other, "this is my father's orchard and you'll keep off it. You
and the rest of you tin soldiers. I don't want you stealing our
peaches."

"I guess you are sore, Jack Curtiss, because you couldn't get a
boy scout patrol of your own! I guess that's what the trouble
is," remarked Tubby Hopkins softly, but with a meaning look at
the big lad.

"You impudent little whipper-snapper," roared Jack Curtiss, "if
you weren't such a shrimp I'd lick you for that remark, but
you're all beneath my notice. All I want to say to you is keep
away from my orchard or I'll give you a trimming."

"Suppose you start now," said Rob Blake quietly, "if you are so
anxious to show what a scrapper you are."

"Bah, I don't want anything to do with you, I tell you," rejoined
Curtiss, turning away, with a rather troubled expression,
however, for while he was a bully the big lad had no particular
liking for a fight unless he was pretty sure that all the
advantage lay on his side.

"It was too bad you didn't get that patrol of yours, Jack,"
called the irrepressible Tubby after him as the big youth strode
off across the orchard toward the old-fashioned farmhouse in
which he lived with his father, a well-to-do farmer. "Never
mind; better luck next time," he went on, "or maybe we'll let you
into ours some time."