"I'm as well as a man can be who's just over a drunk and can't get a cocktail," he growled. "Have you come to pay me that money for Cap. Peyton?" And his bloodshot eyes gleamed fiercely up at Harrod's calm features.
"How much do you claim, Smith?" was the evasive query.
"He knows d—d well. It's a round five hundred dollars, and I'll foller him to Mexico but that I'll get it out of him, if you don't pay it."
"Why did you not make him pay you yesterday?"
"Yesterday?" said Hank, starting to his feet. "He ain't got back, has he? If he's lied to me again, I'll——Say, is he back?" he asked, eagerly.
"I have not seen him yet," answered Harrod, "and I do not wish to see him. I want you to warn him never to show his face among us again. Now, supposing you are released to-night, how soon can you find him?"
"Find him? The young whelp! He's tricked me. He's gone to Mexico, d—n him! I came here two days ago to meet him as agreed. He was to pay me the money then, and said you was here to get it for him; and then, when I got here, he left word that he was in a scrape, and had to light out for Texas right away, and never said another word about the money, except that I might apply to him there for it ('him there' being the bedraggled-looking youth sitting up now on his wooden bench and staring stupidly about him), and—and this is what came of it, by God! The money's mine, colonel, and I earned it fairly that last scrape he was in. He swore he'd pay me if we'd help him out. They'd have jailed him sure at Holly Springs if we hadn't stood by him. It took some of the hardest swearing you ever listened to to turn that marshal off his track." And Hank's face was woe-begone as this touching reminiscence occurred to him.
"And that was the service your people rendered him, was it? You could have rendered his people a much better one by telling the truth and 'jailing him,' as you say. What had he been doing to set the marshal on his track?"
Hank looked suspiciously at me a moment. He was apparently ready to make a clean breast of matters to Harrod, but I was one of a class he regarded with distrust. Seeing this, Harrod glanced significantly at me, and I withdrew, leaving them to work out their own conclusions.
Strolling up to headquarters and thence over to Amory's, I found him sleeping quietly and Parker reading the newspapers at his bedside. An enlivening conversation was not to be looked for in that quarter therefore, and on my speaking to Parker about a room for Mrs. Amory, who was to arrive on the following day, he replied that he had already secured one close at hand. This again left me with nothing especial to do, and in my loneliness and lack of occupation I went down to Royal Street, and came luckily upon a cheerful gathering at Newhall's, as we had learned to speak of the house wherein our Sandbrook party were quartered.