“No, it ain’t, sir—­I look at it this-a-ways; it’s a clear case of my giving him the damnedest sort of a body beating!”

“Sir,” said the judge, “I’ll hold your hat while you are about it!”

Hicks had taken his time in responding to the judge’s summons, but now his step sounded in the hall and throwing open the door he entered the room.  Whether consciously or not he had acquired something of that surly, forbidding manner which was characteristic of his employer.  A curt nod of the head was his only greeting.

“Will you sit down?” asked the judge.  Hicks signified by another movement of the head that he would not.  “This is a very dreadful business!” began the judge softly.

“Ain’t it?” agreed Hicks.  “What you got to say to me?” he added petulantly.

“Have you started to drag the bayou?” asked the judge.  Hicks nodded.  “That was your idea?” suggested the judge.

“No, it wa’n’t,” objected Hicks quickly.  “But I said she had been actin’ like she was plumb distracted ever since Charley Norton got shot—­”

“How?” inquired the judge, arching his eyebrows.  Hicks was plainly disturbed by the question.

“Sort of out of her head.  Mr. Ware seen it, too—­”

“He spoke of it?”

“Yes, sir; him and me discussed it together.”

The judge regarded Hicks long and intently and in, silence.  His magnificent mind was at work.  If Betty had been distraught he had not observed any sign of it the previous day.  If Ware were better informed as to her true mental state why had he chosen this time to go to Memphis?

“I suppose Mr. Ware asked you to keep an eye on Miss Malroy while he was away from home?” said the judge.  Hicks, suspicious of the drift of his questioning, made no answer.  “I suppose you told the house servants to keep her under observation?” continued the judge.

“I don’t talk to no niggers,” replied Hicks, “except to give ’em my orders.”

“Well, did you give them that order?”

“No, I didn’t.”

The sudden and hurried entrance of big Steve brought the judge’s examination of Mr. Hicks to a standstill.

“Mas’r, you know dat ’ar coachman George—­the big black fellow dat took you into town las’ evenin’?  I jes’ been down at Shanty Hill whar Milly, his wife, is carryin’ on something scandalous ’cause George ain’t never come home!” Steve was laboring under intense excitement, but he ignored the presence of the overseer and addressed himself to Slocum Price.

“Well, what of that?” cried Hicks quickly.

“Thar warn’t no George, mind you, Mas’r, but dar was his team in de stable this mo’ning and lookin’ mighty nigh done up with hard driving.”

“Yes.” interrupted Hicks uneasily; “put a pair of lines in a nigger’s hands and he’ll run any team off its legs!”

“An’ the kerriage all scratched up from bein’ thrashed through the bushes,” added Steve.