n at all! There aint nowhere a better man than my man; and Carl
Olsen, he knows that. Kurt, he always buys a whole ham and a whole
barrel of flour, and never less than a dollar of sugar at a time! And he
never gits drunk nor he never gives me any bad talk. It was only he got
this wanting to kill himself on him, sometimes."

"Well, I guess I'll go put on my things," said Mrs. Olsen, wisely
declining to defend her position. "You set right still and warm
yourself, and we'll be back in a minute."

Indeed, it was hardly more than that time before both Carl Olsen, who
worked in the same furniture factory as Kurt Lieders, and was a comely
and after-witted giant, appeared with Mrs. Olsen ready for the street.

He nodded at Mrs. Lieders and made a gurgling noise in his throat,
expected to convey sympathy. Then, he coughed and said that he was
ready, and they started.

Feeling further expression demanded, Mrs. Olsen asked: "How many times
has he done it, Mrs. Lieders?"

Mrs. Lieders was trotting along, her anxious eyes on the house in the
distance, especially on the garret windows. "Three times," she answered,
not removing her eyes; "onct he tooked Rough on Rats and I found it out
and I put some apple butter in the place of it, and he kept wondering
and wondering how he didn't feel notings, and after awhile I got him off
the notion, that time. He wasn't mad at me; he just said: 'Well, I do it
some other time. You see!' but he promised to wait till I got the spring
house cleaning over, so he could shake the carpets for me; and by and
by he got feeling better. He was mad at the boss and that made him
feel bad. The next time it was the same, that time he jumped into the
cistern----"

"Yes, I know," said Olsen, with a half grin, "I pulled him out."

"It was the razor he wanted," the wife continued, "and when he come home
and says he was going to leave the shop and he aint never going back
there, and gets out his razor and sharps it, I knowed what that meant
and I told him I got to have some bluing and wouldn't he go and get it?
and he says, 'You won't git another husband run so free on your errands,
Thekla,' and I says I don't want none; and when he was gone I hid the
razor and he couldn't find it, but that didn't mad him, he didn't say
notings; and when I went to git the supper he walked out in the yard and
jumped into the cistern, and I heard the splash and looked in and there
he was trying to git his head under, and I calle