“A year ago. A year ago, in this very town.”
The shock of relief was too much for Andy. He was furious. “They didn’t hang him for it, did they?”
“Hang who?” asked Parthy, feebly.
“Who! Ravenal! They didn’t hang him?”
“Why, no, they let him go. He said he shot him in self——”
“He killed a man and they let him go. What does that prove? He’d a right to. All right. What of it!”
“What of it! Your own daughter is out driving in an open carriage this minute with a murderer, that’s what, Andy Hawks. I saw them with my own eyes. There I was, out trying to protect her from contamination by finding out . . . and I saw her the minute my back was turned . . . your doings . . . your own daughter driving in the open streets in an open carriage with a murderer——”
“Oh, open murderer be damned!” squeaked Andy in his falsetto of utter rage. “I killed a man when I was nineteen, Mrs. Hawks, ma’am, and I’ve been twenty-five years and more as respected a man as there is on the rivers, and that’s the truth if you want to talk about mur——”
But Parthenia Ann Hawks, for the first time in her vigorous life, had fainted.