“It’s just as if Vinzi were back since Jos is with us. Don’t you think so, mother?” said Stefeli, coming home one day with cheeks flushed, partly from delight and partly from the bright light of the setting sun. Jos as usual had stayed outside with his uncle.
“Yes,” replied the mother. “As long as we can’t have Vinzi, I am glad Jos takes his place. I like Jos as much as if he belonged to us.”
“I, too,” said Stefeli without hesitation. “But there are three times when I had a better time with Vinzi. In the morning, in the evening, and on rainy days. It was much nicer then when Vinzi was at home.”
The mother well understood what Stefeli alluded to, but she asked the child to let Jos go on his way, as he was doing his duty and it would be wrong of her to hinder him in that.
“I have tried already, but it does no good,” said Stefeli frankly.
She was forbidden to do so again. The mother was only too glad and grateful to see how Jos occupied himself at those times, even if Stefeli was displeased. He did so of his own free will, and she had noticed that it had actually improved her husband’s temper.
Jos was always the first up in the morning, and if the stable, which was his favorite resort, was still closed, he thought of something which had to be set in order in the barn. In this way Vinzenz would find him busy with hammering or mending something. The boy always came to breakfast at the very last minute when the coffee was put upon the table. He didn’t even notice how impatiently Stefeli was waiting for him. In the evening after their return Jos could not be lured away from his cows till the last one had returned from watering and was comfortably bedded on the straw.
The mother had always set the steaming pot on the table before he came in. Stefeli never could count on running over to the wild strawberry bed with Jos, therefore.
On rainy days Jos always disappeared entirely. He knew in the early morning what work had to be done that day in the fields, the hills, the woods or on the trees. When it rained, he would quickly ask his uncle, “Can I go with the man today?”
The other always agreed, “Why not, if you don’t mind the rain?”