A Bid for Fortune | Page 8

That is your hansom, not mine. If you don't
require it any longer, I should advise you to pay the man and let him
go."
"You are a swindler, sir. I refuse to pay the cabman. It is your hansom."
I took a step closer to my fine gentleman, and, looking him full in the
face, said as quietly as possible, for I didn't want all the street to hear:
"Mr. Dorunda Dodson, let this be a lesson to you. Perhaps you'll think
twice next time before you try your little games on me!"
He stepped back as if he had been shot, hesitated a moment, and then
jumped into his cab and drove off in the opposite direction. When he
had gone I looked at my astonished companion.
"Well, now," he ejaculated at last, "how on earth did you manage that?"
"Very easily," I replied. "I happened to remember having met that
gentleman up in our part of the world when he was in a very awkward
position--very awkward. By his action just now I should say that he has
not forgotten the circumstance any more than I have."
That was the first of the only two adventures of any importance I met
with during my stay in New South Wales. And there's not much in that,
I fancy I can hear you saying. Well, that may be so, I don't deny it, but
it was nevertheless through that that I became mixed up with the folk
who figure in this book, and indeed it was to that very circumstance,
and that alone, I owe my connection with the queer story I have set
myself to tell. And this is how it came about.

Three days before the steamer sailed, and about four o'clock in the
afternoon, I chanced to be walking down Castlereagh Street, wondering
what on earth I should do with myself until dinner-time, when I saw
approaching me the very man whose discomfiture I have just described.
Being probably occupied planning the plucking of some unfortunate
new chum, he did not see me. And as I had no desire to meet him again,
after what had passed between us, I crossed the road and meandered off
in a different direction, eventually finding myself located on a seat in
the Domain, lighting a cigarette and looking down over a broad
expanse of harbour.
One thought led to another, and so I sat on and on long after dusk had
fallen, never stirring until a circumstance occurred on a neighbouring
path that attracted my attention. A young and well-dressed lady was
pursuing her way in my direction, evidently intending to leave the park
by the entrance I had used to come into it. But unfortunately for her, at
the junction of two paths to my right, three of Sydney's typical larrikins
were engaged in earnest conversation. They had observed the girl
coming towards them, and were evidently preparing some plan for
accosting her. When she was only about fifty yards away, two of them
walked to a distance, leaving the third and biggest ruffian to waylay her.
He did so, but without success; she passed him and continued her walk
at increased speed.
The man thereupon quickened his pace, and, secure in the knowledge
that he was unobserved, again accosted her. Again she tried to escape
him, but this time he would not leave her. What was worse, his two
friends were now blocking the path in front. She looked to right and left,
and was evidently uncertain what to do. Then, seeing escape was
hopeless, she stopped, took out her purse, and gave it to the man who
had first spoken to her. Thinking this was going too far, I jumped up
and went quickly across the turf towards them. My footsteps made no
sound on the soft grass, and as they were too much occupied in
examining what she had given them, they did not notice my approach.
"You scoundrels!" I said, when I had come up with them. "What do
you mean by stopping this lady? Let her go instantly; and you, my

friend, just hand over that purse."
The man addressed looked at me as if he were taking my measure, and
were wondering what sort of chance he'd have against me in a fight.
But I suppose my height must have rather scared him, for he changed
his tone and began to whine.
"I haven't got the lady's purse, s'help me, I ain't! I was only a asking of
'er the time!"
"Hand over that purse!" I said sternly, approaching a step nearer to him.
One of the others here intervened,--"Let's stowch 'im, Dog! There ain't
a copper in sight!"
With that they began to close upon me. But, as the saying goes, "I'd
been