A long line of people already stretched from the entrance under the portico far out across the park, awaiting their turn to see the President.
Mrs. Cameron placed her hand falteringly on Elsie’s shoulder.
“Look, my dear, what a crowd already! Must we wait in line?”
“No, I can get you past the throng with my father’s name.”
“Will it be very difficult to reach the President?”
“No, it’s very easy. Guards and sentinels annoy him. He frets until they are removed. An assassin or maniac could kill him almost any hour of the day or night. The doors are open at all hours, very late at night. I have often walked up to the rooms of his secretaries as late as nine o’clock without being challenged by a soul.”
“What must I call him? Must I say ‘Your Excellency?’”
“By no means—he hates titles and forms. You should say ‘Mr. President’ in addressing him. But you will please him best if, in your sweet, homelike way, you will just call him by his name. You can rely on his sympathy. Read this letter of his to a widow. I brought it to show you.”
She handed Mrs. Cameron a newspaper clipping on which was printed Mr. Lincoln’s letter to Mrs. Bixby, of Boston, who had lost five sons in the war.
Over and over she read its sentences until they echoed as solemn music in her soul: