aids, and the organization was a girls' school led by
their apron strings. He thought with indignation of those conditions,
worked himself into a rage when he remembered that those immature
fellows had laughed at him, and turned his attention to the tailor's
daughter.

Hoeflinger did not allude with a single word to Victor's maiden speech.
He did not even seem to have felt the pointed hint about childless
people, or he bore him no grudge. That made Pratteler more angry with
him. That long fellow had no temperament; that is why the couple had no
children. Victor sulkily took up Spiele's sprinkler and deluged her
lettuce plants until they were almost drowned. He scratched the weeds
from the paths, raked them up and grumpily fed them to the rabbit. He
thought by himself that Hoeflinger could well afford to talk: he would
not be thrown out of his home when he went on strike, because he was a
house-owner. Then he spat furiously. After all the long one had worked
hard and saved in order to get where he was. And if he had drawn his
purse-strings tight, when the organization was in need, he would not
have been held in such esteem. So much he had to admit: that Hoeflinger
was devoted to the cause. But he had a good job; so what credit was
there in it?

Victor cleaned Spiele's wheel. He took it apart, washed everything in
kerosene, oiled all the parts and set it up again. There was a human
being for whom it was worth while to do something. He proposed that she
should have the handle-bar lowered; he himself almost touched the road
with his nose when he was on his wheel, and brushed the branches with
his back: that he considered the sporting way to ride. When she refused
and laughed, he laughed with her, and their merriment and friendliness
was doubled. But she ought to have an auto-horn, he said; that would
make the children heed her more than the thin little bell. When she
refused that, too, he suggested that she should discard the mud-brake
to make the wheel run more lightly. He had removed his; and when he
returned in rainy weather he bore on his back an armor of dirt thrown
up by the machine. When all the spinach was eaten, he dug over the bed
and wanted to help Spiele plant cabbage. But when he came home that
evening, she had done it herself. He sulked, she laughed, and finally
he joined in her laugh.

Spiele visibly brightened. She grew more lively and talkative. It
struck him, how often and how heartily she laughed of la