"Wal, then, ez to carpenters," Bert switched, seeing that I could not be budged; "thar's good carpenters, an' bad carpenters, an' Hard Cider Howard. Hard Cider's fergotten more abeout carpent'rin' then most o' the rest ever knoo, and he ain't fergot much, neither. But he ain't handsome, and he looks upon the apple juice when it's yaller. Maybe yer don't mind looks, an' I kin keep Hard Cider sober while he's on your job. He'll treat yer fair, an' see thet the plumbers do, an' fix all them rotten sills ez good ez noo." "What's that?" said I. "Rotten sills?" "Sure," Bert answered. "Mean to tell me yer didn't know thet? Yer can't pack all yer sills with leaves fer a hundred years, an' not take 'em away summers half the time, an' _not_ rot yer sills. I'd say, treat 'em with cement like they do trees neow." I began to have visions of my remaining $24,000 melting away in sills. "I suppose the barn is rotten, too?" said I, faintly, as an interrogation. We were then passing the barn. Bert stepped in--the door wasn't locked--lit a lantern, came out with it, and led me around to one side. He held the lantern against one of the timbers which formed the foundation frame. It was a foot in diameter, and made of hand-hewn oak! Though it had never been guilty of paint, it looked as solid as a rock. "Barn needs some patchin' and floorin' and a few shingles," said Bert, "but it ain't doo to fall deown jest yit!" He put the lantern back, and we walked on, turned the corner at my brook, and followed the other road along past my pines till we came to a small settlement of white cottages. At one of these Bert knocked. We were admitted by a pretty, blue-eyed Irish girl, who had a copy of Cæsar's Commentaries in her hand, into a tiny parlour where an "airtight" stove stood below a coloured chromo of the Virgin and Child, and a middle-aged Irishman sat in his shirt sleeves, smoking a pipe. "Hello, Mike," said Bert, "this is Mr. John Upton, who's bought Milt Noble's place, an' wants a farmer _and_ gardener. I told him you wuz the man." "Sit down, sor, sit down," said Mike, offering a chair with an expansive and hospitable gesture. "Sure, let's talk it over." The pretty daughter had gone back to her Cæsar by the nickel oil lamp, but she had one ear toward us, and I caught a corner of her eye, too--an extremely attractive, not to say provocative, eye. "Well, now," Mike was saying, "sure I can run a farm, but what do I be gettin' for it?" "Fifty a month," said I, "which includes milking the cows and tending furnace in winter." "Sure, I got more than that on me last place and no cows at all." "Ye're a liar, Mike," said Bert. "That's a fightin' word in the ould country," said Mike. "This ain't the old country, and yer got $45," Bert grinned. "Besides, yer'll be close to yer work. You wuz a mile an' a half frum the Sulloways. Thet makes up fer the milkin'."