"I suppose you will sell me what I need. I have money."
"Money's of no use to me here," said Jim grimly.
"Then I won't trouble you," said Ralph quickly.
Jim showed a certain compunction. "It ain't a question of money when you're short of necessities yourself," he explained.
"Then the sooner you are quit of me the better," said Ralph.
"You could stay here a while and work out your keep," said Jim craftily.
Ralph merely shook his head. They were silent, Jim meanwhile transparently debating with himself how to open the subject again.
"Look here!" he said testily. "I can't talk to you while you're swinging the axe. Are you in such a rush you can't stop for five minutes?"
Ralph put down his axe with none too good a grace, and sat down on another stone beside the creek's bed. His face showed a sullenness that promised badly for the results of their talk. Ralph had conceived a great liking for the bluff and simple Jim, but the situation was hopeless, and since he could not mend it, he saw nothing but to brazen it out. To protest his regrets he felt would be insincere, if not positively insulting to the Scotchman.
Jim was humbling himself for Kitty's sake. He knew that the situation was too much for him, but he was obliged to try to mend it because there was no one else to help her.