A new boy in a town makes an impression, good or bad, very quickly. If he is obtrusive he forces his way into boy circles at once, and is accepted more or less on his own terms provided he makes good. The rough and ready way is perhaps the best way for a boy to get into the midst of things in a new town or a new neighborhood. Modesty and diffidence, so highly esteemed in some quarters, are apt to prove a handicap to a boy. For these good qualities counterfeit so many other qualities which are not good at all.
No doubt the shortest path of glory for a new boy is to lick the leader of the group in the strange neighborhood. Next to this heroic shortcut, boastful reminiscences of the town from which he came, and original forms of mischief imported from it, do very well—at the start.
But Wilfred Cowell was not the sort of boy to seek admittance into Bridgeboro’s coterie by any such means. He was diffident and sensitive. He began, as a shy boy will, to make acquaintance among the younger children, and for the first week or so was to be seen pulling the little Wentworth girl about in her wagon, or visiting “Bennett’s Fresh Confectionery” with Roland Ellman who lived next door. He walked home from school with the diminutive Willie Bradley and one day accompanied the little fellow to his back yard to inspect Willie’s turtle.
Following the path of least resistance and utterly unable to “butt in,” he made acquaintance where acquaintance was easiest to make. Thus, all unknown to him, the boys came to think of him as a “sissy.” Of course, they were not going to go after him and he did not know how to “get in” with them; at least he did not know any shortcut method. If he had stridden down to the ball field and said, “Give us a chance here, will you?” they would have given him a chance and then all would have been easy sailing. But he just did not know how to do that.
So he pulled the little Wentworth girl in her brother’s wagon, and he was doing that before returning to school on this memorable day of his collapse.
It must be admitted that he looked rather large to play the willing horse for so diminutive a driver. He was husky-looking enough and slender and rather tall for his age. There was no reminder of recent illness in his appearance. He had a fine color and brown eyes with the same spirited expression as those of his sister. He came of a good-looking family. Rosleigh, the little brother who had suffered a fate worse than death before Wilfred was born, was recalled by old friends of the saddened and reduced little family, as a child of rare beauty.
One feature only Wilfred had which was available to boy ridicule. His hair was wavy and a rebellious lock was continually falling over his forehead which he was forever pushing up again with his hand. There was certainly nothing sissified (as they say) in this. But in that fateful noon hour the groups of boys passing through the block paused to watch the new boy and soon caught on to this habit of his. Loitering, they began mimicking him and seemed to find satisfaction in ruffling their own hair in celebration of his unconscious habit.
It was certainly an inglorious and menial task to which Wilfred had consecrated the half hour or so at his disposal. The little Wentworth girl was a true autocrat. She threw the ball and he conveyed her to the stopping point.
How Lorrie Madden happened to get the ball no one noticed; he was always well ahead of his colleagues in mischief and teasing ridicule. Having secured it he put it in his pocket. He had not the slightest idea that Wilfred Cowell would approach him and demand it. No one ever demanded anything of Lorrie Madden; it was his habit to keep other boys’ property (and especially that of small children) until it suited his pleasure to return it. He did this, not in dishonesty, but for exhibit purposes.
Knowing his power and disposition to carry these unworthy whims to the last extreme of his victim’s exasperation, the boys upon the curb were seized with mirth at beholding Wilfred Cowell sauntering toward Madden as if all he had to do was to ask for the ball in order to get it. Such girlish innocence! They did not hear what was said, they only saw what happened.
“Let’s have that ball—quick,” said Wilfred easily.
“Quick? How do you get that way,” sneered Madden, producing the ball and bouncing it on the ground.
“Give it to me,” said Wilfred easily, “or I’ll knock you flat. Now don’t stand there talking.”
These were strange words to be addressed to Lorrie Madden—by a new boy with wavy hair. Lorrie Madden who had pulled Pee-wee Harris’ radio aerial down, “just for the fun of it.” Lorrie Madden who returned caps and desisted from disordering other boys’ neckties only in the moment dictated by his own sweet will. Yet it was not exactly the words he heard that gave him pause. Two brown eyes, wonderful with a strange light, were looking straight at him. One of these eyes, the right one, was contracted a little, conveying a suggestion of cold determination. No one saw this but Lorrie.
Then it was that Lorrie Madden did two things—immediately. One of these was on account of Wilfred Cowell. The other was on account of his audience on the opposite curb. To do him justice he thought and acted quickly, and with well-considered art. He threw the ball away nonchalantly, at the same time raising his arm in a disdainful threat. And Wilfred, being the kind of a boy he was, turned quietly and went after the ball. In this pursuit he presented a much less heroic figure than did the menacing warrior who had sent him scampering. He looked as if he were running away from a blow instead of after a ball.
It was in that moment of his unseen triumph that the clamorous group across the way hit upon the dubious nickname by which Wilfred Cowell came to be known at Temple Camp.
“Wilfraid, Wilfraid!” they called. “Run faster, you’ll catch it! There it goes in the gutter, Wilfraid. Wilfraid Coward! Giddap, horsy! Giddap, Wilfraid!”
It was with these cruel taunts ringing in his ears that Wilfred was laid low by the old enemy—the only foe that ever dared to lay hand on him. Treacherous to the last, his old adversary, diphtheria, with which he had fought a good fight, struck him to the ground amid the chorus of scornful mirth which he had aroused.