“Let them!” said Adam.
Then Adam walked on alone. Adam walked alone for forty years.
Not only on Memorial Day did he don his gray uniform and make the rounds of the village. When the Fosterville Grand Army Post met on Friday evenings in the post room, Adam managed to meet most of the members either going or returning. He and his gray suit became gradually so familiar to the village that no one turned his head or glanced up from book or paper to see him go by. He had from time to time a new suit, and he ordered from somewhere in the South a succession of gray, broad-brimmed military hats. The farther the war sank into the past, the straighter grew old Adam’s back, the prouder his head. Sometimes, early in the forty years, the acquaintances of his childhood, especially the women, remonstrated with him.
“The war’s over, Adam,” they would say. “Can’t you forget it?”
“Those G.A.R. fellows don’t forget it,” Adam would answer. “They haven’t changed their principles. Why should I change mine?”
“But you might make up with Henry.”
“That’s nobody’s business but my own.”
“But when you were children you were never separated. Make up, Adam.”
“When Henry needs me, I’ll help him,” said Adam.
“Henry will never need you. Look at all he’s got!”