Besides, until a few days ago I had a vague hope that by working double
tides, I might get another crop in. Somebody might have advanced me a
little on it because the mortgage only claims the house and land."

Courthorne looked at him curiously. "No. We are not alike," he said.
"There's a slow stubborn devil in you, Winston, and I think I'd be
afraid of you if I ever did you an injury. But go on."

"There's very little more. My team ran away down the ravine, and I had
to put one beast out of its misery. I can't do my plowing with one
horse, and that leaves me stranded for the want of the dollars to buy
another with. It's usually a very little thing that turns the scale,
but now the end has come, I don't know that I'm sorry. I've never had
a good time, you see, and the struggle was slowly crushing the life out
of me."

Winston spoke quietly, without bitterness, but Courthorne, who had
never striven at all but stretched out his hand and taken what was
offered, the more willingly when it was banned alike by judicial and
moral law, dimly understood him. He was a fearless man, but he knew
his courage would not have been equal to the strain of that six years'
struggle against loneliness, physical fatigue, and adverse seasons,
during which disaster followed disaster. He looked at the bronzed
farmer as he said, "Still, you would do a little in return for a
hundred dollars that would help you to go on with the fight?"

A faint sparkle crept into Winston's eyes. It was not hope, but rather
the grim anticipation of the man offered a better weapon when standing
with his back to the wall.