The sight of the horn on the house boat impressed Lockwood powerfully. It was not an extraordinary article to find there, indeed; but he remembered the blowing and response on the night of the card party. It seemed to him now remarkably as if these had been preconcerted signals. Young Jackson’s presence on the house boat, the quarrel that Lockwood had overheard, the boy’s evidently intimate relation with the river gang made the shadowy possibility seem almost probable.
The Power boys were no doubt old acquaintances of Blue Bob; they had even interfered when Charley Craig had wished to “run him off.” They had no social prejudices, and Jackson would probably not be above drinking shinney or gambling on board the house boat. Probably the quarrel had related to a hand of cards, and the horn-blowing might have been a summons or appointment for a rendezvous.
So Lockwood half reassured himself, and then he remembered that Hanna had been listening, too. Hanna had taken an interest in the altercation, and had afterwards gone aboard to talk with river pirates. It was the second time that Lockwood had caught him going to them, and what he could have to say to them was a mystery.
It was nearly a week before he again saw any members of the Power family. He rode over once just before dusk and found nobody at home. A few days later, finding some spare time on his hands early in the forenoon, he repeated his call. He found old Henry Power sitting in his customary attitude of relaxation on the front gallery. He had discarded shoes and socks in the heat, and his bare brown feet were cocked up on the railing. His cob pipe was in his mouth, and an empty tumbler stood on a stool beside him. No one else was in sight.
Lockwood’s hyper-sensitive nerves made him instantly sense a shade of difference in the old squatter’s greeting. He hesitated; then dismounted and tied his horse.
“Won’t you come up?” Henry drawled, without rising. “Right hot, ain’t it?”
The words were not quite inhospitable, but Henry’s face did not beam with its usual cordiality. Lockwood sat down on the top step of the gallery and fanned himself with his hat. It was hot, indeed.
“Won’t you have a shot o’ cawn licker?” Power suggested, with a rather forced manner.
“No, I can’t drink in hot weather,” Lockwood declined. “Are the boys at home?”
“Naw. They’ve done gone out in the cyar,” responded Henry, gazing straight out through the walnut avenue.