Every one of the eleven boys rose to his feet. Blackie looked from one face to another of those who had been his friends, and read there only reluctant determination. Ken Haviland tore a scrap of paper from a notebook in his pocket, and scribbled on it with a pencil. Soapy Mullins yanked Blackie to a standing position.
“Prisoner,” said Ken gravely, “the unanimous decision of the Kangaroo Court is that you shall be given the Black Spot.” He held out the scrap of paper, and Blackie took it wonderingly. There was nothing on it save a rude pencilled black disc in the center. “From this moment you are branded as a disgrace to Camp Lenape, and not a single camper will speak so much as a word to you. Court’s adjourned!”
The members of the court departed toward the baseball field, taking Guppy with them, and the culprit was left alone with the marked piece of paper still in his hand. He crumpled it with an angry gesture, and tossed it to the ground.
“Huh! They must think they’ve done something smart! The Black Spot! Nobody will talk to me—we’ll see about that! And what if they don’t? A lot I’d care if I never saw any of this bunch of Sunday-school kids again!”
He caught up a hat and marched down to the ball field, drawn there by a desire to brazen it out and see if his sentence meant anything. The boys’ team was at bat, and Lefty Reardon, captain, was coaching off third base.
“Hey, Lefty!” Blackie hailed him. “How about giving me a game?”
Lefty turned, looked him up and down quietly, and turned away again as though he hadn’t heard the question. Blackie flushed, and after standing uneasily for a minute, tried to look unconcerned and strolled down to the gathering around the batter. There was a low ripple of whispers at his approach; boys nudged each other and turned to look, turned away with half-hidden smiles of contempt. He did not even dare to speak to one of them. For the moment he was tempted to rough-house one or two of the younger boys just to see whether or not they could be made to speak; but he remembered what had happened when he had twisted Guppy’s arm, and knew that any defiance of the unwritten code would be useless.
“What’s the score?” he asked of the world in general.
Not a boy answered him. Someone at his elbow snickered; no one looked in his face. He felt like a ghost, a branded being who had no right among that bunch of happy campers; he was lonely in a crowd.
The only reason he watched the game to its finish was because he refused to give the boys the satisfaction of having driven him away. It was the most wretched afternoon he had ever spent. He sat, drawn apart from the rest, inwardly seething with fury and wondering how long he could stand it. He forgot the exhilarating, breath-taking delights he had enjoyed at Lenape; he could only remember the little dislikes he had acquired, the humiliation of his ejection from the Stuck-Up initiation, the crude and unceasing jokes that had been played upon him. He hated the Chief, the leaders; with all the boys against him, staying at Lenape was unbearable. He would leave the hateful place! It was the only thing to do—run away from them all and never, never come back!