Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also pebble-beached stoney, pebbly beach) penniless, destitute; thus pebble-beach, as v.

1886		Sporting Times 16 Jan. 2/5: We shall probably get enough of music hall tips to get thoroughly pebble-beached before the close of the season.
1890		Sporting Times 22 Feb. 2/3: I can come down on the Administration for my viatique when I am pebble-beached, as I certainly shall be. [Ibid.] 8 Mar. 2/1: [We] had been bunging it in on our own particular pet system, warranted to make its followers gradually and gracefully stone pebble-beached broke.
1898		Binstead & Wells Pink ’Un and Pelican 278: Fleet Street can possibly ‘give a bit of weight’ to most places as a ‘run for the utterly magless, rapless and pebble-beached’.
1901		Referee 21 Ap. 9/2: In the slang of the day a gentleman who is ‘stony broke’ describes himself as pebbly beach [F&H].
1906		Falkirk Herald 30 May 2/1: After his six months’ fling [...] he was ‘pebble-beached stoney’.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Money In It’ Sporting Times 5 Feb. 1/3: ‘Ah!’ said Pebblebeach, agreeing with the Judge’s timely tip, ‘There’s no sound of money when my name’s on anybody’s lip.’.

2. dazed, absent-minded.

1934

Wodehouse Right Ho, Jeeves 173: He was staring before him with a smile so fixed and pebble-beached.