"You go to--" cried Doug. "Maybe you think you can run over me, you stuck-up Mr. Proper." "I don't want to do anything of the sort," answered Dic; "but if you don't let loose of Rita's arm, I'll--" "What will you do?" asked Doug, laughing uproariously. For a moment Dic allowed himself to grow angry, and said, "I'll knock that pumpkin off your shoulders," but at once regretted his words. Doug thought Dic's remark very funny, and intimated as much. Then he bowed his head in front of our hero and said, "Here is the pumpkin; hit it if you dare." Dic restrained an ardent desire, and Doug still with bowed head continued, "I'll give you a shillin' if you'll hit it, and if you don't, I'll break your stuck-up face." Dic did not accept the shilling, which was not actually tendered in lawful coin, but stepped back from Doug that he might be prepared for the attack he expected. After waiting what he considered to be a reasonable time for Dic to accept his offer, Doug started toward our hero, looking very ugly and savage. Dic was strong and brave, but he seemed small beside his bulky antagonist, and Rita, frightened out of all sense of propriety, ran to her champion, and placing her back against his breast, faced Doug with fear and trembling. The girl was not tall enough by many inches to protect Dic's face from the breaking Doug had threatened; but what she lacked in height she made up in terror, and she looked so "skeert," as Doug afterwards said, that he turned upon his heel with the remark:-- "That's all right. I was only joking. We don't want no fight at a church social, do we, Dic?" "I don't particularly want to fight any place," replied Dic, glad that the ugly situation had taken a pleasant turn. "Reckon you don't," returned Doug, uproariously, and the game proceeded. Partly from disinclination, and partly because he wanted to talk to Rita, Dic did not at first enter the game, but during an intermission Sukey whispered to him:-- "We are going to play Drop the Handkerchief, and if you'll come in I'll drop it behind you every time, and--" here the whispers became very low and soft, "I'll let you catch me, too. We'll make pumpkin-head sick."