"That's about it!" he answered.
"Well, ye do look a bit of a shivery-shake,—a kind o' not-long-for-this-world," said the man. "Howsomiver, we'se be all 'elpless an' 'omeless soon, for the Lord hisself don't stop a man growin' old, an' under the new ways o' the world, it's a reg'lar crime to run past forty. I'm sixty, an' I gits my livin' my own way, axin' nobody for the kind permission. That's my fortin!"
And he pointed to the basket of weedy stuff which he had just set down. Helmsley looked at it with some curiosity.
"What's in it?" he asked.
"What's in it? What's not in it!" And the man gave a gesture of mingled pride and defiance. "There's all what the doctors makes their guineas out of with their purr-escriptions, for they can't purr-escribe no more than is in that there basket without they goes to minerals. An' minerals is rank poison to ivery 'uman body. But so far as 'erbs an' seeds, an' precious stalks an' flowers is savin' grace for man an' beast, Matthew Peke's got 'em all in there. An' Matthew Peke wouldn't be the man he is, if he didn't know where to find 'em better'n any livin' soul iver born! Ah!—an' there aint a toad in a hole hoppin' out between Quantocks an' Cornwall as hasn't seen Matthew Peke gatherin' the blessin' an' health o' the fields at rise o' sun an' set o' moon, spring, summer, autumn, ay, an' even winter, all the year through!"
Helmsley became interested.
"And you are the man!" he said questioningly—"You are Matthew Peke?"
"I am! An' proud so ter be! An' you—'ave yer got a name for the arskin'?"
"Why, certainly!" And Helmsley's pale face flushed. "My name is David."
"Chrisen name? Surname?"