setting up on his own
account. He, simple as a baby for all his doggedness, thought that
they came because of his fame as a workman, and felt a glow of pride,
particularly as (having been prepared by the wife, who said, "You see it
don't make so much difference with my Kurt 'bout de prize, if so he can
get the furniture like he wants it, and he always know of the best in
the old country") they all were duly humble. He accepted a few orders
and went to work with a will; he would show them what the old man
could do. But it was only a temporary gleam; in a little while he grew
homesick for the shop, for the sawdust floor and the familiar smell
of oil, and the picture of Lossing flitting in and out. He missed the
careless young workmen at whom he had grumbled, he missed the whir of
machinery, and the consciousness of rush and hurry accented by the cars
on the track outside. In short, he missed the feeling of being part of
a great whole. At home, in his cosey little improvised shop, there was
none to dispute him, but there was none to obey him either. He grew
deathly tired of it all. He got into the habit of walking around the
shops at night, prowling about his old haunts like a cat. Once the night
watchman saw him. The next day there was a second watchman engaged.
And Olsen told him very kindly, meaning only to warn him, that he was
suspected to be there for no good purpose. Lieders confirmed a lurking
suspicion of the good Carl's own, by the clouding of his face. Yet he
would have chopped his hand off rather than have lifted it against the
shop.

That was Tuesday night, this was Wednesday morning.

The memory of it all, the cruel sense of injustice, returned with such
poignant force that Lieders groaned aloud.

Instantly, Thekla was bending over him. He did not know whether to laugh
at her or to swear, for she began fumbling at the ropes, half sobbing.
"Yes, I knowed they was hurting you, papa; I'm going to loose one arm.
Then I put it back again and loose the other. Please don't be bad!"

He made no resistance and she was as good as her word. She unbound and
bound him in sections, as it were; he watching her with a morose smile.

Then she left the room, but only to return with some hot coffee.
Lieders twisted his head away. "No," said he, "I don't eat none of that
breakfast, not if you make fresh coffee all the morning; I feel like I
don't eat never no more on earth."

Thekla knew that the obstinate nature that she