"I said it makes him sick not to work," insisted Ersten. "If he
wants to come he knows the way."

"His job's waiting for him, isn't it?"

"In this place, yes. In no other place. I don't move my shop to
please my coat cutter--even if he is the best in New York and a boy
that come over from the old country with me in the same ship, and
his word as good as gold money. It's like I told Heinrich when he
left: If he comes back to me he comes back here--in this place. Are
his eyes very bad?"

"Not very," judged Johnny. "He must take care of them though."

"Sure he must," agreed Ersten. "We're getting old. Thirty-seven
years we worked together. I stood up for Heinrich at his wedding and
he stood up for me at mine. He's a stubborn assel!"

"That's the trouble," mused Johnny, "He said he wouldn't work in
this shop any more."

"Here must he come--in this place!" reiterated Ersten, instantly
stern; and he walked sturdily away, removing his coat.

Johnny found Heinrich Schnitt weeding onions, picking out each weed
with minute care and petting the tender young bulbs through their
covering of soft earth as he went along. Mama Schnitt, divided into
two bulges by an apron-string and wearing a man's broad-brimmed
straw hat, stood placidly at the end of the row for company.