belief that he was going to cheat the pool room by placing a bet upon a
"sure thing." Secondarily it involved, as the dupe supposed, the theft
or disclosure of messages which were being transmitted over the lines of
a telegraph company--a misdemeanor. Hence, it was argued, the victim was
as much a thief as the proposer of the scheme, had parted with his money
for a dishonest purpose, did not come into court with "clean hands," and
no prosecution could be sustained, no matter whether he had been led to
give up his money by means of false pretences or not.

While "wire-tapping" differed technically from the precise frauds
committed by McCord and Livingston, it nevertheless closely resembled
those swindlers in general character and came clearly within the
doctrine that the law was not designed to protect "rogues in their
dealings with each other."

No genuine attempt had ever been made to prosecute one of these gentry
until the catastrophe which deprived Felix of his $50,000. The
"wire-tappers" rolled in money. Indeed, the fraternity were so liberal
with their "rolls" that they became friendly with certain police
officials and intimately affiliated with various politicians of
influence, a friend of one of whom went on Summerfield's bond, when the
latter was being prosecuted for the "sick-engineer" frauds to the extent
of $30,000. They regularly went to Europe in the summer season and could
be seen at all the race-courses and gambling resorts of the Continent.
It is amusing to chronicle in this connection that just prior to
McPherson's arrest--that is to say during the summer vacation of
1904--he crossed the Atlantic on the same steamer with an assistant
district attorney of New York county, who failed to recognize his ship
companion and found him an entertaining and agreeable comrade.