"Two loads!" snorted Uncle Ezra. "Why, Sam Whitmarsh, there's a good seven ton o' hay there if there's a paound. It's packed close as it kin be packed."
Uncle Sam kicked into the hay and succeeded in finding near a crack in the wall a small mildewed spot.
"It's spiled, Ezry, same's I said it was," he shouted triumphantly. "Look ye here! All along these cracks the rain's beat in an' spiled it. An' there's no tellin' haow far that there mildew goes. Spiled alfalfy hain't no good fer nuthin'."
"Now, Sam, there ain't no use in your a-talkin' on like that," said Uncle Ezra in the tone of one who deals with facts. "You know well nuf there hain't but a handful of it in that corner that's been teched by rain."
"An' see here," went on Sam, "this hay must o' laid two or three days afore you raked it. Why, half the leaves is off. An' I bet it had a rain onto it, too, while it laid on the graound. Look what a dark color it is. Good alfalfy hain't that color."
"It didn't lay ner it didn't see no rain," exclaimed Uncle Ezra, his voice harsh with indignation. "You know yerse'f, Sam, I cut an' hauled that hay latter part of las' July; an' there didn't a drop o' rain fall after the ninth. The alfalfy's a good color if ye see it in the light."
"Looks to me like it's a bit woody," mused Uncle Sam, rubbing a scrap between his thumb and forefinger. "An' here's seed on some of it. You was a bit late a-cuttin' this hay, Ezry."
"Naow, Sam Whitmarsh, you know well's I do, I cut this here hay in the bloom." Uncle Ezra's hands were beginning to tremble with exasperation. "Why, I 'member you come by one Friday when we was a-cuttin' an' you said what fine alfalfy that was."
"Haow do I know this is the same alfalfy, Ezry?" queried Uncle Sam, darting a swift look from his keen blue eyes. "Don't look to me like it is. An' I see jes lots o' weeds through it, too. Part of it hain't good fer nuthin but beddin'. Well, Ezry," with the tone of one coming at last to the crucial point, "what're you a-askin' for it?"
There was a long, ruminating pause. The subject of price could not be approached without deliberation befitting its importance.
"Waal," hesitated Uncle Ezra at last, "you've said every dirty thing you kin think of to say about the hay. But the hay's good hay jes the same; an' you know it well's I do. An' if I had a place to put it I wouldn't sell you nary pound of it fer no money. But bein' as haow I gotta have the room in the barn, I'll take forty-five dollars, an' you do the haulin'. An' that's dern cheap hay I'm a-offerin' you."