Then the President rose, shaking himself like a great spaniel and laughing from delight in living.
"There are things to be done--oh, the fight is not over. Perhaps it is only begun. But to-day is my perfect moment--the first perfect moment of my life, God knows." He paused and raised himself to his full stature--challenging his fate. "It is enough to have lived for. I am content!"
He turned to Schotz again, and his face was radiant with steadfast brightness.
"There will be a future, my friend. We are ready for it, are we not? I know the path will be clear. I have begun--the first thing to be done is to heal. Beyond that"--he paused, and his forehead contracted slightly as if from doubt--"all is in the shadow." A veil made vague the joyousness of his eyes. It seemed to Joseph that his great friend was looking upon something that he himself could not see. The face brightened--the eyes opened wide--became luminous.... The President took up his words in an altered tone. "Beyond that--I cannot see," he ended, happily.
Joseph watched him for a moment. Then, uneasy, he put out his hand and touched him timidly on the sleeve. The President smiled at him again. There seemed to be no transition, and yet--they were back again in the world where things were to be done and--borne.
"And now, friend Joseph" (the President took up again the task he had set himself in the shadowed toy-shop), "when we were in the conquered city I found a toy--" He interrupted himself to laugh. "It was the only loot I permitted myself."
Joseph stared at him with puzzled expectation.
"For, after all, toys are the only things that are worth the consideration of wise folks like you and me." He was busily extricating a package from his pocket. It was done up in many wrappings. He watched while the sick man pulled off the papers, one after another. Joseph became angry with them--they seemed endless. Then the President chuckled gleefully, for he saw the color coming into Joseph's face. At last the toy stood in Joseph's hand revealed--a little tin soldier. Joseph looked at it in wonder.
"But what--?" he began. Then, "Why, it is the old uniform--he carries the tricolor. Where did you find Napoleon's soldier, my President?"