“I can raise a few things this year,” Caleb had said when he heard it--“Lettuce and parsley and reddishes, maybe. And next year we ’ll have a _real_ garden. I’m going to take up some roots of daffydils and some jonquils and a stalk of that flowering shrub by the walk.” He was occupied with this new hope when John arrived--pottering about with hoe and trowel--and they left him to his garden, while inside the house John tied up furniture and packed boxes, with watchful eye upon his mother that she should not overtax her strength before the journey. She had been a little restless the first day of his homecoming, going from room to room with long pauses for rest--a kind of slow pilgrimage--touching the familiar things softly, her thin hands lingering on them as if she might not see them again in the new home. The boy watched a little anxiously. But her face was still and her eyes smiling when they met his, and after the first day she sat with him while he packed, talking of their new home and his work, and when the carriage left the house, she did not look back--her eyes were on the boy’s face. It had been arranged that they should travel in the baggage-car. Simeon had spoken gruffly of the special and John had refused it, and she herself had chosen the baggage-car. “It will interest me, I think,” she said. There was a free space about her steamer-chair and through the partly-open door that framed a great picture a fresh breeze blew in, stirring her hair and bringing a clear color to her cheeks. Her eyes were like stars, looking out on the fields, and she grew like a child with the miles. John’s heart lightened as he watched her. What a thing of courage she was! Sheer courage. Just a frail body to give it foothold on the earth. The boy could not have said it, but he felt it--through every dull fiber--the courage that he could never match, but that had been before every day of life.... He need not have feared the journey for her--She made holiday of it! After a little he left her and went forward. He had seen a man sitting at the farther end of the car, bent forward, his elbows resting on his knees, his gaze on the floor of the car. He did not look up as John paused beside him, and the boy seated himself on a box. After a time he looked up. “You ’re taking her to the Port?” He nodded toward the steamer-chair. “We ’re all going down.” “I heerd it,” said the man. He relapsed into silence. The train thundered on with hoarse stops and fierce quickening of power as it left the stations behind. The man lifted his head. “He ’s a hard man!” he said. He fixed his reddened eyes on the boy’s face. “I’ve served the road--man and boy--forty year.” He said the words slowly, as if they were important. They became a kind of chant in the roar of the train--“And now I’m turned off.” John waited a minute. His slow mind did not find words to speak to the haggard face. “I’m going down to see him,” said the man. “The president!”.