"Where is the President?" they asked, and Billy heard the answer.
"There, there! Look! By Jakie Barsinger!"
The old man's hands dropped, and he sobbed. It had all been so neatly done: the pretense of a runaway, the confusion of the moment, Colonel Mott's excitement—and the crown of his life was gone.
Long after the crowd had followed in the dusty wake of Jakie Barsinger's carriage, he turned his horses toward home. A hundred tourists had begged him to take them over the field, but he had silently shaken his head. He could not speak. Dan and Bess trotted briskly, mindful of the cool stable toward which their heads were set, and they whinnied eagerly at the stable door. They stood there for half an hour, however, before their master clambered down to unharness them. He talked to himself feebly, and, when he had finished, went out, not to the house, where Abbie, who had watched Jakie Barsinger drive by, waited in an agony of fear, but down the street, and out by quiet alleys and lanes to the National Cemetery. Sometimes he looked a little wonderingly toward the crowded main streets, not able to recall instantly why the crowd was there, then remembering with a rage which shook him to the soul. Fleeting, futile suggestions of revenge rushed upon him—a loosened nut in Jakie Barsinger's swingle-tree or a cut trace—and were repelled with horror which hurt as much as the rage. All the town would taunt him now. Why had he not turned his carriage across the road and stopped Jakie Barsinger in his wild dash? It would have been better to have been killed than to have lived to this.
Around the gate of the cemetery a company of cavalry was stationed, and within new thousands of visitors waited. It was afternoon now, and almost time for the trip over the field to end and the exercises to begin. As Billy passed through the crowd, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Thought you were going to drive the President," said a loud voice.
Billy saw for an instant the strange faces about him, gaping, interested to hear his answer.
"I ain't nobody's coachman," he said coolly, and walked on.
"They ain't goin' to get a rise out of me," he choked. "They ain't goin' to get a rise out of me."
He walked slowly up the wide avenue, and presently sat down on a bench. He was tired to death, his head nodded, and soon he slept, regardless of blare of band and shouting of men and roll of carriage wheels. There was a song, and then a prayer, but Billy heard nothing until the great speech was almost over. Then he opened his eyes drowsily, and saw the throng gathered round the wistaria-covered rostrum, on which the President was standing. Billy sprang up. At least he would hear the speech. Nobody could cheat him out of that. He pushed his way through the crowd, which, seeing his white hair, opened easily enough. Then he stood trembling, all his misery rushing over him again at sight of the tall figure. He was to have sat beside him, to have talked with him! He rubbed a weak hand across his eyes. Suddenly he realized that the formal portion of the speech was over, the President was saying now a short farewell.