"Your name is Vetturi, isn't it?" asked Anton. "Come here. Is there anything you want?"
"I won't take alms like a beggar, I'd rather strike my mouth against a stone," replied Vetturi in a hoarse voice; and turning to his mother as though she had contradicted him, said: "Mother, you shan't take anything."
Then in an entirely different tone he said to Thoma: "May I wish you joy?"
"No, you may not. Nobody who speaks so disrespectfully of my father shall wish me joy. Own up to stealing the oats. If you do, I will go to father and get him to forgive you."
"I won't do it."
"Then abuse me, not my father. My father might, perhaps, have given up to you, but I won't let him as long as you keep on lying."
"But I can wish you joy, Anton," cried Cushion Kate; "I hope your wife will be like your mother. She was a good woman; there isn't her like in the whole country. I was in your house when you came into the world. You are just eight days older than my oldest daughter would be now. Now, get your father-in-law to take my Vetturi again, and straighten everything out. We are poor people. We don't want to quarrel with such a powerful farmer as he is, but he must not squeeze us until the blood runs out from under our nails."
"Come along," cried Thoma, taking hold of Anton's arm, "don't let her talk to you so."
She walked away. Anton did not follow her, but said to Vetturi that he would employ him as a wood-cutter up in the forest.
"My Vetturi cannot do that," interrupted the mother. "He cannot work up there from Monday morning to Saturday night, and have no decent food, and no decent bed."