You cannot like that character without also liking another, Rooster Cogburn. If you will remember who Rooster served with Steve, and remember that he was ready to fight at the mention of the good Colonel's honor being sullied-especially the assertion that they had harmed innocents. He called it, "a damn lie". He also went as far as to josh a member of Kirby Smith's merry men as to what side he fought on-the assertion being that some of those farther south had seen so much less action than the Missourians that they were hardly in the war. "True Grit" was a great novel on many accounts, one of the most outstanding being its historical accuracy.
