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He had to do it, and I had a feeling that it was a very difficult thing he had in mind. I felt like saying to him - I stopped by his chair, and he reached up and took my hand, and I said, “Remember, I'll pray for you every day of my life, while you're gone.”

He squeezed my hand in that kind of emotional sincere feeling, and he said, “for God's sake, do, Francis. I need it.” or, “I shall need it.”

You know - that was that. It was an exchange of considerable intimacy of feeling; that I knew he was on a mission, and that my duty to him was to pray for him, for strength and wisdom and health and everything else.

He didn't look so terribly badly that morning. He'd been looking, of course, thinner. This is the morning of Inauguration Day. He didn't look so badly that morning - he didn't look really as badly as he had looked in the Cabinet room two days before, when I had finally pressed him on my resignation, you remember, and he had all but collapsed in my arms as he said he couldn't let me go now, and please don't talk about it now. Don't talk about it again. Let everything go. He looked very badly then.

But by that morning of Inauguration Day, he looked quite well - that is, his eyes looked bright, his skin looked good, he had a kind of vigor of approach. He didn't look dead-pale, I mean - he had some life in his skin.