"When I was a kid, I took a prize in a beauty show," announced James, with pardonable pride.
"Swiped it?" asked the Watermelon.
"Dog show?" inquired Mike drowsily, listening to the pleasing drone of a bee in a near-by clump of daisies.
James sat up and ran his fingers with musing regret through the coarse stubble on cheeks and chin. "I was three, I remember, a cute little cuss. My hair was yellow and ma curled it—you know how—all fuzzy—and I had a little white dress on. It was a county fair. I got the first prize for the best lookin' kid and was mugged for the papers. If I was shaved now and had on some glad rags, I'd be a lady killer, all right, all right."
"'Longside of me," said the Watermelon, "you'd look like a blear-eyed son of a toad."
"You! Why, you'd make a balky horse run, you would."
"When me hair's cut, I'm a bloomin' Adonis, not Venus;" and the Watermelon drew languidly at an old brown pipe, warm and comfortable in the pleasant shade, where soft breezes wandered fitfully by, laden with the odors of the fields in June.
James was skeptical. "Did y' ever take a prize in a beauty show?" he demanded, still musing upon those bygone honors.
"No," admitted the Watermelon. "My old man was a parson, and parsons' kids never have any chance. Besides, I wouldn't care to. Too much like the finest bull in a county fair, or the best laying hen."
"Huh," sneered James. "My folks was of the bon-ton."