aid the presiding officer.
"We will now proceed to--"

But Georgie was disposed to be informal. He interrupted, turning to
the boy who had admitted him: "Look here, Charlie Johnson, what's Fred
Kinney doing in the president's chair? That's my place, isn't it?
What you men been up to here, anyhow? Didn't you all agree I was to be
president just the same, even if I was away at school?"

"Well--" said Charlie Johnson uneasily. "Listen! I didn't have much to
do with it. Some of the other members thought that long as you weren't
in town or anything, and Fred gave the sideboard, why--"

Mr. Kinney, presiding, held in his hand, in lieu of a gavel, and
considered much more impressive, a Civil War relic known as a
"horse-pistol." He rapped loudly for order. "All Friends of the Ace will
take their seats!" he said sharply. "I'm president of the F. O. T. A.
now, George Minafer, and don't you forget it! You and Charlie Johnson
sit down, because I was elected perfectly fair, and we're goin' to hold
a meeting here."

"Oh, you are, are you?" said George skeptically.

Charlie Johnson thought to mollify him. "Well, didn't we call this
meeting just especially because you told us to? You said yourself we
ought to have a kind of celebration because you've got back to town,
George, and that's what we're here for now, and everything. What do you
care about being president? All it amounts to is just calling the roll
and--"

The president de facto hammered the table. "This meeting will now
proceed to--"

"No, it won't," said George, and he advanced to the desk, laughing
contemptuously. "Get off that platform."

"This meeting will come to order!" Mr. Kinney commanded fiercely.

"You put down that gavel," said George. "Whose is it, I'd like to know?
It belongs to my grandfather, and you quit hammering it that way or
you'll break it, and I'll have to knock your head off."

"This meeting will come to order! I was legally elected here, and I'm
not going to be bulldozed!"

"All right," said Georgie. "You're president. Now we'll hold another
election."

"We will not!" Fred Kinney shouted. "We'll have our reg'lar meeting,
and then we'll play euchre & nickel a corner, what we're here for. This
meeting will now come to ord--"

Georgie addressed the members. "I'd like to know who got up this thing
in the first place," he said. "Who's the founder of the F.O.T.A., if you
please? Who got this room rent free? Who got the janitor to let us
ha