last year's dried sunflower stalks, were sing-
ing straight at the sun, their heads thrown
back and their yellow breasts a-quiver. The
wind blew about us in warm, sweet gusts. We
rode slowly, with a pleasant sense of Sunday
indolence.

We found the Shimerdas working just as if
it were a week-day. Marek was cleaning out
the stable, and Antonia and her mother were
making garden, off across the pond in the
draw-head. Ambrosch was up on the wind-
mill tower, oiling the wheel. He came down,
not very cordially. When Jake asked for the
collar, he grunted and scratched his head.
The collar belonged to grandfather, of course,
and Jake, feeling responsible for it, flared up.

"Now, don't you say you haven't got it,
Ambrosch, because I know you have, and if
you ain't a-going to look for it, I will."

Ambrosch shrugged his shoulders and saun-
tered down the hill toward the stable. I
could see that it was one of his mean days.
Presently he returned, carrying a collar that
had been badly used -- trampled in the dirt
and gnawed by rats until the hair was sticking
out of it.

"This what you want?" he asked surlily.

[[146]]

p145 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p146w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p147

v?