At the dinner-table, that evening, Penrod Surprised his family by
remarking, in a voice they had never heard him attempt--a law-giving
voice of intentional gruffness:
“Any man that's makin' a hunderd dollars a month is makin' good money.”
“What?” asked Mr. Schofield, staring, for the previous conversation had
concerned the illness of an infant relative in Council Bluffs.
“Any man that's makin' a hunderd dollars a month is makin' good money.”
“What IS he talking about!” Margaret appealed to the invisible.
“Well,” said Penrod, frowning, “that's what foremen at the ladder works
get.”
“How in the world do you know?” asked his mother.
“Well, I KNOW it! A hunderd dollars a month is good money, I tell you!”
“Well, what of it?” said the father, impatiently.
“Nothin'. I only said it was good money.”
Mr. Schofield shook his head, dismissing the subject; and here he made
a mistake: he should have followed up his son's singular contribution
to the conversation. That would have revealed the fact that there was a
certain Rupe Collins whose father was a foreman at the ladder works. All
clues are important when a boy makes his first remark in a new key.
“'Good money'?” repeated Margaret, curiously. “What is 'good' money?”
Penrod turned upon her a stern glance. “Say, wouldn't you be just as
happy if you had SOME sense?”
“Penrod!” shouted his father. But Penrod's mother gazed with dismay at
her son: he had never before spoken like that to his sister.
Mrs. Schofield might have been more dismayed than she was, if she had
realized that it was the beginning of an epoch. After dinner, Penrod was
slightly scalded in the back as the result of telling Della, the cook,
that there was a wart on the middle finger of her right hand. Della thus
proving poor material for his new manner to work upon, he approached
Duke, in the backyard, and, bending double, seized the lowly animal by
the forepaws.
“I let you know my name's Penrod Schofield,” hissed the boy. He
protruded his underlip ferociously, scowled, and thrust forward his head
until his nose touched the dog's. “And you better look out when Penrod
Schofield's around, or you'll get in big trouble! YOU UNDERSTAN' THAT,
'BO?”
The next day, and the next, the increasing change in Penrod puzzled and
distressed his family, who had no idea of its source.
How might they guess that hero-worship takes such forms? They were
vaguely conscious that a rather shabby boy, not of the neighbourhood,
came to “play” with Penrod several times; but they failed to connect
this circumstance with the peculiar behaviour of the son of the house,
whose ideals (his father remarked) seemed to have suddenly become
identical with those of Gyp the Blood.
Meanwhile, for Penrod himself, “life had taken on new meaning, new
richness.” He had become a fighting man--in conversation at least. “Do
you want to know how I do when they try to slip up on me from behind?”
he asked Della. And he enacted for her unappreciative eye a scene of
fistic manoeuvres wherein he held an imaginary antagonist helpless in a
net of stratagems.
Frequently, when he was alone, he would outwit, and pummel this same
enemy, and, after a cunning feint, land a dolorous stroke full upon a
face of air. “There! I guess you'll know better next time. That's the
way we do up at the Third!”
Sometimes, in solitary pantomime, he encountered more than one opponent
at a time, for numbers were apt to come upon him treacherously,
especially at a little after his rising hour, when he might be caught at
a disadvantage--perhaps standing on one leg to encase the other in his
knickerbockers. Like lightning, he would hurl the trapping garment from
him, and, ducking and pivoting, deal great sweeping blows among the
circle of sneaking devils. (That was how he broke the clock in his
bedroom.) And while these battles were occupying his attention, it was
a waste of voice to call him to breakfast, though if his mother, losing
patience, came to his room, she would find him seated on the bed pulling
at a stocking. “Well, ain't I coming fast as I CAN?”
At the table and about the house generally he was bumptious, loud with
fatuous misinformation, and assumed a domineering tone, which neither
satire nor reproof seemed able to reduce: but it was among his own
intimates that his new superiority was most outrageous. He twisted the
fingers and squeezed the necks of all the boys of the neighbourhood,
meeting their indignation with a hoarse and rasping laugh he had
acquired after short practice in the stable, where he jeered and taunted
the lawn-mower, the garden-scythe and the wheelbarrow quite out of
countenance.
Likewise he bragged to the other boys by the hour, Rupe Collins being
the chief subject of encomium--next to Penrod himself. “That's the
way we do up at the Third,” became staple explanation of violence, for
Penrod, like Tartarin, was plastic in the hands of his own imagination,
and at times convinced himself that he really was one of those dark
and murderous spirits exclusively of whom “the Third” was
composed--according to Rupe Collins.
Then, when Penrod had exhausted himself repeating to nausea accounts of
the prowess of himself and his great friend, he would turn to two other
subjects for vainglory. These were his father and Duke.
Mothers must accept the fact that between babyhood and manhood their
sons do not boast of them. The boy, with boys, is a Choctaw; and either
the influence or the protection of women is shameful. “Your mother won't
let you,” is an insult. But, “My father won't let me,” is a dignified
explanation and cannot be hooted. A boy is ruined among his fellows if
he talks much of his mother or sisters; and he must recognize it as
his duty to offer at least the appearance of persecution to all things
ranked as female, such as cats and every species of fowl. But he must
champion his father and his dog, and, ever, ready to pit either against
any challenger, must picture both as ravening for battle and absolutely
unconquerable.
Penrod, of course, had always talked by the code, but, under the new
stimulus, Duke was represented virtually as a cross between Bob, Son of
Battle, and a South American vampire; and this in spite of the fact that
Duke himself often sat close by, a living lie, with the hope of peace
in his heart. As for Penrod's father, that gladiator was painted as of
sentiments and dimensions suitable to a super-demon composed of equal
parts of Goliath, Jack Johnson and the Emperor Nero.
Even Penrod's walk was affected; he adopted a gait which was a kind of
taunting swagger; and, when he passed other children on the street, he
practised the habit of feinting a blow; then, as the victim dodged,
he rasped the triumphant horse laugh which he gradually mastered to
horrible perfection. He did this to Marjorie Jones--ay! this was
their next meeting, and such is Eros, young! What was even worse, in
Marjorie's opinion, he went on his way without explanation, and left
her standing on the corner talking about it, long after he was out of
hearing.
Within five days from his first encounter with Rupe Collins, Penrod had
become unbearable. He even almost alienated Sam Williams, who for a time
submitted to finger twisting and neck squeezing and the new style of
conversation, but finally declared that Penrod made him “sick.” He made
the statement with fervour, one sultry afternoon, in Mr. Schofield's
stable, in the presence of Herman and Verman.
“You better look out, 'bo,” said Penrod, threateningly. “I'll show you a
little how we do up at the Third.”
“Up at the Third!” Sam repeated with scorn. “You haven't ever been up
there.”
“I haven't?” cried Penrod. “I HAVEN'T?”
“No, you haven't!”
“Looky here!” Penrod, darkly argumentative, prepared to perform the
eye-to-eye business. “When haven't I been up there?”
“You haven't NEVER been up there!” In spite of Penrod's closely
approaching nose Sam maintained his ground, and appealed for
confirmation. “Has he, Herman?”
“I don' reckon so,” said Herman, laughing.
“WHAT!” Penrod transferred his nose to the immediate vicinity of
Herman's nose. “You don't reckon so, 'bo, don't you? You better look out
how you reckon around here! YOU UNDERSTAN' THAT, 'BO?”
Herman bore the eye-to-eye very well; indeed, it seemed to please
him, for he continued to laugh while Verman chuckled delightedly. The
brothers had been in the country picking berries for a week, and it
happened that this was their first experience of the new manifestation
of Penrod.
“HAVEN'T I been up at the Third?” the sinister Penrod demanded.
“I don' reckon so. How come you ast ME?”
“Didn't you just hear me SAY I been up there?”
“Well,” said Herman mischievously, “hearin' ain't believin'!”
Penrod clutched him by the back of the neck, but Herman, laughing
loudly, ducked and released himself at once, retreating to the wall.
“You take that back!” Penrod shouted, striking out wildly.
“Don' git mad,” begged the small darky, while a number of blows falling
upon his warding arms failed to abate his amusement, and a sound one
upon the cheek only made him laugh the more unrestrainedly. He behaved
exactly as if Penrod were tickling him, and his brother, Verman, rolled
with joy in a wheelbarrow. Penrod pummelled till he was tired, and
produced no greater effect.
“There!” he panted, desisting finally. “NOW I reckon you know whether I
been up there or not!”
Herman rubbed his smitten cheek. “Pow!” he exclaimed. “Pow-ee! You
cert'ny did lan' me good one NAT time! Oo-ee! she HURT!”
“You'll get hurt worse'n that,” Penrod assured him, “if you stay around
here much. Rupe Collins is comin' this afternoon, he said. We're goin'
to make some policemen's billies out of the rake handle.”
“You go' spoil new rake you' pa bought?”
“What do WE care? I and Rupe got to have billies, haven't we?”
“How you make 'em?”
“Melt lead and pour in a hole we're goin' to make in the end of 'em.
Then we're goin' to carry 'em in our pockets, and if anybody says
anything to us--OH, oh! look out! They won't get a crack on the
head--OH, no!”
“When's Rupe Collins coming?” Sam Williams inquired rather uneasily.
He had heard a great deal too much of this personage, but as yet the
pleasure of actual acquaintance had been denied him.
“He's liable to be here any time,” answered Penrod. “You better look
out. You'll be lucky if you get home alive, if you stay till HE comes.”
“I ain't afraid of him,” Sam returned, conventionally.
“You are, too!” (There was some truth in the retort.) “There ain't any
boy in this part of town but me that wouldn't be afraid of him. You'd be
afraid to talk to him. You wouldn't get a word out of your mouth before
old Rupie'd have you where you'd wished you never come around HIM,
lettin' on like you was so much! YOU wouldn't run home yellin' 'Mom-muh'
or nothin'! OH, no!”
“Who Rupe Collins?” asked Herman.
“'Who Rupe Collins?'” Penrod mocked, and used his rasping laugh, but,
instead of showing fright, Herman appeared to think he was meant to
laugh, too; and so he did, echoed by Verman. “You just hang around here
a little while longer,” Penrod added, grimly, “and you'll find out who
Rupe Collins is, and I pity YOU when you do!”
“What he go' do?”
“You'll see; that's all! You just wait and----”
At this moment a brown hound ran into the stable through the alley door,
wagged a greeting to Penrod, and fraternized with Duke. The fat-faced
boy appeared upon the threshold and gazed coldly about the little
company in the carriage-house, whereupon the coloured brethren, ceasing
from merriment, were instantly impassive, and Sam Williams moved a
little nearer the door leading into the yard.
Obviously, Sam regarded the newcomer as a redoubtable if not ominous
figure. He was a head taller than either Sam or Penrod; head and
shoulders taller than Herman, who was short for his age; and Verman
could hardly be used for purposes of comparison at all, being a mere
squat brown spot, not yet quite nine years on this planet. And to
Sam's mind, the aspect of Mr. Collins realized Penrod's portentous
foreshadowings. Upon the fat face there was an expression of truculent
intolerance which had been cultivated by careful habit to such
perfection that Sam's heart sank at sight of it. A somewhat enfeebled
twin to this expression had of late often decorated the visage of
Penrod, and appeared upon that ingenuous surface now, as he advanced to
welcome the eminent visitor.
The host swaggered toward the door with a great deal of shoulder
movement, carelessly feinting a slap at Verman in passing, and creating
by various means the atmosphere of a man who has contemptuously amused
himself with underlings while awaiting an equal.
“Hello, 'bo!” Penrod said in the deepest voice possible to him.
“Who you callin' 'bo?” was the ungracious response, accompanied by
immediate action of a similar nature. Rupe held Penrod's head in the
crook of an elbow and massaged his temples with a hard-pressing knuckle.
“I was only in fun, Rupie,” pleaded the sufferer, and then, being set
free, “Come here, Sam,” he said.
“What for?”
Penrod laughed pityingly. “Pshaw, I ain't goin' to hurt you. Come on.”
Sam, maintaining his position near the other door, Penrod went to him
and caught him round the neck.
“Watch me, Rupie!” Penrod called, and performed upon Sam the knuckle
operation which he had himself just undergone, Sam submitting
mechanically, his eyes fixed with increasing uneasiness upon Rupe
Collins. Sam had a premonition that something even more painful than
Penrod's knuckle was going to be inflicted upon him.
“THAT don' hurt,” said Penrod, pushing him away.
“Yes, it does, too!” Sam rubbed his temple.
“Puh! It didn't hurt me, did it, Rupie? Come on in, Rupe: show this baby
where he's got a wart on his finger.”
“You showed me that trick,” Sam objected. “You already did that to
me. You tried it twice this afternoon and I don't know how many times
before, only you weren't strong enough after the first time. Anyway, I
know what it is, and I don't----”
“Come on, Rupe,” said Penrod. “Make the baby lick dirt.”
At this bidding, Rupe approached, while Sam, still protesting, moved to
the threshold of the outer door; but Penrod seized him by the shoulders
and swung him indoors with a shout.
“Little baby wants to run home to its Mom-muh! Here he is, Rupie.”
Thereupon was Penrod's treachery to an old comrade properly rewarded,
for as the two struggled, Rupe caught each by the back of the neck,
simultaneously, and, with creditable impartiality, forced both boys to
their knees.
“Lick dirt!” he commanded, forcing them still forward, until their faces
were close to the stable floor.
At this moment he received a real surprise. With a loud whack something
struck the back of his head, and, turning, he beheld Verman in the act
of lifting a piece of lath to strike again.
“Em moys ome!” said Verman, the Giant Killer.
“He tongue-tie',” Herman explained. “He say, let 'em boys alone.”
Rupe addressed his host briefly:
“Chase them nigs out o' here!”
“Don' call me nig,” said Herman. “I mine my own biznuss. You let 'em
boys alone.”
Rupe strode across the still prostrate Sam, stepped upon Penrod, and,
equipping his countenance with the terrifying scowl and protruded jaw,
lowered his head to the level of Herman's.
“Nig, you'll be lucky if you leave here alive!” And he leaned forward
till his nose was within less than an inch of Herman's nose.
It could be felt that something awful was about to happen, and Penrod,
as he rose from the floor, suffered an unexpected twinge of apprehension
and remorse: he hoped that Rupe wouldn't REALLY hurt Herman. A sudden
dislike of Rupe and Rupe's ways rose within him, as he looked at the big
boy overwhelming the little darky with that ferocious scowl. Penrod,
all at once, felt sorry about something indefinable; and, with equal
vagueness, he felt foolish. “Come on, Rupe,” he suggested, feebly, “let
Herman go, and let's us make our billies out of the rake handle.”
The rake handle, however, was not available, if Rupe had inclined to
favour the suggestion. Verman had discarded his lath for the rake, which
he was at this moment lifting in the air.
“You ole black nigger,” the fat-faced boy said venomously to Herman,
“I'm agoin' to----”
But he had allowed his nose to remain too long near Herman's.
Penrod's familiar nose had been as close with only a ticklish spinal
effect upon the not very remote descendant of Congo man-eaters. The
result produced by the glare of Rupe's unfamiliar eyes, and by
the dreadfully suggestive proximity of Rupe's unfamiliar nose, was
altogether different. Herman's and Verman's Bangala great-grandfathers
never considered people of their own jungle neighbourhood proper
material for a meal, but they looked upon strangers especially truculent
strangers--as distinctly edible.
Penrod and Sam heard Rupe suddenly squawk and bellow; saw him writhe and
twist and fling out his arms like flails, though without removing his
face from its juxtaposition; indeed, for a moment, the two heads seemed
even closer.
Then they separated--and battle was on!