returned with water from the duck-pond, he had departed, and departed—as I gathered—in company with the old gentleman's pocket-book, for its owner sat on the grass evidently dazed, nursing a portion of the porte-monnaie, for which, I suppose, he had made a good fight, if the jagged and torn appearance of the remnant was any indication of a struggle.

I could see our friend careering down the lane, some distance away, towards Thornton Heath, well out of reach of pursuit, and I was straining my eyes after him in hopes of marking him down somewhere, when the old miser behind me suddenly interrupted my reflections by bursting anew into a paroxysm of abuse and bad language, which threw even his previous excursions into the shade.

Whether I or the thief, or both of us, were the objects of his frenzy was not very apparent, for his vituperations were incoherent and inarticulate; but I gathered presently that I was at least in part responsible for the disaster, for he inquired, with many added flowers of speech, why I had been so foolish as to go for water and leave him with a cold-blooded ruffian who had robbed a poor old man of his entire fortune.

I was sorry for the unfortunate victim to my ill-judged humanity, and did my best to soothe him.

"You must stop the notes at once," I said; "and as for the fellow himself, why, we'll describe him to the police and identify him in no time; we shall get your money back, never fear."

"It's a lie!" he shrieked; "I am ruined! I shall never see a penny of it; you and your accomplices will fatten upon the old man's savings. Curse you all! I wish you were dead!"

"Thank you," I said; "if that's the case I shall wish you good afternoon and depart, or my accomplices will levant with my share of the spoil." I started to go in the direction of Streatham. The old fellow came to his senses at once.

"Stop a minute!" he cried; "I don't mean that. Stop and help me to recover my money."

"What, from my own accomplices?" said I. He took no notice.

"Help me to recover my money," he continued, "and to bring that rogue to the gallows, and—and you won't be sorry for it!"

"It isn't a hanging matter," I said; "but I am ready to help you if you talk like a sensible man. How much has the fellow taken?"

This was an unfortunate remark, for it instantly plunged the old man into renewed paroxysms of rage and woe. I therefore did not pursue my inquiries, but led my friend slowly towards Streatham, he spluttering and muttering his maledictions, I patiently awaiting the dawn of reason. I inquired, however, presently, whether he knew the numbers of his stolen notes, and as my companion inquired, in response, whether I took him for a fool, I concluded that he did possess this information.

The old man grew calmer after a while, and I accompanied him first to the police station, and afterwards to the telegraph office, where he wrote and despatched a wire to the manager of the Bank of England. The clerk read out his message as we stood at the counter, and I was astonished and rather shocked to learn that my new friend's loss, according to his list of notes, amounted to something very near three hundred pounds.

During the next few days my acquaintance with the strange old man ripened considerably; for together we were called upon by the police authorities to attend, at least once per diem, at the Streatham police station, in order to identify the culprit among a large assortment of suspicious characters brought up daily for our inspection. I think it was on the fifth or sixth day after the robbery that our pilgrimages to the police station were at last crowned with success, and we had the pleasure of seeing once again the unmistakable features of the rogue we were in search of, and afterwards of getting him condemned by a magistrate to a period of enforced virtue and innocence. We were, moreover, successful in recovering a portion of the stolen property, though not all of it—a circumstance which greatly pleased me, for I honestly believed that the lost three hundred pounds represented the whole of my old friend's worldly possessions, as he had led me to understand, and I had been grieved to think of the poor old fellow's sudden misfortune and ruin through the guile of a fellow-creature.

Mr. Clutterbuck, which was the old miser's name, lived in a small villa in Lower Streatham—a dingy, dull-looking house situated in the midst of a moderate garden surrounded by a high brick wall. So far as could be seen, there was no way of entering the abode excepting by a small door in the wall leading up through the square garden to the house; and though I several times, during that week of attendance at the police station and the police court, accompanied the old man home, he never once invited me within doors; neither did he ever express to me one word of thanks for the services I had rendered him in connection with the loss he had sustained and the recovery of a good portion of his property.

Meanwhile, however, this affair had delayed my enlistment for more than a week, and during that period I received an invitation from a college friend in the country to pay him a visit at his house in Gloucestershire; an invitation which I gladly accepted, thanking my lucky stars that some good, at least, had thus come of my strange encounter with the eccentric old miser, Clutterbuck.

Assuredly, when I parted from him for the last time, after the completion of the business which had brought us daily together for a week or near it, I never supposed that any other good could possibly proceed from the acquaintance, or from the delay in my "career" which the affair had occasioned. After my visit to Gloucestershire I should return to London and enlist without further delay; and as for old Clutterbuck, I had neither expectation nor desire ever to behold his face or hear his name again. For how could I know that—

As a matter of fact I never did see the old man again. I went to Gloucestershire and forgot him, or at all events forgot to think of him, until—nearly a month after—I received a letter which brought him suddenly and very forcibly to remembrance—a letter which was destined to lead to a complete "general post" of all my ideas and plans in life, driving from my mind all thoughts of enlistment and office drudgery and everything else of the kind; a letter which told of the miser's end and gave me hope of a new beginning, and which proved, after I had learned its full significance, that even misers may remember benefits conferred, and show a sense of gratitude for which they do not, as a rule, obtain much credit.

I read the letter, first, with my heart all a-flutter with excitement; but presently my agitation cooled down, for, I reflected, even though I should have been chosen as the old man's heir, or part-heir, what could the old fellow have to leave?

"Don't be a sanguine fool, man!" I said to myself. "There isn't much in the business."

Which showed that, though good at games, I was no better prophet than I was scholar!

CHAPTER III

THE GREAT PRIZE IS OFFERED

The letter, so far as I can remember the wording of it, read