I pointed to the basket.
"Coal costs about eleven dollars a ton, down here."
When she found out that this was all that caused my remark, she didn't seem to be disturbed.
"Billy," she said, "before we touch the ginger jar it will have to cost twenty dollars a ton. We'll live on pea soup and rice three times a day before I touch that."
"All right," I said, "but it does seem a pity that the burden of such prices as these should fall on the poor."
"Why do they?" she asked.
"Because in this case," I said, "the dealers seem to have us where the wool is short."
"How have they?" she insisted.
"We can't buy coal by the ton because we haven't any place to put it." She thought a moment and then she said:
"We could take care of a fifth of a ton, Billy. That's only five baskets."