Jim frowned slightly. “Why, yes, I guess I do,” he replied. “Every fellow does, don’t he?”
“Well, I meant to say you didn’t mind much. Of course no fellow wants to take a defeat, but he has to do it just the same sometimes, you know. And there’s a whole lot in taking it the right way.”
“The right way?” inquired Jim.
“Why, yes, Todd. Look here, are you joshing me? You know what I mean, confound you!”
“Well, I don’t know as I do,” said Jim doubtfully. “I don’t get mad when I’m licked, if that’s what you mean. Leastways, I don’t let on I’m mad. But it don’t make me feel any too good to get beat!”
“I suppose your trouble is that you’ve never been beaten often enough to get used to it, then,” answered Clem. “Getting mad doesn’t do any good, you crazy goof. You want to smile and make believe you like it.”
“What for?”
“Oh, for the love of Liberty,” wailed Clem, “take this fellow off me, Mart! He’s worse than a Philadelphia lawyer!”
Mart’s return with the skates provided a diversion. They were a size too small, but after a long and admiring appraisal of them Jim declared that they would do. “I never saw a pair just like these before,” he confided admiringly. “What they made of, Gray?”