‘Just about done, and that’s the truth,’ made answer Mr. Levison slowly, and with consideration. ‘I’m on my way to Mingadee, a place of mine down the river, about a hundred miles from here. I shall have to walk and carry my swag, for the horses, poor things, are as weak as cats. If I hadn’t come through the back country, where I knew a few spots where there’s feed in all seasons, such as it is, they’d have knocked up before now.’
‘Walking is becoming quite fashionable,’ said Ernest; ‘people are coming round fast to my way of thinking, that we were intended to use our legs in some other way than lolling upon a horse all day. I saw a police trooper trudging past to the Quarter Sessions at Warren last week, with a good part of a hide (evidence in a cattle-stealing case) on his back. The mail had stopped running. He told Jack one of his horses was dead, and he was as able to carry the other as the poor brute was to carry him. But you won’t have to walk this time, if you’ll stay with me to-night. We have a horse or two left, and I can give you one that steps as fast nearly as the roan you were good enough to lend me near Nubba.’
‘All right,’ said Mr. Levison. ‘I’d not be particular about it; only I’m a little pushed for time. I have to meet a man about a largish lot of stores that we’re dealing over.’
‘Buying store cattle in the teeth of a season like this!’ exclaimed Ernest in astonishment. ‘Why, it’s a hard matter to keep alive one’s own, I should think.’
‘Look here!’ said the man of original mould, commencing on the lunch which had been provided for him calmly but with decision, as if the back country that he mentioned had been better provisioned for the quadrupedal than the human part of his equipment. ‘It’s always been a way of mine to act different from other folks in the way of buying and selling stock. I can recollect the markets for many years back. I’ve seen sheep at all prices from a shilling to a guinea, and cattle in proportion. My rule is—I don’t mind telling you, for you’ll never do much in the dealing line—my rule is, to buy when every one wants to sell, to sell when every one tries to hold on; and it’s paid me, so far. That’s good damper of yours; your cook kneads it up well, that’s half the battle.’
‘He’s not a bad fellow in his way,’ asserted Ernest; ‘but he will soon have very little flour to knead. Drays can’t travel, and we shall have only South American fare directly, beef and water. Certainly we have plenty of pumpkins, that’s the advantage of a garden.’
‘Couldn’t have a better thing. Lived on them for a year, in ’38,’ said Mr. Levison approvingly. ‘That was something like a drought. If we ever get one like it again it will cook half the stock in the country. We’re that crowded up now that there’s no get-away, as there was then, to the mountains.’
‘Then you don’t think this season is as bad as can be?’ inquired Ernest. ‘It seems very terrible to me.’
‘It ain’t as bad as that time unless you’ve lost half your cattle and don’t see no way to save the rest,’ affirmed his guest with mild decision, as if stating some rather agreeable proposition.
‘Whatever shall we do?’ groaned Ernest. ‘I’m half ruined as it is.’