Jackson pretended not to hear and sought to delay the coming reckoning.
"Billy! You Billy," he called sharply, "go bring me some fresh water."
The absorbed Billy looked up for a moment with an air of one rudely awakened from a dream, but he did not move and his eyes promptly returned to the object in the grass that seemed to fascinate him.
"Don't you hear me?" shouted Jackson.
"Don't you hear me?" shouted Buck. "Sweet Jackson, step out h-yuh and take yo' whippin'."
Jackson could pretend inattention no longer. Planning to force the other men to interfere while storming at Billy, he now whipped a revolver out of his pocket and wheeled round.
"Drop it," ordered Buck. "I've got you covered. I expected this and I was ready."
Two men rushed to Jackson's side, he permitted Zack James to take his weapon, and moved a step or two forward. Then Buck took his hand from the revolver in his coat pocket.
"What I done to you, Buck Hardy?" demanded Jackson with as blustering an air as he could support.
"Nothin'," answered Buck. "You know better'n to do anything to me. It's what you've done to two helpless boys when I was gone. You know what I'm talkin' about. I can be sorry for a natural-born coward. If I saw you runnin' from the draft officers and hollerin' that you wished you was a baby and a gal baby at that, I'd be sorry for you. But I can't stand a man that's a coward underneath and a bully on top whenever he thinks there's nobody to stop him. I whipped you once for beatin' on that po' weak-minded Billy. This time it's for what you did to two as nice boys as there ever was. I'd whip you for it if every man in this camp stood behind you. But there ain't nobody to stand behind you because they all despise you."