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During the next twenty years deaths were fewer. Fosterville prospered as never before; it built factories and an electric car line. Of all its enterprises Henry Foust was at the head. He enlarged his house and bought farms and grew handsomer as he grew older. Everybody loved him; all Fosterville, except Adam, sought his company.
Henry Foust ran down the steps and out to the gate. "Oh, Adam!" cried he. Adam stopped, stock-still. He could see Peter Allinson and Newton Towne, and even Ed Green, on Henry's porch. They were all having ice-cream and cake together. "Well, what?" said he, roughly. "Won't you shake hands with me?" "No," said Adam. "Won't you come in?" "Never." Still Henry persisted.
Before the court-house waited the band, and the long line of school-children, and the burgess, and the fire company, and the distinguished stranger who was to make the address, until Henry Foust appeared, in his blue suit, with his flag on his breast and his bouquet in his hand.
Copyright, 1916, by Elsie Singmaster Lewars In the year 1868, when Memorial Day was instituted, Fosterville had thirty-five men in its parade. Fosterville was a border town; in it enthusiasm had run high, and many more men had enlisted than those required by the draft. All the men were on the same side but Adam Foust, who, slipping away, joined himself to the troops of his mother's Southern State.
Past them still on post evenings walked Adam, head in air, hands clasped behind his back. There was Edward Green, round, fat, who puffed and panted; there was Newton Towne, who walked, in spite of palsy, as though he had won the battle of Gettysburg; there was, last of all, Henry Foust, who at seventy-five was hale and strong.
These were people who had known him always; the word flew from step to step. Many persons spoke to him, some laughed, and a few jeered. To no one did Adam pay any heed. Past the house of Newton Towne, past the store of Ed Green, past the wide lawn of Henry Foust, walked Adam, his hands clasped behind his back, as though to make more perpendicular than perpendicularity itself that stiff backbone.
Houses were gayly decorated, flags and banners floated in the pleasant spring breeze. Early in the morning carriages and wagons began to bring in the country folk. Adam Foust realized as well as Fosterville that the parades of veterans were drawing to their close. "This may be the last time I can show my principles," said he, with grim setting of his lips.
The tune was one which he hated; the colors he hated also; the marchers, all but one, he had never liked. There was Newton Towne, with a sergeant's stripe on his blue sleeve; there was Edward Green, a captain; there was Peter Allinson, a color-bearer. At their head, taller, handsomer, dearer than ever to Adam's jealous eyes, walked Henry Foust. In an instant of forgetfulness Adam waved his hand.
It seemed sometimes as though Adam would almost die from loneliness and jealousy. "Henry Foust sittin' with Ed Green!" said Adam to himself, as though he could never accustom his eyes to this phenomenon. "Henry consortin' with Newt Towne!" The Grand Army post also grew in importance. It paraded each year with more ceremony; it imported fine music and great speakers for Memorial Day.
Even his own grand-children did not dare to wave or call from their places in the ranks. Then the storm of cheers broke. Round the next corner Adam Foust waited. He was clad in his gray uniform those who looked at him closely saw with astonishment that it was a new uniform; his brows met in a frown, his gray moustache seemed to bristle.
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