"That's so," he said. "But he didn't just give that poor life of his. I allow he was ready to because—because, wal, I guess he's built in a right fashion. We owed him for that sure. But I 'low he's been paid in a way it don't fall to every feller's lot to git paid. You paid that score for us both, an' if ther's any debt left over to be paid, why I guess I'm ready to pay it." He chuckled. "You know, Nan, woman's a ticklish proposition. Ther's wise highbrows guess they handed out all ther' is to say 'bout women-folk, an' I figger some has used elegant langwidge, an' made pretty talk. But they ain't said it all, an' ain't never likely to ef they was to yarn the whole way from here to hell an' back. I'm gettin' older most every day, an' maybe I oughter git wiser. But ef I was to live till the great round-up I don't guess I'd ever learn the limits of a woman's self-sacrifice fer them she takes the notion to mother. An' it don't matter if it's her own folk, or her beau, or her man, or some pestilential kid she's rescued from drownin' in a churn of cream she's jest fixed ready fer butter makin'. Wot Jeff don't owe you fer haulin' him right back into the midst of life, why I guess you couldn't find with one of them things crazy highbrows wastes otherwise valuable lives in lookin' at bugs with."
Nan laughed, but her denial came swiftly.
"Jeff doesn't owe me a thing," she declared. "The wasn't a soul else around to nurse him. I'd have hated handing him on to you." Then she sighed, but her eyes shone with a light which her father well enough understood. "I—I needed to nurse him. If I hadn't been able to, why, I think I'd have just died. But he don't owe me a thing—not a thing."
Bud took a great gulp of coffee and set his cup down with a clatter.
His deep gurgling laugh was good to hear.
"That ain't no argyment," he cried, his deep eyes twinkling. "You've jest said the things I hadn't savvee to put into words right. Woman's jest a sort of angel come right down from Heaven on a snowflake. She sure is. Ther' ain't no reason to her. Set her around a sick bed with physic she ken hand on to the feller lyin' there, an' ther' ain't no limit to wot she can do. It's a passion. You can't blame her. She's fixed that way. She'll just nurse that feller in a way that makes him feel he wants to start right in trundlin' a wooden hoop, or blowin' a painted trumpet, hanging on to her hand, same as he did before he quit actin' foolish on his mother's lap. It kind o' seems to me a mortal wonder women don't set their men-folk actin' queer settin' aside a railroad track guessin' they're advertisements fer a new hair-wash, or some other fancy dope. I guess women is the greatest proposition ever step out o' the Garden of Eden—someways."
Nan laughed happily.
"That's spoiled it, Daddy," she cried. "Why not leave it at the Garden of Eden?"
Bud laughingly shook his head.
"Why for should I?" he retorted. "If they're angels they ain't all halo an' wings. Anyway, she did step out o' the Garden. An' though the committee ast her to vacate, I allow it was a mighty good thing fer the human race, or we'd all be eatin' grass still, or some other perfectly ridiculous cattle feed. No siree! She ain't all halo an' wings, or us men 'ud be settin' around all the time shoutin' hymns doleful instead of enjoyin' ourselves lyin' awake at nights figgerin' to beat the other feller's play. Woman's jest woman, an' the diff'rences in her is just what a mighty tough world makes of her. Maybe she's foolish. Maybe she ain't. Anyway, she's got most things agin her to make her that way, an' it seems to me a yeller dawg don't have much the worst of the game. No. I guess woman's jest woman, an' us men needs to git right on our knees and thank Providence that is so."
Bud reattacked his supper. There had been impatience as well as amiability in his denial. For all his regard for his partner he could not allow Nan her absurd self-effacement without protest. None knew better than he the extent of his debt to Jeff for ridding the Obar of the rustlers. But Jeff, he also knew, owed his life to the devotion, the skill, the love of this girl upon whom he had no claim.