Weitbreck," as he was called
all through the country, possessed to a degree much out of the ordinary;
and it was a combination of two of them--the obstinacy and the
savingness--which had brought him into his present predicament.

In June he had had a good laborer,--one of the best known, and eagerly
sought by every farmer in the county; a man who had never yet been
beaten in a mowing-match or a reaping. By his help the haying had been
done in not much more than two thirds the usual time; but when John
Weitbreck, like a sensible fellow, said, "Now, we would better keep Alf
on till harvest; there is plenty of odds-and-ends work about the farm he
can help at, and we won't get his like again in a hurry," his father had
cried out,--

"Mein Gott! It is that you tink I must be made out of money! I vill not
keep dis man on so big wages to do vat you call odd-and-end vork. We do
odd-and-end vork ourself."

There was no discussion of the point. John Weitbreck knew better than
ever to waste his time and breath or temper in trying to change a
purpose of his father's or convince him of a mistake. But he bided his
time; and he would not have been human if he had not now taken secret
satisfaction, seeing his father's anxiety daily increase as the August
sun grew hotter and hotter, and the grain rattled in the husks waiting
to be reaped, while they two, straining their arms to the utmost, and in
long days' work, seemed to produce small impression on the great fields.

"The women shall come work in field to-morrow," thought the old man, as
he continued his anxious reverie. "It is not that they sit idle all day
in house, when the wheat grows to rattle like the peas in pod. They can
help, the muetter and Carlen; that will be much help; they can do." And
hearing John's steps behind him, the old man turned and said,--

"Johan, dere comes yet no man to reap. To-morrow must go in the field
Carlen and the muetter; it must. The wheat get fast too dry; it is more
as two men can do."

John bit his lips. He was aghast. Never had he seen his mother and
sister at work in the fields. John had been born in America; and he was
American, not German, in his feeling about this. Without due
consideration he answered,--

"I would rather work day and night, father, than see my mother and
sister in the fields. I will do it, too, if only you will not make them
go!"

The old man, irritated by the secret knowledge that he had nobody but
himself to blam