The suggestion caused him to laugh at first; then his face suddenly sobered, as though a new thought had occurred to him.
“Damn me, no, it couldn't be that,” he exclaimed, one hand pressing his head. “He couldn't be workin' no trick of that kind on me.”
“Whom do you mean?”
“A fellow named Hawley,” evasively. “The man who claimed to have met my sister.”
“'Black Bart' Hawley?”
The boy lifted his head again, his eyes filled with suspicion.
“Yes, if you must know; he's a gambler all right, but he's stuck to me when I was down and out. You know him?”
“Just a little,” carelessly; “but what sort of a trick could he be working trying to make you acknowledge Christie Maclaire as your sister?”
Willoughby did not answer, shifting uneasily about on the bed. Keith waited, and at last the boy blurted out:
“Oh, it wasn't nothing much. I told him something when I was drunk once, that I thought maybe might have stuck to him. Odd he should make that mistake, too, for I showed him Hope's picture. Bart's a schemer, and I didn't know but what he might have figured out a trick, though I don't see how he could. It wasn't no more than a pipe dream, I reckon. Where did you meet Hope? Back in Missouri?”