. He felt lonely, deserted, and
mistreated, but he saw in the faces of his comrades the reflection of
the injunction to put down the stones. He did so, and his anger began
to cool. But he whimpered again, "Well now, touch me if you dare!"

The new boy came over briskly, and made a feint to slap the naked lad,
who warded off the blow, sniffling, "You just leave me alone. I ain't
hurtin' you." The boys in the water laughed--it seemed to Mealy such
a cruel laugh. Anger enveloped him again, and he struck out blindly
through his tears, hand over hand, striking the new boy in the mouth
and making it bleed, before he realized that the fight had begun. The
new boy tried to clinch Mealy, but the naked body slipped away from
him; and just then the combatants saw the satisfied grin freeze on the
faces of the boys in the water. A step crunched the gravel near them,
and in a moment that flashed vividly with rejoicing that the fight was
ended, then with abject, chattering terror, Mealy Jones saw his
father approaching. Mealy did not run. The uplifted cane and the red,
perspiring face of his father transfixed the lad, yet he felt called
upon to say something. His voice came from a dry throat, and he spoke
through an idiotic grin as he said, "I didn't know you wanted me, pa."

After the burst of his father's anger ten awful minutes of shame
passed for Mealy while he was putting on his wet clothes. The boys
in the water swam noiselessly upstream to the roots of the elm-tree,
where he saw them looking at his disgrace. During those ten minutes
Mealy realized that his father's deepening silence portended evil; so
he tried to draw his father into a discussion of the merits of the
case by whimpering from time to time, "Well, I guess they ast me to
come," or "Piggy said it wouldn't hurt, 'cause 't ain't in dog days,"
or "I wasn't in where it was deep. I was only a-wadin'." The new boy,
who was seated upon a log near by with a stone in his hand, which he
had picked up fearing the elder Jones would join the fray, sniffed
audibly. He called to the other boys derisively, "Say, any of you boys
got the baby's blocks?" It did not lift the mantle of humiliation that
covered Mealy to hear his father reply to the new boy, "That will do
for you, sir." While Mealy wept he wiped away his tears first with one
hand and then with the other, employing the free hand in fastening
his clothes together. He did not fear the punishment that might be in
store for h