"I'll let you have her for twenty-five dollars boot. Bejasus, that's givin' her away. But what kin a man do when his pocket's flat? A baby kin have the best of him."
For about the twentieth time Uncle Sam looked into the horse's mouth and assured himself again that she was in very truth only five years old. Then he carefully ran his practised hand down each of her legs, feeling for bumps and finding none. Then he meditatively scratched his head.
"Waal, I tell yuh, stranger," he said, after a long period of deliberation. "I hain't got a passell of use fer the mare; but I'll give yuh five dollars boot. That's the best I kin do."
After a great deal of further parley, they compromised on ten dollars boot. Uncle Sam took two five dollar bills out of his well worn billfold and handed them to the trader, put his own saddle and bridle on the cream colored mare, wished the young man the best of luck, and the trade was made.
By this time it was getting on toward noon, and they went to the place where they had left the horse and cart to eat their lunch. Joe and Uncle Sam accompanied them, unfolding the lunches that they had brought in their coat pockets; and the four made a festive picnic meal together, supplementing what they had brought from home with peppermint drops and ginger snaps contributed by Uncle Sam, who was always a free spender on holiday occasions.
As they were eating, Uncle Sam entertained the little company with the tale of how he had that morning started out from home with a pocket knife and by a series of successful trades ended by possessing a fine new Colt automatic. He drew the revolver out of his pocket and caressed its smooth surfaces with his finger tips, a satisfied smile spreading over his foxy, fun-loving, and kindly face.
"The knife wa'n't a heap o' good," he said in his deliberate drawl. "So I up an' swapped it fer a dawg. I knowed I'd sholy have trouble gittin' the dawg back home, me bein' on hossback; so I traded him fer a watch. I had a purty good notion the watch wa'n't no timekeeper; so I traded it to Tom Pooler fer hisn that I knowed was a good un. Then I traded the watch fer a shot gun. It was a good shot gun; but I got two shot guns home; so I looked raound till I faound this here trade. She's a beauty an' she's jes the same as new."
He fondled the blue metal of the little death dealer with loving fingers.
"An' that's a rare beauty of a little animal I got yonder," he went on, nodding sidewise toward the cream colored mare. "When she gits shoes on her feet, she'll be fine as a fiddle. All in all, I'm praoud of to-day's tradin'. Some folks, 'specially wimmin, thinks a trader lives a idle life. But I tell yuh, tradin' hain't sech child's play. It takes hard work an' stickin' at it—an' it takes injinooity."
Uncle Sam's eyes turned meditatively inward and reposed upon himself, apparently not ill pleased with what they saw there.