"No, Mother," Jerry repeated obediently.
"Try to think awfully hard," said Whiteface; "was there a man with a big mark across his forehead—"
"A red mark?" interrupted Jerry eagerly.
"Yes!" cried his mother. "Robert, it was John Rand! I knew it was that low creature."
"I feared it," said the clown.
"What did he do to you, Gary? Was he kind to you?" asked his mother.
Jerry seemed to see in a flash a man with a red mark across his forehead cuffing him over the head and twisting his arm till he cried out from the pain.
"I'll pull your arm right out if you ever tell any one you ain't my brat," a coarse, thick voice seemed to be saying in his ear, "or if you ever let on as how I ever hurt you in anyway at all."
Jerry cowered down in his mother's arms and hid his face against her breast. He did not answer her questions. His heart was galloping with fear. The man with the red scar might come back.
"Why don't you answer, Gary?" asked the clown gently. "Don't you remember?"