And when the
evening papers were distributed he hurried home to sit on the porch before
the house discussing with his sister Kate the honours that had alighted
upon their family.
* * * * *
With the coming of dawn on the great day the three McPhersons hurried hand
in hand toward Main Street. In the street, on all sides of them, they saw
people coming out of houses rubbing their eyes and buttoning their coats
as they went along the sidewalk. All of Caxton seemed abroad.
In Main Street the people were packed on the sidewalk, and massed on the
curb and in the doorways of the stores. Heads appeared at windows, flags
waved from roofs or hung from ropes stretched across the street, and a
great murmur of voices broke the silence of the dawn.
Sam's heart beat so that he was hard put to it to keep back the tears from
his eyes. He thought with a gasp of the days of anxiety that had passed
when the new bugle had not come from the Chicago company, and in
retrospect he suffered again the horror of the days of waiting. It had
been all important. He could not blame his father for raving and shouting
about the house, he himself had felt like raving, and had put another
dollar of his savings into telegrams before the treasure was finally in
his hands.
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