Johnnie obeyed. He was stunned—that any man having on a One-Eye hat could act so bad. His pride was hurt, too, at being kicked at in public, and called a rat—he, the intimate of the famous Westerner. And his sense of justice was outraged; he had done nothing to deserve attack and insult.
This was not a matter for one of those "think" revenges. He might never see the man again, and whatever he did must be as plain to all passersby as had been the other's performance. So when Johnnie was well out of reach of the long-haired man, he halted to call back at him. "You ain't no real cowboy!" he declared. "Girl's hair! Girl's hair!"
But a pleasant experience came treading on the very heels of the unpleasant. This was under the Elevated Railroad in Second Avenue. At the moment, Johnnie chanced to be a great, champing war horse, grandly drawing, by a harness made all of the finest silk, a casket (that small box) filled with coins and bars of gold from Treasure Island. Being a war horse of Camelot, and, therefore, unused to New York and train tracks on stilts, he was prancing and rearing under his gay trappings in wild style when——
Up the stone-paved avenue they came, two and two, two and two, two and two, and behind those twos still others, all boys of Johnnie's own age, all dressed just alike, wearing clean khaki uniforms, new flat-brimmed hats of olive-drab, leggings, and polished brown shoes. What they were he did not know, though he guessed them to be rich, noting how proud was their carriage—chins up, backs straight. Beside them walked their leader, a grown young man, slender, and with a tanned face plentifully touched with red.
The war horse shrank into his rags. He would have darted out of sight so as not to be seen; would have hid behind a pillar of the Elevated, dreading looks of scorn, and laughter, and cat calls, but the sight of that marching column thrilled and held him. Once before he had seen a number of boys whom he had envied. They had had on sweaters and caps, the caps being lettered. They had carried baseball masks, and bats. But were such—a noisy, clamorous crew—worthy to be compared with these young gods?
Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp!—they passed him, their look high. But the eyes of all were kind and friendly as they caught sight of Johnnie. Yet—could they know who he was? of his friendship with the great cowboy? Hardly. And still the column did not mock at him. There was not a taunt, not a hoot!
When they were gone, he stood staring after them, so entranced that he was in danger of being run down by a surface car, or an automobile. Presently, however, on being ordered off the rails by an irate truck driver, he made on homeward slowly, his yellow head lowered thoughtfully, the box scraping along behind him at the end of a piece of rope.
"Guess they're some kind of soldiers," he told himself, and reflected that they were small to have been sent to war.
A hand touched his shoulder, stopping him. He glanced up. And could scarcely believe his eyes. For here, as surprising as lightning out of a sunny sky, was that leader, that grown young man. "Say, boy!" he panted, breathing hard from a run. "I saw you just now as we went by. Would you like to be a scout?"
"A—a scout?" faltered Johnnie, and did not know whether or not he could trust his ears; because only recently he had come to know all about scouts, regarded them as far beyond even the most distinguished among men (always barring cowboys), and had decided that, next after being one of One-Eye's company, he would like to be a scout. And here——