“You here!  What for?” he demanded, gruffly, in German.

“I had to see you,” replied Kurt, in English.

“Did it rain?” was the old man’s second demand, husky and serious.

“The wheat is made, if we can harvest it,” answered Kurt.

The blaze of joy on old Dorn’s face gave Kurt a twinge of pain.  He hated to dispel it.  “Come aside, here, a minute,” he whispered, and drew his father over to a corner under a lamp.  “I’ve got bad news.  Look at this!” He produced the cake of phosphorus, careful to hide it from other curious eyes there, and with swift, low words he explained its meaning.  He expected an outburst of surprise and fury, but he was mistaken.

“I know about that,” whispered his father, hoarsely.  “There won’t be any thrown in my wheat.”

“Father!  What assurance have you of that?” queried Kurt, astounded.

The old man nodded his gray head wisely.  He knew, but he did not speak.

“Do you think these I.W.W. plotters will spare your wheat?” asked Kurt.  “You are wrong.  They may lie to your face.  But they’ll betray you.  The I.W.W. is backed by—­by interests that want to embarrass the government.”

“What government?”

“Why, ours—­the U.S. government!”

“That’s not my government.  The more it’s embarrassed the better it will suit me.”

In the stress of the moment Kurt had forgotten his father’s bitter and unchangeable hatred.

“But you’re—­you’re stupid,” he hissed, passionately.  “That government has protected you for fifty years.”

Old Dorn growled into his beard.  His huge ox-eyes rolled.  Kurt realized then finally how implacable and hopeless he was—­how utterly German.  Then Kurt importuned him to return the eighty thousand dollars to the bank until he was sure the wheat was harvested and hauled to the railroad.

“My wheat won’t burn,” was old Dorn’s stubborn reply.

“Well, then, give me Anderson’s thirty thousand.  I’ll take it to him at once.  Our debt will be paid.  We’ll have it off our minds.”

“No hurry about that,” replied his father.

“But there is hurry,” returned Kurt, in a hot whisper.  “Anderson came to see you to-day.  He wants his money.”

“Neuman holds the small end of that debt.  I’ll pay him.  Anderson can wait.”

Kurt felt no amaze.  He expected anything.  But he could scarcely contain his fury.  How this old man, his father, whom he had loved—­how he had responded to the influences that must destroy him!

“Anderson shall not wait,” declared Kurt.  “I’ve got some say in this matter.  I’ve worked like a dog in those wheat-fields.  I’ve a right to demand Anderson’s money.  He needs it.  He has a tremendous harvest on his hands.”

Old Dorn shook his huge head in somber and gloomy thought.  His broad face, his deep eyes, seemed to mask and to hide.  It was an expression Kurt had seldom seen there, but had always hated.  It seemed so old to Kurt, that alien look, something not born of his time.