Wherever he was, he never passed by an
opportunity to obtain possession of his neighbor's valuables. If the
monied man would accept a hand at euchre or poker, why, he was so much
the easier cleaned out; if not, false keys, pick-locks, or
sleight-of-hand, soon relieved the unfortunate victim of his superfluous
possessions.
Early in his career of fashionable dissipation, Maxwell had made the
acquaintance of this notorious individual. Indeed, he had sufficient
cause to remember him, for he had made a deep inroad into his patrimony.
Maxwell was too great a rascal himself to be long duped by a greater
one. A kind of business intimacy had grown up between them, and
continued to exist at the time of our story. This connection was not,
however, publicly acknowledged by Maxwell; it would have been the ruin
of his fine prospects: but he used him whenever a scheme of profit or
revenge required an unscrupulous confederate. Yet this Vernon was by no
means a dependent creature of Maxwell's, for he was bold, reckless, and
independent to the last degree.
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