"Can't you speak?" demanded the wife.
No answer.
"Do you know what you deserve? There, now perhaps you'll remember to-morrow!" said the farmer as he boxed his ears sharply. "Now go to bed."
On Wednesday Renti worked diligently, doing carefully whatever task he was set to. He held out bravely until twilight, then he disappeared. When the housewife wanted wood for her fire she called him, but there was no Renti.
"What can we do with such a boy?" said the farmer in despair when he heard this last report.
"I had my suspicions from the first," said the wife accusingly, "when the farmer of Lindenhof offered him to you so readily. I suppose his wife had had enough of the rascal's tricks."
"He does his work very well when he is at it," said the man in a conciliatory tone; "but I really am curious to know where he wanders about." He opened the door once more and looked out.
"I am not," replied the wife. "I'm sure he has fallen in with some good-for-nothing boys who go tramping about the country, and that's why he won't tell where he's been. And what if he does work well? What good is he to us if he is always gone when we need him most? No, we cannot keep him if he goes on in this way."
Just as the farmer was about to lock the door Renti came running in. He had to go without supper, as on the previous night, and received a worse punishment than before, and a stern warning that if the offense was repeated something serious would happen.
On Thursday the farmer said to his wife: "Let him go to school to-day. There is nothing special to do. Next week we shall have particular need of him, and if he is out too many days we may get a notice from the schoolmaster."