"Yes, I remember--I must--let me see--I was in the forty-third Congress with him, was I not, Colonel?"
"The forty-fourth," corrected the colonel.
"To be sure, the forty-fourth. He was a very fine man. I formed a very high opinion of him."
"Yes, he was a fine man," said Garwood. "I read law in his office."
"Did you, indeed? He was a very good lawyer, as I recall him. We sat on the judiciary committee together. Did he have a good practice?"
"Oh, yes, the best at the Grand Prairie bar. He was the best jury lawyer we ever had there."
"Yes, he was a good speaker. Was the breach in the party created by his peculiarly strong character healed at his death?"
"Well, it's pretty much healed now; for a long time it bothered us, but we never hear of it any more."
"Pretty popular with the people, was he?"
"I would presume so." The great man closed his eyes as if shutting in some impression.
"Yes," Garwood went on, "the bare mention of his name will set them wild even now."
"Ah, indeed," said the candidate. "He raised a regiment about there, did he not?"
"Yes--the old ninety-third--the Bloody Ninety-third they called it. A number of his old soldiers will be at your meeting this afternoon."
The candidate reflected that most communities like to think that their regiments have been known as "the Bloody," but he did not say so to Garwood.
The train sped on, then Garwood heard it stop, heard the cheers and cries of the crowds outside, heard the rich voice of the candidate speaking, heard the restless bell as the train moved on again with quickly accelerated speed, while the little station and the crowd and the two shining tracks dissolved into one disappearing point of the perspective far behind. The cheers faded away, and he tried to imagine the sensation of the man for whom all this outcry was being made. The great man seemed to take it coolly enough. Either such things had grown common to him, or he had trained himself by a long course of public life to appear as if they had, for when he was not making speeches on the rear platform, or shaking hands with little delegations that boarded the train to go to the Lincoln meeting, he was resting in his stateroom. He was not well, Garwood heard the colonel explain to some one, and had to conserve his energies, though like some athlete in training he seemed able to rest and sleep between his exertions.