"Guess the boys are havin’ a little fight about something," said the red-haired girl carelessly, and indeed none of the residents of the avenue seemed to take more than a superficial interest in the cluster of struggling bodies, from which proceeded outcries of the most blood-curdling nature. Only the goat which the girls had previously noticed, seemed to share their apprehensions, for it cantered past, a desperate expression in its oblique, wicked eyes, indicating a determination to put as much distance as possible between itself and the scene of the disturbance. The group broke up as Peggy and Priscilla drew near, and proved to be composed of a score or so of boys, ranging in ages from six to fifteen. Some were grinning and some looked angry. And one was crying. The last was the central figure of the group, and he limped as he approached the sidewalk. His nose was bleeding so profusely as to make his appearance distinctly ghastly, and Peggy fumbled for her handkerchief. Then she uttered an exclamation. "It’s Jimmy! Priscilla, it is Jimmy Dunn!" Jimmy’s tears dissolved in a smile startlingly friendly. "I got it," he exclaimed and held forth a wet, dirty and uninviting object, whose proximity caused Priscilla to take a hasty backward step. "What is it?" she exclaimed in horror. "It’s a kitten, I think," Peggy replied doubtfully. "Yes, it is a kitten." Her uncertainty was less singular because the appearance of the poor bedraggled creature was so little suggestive of the kittens Peggy had known. Jimmy Dunn, however, regarded his prize with unalloyed satisfaction. "They was going to drown it, them smart kids," he said with a gesture that included all his late antagonists. "But they didn’t. I got it. And that ain’t all, you bet." Jimmy’s voice took on a portentous hoarseness. "I can’t lick ’em all to onct, but every kid in that bunch is going to get _his_, and don’t you forgit it." "I’m afraid you’re hurt yourself, Jimmy," Peggy said, proffering her handkerchief. Jimmy shook his head and fell back on his sleeve. "But you were crying," Priscilla suggested with less than Peggy’s tact. Jimmy Dunn looked a little sheepish. "I mostly bawl when I get mad," he replied. "Seems as if I couldn’t put up a good fight till I start cryin’. I’m going to the store and get a cent’s worth o’ milk for this kitten. Time it’s dry and cleaned up, and had some milk to drink, you wouldn’t know it." Peggy thought it was very likely. It was impossible to imagine how any kitten dry, warm and fed, could bear even the faintest resemblance to the wet, muddy lump of fur in Jimmy’s arms. Thinking it advisable that measures of resuscitation should begin as promptly as possible, the two girls said good-bye and walked on, hearing till they left Glen Echo Avenue far behind the shrill tones of Jimmy Dunn’s voice as he called to his late opponents promises of retribution in the near future.