He passed on and saw that when his name was announced the Senator looked up from his work with a fretted movement of the head.

"Mr. De Willoughby of Talbot's Cross-roads?" he said. Tom bowed. He became conscious of appearing to occupy too much space in the room of a busy man who had plainly been irritated.

"I was told by Judge Rutherford that you had kindly consented to see me,"

he said.

The Senator tapped the table nervously with his pencil and pushed some papers aside.

"Well, I find I have no time to spare this morning," was his brutally frank response. "I have just been forced to give the time which might have been yours to a little hoosier who made his way in, heaven knows how, and refused to be ordered out. He had a claim, too, and came from your county and said he was an old friend of yours."

"He is not an old enemy," answered Tom. "There is that much foundation in the statement."

"Well, he has occupied the time I had meant to give you," said the Senator, "and I was not prepossessed either by himself or his claim."

"I think he's a man to gain a claim," said Tom; "I'm afraid I'm not."

"It is fair to warn you that I am not friendly to claims made by the families of men who lived in a hot-bed of secession," said the Senator.

He had been badgered too much this morning, and this big, rather convincing looking applicant worried him. "I have an appointment at the White House in ten minutes."

"Then this is no place for me," said Tom. "No man is likely to be friendly to a thing he has no time to talk of. I will bid you good-morning."

"Good-morning," returned the Senator, brusquely.

Tom went away feeling that he was a blunderer. The fact was that he was a neophyte and, it was true, did not possess the qualities which make a successful lobbyist. Mr. Stamps had wheedled or forced his way into the great man's apartment and had persisted in remaining to press his claim until he was figuratively turned out by the shoulders. Big Tom had used only such means to obtain the interview as a gentleman might; he had waited until he was called to take his turn, and so had lost his chance.

When he had found the Senator hurried and unwilling to spend time on him he had withdrawn at once, not feeling Mr. Stamps's method to be possible.

"I suppose I ought to have stayed and buttonholed him in spite of himself," he thought, ruefully. "I'm a greenhorn; I suppose a man in my place ought to stand his ground whether it's decent or indecent, and make people listen to what he has to say, and be quite willing to be kicked downstairs after he has said it. I'm a disgrace to my species--and I don't think much of the species."

As he was walking through one of the corridors he saw before him two men who were evidently visitors to the place. He gathered this from their leisurely movements and the interest with which they regarded the objects about them. They looked at pictures and remarked upon decorations. One was a man who was unusually well-built. He was tall and moved well and had lightly silvered hair; his companion was tall also, but badly hung together, and walked with a stoop of the shoulders.

Tom walked behind them for some yards before his attention was really arrested, but suddenly a movement of one man's head seemed to recall some memory of the past. He did not know what the memory was, but he knew vaguely that it was a memory. He followed a few yards further, wondering idly what had been recalled and why he should be reminded of the mountains and the pine-trees. Yes, it was the mountains and pine-trees--Hamlin County, but not the Hamlin County of to-day. Why not the Hamlin County of to-day? why something which seemed more remote? Confound the fellow; he had made that movement again. Tom wished he would turn his face that he might see it, and he hurried his footsteps somewhat that he might come within nearer range. The two men paused with their backs towards him, and Tom paused also. They were looking at a picture, and the taller of the two made a gesture with his hand. It was a long, bony hand, and as he extended it Tom slightly started. It all came back to him--the memory which had been recalled. He smelt the scent of the pines on the hillside; he saw the little crowd of mourners about the cabin door; inside, women sat with bent heads, upon two wooden chairs rested the ends of a slender coffin, and by it stood a man who lifted his hand and said to those about him: "Let us pray."

The years swept back as he stood there. He was face to face again with the tragic mystery which had seemed to end in utter silence. The man turned his face so that it was plainly to be seen--sallow, rugged, harsh in line. The same face, though older, and perhaps less tragic--the face of the man he had left alone in the awful, desolate stillness of the empty room.

The next moment he turned away again. He and his companion passed round a corner and were gone. Tom made no attempt to follow them.

"There is no reason why I should," was his thought, "either for Sheba's sake or his own. She is happy, and he feels his secret safe--whatsoever it may have been. Perhaps he has had time to outlive the misery of it, and it would all be brought to life again."

But the incident had been a shock. There was nothing to fear from it, he knew; but it had been a shock nevertheless. He did not know the man's name; he had never asked it. He was plainly one of the many strangers who, in passing through the Capital, went to visit the public buildings.

The merest chance might have brought him to the place; the most ordinary course of events might take him away. Tom went back to Dupont Circle in a thoughtful mood. He forgot the claim and the Senator who had had no leisure to hear the statement of his case.

Rupert and Sheba were waiting for his return. Rupert had spent the afternoon searching for employment. He had spent many a long day in the same way and with the same result.

"They don't want me," he had said when he came home. "They don't want me anywhere, it seems--either in lawyers' offices or dry-goods stores. I have not been particular."

They had sat down and gazed at each other.

"I sometimes wonder," said Sheba, "what we shall do when all our money is gone--every penny of it. It cannot last long now. We cannot stay here and we cannot pay our way back to the mountains. What shall we do?"

"I shall go out every day till I find something to do," said Rupert, with the undiscouraged fervour of youth. "I am not looking for employment for a gentleman, in these days; I am looking for work--just as Uncle Matt is."

"He chopped some wood yesterday and brought home two dollars," Sheba said. "He made me take it. He said he wanted to pay his 'bode.'"

She laughed a little, but her eyes were wet and shining.

Rupert took her face between his hands and looked into it adoringly.

"Don't be frightened, Sheba," he said; "don't be unhappy. Lovely darling, I will take care of you."

She pressed her soft cheek against his hand.

"I know you will," she said, "and of Uncle Tom, too. I couldn't be unhappy--we all three love each other so. I do not believe we shall be unhappy, even if we are poor enough to be hungry."

So their moment of dismay ended in smiles. They were passing through a phase of life in which it is not easy to be unhappy. Somehow things always brightened when they drew near each other. His observation of this truth was one of Tom's pleasures. He knew the year of waiting had managed to fill itself with sweetness for them. Their hopes had been alternately raised and dashed to earth; one day it seemed not improbable that they were to be millionaires, the next that beggary awaited them after the dwindling of their small stock of money; but they had shared their emotions and borne their vicissitudes together.

When Tom entered the room they rose and met him with questioning faces.

"Was it good fortune?" they cried. "Did you see him, Uncle Tom? What did he say?"

He told his story as lightly as possible, but it could not be transformed, by any lightness of touch, into an encouraging episode. He made a picture of Stamps sidling through the barely opened door, and was terse and witty at the expense of his own discomfiture and consciousness of incompetence. He laughed at himself and made them laugh, but when he sat down in his accustomed seat there was a shade upon his face.

The children exchanged glances, the eyes of each prompting the other.

They must be at their brightest. They knew the sight of their happiness warmed and lightened his heart always.

"He is tired and hungry," Sheba said. "We must give him a beautiful hot supper. Rupert, we must set the table."

They had grown used to waiting upon themselves, and their domestic services wore more or less the air of festivities. Sheba ran downstairs to Miss Burford's kitchen, where Uncle Matt had prepared the evening meal in his best manner. As the repasts grew more and more simple, Matt seemed to display greater accomplishments.

"It's all very well, Miss Sheba," he had said once, when she praised the skill with which he employed his scant resources. "It's mighty easy to be a good cook when you'se got everythin' right to han'. The giftness is to git up a fine table when you ain't got nuffin'. Dat's whar dish yer niggah likes to show out. De Lard knows I'se got too much yere dis ve'y minnit--to be a-doin' credit to my 'sperience--too much, Miss Sheba."

He was frying hoe-cake and talking to Miss Burford when Sheba came into the kitchen. He was a great comfort and aid to Miss Burford, and in a genteel way the old lady found him a resource in the matters of companionship and conversation. Her life was too pinched and narrow to allow her even the simpler pleasure of social intercourse, and Matt's journeys into the world, and his small adventures, and his comments upon politics and social events were a solace and a source of entertainment to her.

Just now he was describing to her the stories he had heard of a celebrated lecturer who had just arrived in the city.

"Whether he's a 'vivalist or jes' a plain preacher what folks is runnin'

after, I cayn't quite make out, ma'am," he was saying. "I ain't quite thinkin' he's a 'vivalist, but de peoples is a-runnin' after him shore--an' seems like dey doin' it in ev'y city he goes to. Ev'ybody want to heah him--ev'ybody--rich en pore--young en ole. De Rev'end John Baird's his name, an' he's got a fren' travellin' with him as they say is like Jonathan was to David in dese yere ole Bible times. An' I heern tell ev when he rise in de pulpit de people's jest gets so worked up at what he preach to 'em--dey jest cries an' rocks de benches. Dat's what make me think he might be a 'vivalist--cos we all knows dat cryin' an' rockin'

an' clappin' hands is what makes a 'vival." He was full of anecdotes concerning the new arrival whose reputation had plainly preceded him.

"He gwine ter preach nex' Sat'day on ''Pentance,'" he said to Sheba, with a chuckle. "Dat's his big lecture ev'ybody want to hear. De hall shore to be pack full. What I'm a-hopin' is dat it'll be pack full er Senators an'

members er Congrest, an' he'll set some of 'em a-'pentin', dey ain't 'tend to dere business an' git people's claims through. Ef I know'd de gen'leman, I'd ax him to menshun dat special an' pertickler."

As they sat at supper, Sheba repeated his stories and comments. All the comments were worthy of repetition, and most of the anecdotes were suggestively interesting, illustrating, as they did, the power of a single man over many.

"I should like to go and hear him myself," she said. "Uncle Tom, have you anything to repent? Rupert, have you? Uncle Tom, you have not forgotten the Senator. You look at me as if you were thinking of something that was not happy."

"The Senator was not particularly happy," remarked Tom. "He had just had an interview with Stamps, and he certainly was not happy at the sight of me. He thought he had another on his hands. He's in better spirits by this time."

Sheba got up and went to his side of the table. She put her arms round his neck and pressed her cheek against his.