Anna would conceal a bit of banana peel in her muff and, dropping in upon a station platform, would put her heel upon it and fall prostrate, uttering a groan of pain. The guard would come hastily to her assistance and find, to his horror, a woman with every mark of respectability suffering terrible agony from a condition obviously the result of a fall caused by a bit of banana skin carelessly left lying upon the premises. An ambulance would be summoned, but she would insist upon being taken to her own home--an imposing mansion --and calling her own physician. In due course the railroad would send its doctor, who would report that her condition was serious; and, as the leaving of a banana peel upon a public platform is in its very nature "negligent," the company's lawyer would recommend settlement. Thus "Banana Anna" was able to live in comfort if not in luxury; and an infirmity that might under other circumstances have been a curse became, in fact, a blessing. Of course she took a new name and hired--temporarily--a new residence for each accident; but, as she moved from city to city, she was able to keep up the same old ruse for years. Perhaps our most interesting client was the one who made his living by supplying "to the trade" all kinds of corporate bonds and certificates of stock. Some of these bonds had originally been issued by corporations in good standing, but had been exchanged, cancelled, outlawed, or in some other way had become valueless. How our client secured them I never discovered. He also dealt in the repudiated bonds of Southern cities and States, which can be purchased for practically nothing almost everywhere. His principal line of goods, however, was the bonds of companies that he incorporated himself and disposed of at cut rates to a clientele all his own. These companies all bore impressive names, such as Tennessee Gas, Heat, and Power Company, the Mercedes-Panard- Charon Motor Vehicle Supply Company, the Nevada Coal, Coke, Iron, and Bi-product Company, the Chicago Banking and Securities Company, the Southern Georgia Land and Fruit Company, and so on. He had an impressive office in a marble-fronted building on Wall Street, doors covered with green baize inside and gold lettering outside, and he wore a tall hat and patent-leather shoes. He also had a force of several young lady stenographers and clerks, who acted as the officers and directors of his various concerns, all of which were legally incorporated under the laws of West Virginia and New Jersey. His clients were the gilt-edged "con" men of Wall and Nassau Streets, who, when they needed them, could purchase a couple of hundred engraved one-thousand-dollar bonds of imposing appearance, in a real corporation, for a few hundred dollars in cash.