He rolled a blue eye on his incongruous team, and grinned widely.
"Come," he invited; "mine vife vill be glat."
They found her a matron of thirty-odd; fresh-cheeked, round-faced like her husband, typically German, without his accent of the Fatherland. Hazel at once appropriated the baby. It lay peacefully in her arms, staring wide-eyed, making soft, gurgly sounds.
"The little dear!" Hazel murmured.
"Lauer, our name iss," the man said casually, when they were seated.
"Wagstaff, mine is," Bill completed the informal introduction.
"So?" Lauer responded. "Id hass a German sount, dot name, yes."
"Four or five generations back," Bill answered. "I guess I'm as American as they make 'em."
"I am from Bavaria," Lauer told him. "Vill you shmoke? I light mine bibe—mit your vife's permission."
"Yes," he continued, stuffing the bowl of his pipe with a stubby forefinger, "I am from Bavaria. Dere I vass upon a farm brought oop. I serf in der army my dime. Den Ameriga. Dere I marry my vife, who is born in Milvaukee. I vork in der big brreweries. Afder dot I learn to be a carpenter. Now I am a kink, mit a castle all mine own, I am no more a vage slafe."