To do her justice, Sarella was civil to the battered old fellow, but he didn't want her civility, and was ungrateful for it. Yet her civility was to prove useful. Jack lived in a shed at the end of the stables, where he ate and slept, and mended his clothes sitting up in bed, and wearing (then only) a large pair of spectacles, though half a pair would have been enough. He cooked his own food, though Mariquita would have cooked it for him if he would have let her. Sarella loved good eating, and on her coming it irritated her to see so much excellent food "made so little of." Presently she gave specimens of her own superior science, and Don Joaquin approved, as did the cowboys. "Jack," she said to him one day, "do you ever eat anything but stew from year's end to year's end?" "I eats bread, too, and likewise corn porridge," Jack replied coldly. "I could tell you how to make more of your meat--I should think you'd sicken of stew everlastingly." "There's worse than stew," he suggested. "_I_ don't know what's worse, then," the young lady retorted, wrinkling her very pretty nose. "None. That's worse," said Jack, triumphantly. "It seems to me," Sarella observed thoughtfully, "as if you're growing a bit oldish to do for yourself, and have no one to do anything for you. An elderly man wants a woman to keep him comfortable." Jack snorted, but Sarella, undefeated, proceeded to put the case of his being ill. Who would nurse him? "Ill! I've too much to do for sech idleness. The Boss'd stare if I laid out to get ill." "Illness," Sarella remarked piously, "comes from Above, and may come any day. Haven't you anyone belonging to you, Jack? No sister, no niece; you never were married, I suppose, so I don't mention a daughter." "I _was_ married, though," Jack explained, much delighted, "and had a daughter, too." "You quite surprise me!" cried Sarella, "quite!" "She didn't marry me for my looks, my wife didn't," chuckled Jack. "Nor yet for my money." "Out of esteem?" suggested Sarella. "Can't say, I'm sure. I never heerd her mention it. Anyway, it didn't last--" "The esteem?" "No. The firm. She died--when Ginger was born. Since which I have remained a bachelord." "By Ginger you mean your daughter?" "That's what they called her. Her aunt took her, and _she_ took the smallpox. But she didn't die of it. She's alive now." "Married, I daresay?" "No. Single. She's as like me as you're not," Jack explained summarily. Sarella laughed. "A good girl, though, I'll be bound," she hinted amiably. "She's never mentioned the contrary--in her letters." "Oh, she writes! I'm glad she writes." "Thank you, Miss Sarella. She writes most Christmasses. And she wrote lately, tho' it's not Christmas." "Not ill, I hope?" "Ill! She's an industrious girl with plenty o' sense ... but her aunt's dead, and she thinks o' taking a place in a boarding-house." "Jack," said Sarella, after a brief but pregnant pause of consideration, "bring her up here."