The wreck of her
hopes and glad imaginings left her sick, bewildered, in the face
of "the thing that couldn't."
Nor had the effect of this transformation in "Young Ed" been any
less painful to his father. For a time the old man refused to
credit it, but finally, when the truth was borne in upon him
unmistakably, and he saw that Las Palmas was in a fair way to
being ruined through the boy's mismanagement, the old cattleman
had risen in his wrath. The ranch had been his pride as Ed had
been his joy; to see them both go wrong was more than he could
bear. There had been a terrible scene, and a tongue-lashing
delivered in the language of early border days. There had followed
other visits from Austin, senior, other and even bitterer
quarrels; at last, when the girl-wife remained firm in her refusal
to divorce her husband, the understanding had been reached by
which the management of Las Palmas was placed absolutely in her
hands.
Of course, the truth became public, as it always does. This was a
new country--only yesterday it had been the frontier, and even yet
a frontier code of personal conduct to some extent prevailed.
Nevertheless, "Young Ed" Austin's life became a scorn and a
hissing among his neighbors.
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