'Because I calc'late you've been raised in them mean opinions, an' to think yerself not as good flesh an' blood as the aristocrats that keep you in bondage.'
'Come now,' interrupted Sam Holt, 'you shut up, Mr. Bunting. It's no bondage to eat one's dinner afterwards; and he'll be twice as comfortable.'
'That's thrue,' said Andy; 'I never yet could ate my bit in presence of the quality; so that's one right I'd forgive; and as for me—the likes of me—bein' as good blood as the Masther Wynns of Dunore, I'd as soon think the Yankee was himself.'
With sovereign contempt, Andy turned his back on Mr. Bunting, and proceeded to cook his dinner.
'Wal, it's the first time I see a feller's dander riz for tellin' him he's as good as another,' remarked Zack, sauntering in the wake of the others towards the unfinished shanty. 'I reckon it's almost time for me to make tracks to hum; the ole woman will be lookin' out. But I say, stranger, what are you going to do with that heaver meadow below on the creek? It's a choice slice of pasture that.'
'Cut the grass in summer,' replied Sam Holt, tolerably sure of what was coming.
'I've as fine a red heifer,' said the Yankee confidentially, 'as ever was milked, and I'd let you have it, being a new-comer, and not up to the ways of the country, very cheap.' His little black eyes twinkled. 'I'd like to drive a trade with you, I would; for she's a rael prime article.'
'Thank you,' said Mr. Holt, 'but we don't contemplate dairy farming as yet.' Zack could not be rebuffed under half-a-dozen refusals. 'Wal, if you won't trade, you'll be wantin' fixins from the store, an' I have most everythin' in stock. Some of my lads will be along to see you to-morrow, I reckon, and any whisky or tobacco you wanted they could bring; and if you chose to run a bill'—
Refused also, with thanks, as the magazines say to rejected contributions. This, then, was the purport of Mr. Bunting's visit: to gratify curiosity; to drive a trade; to estimate the new settlers' worldly wealth, in order to trust or not, as seemed prudent. While at dinner he had taken a mental inventory and valuation of the boxes and bales about, submitting them to a closer examination where possible. At the time Robert thought it simply an indulgence of inordinate curiosity, but the deeper motive of self-interest lay behind.
'In their own phrase, that fellow can see daylight,' remarked Mr. Holt, as Zack's lean figure disappeared among the trees. 'I never saw little eyes, set in a parenthesis of yellow crowsfeet at the corners, that did not betoken cunning.'