suffer delay and reach the Capital by daybreak.

He read the letter of introduction several times, and wondered what
kind of man the President was; he thought of what he would say--and
how it would end.

At intervals a ghost would extend a long, bony hand and wring drops
of blood from his heart; at such times the President was hostile--the trip
very foolish--he regretted his anger at Judge Long's house; and once,
had the engine been a horse, he might have turned back. At other times
gleams of victory came from somewhere and yet from nowhere, and
routed the gypsies from his brain, and the President stood before him,
a sympathetic gentleman. Once he knew it, and through excess of spirits
walked up and down the aisle, studying the sleeping passengers; for John
Dale travelled in a common "day coach."

At last he yielded to fatigue, and far off on the horizon of consciousness
dimly flashed the duel of his hopes and fears. Rest was impossible, and
after a long time the dawn drifted between his half-closed lids; a glorious
dome floated out of the sky and the porter shouted, "All out for
Washington!"

The cabmen who besieged the well-dressed passengers paid scant homage
to the old man, who walked uncertainly out of the smoky shed and stood
for a moment in Pennsylvania Avenue--on one hand the Capitol, on
the other the Treasury and White House. A great clock above him
struck the hour of six; he hesitated, then went toward the scene of
conflict.

The waking traffic, the great buildings, the pulse of this strange life