ting his friend. He kept close watch of the men who passed him,
always hoping earnestly that one day he might catch sight of One-Eye.

He brought home only one box at a time. At first if some grocer gave him
a large one, so that he had more wood than was needed to start the
morning fire, he burned his surplus, so that he would have to go out
again the following day. Later on he gave the extra sticks to Mrs.
Kukor, tying them into a Robinson Crusoe bundle, like fagots, and
sending them up to the little Jewish lady via the kitchen window when
she let down a string. The two had a special signal for all this; they
called it the "wood sign."

One morning as Johnnie was strolling along New Bowery, alert as ever for
the sight of a pair of fur-faced breeches, his heart suddenly came at a
jump into his throat, and his head swam. For just ahead of him, going in
the same direction, was a tall man wearing a One-Eye hat!

Without a doubt in his mind that here was some one who knew his dear
friend, Johnnie let fall a small box he was carrying under one arm and
rushed forward, planting himself, breathless, in the man's way. "Oh,
Mister!" he cried. "Oh, where's One-Eye? Would y' tell him for me that I
want t' see him?--_awful_ bad! I'm Johnnie--Johnnie Smith!"

The man had long hair that covered his collar like Grandpa's. Also he
plainly had a temper much like Big Tom's. For after staring down at the
boy for a moment, he kicked out at him. "_On_ your way!" he ordered
angrily. "Ske-daddle!--you little rat!"

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