There was no iron in his voice; just the whine of a weakling, dispirited to a point where his resentment at ill fortune, even, was a passive thing.
"Why, she's got a fine house to live in, an' I'll bet she always had. She's never knowed what it was to set out a norther in a wagon. She's never lived on buckskin an' frozen spuds all winter. She's never been chased from one place to another....
"Folks respect her for what she's got. Why don't folks get respected for just what they are?"
There was pathos in that query.
The man answered:
"It ain't what you are that matters, daughter. It's what you own."
"You've always said that, ever since I can remember. Mebby if you hadn't said it so much, Alf, I wouldn't feel like I do."
He shifted his footing uneasily and looked again at the flaring sky.
"Well, it's so," he whined. "You'd have found it out yourself. I've brung you up the best I knowed how."
"Oh, Alf! I didn't mean I was finding fault! Damned if you ain't brought me up good! Why, you're the only friend I got Alf! What'd I do without you? You're the only one I've ever knowed ... real well. You're the only one who's ever been good to me!" She put her hands on his shoulders and looked into his face with a smile of genuine affection. "Good old Alf! We've been pals, ain't we?"