A Man for the Ages Part 28

"I'm glad to hear you declare in favor of external improvements," said Kelso. "We've all been too much absorbed by internal improvements. You're on the right trail, Abe. You've been thinking of the public ear and too little of the public eye. We must show some respect for both."

"Sometimes I think that comely dress ought to go with comely diction,"

said Abe. "But that's a thing you can't learn in books. There's no grammarian of the language of dress. Then I'm so big and awkward. It's a rather hopeless problem."

"You're in good company," Kelso a.s.sured him. "Nature guards her best men with some sort of singularity not attractive to others. Often she makes them odious with conceit or deformity or dumbness or garrulity. Dante was such a poor talker that no one would ever ask him to dinner. If it had not been so I presume his muse would have been sadly crippled by indigestion. If you had been a good dancer and a lady's favorite I wonder if you would have studied Kirkham and Burns and Shakespeare and Blackstone and Starkie, and the science of surveying and been elected to the Legislature. I wonder if you could even have whipped Jack Armstrong."

"Or have enjoyed the friends.h.i.+p of Bill Berry and acquired a national debt, or have saved my imperiled country in the war with Black Hawk," Abe laughed.

In the matter of dress the Postmaster had great confidence in the taste and knowledge of his young friend, Harry Needles, whose neat appearance Abe regarded with serious admiration. So he asked Harry to go with him on this new mission and help to choose the goods and direct the tailoring, for it seemed to him a highly important enterprise.

"It's a difficult problem," said Abe. "Given a big man and a small sum and the large amount of respectability that's desired. We mustn't make a mistake."

They got a ride part of the way with a farmer going home from Rutledge's Mill.

"Our appropriation is only fifteen dollars," said Abe as they came in sight of "the big village" on a warm bright day late in October. "Of course I can't expect to make myself look like the President of the United States with such a sum but I want to look like a respectable citizen of the United States if that is possible. I'll give the old Abe and fifteen dollars to boot for a new one and we'll see what comes of it."

Springfield had been rapidly changing. It was still small and crude but some of the best standards of civilization had been set up in that community. Families of wealth and culture in the East had sent their sons and a share of their capital to this little metropolis of the land of plenty to go into business. The Edwardses in their fine top boots and ruffled s.h.i.+rts were there. So were certain of the Ridgleys of Maryland--well known and successful bankers. The Logans and the Conklings and the Stuarts who had won reputations at the bar before they arrived were now settled in Springfield. Handsome, well groomed horses, in silver mounted harness, drawing carriages that shone "so you could see your face in them," to quote from Abe again, were on its streets.

"My conscience! What a lot of jingling and high stepping there is here in the street and on the sidewalk," said Abe as they came into the village.

"I reckon there's a mile of gold watch chains in this crowd."

A public sale was on and the walks were thronged. Women in fine silks and millinery; men in tall beaver hats and broadcloth and fine linen touched elbows with the hairy, rough clad men of the prairies and their worn wives in old-fas.h.i.+oned bonnets and faded coats.

The two New Salem men stopped and studied a big sign in front of a large store on which this announcement had been lettered:

"Cloths, ca.s.sinettes, ca.s.simeres, velvet silks, satins, Ma.r.s.eilles waistcoating, fine, calf boots, seal and morocco pumps for gentlemen, crepe lisse, lace veils.

Thibet shawls, fine prunella shoes."

"Reads like a foreign language to me," said Abe. "The pomp of the East has got here at last. I'd like to know what seal and morocco pumps are. I reckon they're a contrivance that goes down into a man's pocket and sucks it dry. I wonder what a ca.s.sinette is like, and a prunella shoe. How would you like a little Ma.r.s.eilles waistcoating?"

Suddenly a man touched his shoulder with a hearty "Howdy, Abe?"

It was Eli, "the wandering Jew," as he had been wont to call himself in the days when he carried a pack on the road through Peter's Bluff and Clary's Grove and New Salem to Beardstown and back.

"Dis is my store," said Eli.

"Your store!" Abe exclaimed.

"Ya, look at de sign."

The Jew pointed to his sign-board, some fifty feet long under the cornice, on which they read the legend:

"Eli Fredenberg's Emporium."

Abe looked him over from head to foot and exclaimed:

"My conscience! You look as if you had been fixed up to be sold to the highest bidder."

The hairy, dusty, bow-legged, threadbare peddler had been touched by some miraculous hand. The lavish hand of the West had showered her favors on him. They resembled in some degree the barbaric pearl and gold of the East. He glowed with prosperity. Diamonds and ruffled linen and Scotch plaid and red silk on his neck and a blue band on his hat and a smooth-shorn face and perfumery were the glittering details that surrounded the person of Eli.

"Come in," urged the genial proprietor of the Emporium. "I vould like to show you my goots and introduce you to my brudder."

They went in and met his brother and had their curiosity satisfied as to the look and feel of ca.s.sinettes and waistcoatings and seal and morocco pumps and prunella shoes.

In the men's department after much thoughtful discussion they decided upon a suit of blue jeans--that being the only goods which, in view of the amount of cloth required, came within the appropriation. Eli advised against it.

"You are like Eli already," he said. "You haf got de pack off your back.

Look at me. Don't you hear my clothes say somet'ing?"

"They are very eloquent," said Abe.

"Vell dey make a speech. Dey say 'Eli Fredenberg he is no more a poor devil. You can not sneeze at him once again. Nefer. He has climb de ladder up.' Now you let me sell you somet'ing vat makes a good speech for you."

"If you'll let me dictate the speech I'll agree," said Abe.

"Vell-vat is it?" Eli asked.

"I would like my clothes to say in a low tone of voice: 'This is humble Abraham Lincoln about the same length and breadth that I am. He don't want to scare or astonish anybody. He don't want to look like a beggar or a millionaire. Just put him down for a hard working man of good intentions who is badly in debt.'"

That ended all argument. The suit of blue jeans was ordered and the measures taken. As they were about to go Eli said:

"I forgot to tell you dot I haf seen Bim Kelso de odder day in St. Louis.

I haf seen her on de street. She has been like a queen so grand! De hat and gown from Paris and she valk so proud! But she look not so happy like she usit to be. I speak to her. Oh my, she vas glad and so surprised! She tolt me dot she vould like to come home for a visit but her husband he does not vant her to go dere--nefer again. My jobber haf tolt me dot Mr.

Biggs is git drunk efery day. Bim she t'ink de place no good. She haf tolt me dey treat de n.i.g.g.e.rs awful. She haf cry ven she tolt me dot."

"Poor child!" said Abe. "I'm afraid she's in trouble."

"I've been thinking for some time that I'd go down there and try to see her," said Harry as they were leaving the store. "Now, I'll have to go."

"Maybe I'll go with you," said Abe.

They got a ride part of the way back and had a long tramp again under the starlight.

"I don't believe you had better go down to St. Louis," Abe remarked as they walked along. "It might make things worse. I'm inclined to think that I'd do better alone with that problem."

"I guess you're right," said Harry. "It would be like me to do something foolish."

"And do it very thoroughly," Abe suggested. "You're in love with the girl. I wouldn't trust your judgment in St. Louis."

"She hasn't let on to her parents that she's unhappy. Mother Traylor told me that they got a letter from her last week that told of the good times she was having."

"We know what that means. She can't bear to acknowledge to them that she has made a mistake and she don't want to worry them. Her mother is in part responsible for the marriage. Bim don't want her to be blamed. Eli caught her off her guard and her heart and her face spoke to him."

In a moment Abe added: "Her parents have begun to suspect that something is wrong. They have never been invited to go down there and visit the girl. I reckon we'd better say nothing to any one of what we have heard at present."

They reached New Salem in the middle of the night and went into Rutledge's barn and lay down on the haymow between two buffalo hides until morning.