Sam looked on and again patted his key. The hayseeds had aired their collars and had "got it in the neck." No G. A. R. for Samuel; no excursions, no celebrations, no picnics for him. He had all his teeth, and an extra wisdom molar for Sundays.
The contents of the tenement now began to press through the closed shed on their way to the gangplank, and Sam, realizing the size of the mob, and fearing that half of them, including himself, would be left on the dock, slipped into the current and was swept over the temporary bridge, across the deck and up the main staircase leading to the saloon—up to the top step.
Here the current stopped.
Ahead of him was a solid mass, and behind him a pressure that increased every moment and that threatened to push him off his feet. He could get neither forward nor back.
A number of other people were in the same predicament. One was a young woman who, in sheer exhaustion, had seated herself upon the top step level with the floor of the saloon. Her hair was dishevelled, her bonnet awry, her pretty silk cape covered with dust. On her lap lay a boy of five years of age. Close to her—so close that Sam's shoulder pressed against his—stood a man in an army hat with the cord and acorn encircling the crown. On his breast was pinned a medal. Sam was so close he could read the inscription: "Fair Oaks," it said, and then followed the date and the name and number of the regiment. Sam knew what it meant: he had had an uncle who went to the war, and who wore a medal. His sword hung over the mantel in his mother's sitting-room at home. The man before him had, no doubt, been equally brave: he had saved the colors the day of the fight, perhaps, or had carried a wounded comrade out of range of a rifle pit, or had thrown an unexploded shell clear of a tent—some little thing like that.
Sam had never seen a medal that close before, and his keen lens absorbed every detail—the ribbon, the way it was fastened to the cloth, the broad, strong chest behind it. Then he looked into the man's firm, determined, kindly face with its piercing black eyes and closely trimmed mustache, and then over his back and legs. He was wondering now where the ball had struck him, and what particular part of his person had been sacrificed in earning so distinguishing a mark of his country's gratitude.
Then he turned to the woman, and a slight frown gathered on his face when he realized that she alone had blocked his way to the open air and the deck beyond. He could step over any number of men whenever the mass of human beings crushing his ribs and shoulder-blades began once more to move, but a woman—a tired woman—with a boy—out on a jamboree like this, with——
Here Sam stopped, and instinctively felt around among his loose change for his key. Number 15 was all right, any way.
At the touch of the key Sam's face once more resumed its contented look, the lizards darting out to play, as usual.
The boy gave a sharp cry.