"It's a lie, Jem Bowers, and you know it! He ain't old. He ain't more'n six year old, and he just looks that way—spare and done, 'cause we never had enough feed for our stock. Dad listened to you-all, and staked his land on this rocky part, while you got the fat places. That bull ain't old, and don't you dare say he is. I guess I ought to know, 'cause I raised him myself from a calf."
A silence greeted this outburst from the girl. Eyes shifted, tongues were stuck into cheeks. Compunction not unmixed with admiration showed on the faces of the farmers, aware possibly for the first time of the existence of Nettie, who until then had shrunk into the background. Bull Langdon, arms akimbo, had moved from his position by the fence, and for the first time his appraising eye fell fully upon Nettie. He looked the girl over slowly from head to foot, and as his bold gaze swept her his eyes slightly bulged and he licked his lips.
Her outburst, probably the first in all her gentle life, had left her flushed and breathless, and as her anger subsided, she shrank before the united gaze of that crowd of rough men gathered to buy up their poor possessions. She drew back into the shadow of the house and the sale went on.
Soon it was over. Auctioneer and buyers tramped across the muddy barnyard to the house, to make their reckoning there. As they came to the step Nettie met them, her hands spasmodically clasped.
"Is—everything—sold?" she asked the auctioneer quaveringly.
"Every last thing upon the place gone under the hammer. Did pretty well, I'll say. Not too bad prices."
"Then there'll be something for my brothers and sisters?"
"Not on your life they won't. Scarcely enough to satisfy the mortgage and pay up the debts. You ask Mr. Langdon there. He holds the mortgage, and he's bought in most o' the truck hisself."
Nettie turned her head slowly and looked in the face of Bull Langdon. Then her head dropped. The Bull had stepped forward. One big, thick forefinger went up to the auctioneer, as it had risen when he had bought head by head the stock and cattle.
"How about the gell? My wife needs a good strong gell for the housework, and I'm willin' to take her along with her dad's old truck."