I asked Joe, “Mend the privy door –  it only needs a latch.
The hinge is fine, the boards are tight, it’s just the sneck won’t catch.”

He nodded, and he set to work, humming a formless tune,
striped by sun and shadowy trees in a summer afternoon.

I brewed some tea, and he'd finished the job before I'd poured it out;
so I asked how much I owed him; so quick would be cheap, no doubt.

“Fifteen shilling and sixpence, ma’am,” he told me with delight.
I sat down hard on the wooden seat and clutched my purse in fright.

“Fifteen shilling and sixpence, Joe! When a new latch is only three?
Threepence for latch and threepence for time makes just six pence, to me.”

“Dear lady,” he said, with a gentle smile, “Tha could’a bought latch thisself.
Tha’d have bought it, an’ left it sitting there on the topmost pantry shelf!

“Cos it isn’t the time or buying the parts that costs the fifteen bob,
It’s gettin’ it done, and knowing how, and that’s t’main part o’t job.”