An impetuous young fellow, pushing his way in from the outskirts of the crowd, cried:
“Oh, don’t fool with him! If he won’t take his hat off, knock it off!”
The suggestion was no sooner made than it was acted upon. A near-by hand shot out, and the next moment the offensive head-gear went flying out into the crowd. The face of the defiant one flushed and paled, his dark eyes blazed with indignation, his lips twitched; but he did not speak. No one appeared to sympathize with him; no one put forth any effort to protect him. On the contrary, all those who witnessed the overt act made noisy manifestation of their approval; all but Halpert McCormack. He was silent and doubtful. He would have resented any imputation of disloyalty on his part either in thought or deed. But the thing that had just been done did not appeal to him. It offended his sense of justice. His sympathy, which had always been for the under dog in any fight, was aroused in behalf of the man who was standing alone in the midst of a hostile crowd. But he said nothing; it would have been useless to protest. Nor was he quite sure that the man had not, partly at least, deserved the treatment he had received. Doubtless the incident would have been closed then and there had not the red-faced man who had originally protested desired further to express his abhorrence of acts savoring of disloyalty to the flag.
“You’ve no kick coming,” he said, addressing the young man whose hat had been forcibly removed and was now irretrievably crushed; “you’re lucky not to have your face smashed as well as your hat.”
“Well,” was the prompt reply, “if this is what you call it, the American spirit of fair play, then I have the good reason to dishonor your American flag.”
And the red-faced man, growing still more angry, retorted:
“If you don’t like the American spirit, go back where you came from. What business have you got here, anyway? Who are you?”
Again the reply came promptly and deliberately:
“I have the same business here like you. Me, I am Hugo Donatello, Internationalist. My journal, which I publish in your city, is by name The Disinherited. I commend it to your reading that you may learn from it the first principles of human justice and decency.”
Then the fellow at whose suggestion Donatello was made hatless broke in again: