"Did he say it?" asked Ersten with a haste which betrayed the eagerness he did not want to show.
"Not exactly," admitted Johnny, "but if he knew that he could have a workroom where there is a better light I know he would like to come. His eyes are bad, you know."
"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.