“Why not? Isn’t she worth that much?”
“What did your father pay for her?”
The girl named the sum a trifle anxiously. “It’s a great deal, I know—”
“It’s about a third what she’s worth,” announced Burleson. “If I were you, I’d add seventy-five per cent., and hold out like—like a demon for it.”
“But I cannot ask more than we paid—”
“Why not?”
“I—don’t know. Is it honorable?”
They looked at each other for a moment, then he began to laugh. To her surprise, she felt neither resentment nor chagrin, although he was plainly laughing at her. So presently she laughed, too, a trifle uncertainly, shy eyes avoiding his, yet always returning curiously. She did not know just why; she was scarcely aware that she took pleasure in this lean-faced young horseman’s company.
“I have always believed,” she began, “that to sell anything for more than its value was something as horrid as—as usury.”
“Such a transaction resembles usury as closely as it does the theory of Pythagoras,” he explained; and presently their laughter aroused the workmen, who looked up, leaning on spade and pick.