“I’ll show him!” he said to himself. “Tomorrow he’ll be singing a different tune, or I am mistaken.”
This was the way Jim had been accustomed to break in refractory new arrivals. The logic of his fist usually proved a convincing argument, and thus far his supremacy had never been successfully resisted. He was confident that he would not be interfered with. Secretly, his Uncle Socrates sympathized with him, and relished the thought that his nephew, who so strongly resembled him in mind and person, should be the undisputed boss—to use a word common in political circles—of the school. He discreetly ignored the conflicts which he knew took place, and if any luckless boy, the victim of Jim’s brutality, ventured to appeal to him, the boy soon found that he himself was arraigned, and not the one who had abused him.
“Where’s that new boy?” asked Jim, as he left the schoolroom.
He had not seen our hero’s departure—but his ready tool, Bates, had.
“I saw him sneaking off with Wilkins,” said Bates.
“Where did they go?”
“To the Village, I guess.”
“They seemed to be in a hurry,” said Jim, with a sneer.
“They wanted to get out of your way—that is, the new boy did,” suggested Bates.
Jim nodded.