ROAD TO RUIN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13485, 11 May 1907, Page 2 (Supplement)

ROAD TO RUIN.

£11,000 SQUANDERED IN FOUR MONTHS. FROM CADET TO : MARKET PORTER. The young man ha/I attained his majority.. Collegian, Sandhurst Cadet, an aristocrat nurtured in "a cradle of comfort, his every desire fulfilled, he 'took a holiday by the sea. Young "bloods" like himself had ;, become his friends. He was feted ' and feasted, and lived in an atmosphere of romance. ' The young man had a fortune. To, dissipate if surrounded by such good /;.:/fellows was the'zenith of happiness and;; . . .; the road to ruin. ' Ten years have passed; Z Scenes of revelry there/ are no | longer, to , bring : enjoyment to that young! - man. "The " friends" that-money bought in former days have long ago left the derelict of fortune like rats leave a sinking ship, j And to-day the lion of years ago is the I denizen of a common lodging-house, fight- ■;,-'■ ing for a miserable existence, a market porter. It is the old story of the prodigal] son, deplorable in the sordid sidelights it] throws on I THE DRAMA OF HUMAN' NATURE. ■•, J " All the world's a stage ; s men and women merely players," and in the drama that fate cast for Josslyn Robert Augustus Riley there were many parts. To begin at the beginning. Riley was born lat Pope's Grove, Twickenham,, 30 years ago last December. His father was Captain Frederick '*. Arthur Riley, rof the Rifle -Brigade,. one of the heroes of the Crimean war, and his godfather is the Earl of ; . Muncaster, who, be- • fore ho succeeded to the title, was Josslyn *.Pennington. . Coming from an aristocratic family, claiming connections with the peerage, young Riley was unfortunate in losing- his father when he was 13. ■ Captain Riley died in March, / 1889, , and his .son, with the object of following in his father's* footsteps, ■'..was, sent first ; to Belmont College, Windsor, and then ito Sandhurst. When he was 21 he was to come into a fortune. But his youthful indiscretions were ; most .lamentably: fostered by the company ~ not, perhaps, that which he chose to keep, but that -which his inexperience; of the world's wicked ways led him to drift into. Ultimately he went to Brighton, but in r the meantime the " sharks" that are for ever on the qui vive for the self-willed youth \ with realisable reversions, had long marked him down as a sort of edible morsel. j Therefore, it • was • not surprising that :::■:: at London-by-the-Sea young Riley managed to find what at the time .he thought to be 'a number of eminently desirable acquaintances. From strangers they soon develop;ed into friends, who were always at his elbow picturing to him the delights of liv- ■ ing as they knew it. Henceforth their recreations were those of the fast setthe races, the gambling table, the. drinking saloon. Young Riley's means were limited, "^bub the "rooks" knew the actual.financial position of the "pigeon." They had one aimto pluck their bird. The "rooks" were strong :in brains, for they included men i whose names have since been inscribed oh the roll of notoriety, whose names and ; deeds have set Britain j talking. Fascinated by*his "friends," Riley found life utterly ,'-./■ nnsupportable on ' HIS WIDOWED MOTHER'S ALLOWANCE. He wanted money, and he got it—at a price. His " friends" were the medium —a Piccadilly solicitor the means. The latter was the head of a concern with a grandiloquent" title to cover its money-lending schemes. His .first transaction in this in- ■ iquitous agency was ;to borrow £2000, ru the = , promise that in three months he was ~? to return the capital, ;with £1000 interest, lite £2000 speedily disappeared at Brighton with the help of his \ friends • and dice-box. The easy way in which- the youth had ? raised, the money delighted him. On the strength; of his prospects he borrowed witht in a short interval £7000, £3000 of which was retained to liquidate his, former debt. .i It -went as easy as it had come} £150 was lost in cards in a night at the old Pelican Club; £500 went in; playing billiards at ; v Eastbourne; £250 was 'set aside for the " ; purchase. 5 of a fighting man's handkerchief, a thing •of colours if not of beauty, which probably cost 10s; and other "trophies" ' of, a similar kind were bought at dispro- ; portionate amounts. ■■ Life was fast, but his ; money.soon came to an end. On another 4 - : '-'i reversion' which would have ; brought him iri" J -S7oo'ityear, he raised £11,000. -.This ■;r amount wa3 ; squandered in four months. It"; went •as the other : had gone. .: Two .thou - ; sand pounds was pocketed by his " friends" : i over an -J. incident at, a starling; shooting ';--. : match; t: The party was 'i a very merry one. .',,':•;■ The scene, Bodiam, ; in : Sussex. -..-> A ' navvy casually came across the fields, and the youth, who thought he could shoot, had been wonderfully lucky. 'One i% of his .■:■■"." friends," however, tauntingly insinuated that he was no shot, and offered to bet :, that the labourer could do better than he. ;":The challenge was accepted "navvy won." 'He was bound 'to, for he was nothing less than a. professional in disguise. . That evening: Riley tried -to recoup himself with the dice-box." He lost another £1000. ' On : another 'occasion at pigeon, shoot Riley was,totally unable to bring down a bird, and !if he had known he could never have expected to, for he was firing blank cartridges. " Sport," cards, ' and wine . brought him to bankruptcy with his prospects ruined. His property : was -sold in January,'' 1898, but all his interests had been assigned to the. money-lender. Then : came the awakening, the day of reckoning. . i Riley woke up one morning to find himself . penniless, with his " friends"- gone from him ; like a: dissolving view. : In 11 mouths he ; had squandered; or been ; swindled out . of '■', £22,000. : With no profession to provide ; the means of livelihood he was hopelessly stranded. Then he/, tried to raise the wind by getting £5 on a cheque on a non-exist- , nt bank from a Coventry-street chemist. : For that offence he stood in the dock at tho Cleikenwell Sessions in August. 1898. R was" then stated by Detective-Sergeant Gregory that Riley was the associate of pugilists, racecourse frequenters, and undesirable characters. They;had had such an evil effect on him that in spite of the fact that he had married and had two children, he had forsaken his home to keep their companv. His wife was the daughter of a ■ West Ham Councilor. Out of compassion .: for his wasted past, and in consideration .;■ of his ; ..,;.;'■ :.';-''.-.* '.. /■. ' '.'' | PROMISE TO GO TO CANADA, j with his wife and family, Riley was only j bound over. Apparently, however, he ' elected to stay in England because since then Scotland Yard has registered three .. convictions for theft and one for forgery. . For*the latter he got 18 months. The remainder of the story is told in the following: police court record from Bow-street, where Riley, shabbily dressed, and describ,ed as ' a market porter, was charged with being concerned with another man, not in custody, in stealing an overcoat, belonging j to Messrs. Roberts and Abbott, hosiers: — ) , It was alleged that the coat was taken from the outside of prosecutor's shop in j the Strand by a man who handed it to accused. The latter was in the act of put- . ting it on when ,he was - arrested. Detec- J ; tive-sergeant. Thomas Davis recalled in out- -'••;•'■ line some of the facts narrated with refer- ' ence to prisoner's career. Since last liber-1 ated from prison he had been living at common lodging-houses. Prisoner said he bad been drinking rather heavily, and was" only just recovering from an attack *of i , pneumonia. v His mother had promised ;to receive him into her home again as soon as he was out of this present trouble. When he had lost his fortune he was quite helpJ<«h. Detective-sergeant Davis remarked / that ' there was r good reason to believe prisoner's fortune had been his ruin. "'• -Mr.l Mar«hami : considering it possible that prisoner had been a mere catspaw, ordered .him to come up for judgment if called upon. Riley receives; money and / advice tram time to time from his mother, who is now the wife of a Nottingham:vicar. He <.wt (if* with the money, but the advice,' he feriHirk*, he "docs not" need. He has paid 4miy iw his experience., ''•.■,