"How can a man who doesn't own a thing sell a thing?" she persisted. "Is
it a habit of yours to sell that which you do not own?"

"It is not," Festus Clasby said, feeling that an assault had been
wantonly made on his integrity as a trader. "No one could ever say that
of me. Honest value was ever my motto."

"And the motto of my brother who is sick with the fever. I will go to
him and say, 'I met the most respectable-looking man in all Europe, who
put a value on your can because of the diamond notch.' I will pay into
his hands the one-and-six which is its price."

Festus Clasby had, when taken out of his own peculiar province, a heavy
mind, and the type of mind that will range along side-issues and get
lost in them if they are raised often enough and long enough. The
diamond notch on the handle, the brother who was sick of the fever, the
alleged non-title of Mac-an-Ward, the interposition of the woman, the
cans with the handles which fall out, and the cans with the handles
which do not fall out, the equity of selling that which does not belong
to you--all these things chased each other across Festus Clasby's mind.
The Son of the Bard stood silent by the cart, looking away down the road
with a pensive look on his long, narrow face.

"Pay me the one-and-six to put into the hands of my brother," the woman
said.

Festus Clasby's mind was brought back at once to his pocket. "No," he
said, "but this man can give you my money to pay into the hand of your
brother."