Jackson glanced up doubtfully, but with a flash of interest—possibly of sympathy.
“What’s Hanna done to you?” he asked.
“Everything. He got all I had in the world, just as he’s trying to do to you. He got me sent to prison on the top of it.”
Once more Lockwood told the story of his wrongs and his long hunt for vengeance.
“Now I’ve got the brute cornered,” he finished, after describing his escape from the house boat. “I’ve spoiled his game, and he knows it. You talk to your sister. Take her opinion. She’s seen a bit of the world. You don’t want Hanna to skin you alive, do you? Will you back me up?”
“I reckon you’ve both got me—you an’ Hanna,” said Jackson wearily. “I reckon it looked bad to you, last night, didn’t it? It wasn’t as bad as it looked, though. My gun wasn’t loaded. I didn’t want to hold up that thar car.”
“Then what the deuce did you do it for?”
Jackson scrutinized him with gloomy, boyish eyes, eyes so like those of his sister that they moved Lockwood’s heart.
“Say, Lockwood, I always kinder took to you,” he said. “I couldn’t hardly believe them yarns Hanna told about you. I dunno hardly who to believe now. But I reckon I might as well tell you. Looks to me like it’s got so bad now that it won’t end till somebody’s killed—you or me or Hanna or Blue Bob.”
“So Blue Bob is in it,” Lockwood remarked.