The very look of the cattleman, with that grim, hard, capable aspect, shook Blackwell’s nerve.
“So you’ve got him, Bucky.”
Luck looked the man over as he sat handcuffed beside the table and read in his face both terror and a sly, dogged cunning. Once before the fellow had been put through the third degree. Something of the sort he fearfully expected now. Villainy is usually not consistent. This hulking bully should have been a hardy ruffian. Instead, he shrank like a schoolgirl from the thought of physical pain.
“Stand up,” ordered Cullison quietly.
Blackwell got to his feet at once. He could not help it, even though the fear in his eyes showed that he cowered before the anticipated attack.
“Don’t hit me,” he whined.
Luck knew the man sweated under the punishment his imagination called up, and he understood human nature too well to end the suspense by making real the vision. For then the worst would be past, since the actual is never equal to what is expected.
“Well?” Luck watched him with the look of tempered steel in his hard eyes.
The convict flinched, moistened his lips with his tongue, and spoke at last.
“I—I—Mr. Cullison, I want to explain. Every man is liable to make a mistake—go off half cocked. I didn’t do right. That’s a fac’. I can explain all that, but I’m sick now—awful sick.”