O. HENRY STORY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 189, 12 August 1938, Page 8

O. HENRY STORY.

'BORROWED' OYERQOAT SOLD IT FOR FIVE SHILLINGS. i HAD £1 ODD IN POCKET. As an aftermath to a drinking bout William Gordon Little (45), a labourer, once the holder of a Government job, left the home of a friend who had sheltered him for the night carrying an overcoat which he Mid "borrowed" without Making permission. The one thought in his mind was to find his wife, who had left him, so he set out to walk to Hamilton, where he believed she wan. It was a cold day, and the coat he took for protection from the weather. He could not find the wife, and got to Frankton with the aid of a lift, slept that night in the waiting room of the railway station, and woke the following morning cold,, hungry and low in spirit. He tried to pawn tbe overcoat, but under persuasion sold it to a secondhand dealer for . the sum of 5/. When little was interviewed by the police he fopnd he was charged, not only with the theft erf the coat, but also of £1 5/ which was said to be in the inside pocket. To the police he protested he did not steal the money, neither did he mean to sell the coat, but only to pawn it and redeem it later. If the money was in the pocket, it would' [still be there. The police interviewed the dealer, examined the coat —and there 'was £1 2/6 in the inside pocket.

Those facta, which might have formed the plot of an O. Henry etjry, were revealed in the Police Court by SubJinspector Fox, when Little pleaded guilty to the resultant charge of th&Tt of the coat, worth £4. A cbargs of theft of £1 5/ was withdrawn.

Mr. Aekins said Littie had only one previous conviction for drunkenness and that prior to the offence he had been on a drinking bout. Little's idea was only to pawn the coat to get something to eat. He was unable to trace his wife in Hamilton.

Mr. C. R. Orr Walker, S.M., admitted 1 Little to probation for one year and ordered him to be prohibited for the same period. "I won t make any order for the repayment of 5/ to the secondhand dealer, for I think he saw an opportunity of getting a good coat at a cheap 1 price from a man who was 'down and out,'" Added the magistrate. , order for the return of the coat ; to the owner was mate. •<