CHAPTER XXXIV

FOR THE THINGS THAT ARE TO BE

While Dr. Allen and William Green were yet discussing the strange disappearance of Abe Lincoln, the door opened and he stood before them.

They turned toward him and beheld what seemed a wreckage, wrought by hunger and longing, unrest and the sorrow of a loss which could never be made good. In his face were lines already too deeply cut for Time's erasure.

No word was spoken. The two men seemed awed by the majesty of his silence and strangely moved by his dumb sorrow, and, strong men though they were, tears wet their cheeks.

"Doc," Lincoln said, "how long will this last--for I cannot, cannot bear to think of--of----"

His voice grew unsteady. He did not finish the sentence; instead he said, "Is there any honorable way I can finish it all?"

"You do not want to finish it. You want to live your life."

"I have lived my life."

The voice seemed far away as if from some ancestral tomb. "I have lived my life. I found it here in New Salem--and I will leave it here."

"No, no. You will feel differently after awhile. You will want to live for the things that are to be."

"For the things that are to be? What can a man do when that which alone could make life worth living is taken from it forever?"

"There are other incentives to life than love. There is ambition with its measure of fame, and service with the pleasure of duty," Dr. Allen said.

"Ambition--fame," Lincoln repeated wearily. "What is fame but a bauble--a passin' bauble."

"But think what you may live to do for humanity in some way or another. You have made a good beginning--you have put in the foundation, Lincoln. You might be Governor of Illinois some day. Think then what you might accomplish for liberty--for freedom and justice."

"My interest in these things is dead. Everything is dead."

"No, not dead, only numb. Great pain brings numbness, but Time heals the deepest cuts. The edges stay tender, the old wounds bleed and the scars remain. But in spite of all, the numbness and the pain give way in time to the healing forces of nature."

Lincoln dropped his head wearily on the table. He was ill, tired, hungry, suffering from loss of sleep--all this with the other.

Dr. Allen looked helplessly at Green and wiped his eyes again.

"Abe"--it was Green speaking. "Can't you pull yourself together for a little while--at least until you get Jim Henry's note paid? Tom Dickson from up near Springfield says they're having hard luck. He was over their way and found Jim's wife and baby sick and him about to lose his place. Just a little along now and then will save the day. He was talking about your note, said you would pay every cent of it. On the strength of this they were given more time. This here's a plain duty and a man's job, Abe."

Lincoln raised himself and looked at Green. "Jim Henry's dependin' on me and they've given him more time because my note is good?"

"That's it. And when his wife was down a few months ago and went to see Ann Rutledge, Ann told her you would pay every cent of it if it was the last act of your life."

"I suppose this is one of the things that are to be," he said, addressing Dr. Allen.

"No doubt. And with the days that follow new duties and new opportunities will unfold. 'God moves in a mysterious way,' the hymn book tells us, 'His wonders to perform.' We don't know how or why, but back of it all He moves, and He needs strong men, men not afraid, men who cannot be bought or sold to stand for the interests of the people and the rights of those helpless ones who are always the prey of the powerful and unscrupulous."

"Perhaps you are right," he answered. "I'll not neglect a duty."

Thus it was that the man who did not care to stay in the world to be a governor chose life with all its losses in order to pay an honest debt.

Then William Green delivered a message from "Baby Green" which was a pressing invitation to Abe Lincoln to visit her for the very unselfish reason that the door had mashed her toe and she needed a great, tall horse to ride her.

So Abe Lincoln went home with William Green, where he was fed and looked after by the motherly Aunt Sally Green and where he was in turn expected to look after "Baby Green." Here children came to romp with him, books and papers were sent, and occasionally several of the old friends from New Salem came out to tell him the political gossip.

Aunt Sally found something for him to do every night, for she did not want him wandering away to Ann's grave. He made no effort to do so, however, and after a few weeks' rest he returned to New Salem to take up his life as best he could, and day by day live on for the things that were to be.