of a faculty exercised clumsily enough by most human beings, especially in their youth; in other words, he had a genius—­not, however, a genius having to do with anything generally recognized as art or science.  True, if he had been a violinist prodigy or mathematical prodigy, he would have had some respect from his fellows—­about equal to that he might have received if he were gifted with some pleasant deformity, such as six toes on a foot—­but he would never have enjoyed such deadly prestige as had actually come to be his.  In brief, then, Wallie Torbin had a genius for mockery.

Almost from his babyhood he had been a child of one purpose:  to increase by burlesques the sufferings of unfortunate friends.  If one of them wept, Wallie incessantly pursued him, yelping in horrid mimicry; if one were chastised he could not appear out-of-doors for days except to encounter Wallie and a complete rehearsal of the recent agony.  “Quit, Papa! Pah-puh, quee-yet!  I’ll never do it again, Pah-puh!  Oh, lemme alone, Pah-puh!”

As he grew older, his insatiate curiosity enabled him to expose unnumbered weaknesses, indiscretions, and social misfortunes on the part of acquaintances and schoolmates; and to every exposure his noise and energy gave a hideous publicity:  the more his victim sought privacy the more persistently he was followed by Wallie, vociferous and attended by hilarious spectators.  But above all other things, what most stimulated the demoniac boy to prodigies of satire was a tender episode or any symptom connected with the dawn of love.  Florence herself had suffered at intervals throughout her eleventh summer because Wallie discovered that Georgie Beck had sent her a valentine; and the humorist’s many, many squealings of that valentine’s affectionate quatrain finally left her unable to decide which she hated the more, Wallie or Georgie.  That was the worst of Wallie:  he never “let up”; and in Florence’s circle there was no more sobering threat than, “I’ll tell Wallie Torbin!” As for Henry Rooter and Herbert Illingsworth Atwater, Jr., they would as soon have had a Head-hunter on their trail as Wallie Torbin in the possession of anything that could incriminate them in an implication of love—­or an acknowledgment (in their own handwriting!) of their own beauty.

The fabric of civilized life is interwoven with blackmail:  even some of the noblest people do favours for other people who are depended upon not to tell somebody something that the noblest people have done.  Blackmail is born into us all, and our nurses teach us more blackmail by threatening to tell our parents if we won’t do this and that—­and our parents threaten to tell the doctor—­and so we learn!  Blackmail is part of the daily life of a child.  Displeased, his first resort to get his way with other children is a threat to “tell,” but by-and-by his experience discovers the mutual benefit of honour among blackmailers.  Therefore, at eight it is