He told Radbourn at the station that he had enjoyed every moment of his stay. As the train drew out he looked back upon the city, and the great dome its centre, with a deep feeling of admiration, almost love. It had seized upon him mightily. He had only to shut his eyes to see again that majestic pile with its vast rotundas, its bewildering corridors and its tumultuous representative hall. Life there would be worth while. He began to calculate how long it would be before he should return. It seemed a long while to wait. XXV. IDA COMES INTO HIS LIFE AGAIN. After his return home he accepted every invitation to speak, because that relieved the tedium of his life in Rock River. He took an active part in the fall campaign in county politics, and he delivered the Fourth of July address at the celebration at Rock River amid the usual blare of bands and bray of fakirs and ice-cream vendors, while the small boys fired off crackers in perfect oblivion of anybody but themselves. It was magnificent to occupy a covered carriage in the parade and to sit on the platform as the centre of interest, and to rise amid cheers, to address the citizens of the United States, to point to cloud-capped towering peaks, to plant the stars and stripes upon battlements of ancient wrong, and other equally patriotic things. No occasion was complete now without him. The strawberry festival that secured his presence felicitated itself upon the fact and always insisted on "just a few words, Mr. Congressman." The summer passed rather better than he had anticipated. About a month before his return to Washington he received a letter from Ida asking him to be present at a suffrage meeting in Des Moines, and he accepted the invitation with great pleasure. He had been wondering how he could see her again without making the journey for that purpose, which he could not bring himself to do. It was a soft, hazy October day and the ride to Des Moines was very beautiful. The landscape seemed to be in drowse, half-sleeping and half-waking. The jays flew from amber and orange-colored coverts of maples and oaks across the blue haze of the open, and quails piped from the hazel-thickets. Crows flapped lazily across the fields where the ploughmen were at work. The threshing machines hummed and clattered with a lower, quieter note, and as Bradley looked upon it all, the wonder of his release from the toil of reaping and threshing and ploughing came upon him again. Ida was glad to see him. She gave him her hand in a frank, strong clasp. "You'll stay to tea with us, of course," she said. "There is no one here but mother and I, and we can talk things all over. This is my mother," she said, presenting an elderly lady with a broad, placid face. She said nothing whatever during his stay, but listened to all that was said with unchanging gravity. It was plain she worshipped her daughter, and never questioned what she said. They sat down at the table.