THE OTHER MARGARET
485
Elwin
remembered
the special note in his friends' voices
a~
they
spoke of the DeDions. They talked about the great Mediterranean mo–
tors with a respect that was not only technical but historical. There
had never been more than a
few
of the DeDions in America. Even
in 1917 they were no longer being imported and the boys thought
of them as old and rare.
Elwin took
his
seat inside the bus, at the rear.
As
suddenly as
the name DeDion, it came to him how the open deck had once been
a deck indeed- how, as sometimes the only passenger braving the
weather up there, he had been the captain of the adventure, facing
into the cold wind, even into the snow or rain, stoic, assailed but
unmoved by the elements, inhaling health, fortitude and growth, for
he had a boy's certainty that the more he endured, the stronger he
would become. And when he had learned to board the bus and alight
from it while it was still moving-"board" and "alight" were words
the company used in its notices-how far advanced in life he had
felt. So many landmarks of Elwin's boyhood in the city had vanished
but this shabby bus had endured since the day'l when it had taken
him daily to school.
At 82nd Street the bus ;;topped for a red hght. A boy stood
at the curb near the iron stanchion that bore the bus-stop sign. He
clutched something in his hand. It must have been a coin, for he said
to the conductor, "Mister, how much does it cost to ride on this
bus?"
Elwin could not be sure of the boy's age, but he was perhaps
twelve, Elwin's own age when he had been touched by his friends'
elegiac discussions of the DeDions. The boy was not alone, he had a
friend with him, and to see this friend , clearly a follower, was to un–
derstand the quality of the chief. The &ubaltern was a boy like any
other, but the face of his leader was alight with the power of mind
and a great urgency. Perhaps he was only late and in a hurry, but
in any case the urgency illuminated his remarkable face.
The conductor did not answer the question.
"Mister," the boy said again, "how much does it cost to
ride
on this bus?"
His friend stood by, sharing passively in the question but say–
ing nothing. They did not dare "board" until they knew whether or
not their resources were sufficient.
The boy was dressed sturdily enough, perhaps for a boy of his
age he was even well dressed. But he had been on the town or in the
park most of the afternoon, or perhaps he had been one of those
boys who, half in awe, half in rowdy levity, troop incessantly through
