"Far from it--I assure you! I'm only wondering if it has the sullen,
dogged, staying qualities these stolid Northern men down there have
exhibited while they listened--"
The girl threw him a quick surprised look and he stopped. His voice had
unconsciously taken the tones of a soliloquy.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Barton," he said, with sudden swing to the
polite tones of society. "I'm annoying you with my foreign
speculations--"
A sudden murmur swept the galleries and all eyes were turned on the tall
slender figure of Jefferson Davis as he slowly entered the Senate
Chamber.
"Who is it?" Socola asked.
"Senator Davis--you don't know him?"
"I have never seen him before. He has been quite ill I hear."
"Yes. He's been in bed for the past week suffering agonies from
neuralgia. He lost the sight of one of his eyes from chronic pain caused
by exposure in the service of his country in the northwest."
"Really--I didn't know that."
"He was compelled to remain in a darkened room for months the past year
to save the sight of his remaining eye."
"That accounts for my not having seen him before."
Socola followed the straight military figure with painful interest as he
slowly moved toward his seat greeting with evident weakness his
colleagues as he passed.
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