"It's hard to tell you how I managed it. When I saw the shaft had me by the coat, I didn't try too long to pull away, Or fumble for my knife to cut away, I just embraced the shaft and rode it out—- Till Weiss shut off the water in the wheel-pit. That's how I think I didn't lose my head, But my legs got their knocks against the ceiling." "Awful. Why didn't they throw off the belt Instead of going clear down in the wheel-pit?" "They say sometime was wasted on the belt—- Old streak of leather—doesn't love me much Because I made him spit fire at my knuckles, The way Ben Franklin used to make the kite-string. That must be it. Some days he won't stay on. That day a woman couldn't coax him off. He's on his rounds now with his tail in his mouth Snatched right and left across the silver pulleys. Everything goes the same without me there. You can hear the small buzz saws whine, the big saw Caterwaul to the hills around the village As they both bite the wood. It's all our music. One ought as a good villager to like it. No doubt it has a sort of prosperous sound, And it's our life." "Yes, when it's not our death." "You make that sound as if it wasn't so With everything. What we live by we die by. I wonder where my lawyer is. His train's in. I want this over with; I'm hot and tired." "You're getting ready to do something foolish." "Watch for him, will you, Will? You let him in. I'd rather Mrs. Corbin didn't know; I've boarded here so long, she thinks she owns me. You're bad enough to manage without her." "And I'm going to be worse instead of better. You've got to tell me how far this is gone: Have you agreed to any price?" "Five hundred. Five hundred—-five—-five! One, two, three, four, five. You needn't look at me." "I don't believe you." "I told you, Willis, when you first came in. Don't you be hard on me. I have to take What I can get. You see they have the feet, Which gives them the advantage in the trade. I can't get back the feet in any case." "But your flowers, man, you're selling out your flowers." "Yes, that's one way to put it—-all the flowers Of every kind everywhere in this region For the next forty summers—-call it forty. But I'm not selling those, I'm giving them, They never earned me so much as one cent: Money can't pay me for the loss of them. No, the five hundred was the sum they named To pay the doctor's bill and tide me over. It's that or fight, and I don't want to fight—- I just want to get settled in my life, Such as it's going to be, and know the worst, Or best—-it may not be so bad. The firm Promise me all the shooks I want to nail." "But what about your flora of the valley?"