“Yes—”
“I don’t think it can be done, little sweetheart. I never could like a hen that crows—”
Zonia waved her arm toward the big platform of the Woman’s Federated Clubs.
“There they are now!” she cried—“Marya and Grandpa—they’re sitting on the steps—”
“So I see—“ Vassar laughed.
Old Andrew Vassar was beaming his good-natured approval on the throng that surged about the stand, his arm encircling his little granddaughter with loving touch.
The younger man watched him a moment with a tender smile. His father was supremely happy in the great crowd of strong, healthy, free men and women. He knew nothing of the meaning of the meeting. He never bothered his head about it. The thing was a part of the life of America and it was good. He was seventy years old now—lame from an old wound received in Poland—but had a fine strong face beaming generous thoughts to all men. He had landed on our shores thirty years ago broken, bruised and ruined. He had dared to lift his voice in Poland for one of the simplest rights of his people. A brutal soldier at the order of their imperial master had sacked his home, murdered his wife and daughter before his eyes, robbed him of all and at last left him in the street, bleeding to death with a baby boy of five clinging to his body. His older son had smuggled him aboard a ship bound for New York. He had prospered from the day of his landing. A tailor by trade he had proven his worth from the first. For ten years he had been head cutter for a wholesale clothing house and received an annual salary of ten thousand dollars. Ten years ago the might of kings had gripped the son he left behind. His goods too were forfeited, his life snuffed out and his children orphaned. Big free America had received them now, and the old man’s strong arm circled them. The little terror-stricken boy, who had clung to him the day the soldiers left him in the street for dead, was the Honorable John Vassar, the coming man of a mighty nation of freemen.
Old Andrew Vassar made no effort to grasp the current of our social or political life. It was all good. He went to all the political meetings, Democratic, Republican, Socialist, Woman’s Suffrage. He liked to test his freedom and laugh to find it true.
He caught John’s eye, waved his arm enthusiastically and lifted Marya high above the heads of the crowd that she might throw him a kiss.
Zonia answered with a little cry of love and they quickly pressed through the throng to a position directly in front of the speaker’s stand.