STOWAWAY'S LUCK

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 136, 1 February 1932, Page 5

STOWAWAY'S LUCK

GOT AWAY ON OVERSEAS VESSEL UNTIL GIVEN AWAY. TOOK HIS MEDICINE. Tom Walton, a young Enlishman with three fingers missing, must agree with Kipling that "fortune changeth as the moon." He had the good luek a few months ago to stowaway on an overseas vessel which was carrying a passenger, also with three fingers missing. This coineidence resulted in Walton getting as far as Port Said before detection. With the help of a friend returning to England, Walton got his bag aboard the vessel. The four other occupants of the cabin were in his eonfidence and two agreed to help him. A Welshman, however, took an instant dislike to the stowaway, and a Scotsman washed his hands of the affair. Ate With Passengers. The first thrill came wben a steward called at the cabin to collect names. Walton overcame this by ppetending his berth was on another deck. At the first meal he just went into ' the saloon with the others and took a seat. Nothing happened. He was served as a passenger until caught nearly three weeks later. If it had not been for the Welshman, Walton said yesterday, he would have got through. This passenger resented his presence, and after a few words had passed openly threatened to give him away. Once past Fremantle the stowaway began to breathe more freely. But on deck one afternoon, when a woman said, "I believe there are six stowaways on board," he was surprised tq hear a voice say, "Yes! There is one who sleeps on the floor of our cabin." It was his Welsh friend. Tipped Off. Later, according to Walton, the Welshman tipped off the head steward that a man, with three fingeps missing, was a stowaway. A hunt started, and a man • with three fingers was found; but it proved to be a bona-fide passenger. The Welshman was unpopular with the head steward after this, and the stowaway gained a respite which took him past Colombo. When Walton was finally caught at Port Said, the Scotsman gathered subscriptions to pay his fare on to London. According to Walton, the captain of the ship said that if hq gave back the money and took what was coming to him in Port Said he would recommend him to the captain of another vessel for a job which would land him in London. Walton took this advice and did 1Q days in an Egyptian gaol. He came back to Sydney, but did not succeed in getting the job, and is now where he started from.