It hung over one knee now, a red cotton handkerchief tucked under
its brim. He was superstitious about it, no doubt; he would wear it when
he walked out a free man, and wanted it always within reach. Hooked in
its band was a trout-fly, a red ibis, some souvenir, perhaps, of the
cool woods that he loved, and which brought back to him the clearer the
happy, careless days which might never be his again.
The trout-fly settled all doubts in my mind as to his origin and his
identity. He was not a "moonshiner"; he was my old trout fisherman,
Jonathan Gordon, come back to life, even to his streaming, unkempt
beard, leathery skin, thin, peaked nose, and deep, searching eyes. That
the daisies which Jonathan loved were at that very moment blooming over
his grave up in his New Hampshire hills, and had been for years back,
made no difference to me. I could not be mistaken. The feeble old man
sitting within ten feet of me, fidgeting about in his chair, the glare
of the big windows flooding his face with light, his long legs tucked
under him, his bony hands clasped together, the scanty gray hair adrift
over his forehead, his slouch hat hooked over his knee, was my own
Jonathan come back to life.
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