After supper they liked to gather at the inn to listen to Abe tell funny stories.  “I laughed until I shook my ribs loose,” said one dignified judge.

The other lawyers often teased Abe.  “You ought to charge your clients more money,” they said, “or you will always be as poor as Job’s turkey.”

One evening they held a mock trial.  Abe was accused of charging such small fees that the other lawyers could not charge as much as they should.  The judge looked as solemn as he did at a real trial.

“You are guilty of an awful crime against the pockets of your brother lawyers,” he said severely.  “I hereby sentence you to pay a fine.”

There was a shout of laughter.  “I’ll pay the fine,” said Abe good-naturedly.  “But my own firm is never going to be known as Catchem & Cheatem.”

Meanwhile a young lady named Mary Todd had come to Springfield to live.  Her father was a rich and important man in Kentucky.  Mary was pretty and well educated.  Abe was a little afraid of her, but one night at a party he screwed up his courage to ask her for a dance.

[Illustration]

“Miss Todd,” he said, “I would like to dance with you the worst way.”

As he swept her around the dance floor, he bumped into other couples.  He stepped on her toes.  “Mr. Lincoln,” said Mary, as she limped over to a chair, “you did dance with me the worst way—­the very worst.”

She did not mind that he was not a good dancer.  As she looked up into Abe’s homely face, she decided that he had a great future ahead of him.  She remembered something she had once said as a little girl:  “When I grow up, I want to marry a man who will be President of the United States.”

Abe was not the only one who liked Mary Todd.  Among the other young men who came to see her was another lawyer, Stephen A. Douglas.  He was no taller than Mary herself, but he had such a large head and shoulders that he had been nicknamed “the Little Giant.”  He was handsome, and rich, and brilliant.  His friends thought that he might be President some day.

“No,” said Mary, “Abe Lincoln has the better chance to succeed.”

Anyway, Abe was the man she loved.  The next year they were married.

“I mean to make him President of the United States,” she wrote to a friend in Kentucky.  “You will see that, as I always told you, I will yet be the President’s wife.”

At first Mary thought that her dream was coming true.  In 1846 Abe was elected a member of the United States Congress in Washington.  He had made a good start as a political leader, and she was disappointed when he did not run for a second term.  Back he came to Springfield to practice law again.  By 1854 there were three lively boys romping through the rooms of the comfortable white house that he had bought for his family.  Robert was eleven, Willie was four, and Tad was still a baby.  The neighbors used to smile to see Lawyer Lincoln walking down the street carrying Tad on his shoulders, while Willie clung to his coattails.  The boys adored their father.