"Then I knew who Black-heart Bill was."
"That is so. I had not thought of that."
"He was the brother of Manton Mayhew, the sergeant."
"Indeed!"
"Yes, sir."
"You knew Sergeant Mayhew, then?"
"Intimately, for we were boys together."
"Ah! tell me of him."
"We lived near each other, sir, and Manton Mayhew was my rival at school, and also for the love of a pretty girl whom I idolized. He did all in his power to ruin me, and when I obtained a position in a bank, where he also was a clerk, he did wreck my life, for I was accused of robbery, and worse still, of murdering the watchman, who caught me in the act.
"I would surely have been hanged but for the girl I spoke of, who forced me to fly for my life, aiding me to escape. I fled, to prove my innocence, and became a wanderer.