The girl looked up with a quick flush of surprise. Y.D. was no puzzle to her, and if he went out of his way to commend Transley he had a purpose.
“Mr. Transley seems to have made a hit with you, Dad,” she remarked, evasively.
“Well, I do like to see a man who’s got the goods in him. I like a man that can get there, just as I like a horse that can get there. I’ve often wondered, Zen, what kind you’d take up with, when it came to that, an’ hoped he’d be a live crittur. After I’m dead an’ buried I don’t want no other dead one spendin’ my simoleons.”
“How about Mr. Linder?” said Zen, naively.
Her father looked up sharply. “Zen,” he said, “you’re not serious?”
Zen laughed. “I don’t figure you’re exactly serious, Dad, in your talk about Transley. You’re just feeling out. Well—let me do a little feeling out. How about Linder?”
“Linder’s all right,” Y.D. replied. “Better than the average, I admit. But he’s not the man Transley is. If he was, he wouldn’t be workin’ for Transley. You can’t keep a man down, Zen, if he’s got the goods in him. Linder comes up over the average, so’s you can notice it, but not like Transley does.”
Zen did not pursue the subject. She understood her father’s philosophy very well indeed, and, to a large degree, she accepted it as her own. It was natural that a man of Y.D.‘s experience, who had begun life with no favors and had asked none since, and had made of himself a big success—it was natural that such a man should judge all others by their material achievements. The only quality Y.D. took off his hat to was the ability to do things. And Y.D.‘s idea of things was very concrete; it had to do with steers and land, with hay and money and men. It was by such things he measured success. And Zen was disposed to agree with him. Why not? It was the only success she knew.
Transley was greeting them as they drew into camp.
“Glad to see you, Y.D.; honored to have a visit from you, Ma’am,” he said, as he helped them from the democrat, and gave instructions for the care of their horses. “Supper is waiting, and the men won’t be ready for some time.”