“She wouldn’t remember me—an old cuss like me—but I’ve seen her with Wetherford when she was a kidlet. I never thought she’d grow up into such a ‘queen.’ She’s a wonder.”
Strange to say, Ross no longer objected to the old man’s words of admiration; on the contrary, he encouraged him to talk on.
“Her courage is greater than you know. When she came to that hotel it was a place of dirt and vermin. She has transformed it. She’s now engaged on the reformation of her mother.”
“Lize was straight when I knew her,” remarked the other, in the tone of one who wishes to defend a memory. “Straight as a die.”
“In certain ways she’s straight now, but she’s been hard pushed at times, and has traded in liquor to help out—then she’s naturally a slattern.”
“She didn’t used to be,” asserted Edwards; “she was a mighty handsome woman when I used to see her riding around with Ed.”
“She’s down at the heel now, quite like the town.”
“She looked sick to me. You shouldn’t be too hard on a sick woman, but she ought to send her girl away or get out. As you say, the Fork is no kind of a place for such a girl. If I had a son, a fine young feller like that girl is, do you suppose I’d let him load himself up with an old soak like me? No, sir; Lize has no right to spoil that girl’s life. I’m nothing but a ham-strung old cow-puncher, but I’ve too much pride to saddle my pack on the shoulders of my son the way Lize seems to be doin’ with that girl.”
He spoke with a good deal of feeling, and the ranger studied him with deepening interest. He had taken on dignity in the heat of his protest, and in his eyes blazed something that was both manly and admirable.
Cavanagh took his turn at defending Lize. “As a matter of fact, she tried to send her daughter away, but Lee refuses to go, insisting that it is her duty to remain. In spite of her bad blood the girl is surprisingly true and sweet. She makes me wonder whether there is as much in heredity as we think.”