aracter whatever in response to his menacing
demands. He had always assumed that boys who were well dressed had
fruit or candy in their pockets. He had sometimes required them to
verify their denials by an exhibition of the interior of these
receptacles. His invariable demand had become a habit with him.
Therefore the little sugared black brick which now hit him in the eye
came as an unprecedented surprise. For a moment he did not know
whether to construe it as a propitiatory gift or a warlike missile.

"What's the matter with you, can't you catch?" Pee-wee demanded.

CHAPTER IV

KEEKIE JOE

It required but a few seconds for Keekie Joe to decide to run true to
form. The situation was an unusual one, the missile was a delicious
morsel, and was nothing more nor less than what he had demanded. But
still it had been thrown at him and Keekie Joe elected to consider it
as a shot fired by the enemy.

"Whatcher chuckin' things at me fer?" he demanded, descending from the
fence and approaching Pee-wee with a terrible look of menace. He had
been careful, however, to pick the jawbreaker up and put it in his
mouth.

"Didn't you say you wanted one?" Pee-wee asked. "Didn't you just put
it in your mouth?"

"Never you mind wot I done," said Keekie Joe. "D'yer think yer cin
sass me?"

"I'll show you how to catch if you'll say you'll be a scout," Pee-wee
answered. There could be no better illustration of his desperation as
a scout missionary than this artless proposition to the sentinel of
Barrel Alley.

"Who can't catch?" Keekie Joe demanded.

"You can't."

"Me?"

"Yes, you."

"Yer dasn' say it again."

"You can't catch, you can't catch, you can't catch," said Pee-wee.

There seemed nothing left now but to break off diplomatic relations
altogether. The issue was clear. But Keekie Joe did not plunge his
outlandish person into war.

"If I didn' have ter lay keekie I'd slam yer one," he announced.

"What's the use of giving you candy if we can't be friends?" Pee-wee
said. "Gee whiz, I wouldn't care how much candy fellers threw at me;
the more the merrier. They can throw mince pies at me for all I care,"
he added. "If you want to be a scout I'll show you how and we can
start a patrol maybe."

[Illustration: Keekie Joe interviews Pee-wee]

The word patrol seemed to suggest something ominous to Keekie Joe, for
he glanced furtively up and down the alley, and then waved his hand
reassuringly to t