than this I'd sell out and leave town."

Not having enough presence of mind to inquire what he would sell out,
his adversaries replied with mere formless yells of scorn.

"I could get up a better show than this with my left hand," Roderick
asserted.

"Well, what would you have in your ole show?" asked Penrod,
condescending to language.

"That's all right, what I'd HAVE. I'd have enough!"

"You couldn't get Herman and Verman in your ole show."

"No, and I wouldn't want 'em, either!"

"Well, what WOULD you have?" insisted Penrod derisively. "You'd have to
have SUMPTHING--you couldn't be a show yourself!"

"How do YOU know?" This was but meandering while waiting for ideas, and
evoked another yell.

"You think you could be a show all by yourself?" demanded Penrod.

"How do YOU know I couldn't?"

Two white boys and two black boys shrieked their scorn of the boaster.

"I could, too!" Roderick raised his voice to a sudden howl, obtaining a
hearing.

"Well, why don't you tell us how?"

"Well, _I_ know HOW, all right," said Roderick. "If anybody asks you,
you can just tell him I know HOW, all right."

"Why, you can't DO anything," Sam began argumentatively. "You talk
about being a show all by yourself; what could you try to do? Show us
sumpthing you can do."

"I didn't say I was going to DO anything," returned the badgered one,
still evading.

"Well, then, how'd you BE a show?" Penrod demanded. "WE got a show here,
even if Herman didn't point or Verman didn't talk. Their father stabbed
a man with a pitchfork, I guess, didn't he?"

"How do _I_ know?"

"Well, I guess he's in jail, ain't he?"

"Well, what if their father is in jail? I didn't say he wasn't, did I?"

"Well, YOUR father ain't in jail, is he?"

"Well, I never said he was, did I?"

"Well, then," continued Penrod, "how could you be a----" He stopped
abruptly, staring at Roderick, the birth of an idea plainly visible in
his altered expression. He had suddenly remembered his intention to
ask Roderick Magsworth Bitts, Junior, about Rena Magsworth, and this
recollection collided in his mind with the irritation produced by
Roderick's claiming some mysterious attainment which would warrant his
setting up as a show in his single person. Penrod's whole manner changed
instantly.

"Roddy," he asked, almost overwhelmed by a prescience of something vast
and magnificent, "Roddy, are you any relation of Rena Magsworth?"

Roderick had never heard of Re