Mary. She was always impulsive, save to me
sometimes. 'I was just wondering where we were going to get any fresh
meat. How kind of your mother! Tell her I'm very much obliged to her
indeed.' And she felt behind her for a poor little purse she had. 'And
now--how much did your mother say it would be?'

The boy blinked at her, and scratched his head.

'How much will it be,' he repeated, puzzled. 'Oh--how much does it weigh
I-s'pose-yer-mean. Well, it ain't been weighed at all--we ain't got no
scales. A butcher does all that sort of think. We just kills it, and
cooks it, and eats it--and goes by guess. What won't keep we salts down
in the cask. I reckon it weighs about a ton by the weight of it if yer
wanter know. Mother thought that if she sent any more it would go bad
before you could scoff it. I can't see----'

'Yes, yes,' said Mary, getting confused. 'But what I want to know is,
how do you manage when you sell it?'

He glared at her, and scratched his head. 'Sell it? Why, we only goes
halves in a steer with some one, or sells steers to the butcher--or
maybe some meat to a party of fencers or surveyors, or tank-sinkers, or
them sorter people----'

'Yes, yes; but what I want to know is, how much am I to send your mother
for this?'

'How much what?'

'Money, of course, you stupid boy,' said Mary. 'You seem a very stupid
boy.'

Then he saw what she was driving at. He began to fling his heels
convulsively against the sides of his horse, jerking his body backward
and forward at the same time, as if to wind up and start some clockwork
machinery inside the horse, that made it go, and seemed to need
repairing or oiling.

'We ain't that sorter people, missus,' he said. 'We don't sell meat
to new people that come to settle here.' Then, jerking his thumb
contemptuously towards the ridges, 'Go over ter Wall's if yer wanter buy
meat; they sell meat ter strangers.' (Wall was the big squatter over the
ridges.)

'Oh!' said Mary, 'I'm SO sorry. Thank your mother for me. She IS kind.'

'Oh, that's nothink. She said to tell yer she'll be up as soon as she
can. She'd have come up yisterday evening--she thought yer'd feel lonely
comin' new to a place like this--but she couldn't git up.'

The machinery inside the old horse showed signs of starting. You
almost heard the wooden joints CREAK as he lurched forward, like an old
propped-up humpy when the rotting props give way; but at the sound of
Mary's voice he settled back on his