He spoke in a tone of aggrieved virtue, and regarded the other with a scowl.  The men guffawed, and after a second the boys also.  Then a little fellow behind the ringleader offered additional testimony.

“He said he used to get up a private circus once a week, every Saturday, and charge ten cents a head, and made ten dollars a week,” he said.  Then his voice of angry accusation ended in a chuckle.

Anderson kept his face quite grave, but all the others joined in the chorus of merriment.  The little fellow backed against the iron fence gave an incredulous start at the sound of the laughter, then the red roses faded out on his smooth cheeks and he went quite white.  The laughter stung his very soul as no recrimination could have done.  He suffered tortures of mortified pride.  His fists were still clinched, but his proud lip quivered a little.  He looked very young—­a baby.

Anderson stepped to his aid.  He raised his voice.  “Now, look here, boys,” he said.  But he made no headway against the hilarity, which swelled higher and higher.  The crowd increased.  Several more men and boys were on the outskirts.  An ally pressed through the crowd to Anderson’s side.

“Now, boys,” he proclaimed, and for a moment his thin squeak weighted with importance gained a hearing—­“now, boys,” said the barber, “this little feller’s father is an extinguished new denizen of Banbridge, and you ain’t treatin’ of him with proper disrespect.  Now—­” But then his voice was drowned in a wilder outburst than ever.  The little crowd of men and boys went fairly mad with hysterical joy of mirth, as an American crowd will when once overcome by the humor of the situation in the midst of their stress of life.  They now laughed at the little barber and the boy.  The old familiar butt had joined forces with the new ones.

“They have formed a trust,” said Amidon, deserting his partisanship, now that it had assumed this phase of harmless jocularity.

But the boy at bay, as the laughter at his expense increased, was fairly frantic.  He lost what he had hitherto retained, his self-possession.  “I tell you I did!” he suddenly screamed out, in a sweet screech, like an angry bird, which commanded the ears of the crowd from its strangeness.  “I tell you I did have an elephant, I did ride him, and I did have a circus every Saturday afternoon, so there!”

The “so there” was tremendous.  The words vanished in the sound.  The boyish expression denoting triumphant climax became individual, the language of one soul.  He fired the words at them all like a charge of shot.  There was a pause of a second, then the laughter and mocking were recommencing.  But Anderson took advantage of the lull.

“See here, boys,” he shouted, “there’s been enough of this.  What is it to you whether he had a dozen elephants and rode them all at once, and had a circus every day in the week with a dozen tame bears thrown in?  Clear out and go home and get your dinners.  Clear out!  Vamoose!  Scatter!” His tone was at once angry and appealing.  It implied authority and comradeship.