Ran home bellowing to Papa
And told a lot of lies
To get a brave boy whipped.
Cowardy calf, cowardy calf!”
Then the other little girls and some of the boys, with the flexibility of childhood, pointed their fingers at Junior and began shrieking, “Cowardy calf!” until he was furious. But he was helpless among such numbers as were ranged against him, so, breaking from the group, he ran down the street with all his might. As far as he could hear, a shrill chorus followed him: “Cowardy calf! Cowardy calf!”
Jason lingered in the lower hallway until the other children had left the school grounds and were some distance ahead of him; then he followed. In passing down Market Street on his way home, he saw Peter Potter standing at the door of his grocery with a heaped basket in his hand, looking up the street and down the street, evidently wondering why his delivery wagon was not standing before his door as it should have been. Instantly, Jason changed his course and headed toward Peter, because he and Peter were friends. The time had been when Peter was the leading grocer of the village, but he had not been able to make his way against the new methods and the seductive advertising of an opponent who, in recent years, had been able to take a good deal of his trade. Peter was not suffering from either cold or hunger. His fifty years had left his British face round and jolly. He was not sufficiently energetic to exert himself to an extent that would bring him back his lost opportunities. Instead of trying to regain his position, he tried by closeness in all his dealings to recover his losses, but he only succeeded in narrowing his soul, which had been fashioned rather narrow in the making.
When he saw Jason coming toward him he began to smile. He had asked several boys passing to deliver the groceries and they had refused; but here was a boy who would not refuse. Here was a boy who frequently had helped him for very small pay. Peter explained that, for some reason, his wagon had not returned from the ten o’clock delivery and these later orders were wanted for the dinners of some of his customers. Jason immediately shouldered the heavy basket and started on a long trip across town. When he returned the delivery slips, Peter understood that Jason would not have time to go home for his dinner, so he cut him a very small piece of cheese and gave him a handful of crackers to pay for having delivered the orders. Jason started back to school munching as he went.
His body was stiff and sore, but his heart was crushed. The boys knew that he had tried to get away without trouble; several of the girls had seen Junior push and maltreat him; at his elbow there had been the whisper that nerved him—yet when his hour came he had stood alone. He had felt Mahala’s eyes on him, but he would not let himself look at her, in the fear that he would seem to be asking her help, and so involve her in trouble. All of them, the teacher included, had kept still. He was to understand that Junior was to do with him exactly as he chose. He was a few months older, he was taller, he was stronger, but because he was poor and Junior was rich, he must endure taunt, insult, even submit to being pushed and pulled. A slow red rimmed Jason’s ears. He lifted a hand to allay the pricking in his scalp. Would he follow alleys and back streets, and dodge and hide from Junior, or would he meet him unafraid? He had no reason to fear Junior, but he remembered strong men who deeply feared the power behind the boy. As Jason slowly walked toward the school house, his brain and blood were in tumult.
When the last companion left her, Mahala had two blocks for sober reflection. She was ashamed of herself. She had incited Jason to strike Junior; when his father came into the school room she should have faced him bravely and cried out the truth. Maybe she could have saved Jason a beating. Never having suffered a blow herself, Mahala did not fully realize just what had happened to Jason. She did know that she had not been brave or fair in school. At least she had shamed Junior on the street and let him see what she thought of him. That made her feel better, and Jason knew she felt sorry for him. He did know that; but what must he think of her? And what ailed Edith Williams? Would Edith start to school early and tell the other girls things that would make them desert Mahala and be friends with her?
A daring thought flashed in Mahala’s brain. She knew how to hold her ascendancy. Dinner was not quite ready when she entered the house. She kissed her mother, and slipping to the living room, she snatched her charm string from its place in the little mahogany sewing-table pocket, and hid it in the folds of her dress. Her mother would attend the Mite Society, held on Monday so that ladies of wealth might feel their superiority through having freedom to attend, and those that worked might gauge their inferiority by the amount of extra work they would be compelled to do in order to find time for the meeting. Mahala felt wildly daring; but her position demanded some risk. She darted across the door yard, tucked the heavy glittering string in a grassy corner of the fence, and managed her return unobserved. Now if only her mother would not be so silly as to follow her to the gate—but she was! So Mahala was forced to walk to the corner demurely, throw back a farewell kiss, and disappear. Then she must wait a palpitant interval, fly back on guilty feet, thrust a small hand through the fence, draw out the precious charm string, carefully, and race headlong toward the corner again. Safely past it, she might pause and hang the glittering length around her neck in gleaming festoons to her knees. Edith Williams would turn the other girls against her, would she? Mahala proudly swung the string before her and made a tongue-exposing face at an invisible Edith. She knew what would happen, and she was secure in her knowledge. The first little girl who saw her ran straight to her side and remained; the others came as they appeared around diverse corners—and remained. Every one of them had a charm string, but what meagre little things compared with the magnificence of the string of the merchant’s daughter who might have the sample button from every emptied box as it left his shelves, to whom wonderful buttons of brass and glass and bone and pearl came in handfuls at every trip to New York to buy goods. Mahala’s eyes were shining, her heart was throbbing. She knew the history of every button on her string: “Post Commander Johnston cut that right from the vest of his soldier suit, and that’s the top left-hand one from Papa’s dress vest, and that is from the coat of Mama’s best friend——” she told them over like a rosary as they slipped through her fingers—great, brass-rimmed circles of glass with gay flower faces showing through, carved insets of bird and animal, globes of every size, colour, and cutting that ever held fast a garment worn by man or woman—Edith Williams indeed!