At that moment some one threw a ball of mud which struck him upon the cheek, where the most of it stuck until he had wiped it away.
At this loud laughter, in which the men joined, rang tauntingly on his ears.
“Looks well!” cried out one of the spectators. “Let me see if I can’t fix the other cheek like it,” and a second mud-ball struck Rob in the face, the moist dirt filling one eye so that he could not see plainly with it. Abused nature could stand no more, and Little Hickory was aroused. As soon as he could make himself heard for the loud huzzas that followed this last insult, he said, in a tone that showed he was in earnest:
“Stand aside, sir, and let me pass.”
“Lay so much as a finger on me if you dare!” replied Ralph Hardy, without offering to let him pass. “I dare you to touch me!”
“I don’t want any trouble with you,” replied Rob. “We came here peacefully, and it is you who are making the fuss.”
“You lie!” exclaimed young Hardy, shaking his fist in Little Hickory’s face, “and daresn’t say you don’t!”
“If it were you alone and myself alone I’d make you eat them words,” retorted Rob, his face now showing his righteous anger, while he continued to advance.
“You’re a sneaking, low-lived, dirt-covered hoodlum of the alleys of New York, and you have no business——”
Ralph Hardy had got so far, when, flourishing his fist in the face of Little Hickory, he hit him plump on the nose.