He Knew Lincoln, and Other Billy Brown Stories

by Ida M. Tarbell

Well, I thought that over a lot, and it was queer how calm I came to feel—calm and sure, just as you be about God and all that. And when he was defeated I didn’t seem to mind—any more’n he did. There wa’n’t hardly anybody could understand why he took it so easy, and he had to go around consolin’ ’em an’ stiffenin’ ’em up and tellin’ ’em as he had me, how it was a durable struggle—that’s the word he always used—“durable.” Always seemed to me it was exactly the word for it—something that wa’n’t going to wear out.

Ever see Douglas after that? Yes, onct. One day after election he come in here, and after talkin’ around a spell he says suddint:

“Billy, you supported Mr. Lincoln, didn’t you?” And he looked me straight in the eye, kind, but meanin’ to know from me. Well, you bet I’d liked to have lied, but that ain’t the kind of a thing a man lies about.

“Yes, Mr. Douglas,” I says, “I did, I had to. He had it right.”

Well, sir, you never see the way he smiled at me. “That’s right, Billy,” he says, “I understand,” and then he grips my hand and turns on his heel and goes off with his head down.

Seemed to me I couldn’t stand it. You see I’d always loved Little Dug, and I’d been proud of him. Lordy, sometimes when he’d come back from Washington in them old days and come in here, all dressed up and lookin’ so handsome and great, and come up and put his arm around me and ask about Ma and Johnnie and how business was, I’ll be blamed if I didn’t git red as a girl, I was so pleased. I’d hurrahed for him and voted for him for years, and here I had gone back on him. It just made me sick.

I couldn’t stand it to stay in the store, so I put on my hat and went home and told Ma. “I almost wisht I hadn’t done it,” I says, groanin’.

“William,” Ma says, “you know well enough you couldn’t have done nuthin’ else. I don’t understand these things none too well. ’Tain’t a woman’s business; but you done what you thought was right and you ain’t no call to worry about doin’ what you think is right.” That’s the way Ma always talks. You ought to know Ma.