“I will,” answered Hank with a new chuckle as he finished the deal of the cards. “But take it from me, Jimmy, when you start little Artie a-jumpin, get out from under. Don’t let him come down on top o’ you.”
“Come off—come off,” yawned Nick Apthorp as he threw his cards towards the next dealer and reached for a string attached to a rotten log against which he had been leaning. “Mebbe this’ll stop the rag chewin’,” and he proceeded to pull on the string, which extended over the edge of the river bank, at the base of which was the gang’s swimming hole, into which Jimmy had threatened to make Art Trevor jump.
As a bottle of beer came in sight all animosities seemed forgotten. Hank Milleson grabbed an empty lard pail. Nick knocked off the top of the bottle on a stone and the lukewarm fluid was emptied into the pail.
“Fair divvies now,” shouted Compton, and the five young loafers crowded about the foam-crusted pail like flies around a molasses jug. In such manner, with few variations, the “Goosetown gang” was accustomed to pass its afternoons.
Others who were accustomed to meet at times to play cards, drink beer and drowse away the hours came only on Saturdays and Sundays. Some of these had light employment in the furniture factories. Like Nick Apthorp, Matt Branson, Mart Clare, Jimmy Compton and Hank Milleson they had grown up without schooling, and they knew few pleasures except those of the young “tough.”
Had the roster of the “Goosetown gang” ever been written, its prominent members would have been in addition to those named, Job Wilkes, Joe Andrews, Buck Bluett, Tom Bates, Pete Chester and Tony Cooper. Of all these the foremost loafer was Hank Milleson. And Hank had a double distinction; he had already been a prisoner in the Scottsville lock-up, for disturbing the peace while intoxicated. At that, he was but seventeen years old. Of the others some were not over twelve years.
Before dark that evening, news of what Jimmy Compton had done reached Elm Street. Sammy Addington was the one who brought the bulletin to the Trevor Garage.
“Jim Compton—Carrots—” reported Sammy, his eyes sparkling, “says he’s goin’ to make you jump in the river,” addressing Art Trevor, who was busy testing rubber cord.
“Me? In the river?” exclaimed Art in surprise. “What’s gone wrong with Carrots?”
“They’re all sore,” went on Sammy. “Nick Apthorp—he’s the guy that pinched our sign—him and Blowhard Compton an’ the gang all give it out—an’ they stuck our sign up on the ole sycamore an’ spit on it; yes that’s what they done,” repeated Sammy rapidly as he saw the news was sensational. “They spit on it an’ give it out if we go over there Saturday it’s goin’ to be rough house an’ that you’ll get yours,” he concluded nodding toward Art.