The Cruise of the Dazzler | Page 9

till you 've licked me."
The gang cheered admiringly, and Reddy stripped a tattered jacket
preparatory for the fray.

"Git ready," he said to Joe.
Joe's knuckles were torn, his nose was bleeding, his lip was cut and
swollen, while his shirt had been ripped down from throat to waist.
Further, he was tired, and breathing hard.
"How many more are there of you Simpsons?" he asked. "I 've got to
get home, and if your family 's much larger this thing is liable to keep
on all night."
"I 'm the last an' the best," Reddy replied. "You gits me an' you gits the
kites. Sure."
"All right," Joe sighed. "Come on."
While the youngest of the clan lacked the strength and skill of his
elders, he made up for it by a wildcat manner of fighting that taxed Joe
severely. Time and again it seemed to him that he must give in to the
little whirlwind; but each time he pulled himself together and went
doggedly on. For he felt that he was fighting for principle, as his
forefathers had fought for principle; also, it seemed to him that the
honor of the Hill was at stake, and that he, as its representative, could
do nothing less than his very best.
So he held on and managed to endure his opponent's swift and
continuous rushes till that young and less experienced person at last
wore himself out with his own exertions, and from the ground
confessed that, for the first time in its history, the "Simpson fambly was
beat."
CHAPTER IV
THE BITER BITTEN
But life in the Pit at best was a precarious affair, as the three
Hill-dwellers were quickly to learn. Before Joe could even possess
himself of his kites, his astonished eyes were greeted with the spectacle
of all his enemies, the fireman included, taking to their heels in wild

flight. As the little girls and urchins had melted away before the
Simpson gang, so was melting away the Simpson gang before some
new and correspondingly awe-inspiring group of predatory creatures.
Joe heard terrified cries of "Fish gang!" "Fish gang!" from those who
fled, and he would have fled himself from this new danger, only he was
breathless from his last encounter, and knew the impossibility of
escaping whatever threatened. Fred and Charley felt mighty longings to
run away from a danger great enough to frighten the redoubtable
Simpson gang and the valorous fireman, but they could not desert their
comrade.
Dark forms broke into the vacant lot, some surrounding the boys and
others dashing after the fugitives. That the laggards were overtaken was
evidenced by the cries of distress that went up, and when later the
pursuers returned, they brought with them the luckless and snarling
Brick, still clinging fast to the bundle of kites.
Joe looked curiously at this latest band of marauders. They were young
men of from seventeen and eighteen to twenty-three and -four years of
age, and bore the unmistakable stamp of the hoodlum class. There were
vicious faces among them--faces so vicious as to make Joe's flesh creep
as he looked at them. A couple grasped him tightly by the arms, and
Fred and Charley were similarly held captive.
"Look here, you," said one who spoke with the authority of leader, "we
've got to inquire into this. Wot 's be'n goin' on here? Wot 're you up to,
Red-head? Wot you be'n doin'?"
"Ain't be'n doin' nothin'," Simpson whined.
"Looks like it." The leader turned up Brick's face to the electric light.
"Who 's been paintin' you up like that?" he demanded.
Brick pointed at Joe, who was forthwith dragged to the front.
"Wot was you scrappin' about?"

"Kites--my kites," Joe spoke up boldly. "That fellow tried to take them
away from me. He 's got them under his arm now."
"Oh, he has, has he? Look here, you Brick, we don't put up with stealin'
in this territory. See? You never rightly owned nothin'. Come, fork over
the kites. Last call."
The leader tightened his grasp threateningly, and Simpson, weeping
tears of rage, surrendered the plunder.
"Wot yer got under yer arm?" the leader demanded abruptly of Fred, at
the same time jerking out the bundle. "More kites, eh? Reg'lar
kite-factory gone and got itself lost," he remarked finally, when he had
appropriated Charley's bundle. "Now, wot I wants to know is wot we
're goin' to do to you t'ree chaps?" he continued in a judicial tone.
"What for?" Joe demanded hotly. "For being robbed of our kites?"
"Not at all, not at all," the leader responded politely; "but for luggin'
kites round these quarters an' causin' all this unseemly disturbance. It 's
disgraceful; that 's wot it is--disgraceful."
At this juncture, when the Hill-dwellers were the center of