The speaker was a tall, slightly-built boy of perhaps sixteen. His eyes flashed, and his fists clenched nervously.
“Let that girl alone, I say, or”—
“Well, or what?” sneered a coarse-looking fellow, some two or three years older than the first. “You needn’t think you own this town, Winthrop Ayre, if you did come from Boston!” And he once more advanced toward a neatly-dressed girl, who was timidly cowering in a corner by a stone wall and a high fence, to avoid the touch of her rough tormentor. The latter was supported by two more of his kind, and all three were evidently trying to frighten her by their fierce looks and rude words.
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Mort Lapham!” exclaimed Winthrop indignantly, placing himself directly in front of the frightened girl. “Deacon Lapham’s son might be in better business than insulting girls in the street.”
“So you want to put your finger in the pie, do you? Here, fellows, let’s give him a lesson!”
Winthrop noticed that the attention of all three was now upon him alone, and motioned to the girl to run. She moved slowly a few steps down the street, and then stopped. Meanwhile the big bully raised his hand and tried to slap the city boy in the face. Winthrop warded off the blow easily, and retreated into the corner where the girl had been. “You’d better keep away, Mort,” he said quietly, though his cheeks were hot; “and you, too, Dick and Phil. I don’t want to fight, and now you’ve let the girl go, there’s nothing to fight about, that I know of.”
“Coward!” cried Mort, enraged at missing his blow. “Don’t you wish you had your Sunday-school teacher here to take care of you! She wouldn’t let any one hurt you, would she, Sonny?”
The color in Winthrop’s face deepened, but he said nothing. He was rapidly turning over the question in his mind, whether Miss Kingsbury would want him to turn his cheek if three boys struck him at once.
A tingling blow on that exact spot put to flight his meditations. His fist drew back impulsively, but he would not strike yet. He was in splendid training, this boy, and still stood entirely on the defense, knowing that the true hero is not he who fights for himself, like a brute creature, but for somebody else.
“Coward!” hissed Mort Lapham once more, cautiously keeping out of reach of the other’s arm. “Hit him again, Phil!”