It was indeed a delicate matter for me to mention pecuniary compensation. Perhaps if I had been alone I would have ignored that point altogether, but Marion's significant glances I could not ignore, so, though it sounded positively brutal in the face of his disinterested appreciation of our worth, I asked him the rent. He made a gesture implying utter indifference. The fact was that, though most of the people in the neighborhood were grasping and mean-minded, he was a man who was built straight-up-and-down-and-square-all-round, and what he considered above everything was that he would have congenial neighbors. The farm was worth--well, he wouldn't say what it was worth, but I might have it at three hundred dollars a year. There were fifty acres of land that would grow enough produce to pay the rent of the whole place and something over, and as I would need a good many implements he would sell me his for a fraction of their cost, and if I wanted a good team of horses and a few cows all I had to do was to make my choice among his. I had been fascinated by the frankly ingenuous assurance of his manner; in fact, I was mentally exulting in my good fortune in finding such a generous landlord, when the sound of Marion's voice aroused me. "Fifty acres, Mr. Waydean!" she exclaimed. "That would never do. My husband is quite opposed to the idea of trying to make money by farming, and----" "Oh, quite," I interjected, shaking my head with emphasis. "We want to live in the country," she continued, "but we can't afford to actually farm." "Between ourselves, Mr. Waydean," I hastened to say, "I've seen so much of city people fooling away money in farming that I've made up my mind not to work any more land than I can attend to with a spade, a rake and a hoe." He stared at us in turn, incredulity giving place to gloom as he realized that I was serious; then he turned to Marion in a burst of candor. "I tell you what, ma'am," he said, with warm approval, "I ain't met many men with so much downright common-sense as your husband. I'll own that I'm a bit sorry that he don't want to work the farm, for I'm getting old and I'd like a rest, but the truth is that running a farm costs a lot of money, and farmers come out at the wrong end of the horn most years. However, you've took a fancy to the place and I've took a shine to you, so I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll work the farming land myself, and you can take the house and grounds for four hundred a year." Peter stood in the attitude of an auctioneer who is forced to throw away a desirable no-reserve lot on the first bid; surely, then, my ears had deceived me into thinking that this was a larger sum than he had asked for the whole farm. Marion was the first to speak. "I don't quite see," she began dubiously, "isn't that _more_?"