eeing all at once that he had betrayed himself.

"It was nearly dark, but I happened to be where I could see. And as I
was coming back, a few minutes after, I saw you come out with a pail of
milk, and look around you like a sneak-thief. You saw me and hurried
away. You are such a coward that you are ashamed to do a little honest
work. Milkmaid! Girl-boy! Coward! And Pewee Rose lets you lead him
around by the nose!"

"You'd better be careful what you say, Susan," said Pewee,
threateningly.

"You won't touch me. You go about bullying little boys, and calling
yourself King Pewee, but you can't do a sum in long division, nor in
short subtraction, for that matter, and you let fellows like Riley make
a fool of you. Your father's poor, and your mother can't keep a girl,
and you ought to be ashamed to let her milk the cows. Who milked your
cow this morning, Pewee?"

"I don't know," said the king, looking like the king's fool.

"You did it," said Susan. "Don't deny it. Then you come here and call a
strange boy a milkmaid!"

"Well, I didn't milk in the street, anyway, and he did." At this, all
laughed aloud, and Susan's victory was complete. She only said, with a
pretty toss of her head, as she turned away: "King Milkmaid!"

Pewee found the nickname likely to stick. He was obliged to declare on
the playground the next day, that he would "thrash" any boy that said
anything about milkmaids. After that, he heard no more of it. But one
morning he found "King Milkmaid" written on the door of his father's
cow-stable. Some boy who dared not attack Pewee, had vented his
irritation by writing the hateful words on the stable, and on the
fence-corners near the school-house, and even on the blackboard.

Pewee could not fight with Susan Lanham, but he made up his mind to
punish the new scholar when he should have a chance. He must give
somebody a beating.

CHAPTER III

ANSWERING BACK

It is hard for one boy to make a fight. Even your bully does not like to
"pitch on" an inoffensive school-mate. You remember AEsop's fable of the
wolf and the lamb, and what pains the wolf took to pick a quarrel with
the lamb. It was a little hard for Pewee to fight with a boy who walked
quietly to and from the school, without giving anybody cause for
offence.

But the chief reason why Pewee did not attack him with his fists was
that both he and Riley had found out that Jack Dudley could help them
over a hard place in their lessons better