But Herman would not give way, as he knew that his was the first shot.
“It’s not fair. It’s beastly unfair. I won’t play robbers with you if you are unfair.”
It looked like a fight.
Laura had been watching with her teeth chattering and trying to hide her little fat fingers in the sleeves of her frock. Now she jumped excitedly down towards the infuriated robbers. Unobserved, even Hedvig left her spy hole in the trap.
Stellan and Herman had already come to grips and scratched and tore at each other in the artless way of children. At last they began to wrestle and Stellan, who was the shorter of the two, was underneath.
“You see that I did shoot first,” panted Herman.
Then Peter with his cool cheek intervened. He rolled round this human knot and extricated Stellan, who, rather shamefaced at his defeat, withdrew with feigned contempt from the robber band. Then Peter sat down astride of Herman.
“Now say that the town is mine.”
“No.”
He began to jump on Herman. This hurt Herman, because he was lying athwart the ridge of the roof.