Anderson had given great promise as a speaker during his college course.  He was a man who, if he exerted himself, could gauge the temper of a mob.  The men on the outskirts began moving away easily; the boys followed their example.  The little barber took the boy familiarly by the arm.

“Now, you look at here,” said he.  “Don’t you hev them chaps a-pesterin’ of you no more, an’ ef they do, you jest streak right into my parlor an’ I’ll take care of ye.  See?”

The boy twitched his arm away and eyed the barber witheringly.  “I don’t want anything to do with you nor your old barber-shop,” said he.

“You had better run along, John,” said Anderson to the barber, who was staring amazedly, although the complacent smirk upon his face was undiminished.

“I guess he’s a child kinder given to speakin’ at tandem,” he said, as he complied with Anderson’s advice.

The boy turned at once to the man.  “What business had that barber telling me to go into his old barber-shop?” demanded he.  “I ain’t afraid of all the boys in this one-horse town.”

“Of course not,” said Anderson.

“I did have an elephant when I lived in Hillfield, and I did ride him, and I did have circuses every Saturday,” said the boy, with challenge.

Anderson said nothing.

“At least—­” said the child, in a modified tone.  Anderson looked at him with an air of polite waiting.  The boy’s roses bloomed again.  “At least—­” he faltered, “at least—­” A maid rang a dinner-bell frantically in the doorway of the house near which they were standing.  Anderson glanced at her, then back at the boy.  “At least—­” said the boy, with a blurt of confidence which yielded nothing, but implied the recognition of a friend and understander in the man—­“at—­least I used to make believe I had an elephant when I lived in Hillfield.”

“Yes?” said Anderson.  He made a movement to go, and the boy still kept at his side.

“And—­” he added, but still with no tone of apology or confession, “I might have had an elephant.”

“Yes,” said Anderson, “you might have.”

“And they did not know but what I might,” said the boy, angrily.

Anderson nodded judicially.  “That’s so, I suppose; only elephants are not very common as setter dogs for a boy to have around these parts.”

“It was a setter dog,” said the boy, with a burst of innocence and admiration.  “How did you know?”

“Oh, I guessed.”

“You must be real smart,” said the boy.  “My father said he thought you were, and somehow had got stranded in a grocery store.  Did you?”

“Yes, I did,” replied Anderson.

Anderson was now walking quite briskly towards home and dinner, and the boy was trotting by his side, with seemingly no thought of parting.  They proceeded in silence for a few steps; then the boy spoke again.

“I began with the setter dog,” said he.  “His name was Archie, and he used to jump over the roof of a part of our house as high as”—­he looked about and pointed conclusively at the ell of a house across the street—­“as high as that,” he said, with one small pink finger indicating unwaveringly.