A big, hearty-looking young man entered. He wore clothes of a sporting cut and carried a hunting-crop, with the long lash gathered in his fingers.
“Oah, it’s you, is it, Mr. Pickerin’?” said Bolland, and Martin’s quick ears caught a note of restraint, almost of hostility, in the question.
“Yes, Mr. Bolland, an’ how are ye?” was the more friendly greeting. “I just dropped in to have a settlement about that beast.”
“A sattlement! What soart o’ sattlement?”
The visitor sat down, uninvited, and produced some papers from his pocket.
“Well, Mr. Bolland,” he said quietly, “it’s not more’n four months since I gave you sixty pounds for a thoroughbred shorthorn, supposed to be in calf to Bainesse Boy the Third.”
“Right enough, Mr. Pickerin’. You’ve gotten t’ certificates and t’ receipt for t’ stud fee.”
Martin detected the latent animosity in both voices. The reiterated use of the prefix “Mr.” was an exaggerated politeness that boded a dispute.
“Receipts, certificates!” cried Pickering testily. “What good are they to me? She cannot carry a calf. For all the use I can make of her, I might as well have thrown the money in the fire.”
“Eh, but she’s a well-bred ’un,” said Bolland, with sapient head-shake.