His shoulders went up in a comprehensive shrug.
“Huh! That's easy. The old geezer's like his orchard—covered with moss. It's plain as the nose on your face, after San Leandro, that he don't know the first thing. An' them horses. It'd be a charity to him, an' a savin' of money for him, to take 'em out an' shoot 'em both. You bet you don't see the Porchugeeze with horses like them. An' it ain't a case of bein' proud, or puttin' on side, to have good horses. It's brass tacks an' business. It pays. That's the game. Old horses eat more 'n young ones to keep in condition an' they can't do the same amount of work. But you bet it costs just as much to shoe them. An' his is scrub on top of it. Every minute he has them horses he's losin' money. You oughta see the way they work an' figure horses in the city.”
They slept soundly, and, after an early breakfast, prepared to start.
“I'd like to give you a couple of days' work,” the old man regretted, at parting, “but I can't see it. The ranch just about keeps me and the old woman, now that the children are gone. An' then it don't always. Seems times have been bad for a long spell now. Ain't never been the same since Grover Cleveland.”
Early in the afternoon, on the outskirts of San Jose, Saxon called a halt.
“I'm going right in there and talk,” she declared, “unless they set the dogs on me. That's the prettiest place yet, isn't it?”
Billy, who was always visioning hills and spacious ranges for his horses, mumbled unenthusiastic assent.
“And the vegetables! Look at them! And the flowers growing along the borders! That beats tomato plants in wrapping paper.”
“Don't see the sense of it,” Billy objected. “Where's the money come in from flowers that take up the ground that good vegetables might be growin' on?”
“And that's what I'm going to find out.” She pointed to a woman, stooped to the ground and working with a trowel; in front of the tiny bungalow. “I don't know what she's like, but at the worst she can only be mean. See! She's looking at us now. Drop your load alongside of mine, and come on in.”