The two sat looking into each other’s eyes for just a moment. Said Thomas Jefferson at length, slowly:
“So! You have come back with all happiness, all success, for me and for others—but not for yourself! Such proving as you have had has fallen to the lot of but few men. I know now how great has been the cost—I see it in your face. The fifteen millions I paid for yonder lands was nothing. We have bought them with the happiness of a human soul! The transient gratitude of this republic—the honor of that little paper—bah, they are nothing! But perhaps it may be something for you to know that at least one friend understands.”
Lewis did not speak.
“What is lost is lost,” the President began again after a time. “What is broken is broken. But see how clearly I look into your soul. You are not thinking now of what you can do for yourself. You are not thinking of your new rank, your honors. You are asking now, at this moment, what you can do for her! Is it not so?”
The smile that came upon the young man’s face was a beautiful, a wonderful thing to see. It made the wise old man sad to see it—but thoughtful, too.
“She is at Richmond, Merne?” said Mr. Jefferson a moment later.
The young man nodded.
“And the greatest boon she could ask would be her father’s freedom—the freedom of the man who sought to ruin this country—the man whom I scarcely dare release.”
The thin lips compressed for a moment. It was not in implacable, vengeful zeal—it was but in thought.
“Now, then,” said Thomas Jefferson sharply, “there comes a veil, a curtain, between you and me and all the world. No record must show that either of us raised a hand against the full action of the law, or planned that Colonel Burr should not suffer the full penalty of the code. Yes, for him that is true—but not for his daughter!”