“So you knew the president, then?” she asked, in a low voice.
“Knew him?—him? Yes’m.”
The old man laughed a hollow, toothless laugh, and squinted out across the dazzling river.
“Knew him twenty year, I did. A good man, and fair at that. Why, I’ve seen him a-settin’ jest where you’re settin’ this minute—seen him a hundred times a-settin’ there.”
“Fishing?” she said, in an awed voice.
“Sometimes. Sometimes he was a-drinkin’ out o’ that silver pocket-pistol o’ his’n. He got drunk a lot up here; but he didn’t drink alone; no’m. There wasn’t a stingy hair in his head; he—”
“Do you mean the president?” she said, incredulously, almost angrily.
“Him? Yes’m. Him an’ Colonel Hyssop an’ Major Brent; they had good times in them days.”
“You knew the president before his marriage,” she observed, coldly.
“Him? He wasn’t never married, miss!” said the old man, scornfully.