“There was one awful night, three years ago. It was a drinking and gambling carouse on Blue Bob’s boat, and a man was killed. Nobody ever knew who did it, but Bob left the Alabama River for nearly a year after that. I wish he had never come back. Jackson was on the boat that night, but he never told us anything about it. Men don’t tell women about such things. But the women know all the same, and have to carry the weight of them.”
She was flushed and shaking, and she winked to keep the tears back. Lockwood had never seen her so moved. It tortured him, but he was afraid to try to comfort her.
“Don’t think of those miseries. You’re safe from all that now,” he reminded her again.
“I don’t know. We ought to be. We ought to be so happy, with all the money and comfort. Mamma died before she ever saw it. Safe? With all this reckless spending? Neither papa nor the boys will listen to anything I say. Women don’t know anything about money, of course. But I’m ten times as wise as they are. Ten thousand dollars seems something with no end to it to them. Do you know, I’ve let them give me diamonds, expensive jewelry, because I knew they could be turned back into cash again if the need came. I did hope that you could make friends with Tom and Jackson, so that they would take advice from you; but now Mr. Hanna seems to have turned them all against you.”
“I expect he has. Never mind,” said Lockwood. “I’ll bring pressure on Mr. Hanna soon.”
“What sort of pressure?”
“A sort he’ll understand. Don’t lose your nerve, Miss Louise. You won’t have to go back to the swamps.”
“Of course, for myself, I could always go back to the city again and earn my living.”
“You won’t have to do that either. Trust me. It’ll all come out right.”
She looked at him in a perplexed way, pathetic, like a puzzled child, and sighed deeply again.