With horses prancing and men shouting and calling, a parade was formed to march up the one street of New Salem. It was a motley crowd, some of them in buckskin, some in foxed and homespun breeches, with a generous sprinkling of coon-skin caps, that formed the company of Captain Lincoln. In addition to the Clary Grove gang, Wolf Creek patriots were there and the rowdies from Sand Town, and it was freely conceded by the cool-headed men of New Salem that not a man could handle such a crowd save Abe Lincoln. Ann Rutledge looked on with smiling face and clapped her hands and shouted when Lincoln went prancing by on his good horse, his face bright with excitement and his black hair flying back from his forehead in the wind. But a shadow came over her face the night after the parade, and during the next few days, when every woman in town was foxing breeches for the Company, she tried to see him, for she had something to say. Unable to find an opportunity she sent Sis to tell him Ann had something to give him before he went away. He came at once, and Mrs. Rutledge told him Ann was somewhere in the back yard. He found her in the garden where a few peach trees were struggling into bloom. "I've come, Ann," he said, stopping before her. "You sent for me, didn't you?" "Yes, Abraham Lincoln. There's something I want to say to you before you go away. I've been holding it against you--but I want to tell you that I forgive you." "Forgive me!" he said in astonishment. "What did I ever do to you that I should need forgiveness for?" "Don't you remember the quilting-bee?" she asked, her face flushing slightly. "And you forgive me?"--he asked the question seriously. Then he laughed. "Don't forgive. Forgiveness might tempt me to do it again. Just remember as I go away that I'm not afraid of wolves or bears or catamounts or snakes or Indians, or any living creature--except women. It's women I'm afraid of," and he laughed. The flush yet showed on Ann's face and her voice was a bit unsteady as she said, "And there's something else." "What is it, Ann?" "I--I don't want anything to harm you. I want you to come back sound and well." There was pleading in her eye and a hint of quaver in her voice. Abe Lincoln regarded her thoughtfully a moment. Her blue eyes did not shift before his steady gaze. "Why do you want me to return unharmed?" he asked. "Because you are kind to the weak and forgotten folks of earth, and not many think of this kind: because I think often what the child said." "What child?" "The beaten and abused child of old Kelly that you saved from more pain." "What was it the child said?" "'God came,'" she said. "'And his name was Abe Lincoln.'" There was an almost imperceptible twitching in Abe Lincoln's face. "There are many children," she continued, "many suffering, sad and helpless ones who need a strong friend to help them. My father says you have a future. I want you to come back to your future."