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----

"Yes. Would you?" What had brought the leader back was the look of
heartrending yearning in the gray eyes of a tattered little boy. He
smiled, seeing that look swiftly change to one of joy, of awe.

"A scout!" repeated Johnnie. Suddenly beside him there was standing a
figure that was strange to Second Avenue. The figure was that of a
sunburned, lanky individual wearing a hunting shirt of forest-green,
fringed with faded yellow, and a summer cap of skins which had been
shorn of their fur. Under the smock-frock were leggings laced at the
sides, and gartered above the knees. On his feet were moccasins. There
was a knife in his girdle, and in his hands a long rifle. This was one
of Johnnie's new friends, that slayer of bad Indians, that crack shot,
the brave scout of _The Last of the Mohicans_. "And y' say I can be one?
One just like Hawkeye?"

"Hawkeye?"--the young man was puzzled.

Johnnie was disappointed. "Oh, y' don't know him," he said. "But he's a
scout."

"I mean a boy scout," explained the other, kindly. "Like my troop
there"--with a jerk of the head toward the khaki-clad column, now halted
a block away on the edge of the sidewalk.

Now that radiant, sunlit look--the glowing eyes and the flashing teeth
adding to the shine of hair and brows and lashes. "_Boy_ scout!" cried
Johnnie. Hawkeye was gone. Another vision stood in his place. It was
Johnnie himself, gloriously transformed. "Oh, gee! Oh, my goodness! Oh,
Mister! Oh, _could_ I? I'm crazy to! _Crazy!_"

The usual crowd of the curious--boys mostly--was now pressing about the
leader and Johnnie, the two or three grown people in it peeping over the
heads of the younger ones. But the young man seemed not to mind; and as
for Johnnie, if honors were coming his way on the open street, what
could be better than to have a few onlookers?

"Of course you'll be one," declared the leader, heartily. He produced a
pencil and a businesslike notebook. There was a pair of glasses hanging
against his coat on a round, black cord. These he adjusted. "Name and
address?" he asked; "--then I'll drop in to see you, and we'll talk it
all over with your father."

Johnnie gave the information. "Only I ain't got a father," he corrected,
as the pencil traveled. "But y' can tell the bo