“I think I know the man,” said our hero. “I’ll describe the man I mean and you can tell me if it was he.”
He described Hogan as well as he could.
“That’s the man,” said Rafferty. “I wouldn’t peach if he hadn’t served me such a mean trick. What’s his name?”
“His name is Hogan. He came over on the same steamer with me, after robbing me of fifty dollars in New York. He has been at the mines, but didn’t make out well. This very afternoon I gave him supper—all he could eat—and charged him nothing for it. He repays me by planning a robbery.”
“He’s a mean skunk,” said Watson bluntly.
“You’re right, stranger,” said Rafferty. “I’m a scamp myself, but I’ll be blowed if I’d turn on a man that fed me when I was hungry.”
The tones were gruff but the man was evidently sincere.
“You’re better than you look,” said Watson, surprised to hear such a sentiment from a man of such ruffianly appearance.
Jack Rafferty laughed shortly.
“I ain’t used to compliments,” he said, “and I expect I’m bad enough, but I ain’t all bad. I won’t turn on my pal, unless he does it first, and I ain’t mean enough to rob a man that’s done me a good turn.”