“Who did that?”
For the count of ten, no one answered. Then a scrawny little Irishman, who wore a Cross of Honor on his ragged jacket, pushed Florence forward as he whispered hoarsely,
“Tell ’im, Miss. I’m wid y’. Me, as never lost a battle yet.”
“I did!” The girl’s words were clear and quite distinct.
A hush fell over the thickening crowd. A fight on Maxwell Street is always an occasion. But a fight between a prosperous man and a good looking girl! Who had seen this before?
Florence, as you will recall, was not one of those weaklings who subsist on pickles and ice-cream in order to develop a slender figure. She weighed one hundred and sixty, was an athletic instructor, knew a few tricks and was hard as a rock.
There was no fight. The man looked her up and down. Then he called her a name. It was a nasty name, seldom heard on Maxwell Street. For the people there, though poor, are a gentle folk.
Then Maxwell Street, slow going, gentle, kindly, poverty-stricken Maxwell Street, went mad. Who threw the first ripe tomato that struck this prosperous insulter squarely on the jaw? No one will ever know. Enough that it was thrown. It was followed quickly by a bushel more, and after that by a cart load of over-ripe fish.
When at last the irate but badly beaten man of importance turned his car southward and fled from Maxwell Street, his beautiful car was no longer blue. It was tomato-pink and fish-yellow. And his costume matched the car.
Then Maxwell Street indulged in a good laugh. In this laugh Angelo did not join. He divided his attention between the business of nursing his swollen jaw and paying the poor venders of tomatoes and fish for their missing wares.