Charles, is a penny for you. I know it isn't much, but I can't afford
more."

It is hard to fancy anything less like Bohemia than Regent Street,
but a little incident that occurred as I walked down that busy
thoroughfare one afternoon recalls the best traditions of the land in
which practical jokes abound. I was going along without any definite
aim, killing time and gathering wool, flanéing, in fact; perhaps there
was a touch of the foreigner about me, for I had only lately returned
from abroad; anyway I suddenly found myself singled out as a fit
subject to be victimised. I felt a hand stealthily sliding into my
pocket; on the spur of the moment I grasped that hand in as much of an
iron grip as I could muster. Then--I hardly know why--I waited quite
a number of seconds before I turned round. When I did, it was du
Maurier's face that I beheld, blanched with terror. Those seconds
had been ages to him. Good heavens! had he made a mistake? Was it not
Bobtail's but another man's hand that was clutching his wrist? Thank
Heaven, it was Bobtail's!

There never was an occasion, before or after, I feel absolutely sure,
when du Maurier was more truly glad to see me. His colour rapidly
returned, and he swore that of all the bonnes blagues this was the
best; but for all that, one thing is certain--he has never since
attempted to pick pockets in Regent Street.

A delightful compromise between Bohemia and the land where
well-regulated Society rules supreme, was the ground on which stood
Moray Lodge, the residence of Arthur Lewis, the head of the well-known
firm of Lewis and Allenby.