’
I refused, for the man was not of a very attractive appearance, being dreadfully pock-marked and squinting in his right eye. So we said good-evening and separated, he to carry out his errand, I to walk on into Euston terminus.
On relating the adventure to my friends, we came to the conclusion that the man was an impostor, and had purposely dropped the ring and stooped to pick it up immediately in front and for the sole edification of myself, evidently hoping that I should purchase it—probably a sham one—from him.
Two years after the above had occurred, my business—I had abandoned the idea of the Civil service—led me one evening along that wondrous thoroughfare the Strand. Proceeding westwards, about midway between the Temple Bar memorial and Charing Cross, I collided somewhat violently with a man immediately in front of me, who had stooped with the evident intention of picking up something off the ground. He turned round sharply and exclaimed: ‘Did you see that?’ at the same time showing me a gold diamond ring, which he stated he had found on the pavement, and on which he had nearly trodden.
I will not weary the reader with a verbatim account of the conversation which then ensued. Suffice it for me to say that I had recognised in the man before me the pock-marked and squinting hero of the Euston Road of two years before. In order, however, further to convince myself that my impressions as to this were correct, I, apparently taking interest in what he had found, allowed him to do and say, act for act and word for word, all that he did and said on the first occasion of my meeting him. He tested the diamond by cutting glass; said he was a poor messenger earning a pound a week; was even then on one of his errands; thought that the discovery of such a ring in his possession would excite suspicion; and—— Well, I neither need, nor will I, rewrite the whole of the first portion of this narration, for what now took place was its precise counterpart.
I taxed the swindler with having played the same rôle at Euston Station, two years previously.
He replied, in the most naïve manner: ‘Ah, then I was in Liverpool.’ But he was, I suspect, somewhat astonished to find out that I knew him. Again did he ask me to drink with him and to part friends.
It is almost needless to add, that though I might have done the latter, I certainly did not do the former, he being evidently a swindler. And so we separated for the second time, he disappearing up one of the tributary streets of the Strand, I proceeding about my business.
It struck me as being very wonderful that this man, whose profession it doubtless was to entrap people—young and unsuspecting—in the manner I have described, should have on two separate occasions, between which there was an interval of two years, singled out myself as an intended victim to his fraud, since I am but one of tens of thousands of the youth daily to be remarked walking in the London streets. The remarkable blunder of the impostor proves how correct is the well-known proverb, ‘A liar should have a good memory;’ and the facts here narrated may perhaps serve to put others on their guard against the wiles of London street swindlers.