This morning Clara was tying a wine-coloured ribbon about her throat when Johanna appeared with her coffee. After putting the tray on a sewing table, she began to make Clara's bed, chattering the while in Bohemian.
“Well, Olaf got off early, and the girls are baking. I'm going down presently to make some poppy-seed bread for Olaf. He asked for prune preserves at breakfast, and I told him I was out of them, and to bring some prunes and honey and cloves from town.”
Clara poured her coffee. “Ugh! I don't see how men can eat so much sweet stuff. In the morning, too!”
Her aunt chuckled knowingly. “Bait a bear with honey, as we say in the old country.”
“Was he cross?” her niece asked indifferently.
“Olaf? Oh, no! He was in fine spirits. He's never cross if you know how to take him. I never knew a man to make so little fuss about bills. I gave him a list of things to get a yard long, and he didn't say a word; just folded it up and put it in his pocket.”
“I can well believe he didn't say a word,” Clara remarked with a shrug. “Some day he'll forget how to talk.”
“Oh, but they say he's a grand speaker in the Legislature. He knows when to keep quiet. That's why he's got such influence in politics. The people have confidence in him.” Johanna beat up a pillow and held it under her fat chin while she slipped on the case. Her niece laughed.
“Maybe we could make people believe we were wise, Aunty, if we held our tongues. Why did you tell Mrs. Ericson that Norman threw me again last Saturday and turned my foot? She's been talking to Olaf.”
Johanna fell into great confusion. “Oh, but, my precious, the old lady asked for you, and she's always so angry if I can't give an excuse. Anyhow, she needn't talk; she's always tearing up something with that motor of hers.”