“I never heard him say he expected to make anything,” said she, “but I read in one of them fruit-growin’ papers he takes that they make as much as three hundred dollars an acre from ’em back in Ellinoi.”
Sol got up, slowly; took a backward step into the yard; filled his lungs, opened his mouth, made his eyes round. Under the internal pressure his whiskers stood on end and his face grew red. “Oh, you git out!” said he.
“I can show it to you in the paper,” she offered, making as if to put aside her sewing.
Sol laid a finger on his palm and stood with his head bent. After a bit he looked up, his eyes still round.
“If he even makes a hundred, that’ll be two thousand dollars a year!”
It was such a magnificent sum that Sol did not feel like taking the familiarity with it of mentioning it aloud. He whispered it, giving it large, rich sound.
“Why, I reckon it would be,” said she, offhand and careless, just as if two thousand a year, more or less, mattered very little to Joe. 365
“That’s more than I ever made in my whole dad-blame life,” said Sol.
“Well, whose fault is it, Sol?” asked she.
“I don’t believe it can be done!”