"One hundred and fifty pounds?" snorted the tanner, secretly overjoyed; "the Senhor is joking. He means three hundred; and even then I should be as good as making him a present of the place." Antonio, who had learned in Oporto and in London to read the faces of men cleverer than the tanner, saw that, even if he cut his offer down to a hundred and twenty-five, he could still be sure of the farm. But he knew that a hundred and fifty was the fair price: and, although he had denied himself a penn'orth of cheese at breakfast, he was not going to make twenty-five pounds out of a widow's extremity. "Your Worship's presents are not wanted," he retorted stiffly, taking up his hat. "I said a hundred and fifty. I meant it. I don't haggle. Good day." The tanner spluttered out a long speech, and finally dragged Antonio upstairs into a stuffy little room where his wife's mother was lying in bed with a black rosary in her thin white hand. He appealed to Antonio, in the name of the commonest decency and humanity, to avoid future prickings of conscience by giving the ridiculous price of two hundred pounds for the best farm in all Portugal, thus defrauding a dying widow of a round hundred only. "You may take it or leave it," said Antonio. "One hundred and fifty pounds, not a vintem more, not a vintem less. Stay. The winter is coming, and the Senhora's blood needs warming. I come from a wine-lodge in Oporto. I have taken wines to England for the King himself. See. Over and above the price, I will send the Senhora ten pounds' worth of old port-wine, and God grant it may do her good." The aged sufferer looked up at the monk in thankful astonishment. She had been a personage in her time: but deference and kindness had lately become so unfamiliar that she had expected to die without encountering them again. Clutching her beads, she mumbled at Antonio some words of gratitude and benediction. The tanner was first greatly chagrined and afterwards a little ashamed: and, at the foot of the stairs, he agreed to his visitor's terms. It was arranged that Antonio should return at noon with a notary to complete the purchase. The cura of Navares, to whom the monk had recourse, named a trustworthy man of law: and by four o'clock the money had passed from Antonio's belt to the tanner's cash-box, the necessary documents had been signed, sealed, and delivered, and the new owner was tramping back to the farm with the keys in his pocket.