He let each boy of us take the stick in his hand and examine it reverently. It was a cane of some brown wood, with a round knob at the top, made of ivory or bone. Then he took a fat silver watch out of his pocket, and looked at that. "It's pretty nigh supper-time, an' I'm goin' along." He rose from the bench and walked slowly away, limping slightly, and leaning on the cane--the cane that Napoleon had given him! We walked toward our homes, maintaining a profound silence. On the other side of the pond we met Rob Currier, who was catching hornpouts. He addressed us derisively. "Was that old Napoleon Jones you were talking with? He been giving you some of his yarns? My father says he's cracked. He was in the Civil War, but some one got him all worked up about Napoleon, till he thinks he has seen him." If Rob had hit each one of us in the face with a wet hornpout, the effect would have been more agreeable. We encountered a realist for the first time when we met Rob that afternoon. We were walking through a golden haze of romance, when he suddenly drew this leaden-gray cloud across the sky. "You make me sick!" declared Ed Mason; "didn't he show us the very cane that Napoleon gave him?" "Of course he did!" replied Jimmy Toppan. And "Of course he did!" I chimed in. So we fell on Rob Currier, dragged him down on the turf, and stuffed grass and clover down the back of his neck until he yelled:-- "I take it all back!" Then we let him up. CHAPTER V A RUN ON THE BANK In the garden, at the side of our house, there was an apple tree. There were two routes to the top of it. One, the common everyday path, was obvious and easy, almost like climbing a ladder. You took hold of the large limb nearest the ground, curled one leg and then the other around it, and so wriggled upon its upper side. From that point you could climb from one branch to another, without any difficulty, till you had reached the top of the tree. That was the prosaic method for ordinary occasions. But when hard pressed by enemies, when the shrieking Indians were at our very heels, or a Bengal tiger with dripping jaws uttered his frightful snarls only three feet behind us, then the circumstances called for a different route. It must be something not only quick, but risky. Time must be saved, seconds were precious. More than that, the fitness of things called for an element of danger in the ascent. There was no honor in the adventure if we climbed by the slow, safe path--the highroad, so to speak, of commerce and trade. Blood was up; the blast of war blew in our ears. So, at such times, we approached the tree from the other side, leaped high in the air to a branch above our heads, and, by a deal of swarming, shinning, pulling, and straining, reached the top. Then, from amid the leaves, we could pour down a murderous fire from our trusty rifles, till every Indian lay stretched on the ground, or the Bengal tiger gave one last bellow and expired.