“He is an ignorant old boor.
“Ten years ago he married my aunt, the widow Allen, who is fully fifteen years his senior. He wanted a position in society and a home. My aunt is a stickler on all that’s polite, but notwithstanding her training and all of old Grim’s wealth, she has been unable to gild him over with even an appearance of culture, learning or decency. I never call at his house. They own perhaps the finest residence in the state of Idaho. If you will talk with Rufus Grim half an hour, it will be a wonder if he does not tell you that I am the biggest scoundrel outside the penitentiary; and it is all because my cousin Bertha is my friend. Sometimes I think he is afraid I will marry her. I believe he is in love with Bertha himself, and is only waiting for my aunt to die. It may be unwise for me to talk so plainly, Mr. Gilder, but when I think of that old reprobate, I become desperate.”
There was certainly no half insinuation in this statement, but rather a fiendish denunciation of the rich miner.
“I think,” said Boast, “we’d better have something to drink. I have a bottle in my pocket, but you are not very sociable, and I don’t presume you will drink with me.”
“No,” said Vance, “I am just as much obliged, but I do not feel the need of any stimulant this evening.”
"I have abstained all day,” said Boast, “out of respect for the ladies.” His voice began to sound piping, and his restless eyes no longer looked squarely at Vance, but confined themselves to side-long glances, as if he were trying to discover what his feelings were toward his cousin and Miss Louise. “They are pretty fair specimens, eh, for the mountains? The ladies, I mean; the ladies.”
Vance answered in the affirmative.
“My cousin is terribly taken with you, Mr. Gilder; if she was not my cousin I would feel jealous of you.” As Vance made no reply, Boast continued: “I know I am going down hill at a pretty rapid rate, all on account of this red liquor.” Tipping up the bottle, he took a swallow, coughed immoderately afterward, and made wry faces, as if he were mentally damning all the “red liquor” to perdition.