“I’ll be glad to! What d’you say to three cents a pound on the hoof?”
Nabours looked at him with astonishment in his eyes.
“Mister, you talk like them cows was sugar or coffee. I never did hear of ary man selling a cow that way. No man can tell how much a cow weighs by looking at him, and I never did see one weighed. Of course, I could make a scales by swinging a pole and putting a few men at the other end of it to balance up a cow—you can guess how much a man weighs pretty clost. But all that’d take too much time. No, a cow is a cow where I come from, whether he’s big or little.”
“Well, what d’you say to eleven dollars a head?”
“I don’t say nothing. These here cows is family pets, and we don’t like fer to part with them. But like enough this is the only herd that ever will come up from Texas, anyhow this year.”
“You wouldn’t say twelve dollars?”
“Straight count, a cow for a cow, as she tallies out?”
“Well, I’d sorter like to see the herd first.”
“It ain’t no trade,” said Nabours calmly. “If I’d sell them family favorites of ours the owner of Del Sol would feel sore—she shore would.”
“You say ’she’ would. Are you working for a widow?”