IV

"SHOWIN' OFF"

Jimmie Trescott's new velocipede had the largest front wheel of any

velocipede in Whilomville. When it first arrived from New York he

wished to sacrifice school, food, and sleep to it. Evidently he wished

to become a sort of a perpetual velocipede-rider. But the powers of

the family laid a number of judicious embargoes upon him, and he was

prevented from becoming a fanatic. Of course this caused him to retain

a fondness for the three-wheeled thing much longer than if he had been

allowed to debauch himself for a span of days. But in the end it was

an immaterial machine to him. For long periods he left it idle in the

stable.

One day he loitered from school towards home by a very circuitous

route. He was accompanied by only one of his retainers. The object of

this detour was the wooing of a little girl in a red hood. He had

been in love with her for some three weeks. His desk was near her desk

in school, but he had never spoken to her. He had been afraid to take

such a radical step. It was not customary to speak to girls. Even boys

who had school-going sisters seldom addressed them during that part of

a day which was devoted to education.

The reasons for this conduct were very plain. First, the more robust

boys considered talking with girls an unmanly occupation; second, the

greater part of the boys were afraid; third, they had no idea of what

to say, because they esteemed the proper sentences should be

supernaturally incisive and eloquent. In consequence, a small

contingent of blue-eyed weaklings were the sole intimates of the frail

sex, and for it they were boisterously and disdainfully called

"girl-boys."

But this situation did not prevent serious and ardent wooing. For

instance, Jimmie and the little girl who wore the red hood must have

exchanged glances at least two hundred times in every school-hour, and

this exchange of glances accomplished everything. In them the two

children renewed their curious inarticulate vows.

Jimmie had developed a devotion to school which was the admiration of

his father and mother. In the mornings he was so impatient to have it

made known to him that no misfortune had befallen his romance during

the night that he was actually detected at times feverishly listening

for the "first bell." Dr. Trescott was exceedingly complacent of the

change, and as for Mrs. Trescott, she had ecstatic visions of a

white-haired Jimmie leading the nations in knowledge, comprehending

all from bugs to comets. It was merely the doing of the little girl in

the red hood.

When Jimmie made up his mind to follow his sweetheart home from

school, the project seemed such an arbitrary and shameless innovation

that he hastily lied to himself about it. No, he was not following

Abbie. He was merely making his way homeward through the new and

rather longer route of Bryant Street and Oakland Park. It had nothing

at all to do with a girl. It was a mere eccentric notion.

"Come on," said Jimmie, gruffly, to his retainer. "Let's go home this

way."

"What fer?" demanded the retainer.

"Oh, b'cause."

"Huh?"

"Oh, it's more fun--goin' this way."

The retainer was bored and loath, but that mattered very little. He

did not know how to disobey his chief. Together they followed the

trail of red-hooded Abbie and another small girl. These latter at once

understood the object of the chase, and looking back giggling, they

pretended to quicken their pace. But they were always looking back.

Jimmie now began his courtship in earnest. The first thing to do was

to prove his strength in battle. This was transacted by means of the

retainer. He took that devoted boy and flung him heavily to the

ground, meanwhile mouthing a preposterous ferocity.

The retainer accepted this behavior with a sort of bland resignation.

After his overthrow he raised himself, coolly brushed some dust and

dead leaves from his clothes, and then seemed to forget the incident.

"I can jump farther'n you can," said Jimmie, in a loud voice.

"I know it," responded the retainer, simply.

But this would not do. There must be a contest.

"Come on," shouted Jimmie, imperiously. "Let's see you jump."

The retainer selected a footing on the curb, balanced and calculated a

moment, and jumped without enthusiasm. Jimmie's leap of course was

longer.

"There!" he cried, blowing out his lips. "I beat you, didn't I? Easy.

I beat you." He made a great hubbub, as if the affair was

unprecedented.

"Yes," admitted the other, emotionless.

Later, Jimmie forced his retainer to run a race with him, held more

jumping matches, flung him twice to earth, and generally behaved as if

a retainer was indestructible. If the retainer had been in the plot,

it is conceivable that he would have endured this treatment with mere

whispered, half-laughing protests. But he was not in the plot at all,

and so he became enigmatic. One cannot often sound the profound well

in which lie the meanings of boyhood.

Following the two little girls, Jimmie eventually passed into that

suburb of Whilomville which is called Oakland Park. At his heels came

a badly battered retainer. Oakland Park was a somewhat strange country

to the boys. They were dubious of the manners and customs, and of

course they would have to meet the local chieftains, who might look

askance upon this invasion.

Jimmie's girl departed into her home with a last backward glance that

almost blinded the thrilling boy. On this pretext and that pretext, he

kept his retainer in play before the house. He had hopes that she

would emerge as soon as she had deposited her school-bag.

A boy came along the walk. Jimmie knew him at school. He was Tommie

Semple, one of the weaklings who made friends with the fair sex.

"Hello, Tom," said Jimmie. "You live round here?"

"Yeh," said Tom, with composed pride. At school he was afraid of

Jimmie, but he did not evince any of this fear as he strolled well

inside his own frontiers. Jimmie and his retainer had not expected

this boy to display the manners of a minor chief, and they

contemplated him attentively. There was a silence. Finally Jimmie

said:

"I can put you down." He moved forward briskly. "Can't I?" he

demanded.

The challenged boy backed away. "I know you can," he declared, frankly

and promptly.

The little girl in the red hood had come out with a hoop. She looked

at Jimmie with an air of insolent surprise in the fact that he still

existed, and began to trundle her hoop off towards some other little

girls who were shrilly playing near a nurse-maid and a perambulator.

Jimmie adroitly shifted his position until he too was playing near the

perambulator, pretentiously making mince-meat out of his retainer and

Tommie Semple.

Of course little Abbie had defined the meaning of Jimmie's appearance

in Oakland Park. Despite this nonchalance and grand air of accident,

nothing could have been more plain. Whereupon she of course became

insufferably vain in manner, and whenever Jimmie came near her she

tossed her head and turned away her face, and daintily swished her

skirts as if he were contagion itself. But Jimmie was happy. His soul

was satisfied with the mere presence of the beloved object so long as

he could feel that she furtively gazed upon him from time to time and

noted his extraordinary prowess, which he was proving upon the persons

of his retainer and Tommie Semple. And he was making an impression.

There could be no doubt of it. He had many times caught her eye fixed

admiringly upon him as he mauled the retainer. Indeed, all the little

girls gave attention to his deeds, and he was the hero of the hour.

Presently a boy on a velocipede was seen to be tooling down towards

them. "Who's this comin'?" said Jimmie, bluntly, to the Semple boy.

"That's Horace Glenn," said Tommie, "an' he's got a new velocipede,

an' he can ride it like anything."

"Can you lick him?" asked Jimmie.

"I don't--I never fought with 'im," answered the other. He bravely

tried to appear as a man of respectable achievement, but with Horace

coming towards them the risk was too great. However, he added,

"_Maybe_ I could."

The advent of Horace on his new velocipede created a sensation which

he haughtily accepted as a familiar thing. Only Jimmie and his

retainer remained silent and impassive. Horace eyed the two invaders.

"Hello, Jimmie!"

"Hello, Horace!"

After the typical silence Jimmie said, pompously, "I got a

velocipede."

"Have you?" asked Horace, anxiously. He did not wish anybody in the

world but himself to possess a velocipede.

"Yes," sang Jimmie. "An' it's a bigger one than that, too! A good deal

bigger! An' it's a better one, too!"

"Huh!" retorted Horace, sceptically.

"'Ain't I, Clarence? 'Ain't I? 'Ain't I got one bigger'n that?"

The retainer answered with alacrity:

"Yes, he has! A good deal bigger! An' it's a dindy, too!"

This corroboration rather disconcerted Horace, but he continued to

scoff at any statement that Jimmie also owned a velocipede. As for the

contention that this supposed velocipede could be larger than his own,

he simply wouldn't hear of it.

Jimmie had been a very gallant figure before the coming of Horace, but

the new velocipede had relegated him to a squalid secondary position.

So he affected to look with contempt upon it. Voluminously he bragged

of the velocipede in the stable at home. He painted its virtues and

beauty in loud and extravagant words, flaming words. And the retainer

stood by, glibly endorsing everything.

The little company heeded him, and he passed on vociferously from

extravagance to utter impossibility. Horace was very sick of it. His

defence was reduced to a mere mechanical grumbling: "Don't believe you

got one 'tall. Don't believe you got one 'tall."

Jimmie turned upon him suddenly. "How fast can you go? How fast can

you go?" he demanded. "Let's see. I bet you can't go fast."

Horace lifted his spirits and answered with proper defiance. "Can't

I?" he mocked. "Can't I?"

"No, you can't," said Jimmie. "You can't go fast."

Horace cried: "Well, you see me now! I'll show you! I'll show you if I

can't go fast!" Taking a firm seat on his vermilion machine, he

pedalled furiously up the walk, turned, and pedalled back again.

"There, now!" he shouted, triumphantly. "Ain't that fast? There, now!"

There was a low murmur of appreciation from the little girls. Jimmie

saw with pain that even his divinity was smiling upon his rival.

"There! Ain't that fast? Ain't that fast?" He strove to pin Jimmie

down to an admission. He was exuberant with victory.

Notwithstanding a feeling of discomfiture, Jimmie did not lose a

moment of time. "Why," he yelled, "that ain't goin' fast 'tall! That

ain't goin' fast 'tall! Why, I can go almost _twice_ as fast as that!

Almost _twice_ as fast! Can't I, Clarence?"

The royal retainer nodded solemnly at the wide-eyed group. "Course you

can!"

"Why," spouted Jimmie, "you just ought to see me ride once! You just

ought to see me! Why, I can go like the wind! Can't I, Clarence? And

I can ride far, too--oh, awful far! Can't I, Clarence? Why, I wouldn't

have that one! 'Tain't any good! You just ought to see mine once!"

The overwhelmed Horace attempted to reconstruct his battered glories.

"I can ride right over the curb-stone--at some of the crossin's," he

announced, brightly.

Jimmie's derision was a splendid sight. "_'Right over the

curb-stone!_' Why, that wouldn't be _nothin'_ for me to do! I've rode

mine down Bridge Street hill. Yessir! 'Ain't I, Clarence? Why, it

ain't nothin' to ride over a curb-stone--not for _me_! Is it,

Clarence?"

"Down Bridge Street hill? You never!" said Horace, hopelessly.

"Well, didn't I, Clarence? Didn't I, now?"

The faithful retainer again nodded solemnly at the assemblage.

At last Horace, having fallen as low as was possible, began to display

a spirit for climbing up again. "Oh, you can do wonders!" he said,

laughing. "You can do wonders! I s'pose you could ride down that bank

there?" he asked, with art. He had indicated a grassy terrace some six

feet in height which bounded one side of the walk. At the bottom was a

small ravine in which the reckless had flung ashes and tins. "I

s'pose you could ride down that bank?"

[Illustration: "'I--' HE BEGAN. THEN HE VANISHED FROM THE EDGE OF THE

WALK."]

All eyes now turned upon Jimmie to detect a sign of his weakening, but

he instantly and sublimely arose to the occasion. "That bank?" he

asked, scornfully. "Why, I've ridden down banks like that many a time.

'Ain't I, Clarence?"

This was too much for the company. A sound like the wind in the leaves

arose; it was the song of incredulity and ridicule. "O--o--o--o--o!"

And on the outskirts a little girl suddenly shrieked out,

"Story-teller!"

Horace had certainly won a skirmish. He was gleeful. "Oh, you can do

wonders!" he gurgled. "You can do wonders!" The neighborhood's

superficial hostility to foreigners arose like magic under the

influence of his sudden success, and Horace had the delight of seeing

Jimmie persecuted in that manner known only to children and insects.

Jimmie called angrily to the boy on the velocipede, "If you'll lend me

yours, I'll show you whether I can or not."

Horace turned his superior nose in the air. "Oh no! I don't ever lend

it." Then he thought of a blow which would make Jimmie's humiliation

complete. "Besides," he said, airily, "'tain't really anything hard

to do. I could do it--easy--if I wanted to."

But his supposed adherents, instead of receiving this boast with

cheers, looked upon him in a sudden blank silence. Jimmie and his

retainer pounced like cats upon their advantage.

"Oh," they yelled, "you _could_, eh? Well, let's see you do it, then!

Let's see you do it! Let's see you do it! Now!" In a moment the crew

of little spectators were gibing at Horace.

The blow that would make Jimmie's humiliation complete! Instead, it

had boomeranged Horace into the mud. He kept up a sullen muttering:

"'Tain't really anything! I could if I wanted to!"

"Dare you to!" screeched Jimmie and his partisans. "Dare you to! Dare

you to! Dare you to!"

There were two things to be done--to make gallant effort or to

retreat. Somewhat to their amazement, the children at last found

Horace moving through their clamor to the edge of the bank. Sitting on

the velocipede, he looked at the ravine, and then, with gloomy pride,

at the other children. A hush came upon them, for it was seen that he

was intending to make some kind of an ante-mortem statement.

"I--" he began. Then he vanished from the edge of the walk. The start

had been unintentional--an accident.

The stupefied Jimmie saw the calamity through a haze. His first clear

vision was when Horace, with a face as red as a red flag, arose

bawling from his tangled velocipede. He and his retainer exchanged a

glance of horror and fled the neighborhood. They did not look back

until they had reached the top of the hill near the lake. They could

see Horace walking slowly under the maples towards his home, pushing

his shattered velocipede before him. His chin was thrown high, and the

breeze bore them the sound of his howls.

V