“Ach, the home-made wine--that is good! Well, it is like old times, Momma--when the older children, Lena and Fred was here, and Lilly was a little girl about Johnnie’s size. Yes, it was fine then. None of these rich people with big houses and all that. We was the bosses then.” “We had all the land,” put in Mrs. Dietz gloomily. “We could get enough off of it to sell a good crop every year and plenty of vegetables to the commission men, and you always had money, if you needed it for anything, like Molly dying. Now it’s in the bank and we can’t spend nothing. No, the land was better than the money.” “Mr. Blaydon, he gives me sixty dollars a month, and all the feed for the stock, and half the money from the truck. That is something, sixty dollars sure every month.” “But you’ve got to work for Mr. Blaydon, and I do, and even the childern. It ain’t the same as when we worked for ourselves.” “Poppa,” broke in Lilly, as she cut the long flat sections of coffee cake, “Mary Hunker was selling some of Johann’s wine over at Corey’s last week. She got a big price, enough to buy a new dress. Can I sell some of Momma’s wine? We can’t ever drink up what we got every year.” “Ach Himmel!” Dietz cried, bringing his glass down with a rattle upon the table. “There is that girl. We have the land and sell that. We have the wine and we got to sell that too. Ain’t there nothing we can call our own? No, Lilly, you let the wine be.” “I never get clothes at all like the Hunker girls,” she replied sullenly. “I saw a green dress, a pretty one, over at town that was only thirteen dollars and fifty cents.” “But, Lilly, your sister Lena never bought no dresses for thirteen dollars and fifty cents. And Lena always looked nice. She married a man with a fine bakery business on Oak Street. He took Lena already because she was a neat, sensible girl and wouldn’t throw away his money for him. I don’t know what to think of you, Lilly. A honest, Christian girl, the way you’ve been brought up. You ain’t like your sister, is she, Momma?” “You wouldn’t expect all girls would be alike, Hermann,” said her mother. “Lilly is a good girl, but times have changed since Lena was her age. You give me the money, now, and I’ll go with her to look at the dress.” “Well, well, I guess so,” replied Hermann, mollified by his wife’s firmness. “That is a lot of money, but Lilly is a pretty girl, eh? I’ll give you the money to-morrow and maybe you can buy the dress before Sunday. Then them Hunker girls won’t be so fresh up at church.” “Pour some more wine for Mrs. Williams, Lilly,” said Mrs. Dietz. “No,” said Ellen, “I must be going.” “Yes, a night cap, Mrs. Williams,” said Dietz, in his best manner. “A little more wine for all of us, and then we’ll go to bed. I got to get Meyer, if I can, or Ed Becker, to help me bury poor Molly to-morrow. You got to dig a big hole for a horse.”