"Oh, Porter," Mary reproached him, as he helped her down from her high
seat on the stand.
"Well, he is. Leila couldn't keep her nice little house any better
than you, Mary. But the thing is that she wants to keep it for
Barry. And you--you want to march on the street--and laugh--at love."
She surveyed him coldly. "That shows just how much you understand me,"
she said, and turned her back on him and accepted an invitation to ride
home in the Jeliffes' car.
On the day of the Inauguration, the same party had seats on the stand
opposite the one in front of the White House from which the President
reviewed the troops.
And it was upon the President that Cousin Patty riveted her attention.
To be sure her little feet beat time to the music, and she flushed and
glowed as the soldiers swept by, and the horses danced, and the people
cheered. But above and beyond all these things was the sight of the
man, who in her eyes represented the resurrection of the South--the man
who should sway it back to its old level in the affairs of the nation.
"I couldn't have dreamed," she emphasized, as she talked it over that
night with Mary, "of anything so satisfying as his smile. I shall
always think of him as smiling out in that quiet way of his at the
people."
Mary had a vision of another Inauguration and of another President who
had smiled--a President who had captured the hearts of his countrymen
as perhaps this scholar never would. It was at the shrine of that
strenuous and smiling President that Mary still worshiped. But they
were both great men--it was for the future to tell which would live
longest in the hearts of the people.
The two women were in Cousin Patty's room. They were too excited to
sleep, for the events of the day had been stimulating. Cousin Patty
had suggested that Mary should get into something comfortable, and come
back and talk. And Mary had come, in a flowing blue gown with her fair
hair in shining braids. They were alone together for the first time
since Cousin Patty's arrival. It was a moment for which Mary had
waited eagerly, yet now that it had come to her, she hardly knew how to
begin.
But when she spoke, it was with an impulsive reaching out of her hands
to the older woman.
"Cousin Patty, tell me about Roger Poole."
Cousin Patty hesitated, then asked a question, almost sharply, "My
dear, why did you fail him?"