“Good enough.”
The apparent peddler smoked, quite at his ease among the ferns, and seemed resolved that the boy should break the silence next.
“Are you banking on this business, dad?” said the latter, finally.
“Ah—why, no, Jack, not really. It's a sort of notion, I admit.” He lifted one knee lazily over the other. “I'm not shoving you, Jack. State the case.” A long silence followed, to which the conversation of the two seemed well accustomed.
“I never knew anything like that down there,” nodding in the direction of Salem. “Those people.—It's different.”
“That's so,” assented the apparent peddler, critically. “I reckon it is. We make a point not to be low. Polish is our strong point, Jack. But we're not in society. We are not, in a way, on speaking terms with society.”
“It ain't that.”
“Isn't,” corrected the other, gently. “Isn't, Jack. But I rather think it is.”
“Well,” said Jack, “it's different, and”—with gloomy decision—“it's better.”
The apparent peddler whistled no more, but lay back among the ferns and gazed up at the drooping leaves overhead. The gray horse whisked at the wood-gnats and looked around now and again inquiringly. The yellow dog cocked his head on one side as if he had an opinion worth listening to if it were only called for.