On one side of the room, which served as kitchen and bed-chamber, stretched on a pallet of straw, lay a grey-haired woman, her thin face and flushed cheeks evidencing all too clearly the ravages of the malady with which she was afflicted.
And resting in the crook of an emaciated arm lay a baby, fussing and whimpering, now and then crying:
"Mik. I wan' my mik."
In his interest in the twain on the sorry bed, the world-famous desperado was oblivious to the rags, dishes, broken chairs and battered stove that formed the rest of the furnishings.
"These men want to know if I'll cook 'em something to eat if they'll buy it," announced the girl, dropping to her knees that she might speak in the woman's ear.
"Law, child, I don' believe the stove'll draw," replied her mother, when she understood the reason for the strangers' presence.
"Then we'll get food that won't need cooking," returned Jesse.
"You'll have to speak louder, Ma's deaf," declared her daughter.
"Well, you kin do as you please," rejoined the sick creature. "It may draw and it may not."