The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade(1857), by Herman Melville (novel)

Male, female, deft, fraudulent, constantly shifting: which of the masquerade of passengers on the Mississippi steamboat Fidele is the confidence man? The central motif of Melville's last and most modern novel can be seen as a symbol of American cultural history.
Onboard the Fidèle, a steamboat floating down the Mississippi to New Orleans, a confidence man sets out to defraud his fellow passengers.In quick succession he assumes numerous guises from a legless beggar and a worldly businessman ...