Hiram lifted his head. "Oh, ay? Well, we shall noan keep ye long—say till six o' th' afternooin," he answered, and resumed his contemplation of the pool.
"Six of the afternoon? 'Tis easy to be seen, sirrah, that thou hast a taste for jesting," said Red Ratcliffe.
"We've scant time for jests, Maister, an' I'm telling ye plain truth. Ay, we'll be done by six o' th' clock, for sure—or mebbe a two-three minutes afore, if these feckless shepherds 'ull bestir theirselns. Jose, what dost tha think?"
"Think?" echoed Jose, rubbing hard and fast at the fleece of an old bell-wether. "Well, mebbe we shall win through by half-after five—but there's niver no telling."
Red Ratcliffe curbed his temper; for he had known many moor folk in his time, and this trick of "shamming gaumless" was no new one to him. He changed his key accordingly, seeing that his own rough banter would stand no chance against Hiram's subtler wit.
"Clear the pens of yond murrain-rotted ewes; we've some whole-bodied sheep to wash," he said peremptorily.
"Clear th' pens?" said Hiram, scratching his head. "Well, we're framing to clear 'em, fast as iver we can. An' as for th' ewes—there's been no murrain among Wayne sheep these five year past."
"Cease fooling, thou lousy dotard! Dost think we've come all the way from Wildwater only to go back again because we find a handful of yokels, belonging to God-know-whom, fouling the water of the pond?"
"Honest muck fouls no pools, an' I thowt onybody wod hev knawn we belonged to Wayne o' Marsh. Ay, for ye allowed as mich a while back—seeing, I warrant, what well-set-up chaps we war."
"Begow, that's th' first we've heard on 't fro' owd Hiram," muttered Jose the shepherd, chuckling soberly as he dipped another ewe.