Gerry Margarita Spalding
The Toy Shop: A Romantic Story of Lincoln the Man
"I have it!" cried the Man, in heart-felt triumph. He looked up. There was a dawning realization of his audience.
"A queer thing for an old man like me to be playing with toy soldiers," he laughed, sweeping the late combatants into an undignified heap.
"So have I seen the officers at home in the école de guerre. Such play would aid you were you a soldier."
The tall man shot a quick glance at Joseph, in which there was much humor and some suspicion.
"Tell me – " he began. But he did not finish his sentence. He was feverishly anxious to be gone. There was so much to be done; the child's fingers were clumsy as she wrapped up the soldiers. But he found time for a smile at the little maid and a sympathetic pressure of Joseph's hand before he crossed the threshold and was gone.
At the same moment there was a bustle at the door. Mrs. Schotz hurried in, market-basket in hand. She had not laid it down before she was at her husband's side, her anxious eyes searching his face to find how he had fared.
"Clara, the tall man has been here again."
"Yes," she said, "I met him. Do you know yet who he is?"
"I have thought that I have somewhere seen a face like that," replied Joseph, slowly. "Something made me feel – his playing with the soldiers, which yet seemed more than play – he might be in the army – he might even be an officer – and yet he had not the air. Still, they are not all drilled in schools, these officers in this war."
"But listen," said his wife, as she seated herself by him, with joy that there was something to tell that he would be glad to hear. "I have something to tell you. This morning, on my way to market, everywhere there were soldiers – dirty, lean as from hunger, faces black with powder stains. At first I was afraid – "
"But, my wife," said Joseph, indulgently, "what was there to be feared?"
"I will tell you. A crowd of soldiers came swaggering into Schmidt's. They ordered him to wait on them, and when he asked for money for the food, they shook their fists at him with ugly words, and called for all to come and take what they would. Two officers hurried up and ordered them to return to their ranks, but they laughed at the officers."
"Mutiny!" whispered Napoleon's soldier, his face pale with excitement.
"They swore oaths and said that they would fight no more battles for men who were old women and stayed at home while they sweated and bled and were starving."
"Without doubt their officers ordered them into arrest?" demanded Joseph, fiercely.
"Who was there to arrest them? The officers looked white, and I was trembling. More soldiers came into the square, until everywhere there were angry faces and bodies swaying this way and that, while the men were thinking what evil they should do. At that moment a carriage drove up at full speed. There was one man in it. He stood up; he was a tall man. A hesitating sort of shout went up from the soldiers. Then there was a great muttering, and every one rushed toward him, and some were shaking their fists.
"The man stood still. He said no word. But little by little the muttering stopped and there was silence. Then the crowd began backing away from him. There was a break in the mass, and through it I saw his face. He was smiling with – well, the way fathers look at their children that have hurt themselves because they were naughty and are yet not very bad. Still there was silence."
"He held them so?" broke in Joseph. "But then he was a great man. But who?"
"Wait. He began talking to them. I couldn't hear what he said, for all the men began crowding up around him. But one moment they laughed, and the next they were wiping their eyes with the back of their hands."
Joseph was listening with shining eyes.
"When he had driven off again the soldiers went back to their camp. Some of them looked downcast and ashamed, but most of them were just boyish and good-natured, as if they had forgotten how they felt before. One boy laughed as he passed me:
"'Say, that was a good one about the tin soldier. I felt like a toy soldier myself when he turned those eyes of his on me!'"
"Who was it?" asked Joseph Schotz, eagerly. "Have they such a man? Was it the new general? I have thought he might be such a man – to win such victories. And yet" – his face fell – "that one is a short man, and this, you said, was very tall."
"The general? No!" said Mrs. Schotz, contemptuously. "It was not the general. As he drove off, some boys shouted, 'Hurrah for the President!'"
"The President!" Joseph echoed.
"The President. And, Joseph, when I saw his face I knew him." She paused to make sure of the effect upon her petted invalid of what she had to say. "It was he who came to us to buy toy soldiers!"
She fell back triumphantly when she had fired this bolt of wonder. But Joseph was looking at her with eyes in which there was no wonder – only comprehension.
"So," he said, slowly – "so – that was the President. So Napoleon would have done."
The doctor had told Joseph that he must go to his bed. The old soldier winced. A man may be brave before bullets and yet quail before the doctor. The bed was brought down into the little kitchen back of the shop. Joseph insisted on it.
"It is that I may be able to help you tend the shop," he said. But the real reason was that he might not be banished from the children's domain. He could still see Minna and Rosa and Bennie come for their toys.
Thus it happened that one morning Joseph sat propped up in his narrow wooden bed. Mrs. Schotz bustled, with much demonstration of activity, about her work. Joseph almost wished that she would go up-stairs. He was forced to keep up an appearance of much cheerfulness – if he screwed up his face when the pain came, she wept.
"I wonder if the President will come to-day," he thought. "He said he would as soon as he got back. I want to see how he looks since the surrender. Strange that it should have been on Palm Sunday." His eyes strayed to the mantel-piece, where a spray of palm waved from a gilt vase. The wife had had it in her hand when she came in from the street with the news the day before.
"If he would come, it would be easier," thought Joseph. "He would take my hand and look deep into my eyes – it would be as if he took some of the pain away from me – into his own heart." And then, because some childishness is permitted to the sick, he moved peevishly in his bed and thumped his pillow.
Suddenly the door opened. It was the President. Still, a different President – almost a new one. His shoulders were straight and held well back. He walked with a sort of joyous impatience, as though he brushed aside palms of victory. His eyes glowed. He spoke as he entered, and his voice broke into a boyish laugh. When he looked into the room and saw Joseph, the full meaning of the change struck him and his face fell. For a moment he looked almost abashed. Then, shaking his head with decision, he strode through the shop to where the sick man lay. He took Joseph's hand with resolute happiness and held it, looking full into the other man's eyes. There was no need of words between them. A heartening and a tonic influence went from one man to the other.