was back, an' went out as
mad as the very devil about some'n or other. Jim an' me set down back at
the desk an' watched Alf figure up. He looked tickled, and after a while
he said:

"'Jim, I'm glad I got back. I know now that Texas ain't no place for my
talent. It's overrun with sharp-witted Jews an' keen Yankees that know
values down to a gnat's heel. But here in these mountains these yokels
git scared clean out o' the'r senses when a dollar has to change hands.
Do you know,' says he, 'that I'm out less'n two hundred this mornin',
an' at a low estimate I have got a thousand dollars' wuth o' truck?'

"'I don't know, Alf,' Jim said. 'I'm with yore judgment, as a general
thing, but not on this deal. I was lookin' at them hosses t'other day in
the court-house yard, an' the Chester brass-band come along. Now, a
average hoss,' Jim said, 'will either git scared or break an' run at a
sound like that, but three o' them things you got this mornin' struck up
a regular jig an' capered about the lot kickin' up the'r heels as if
they was in a ring jumpin' over red strips o' cloth.'

"Well, folks," old Wrinkle continued, "you kin always tell a born trader
by his not bein' in a hurry to unload, an' Alf is that way. While we all
was settin' thar Pete Hepworth come in at the front, an' while he was on
his way to us Alf said: 'You fellers hold yore tongues. That feller is
itchin' fer a deal; I had my eye on 'im at the sale.'

"Pete leaned agin the platform-scales an' talked about the weather an'
crops, an' then he said, kinder offhand, to Alf: 'I had a sort o' idea
o' biddin' on that pile o' old planks, but when the sheriff lumped 'em
in with that fine tent it let me out. I want to build me a cowhouse an'
wagon-shed.'

"'I didn't care for the _tent_,' Alf said, an' he filled his pipe from a
china bowl on the desk an' made Pomp fetch 'im a match. 'It was them
planks I was after, an' I was bound to have 'em. They are smooth,
ready-dressed, long-leaf, heart-pine boards, one an' a quarter by ten,
with the ends sawed square an' seasoned by folks settin' on 'em under
cover for three or four years--never had a nail driv' in 'em, nuther.'

"'Well, I never thought they was as good as all that,' Pete said, 'but
what are you holdin' 'em at?'

"'I hain't thought much about it,' Alf said. 'I hain't much of a hand to
jump at a trade. It railly does my eyes good to look at lumber like that
these days when the best timber you kin git is full o'