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ladybug_archiveI finally drew a picture of my OC Sybil. XD; I hope I didn't give her long hair in an RP I did a while back, but if I did, it'll have to change, because I can only picture her with short hair now.
And here's that thing I've been writing on Duke, at least this is it until I decide what else to put. XD
Name: Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie
Age: Unknown; perhaps in his mid to late twenties
Memorable Quotes: "I'd like to bawl you out, but I haven't got the time!" --- Hot Shots
"You get those carpets cleaned or I'll cut your ears off! And that's no bull!" --- Hold That Hypnotist (Yeah, I was surprised to hear him say that in a movie from the fifties. XD; Another time I'm almost positive he said "Oh my God!" after accidentally punching Sach....)
"The next time I wanna listen to an idiot, I'll listen to myself!" --- Hold That Hypnotist
"Just remember, this man is here for a rest cure. If you don't cut it out, I'll be here for a rest cure!" --- Spook Chasers
"... ROCKHEAD!" --- Looking for Danger
"I know I promised to share everything with you, but I draw the line at the chopping block!" --- Looking for Danger
Information Gained from the Films: Stanislaus Coveleskie, nicknamed "Duke", is Slip's replacement and Sach's other best friend. He's a fast-talking wise guy and generally comes off as more educated, polished, and refined than his predecessor. He also is notorious for seeming rather on edge, which is perhaps an indication of how taxing it is to lead the gang. He seems to have a better command of the English language than Slip does, though every now and then his vocabulary seems to slip (no pun intended). He also has been known to lay back and command the others in doing work, even though he is quite willing to join in himself.
Like Slip, Duke tends to show his affection for Sach in unusual ways. While Slip tends to strike the simple-minded young man with his hat (and sometimes his hand), Duke prefers to tease him by pursuing him with all manner of weapons. Sach knows that Duke will never actually harm him with the swords, or the pickaxes, or whatever his fancy is at the moment, but he runs anyway, as that's all part of the game. They have also been known to engage in mock battles. Their relationship is that of two very close brothers who seem to be at odds frequently but who are always there for each other.
Duke is a logical, scientific sort of person, disbelieving in ghosts, reincarnation, and the powers of hypnosis/regression, though if he finds research and facts that seem to back up elements of the paranormal he will be more open-minded. He is not easily duped, and generally serves as the voice of reason among the Boys.
Duke enjoys the card game gin rummy and considers himself to be quite good at it. He also has been known to check up in the newspapers on the results of the horse races, though merely out of curiosity. He does not tend to gamble, and only tried it a few times when Sach seemed to have knowledge of which horse would win. He does not drink, and he cannot handle smoking cigars without dissolving into a fit of coughing. He does not smoke cigarettes either, and seems to disapprove of Sach doing thusly, as he once remarked upon seeing Sach smoking, "What is this? A smoke signal?"
He tends to fabricate stories in order to get out of tight spots or to tease and bewilder---or for all of the above. He made up the story of his and Sach's service in WWII and of how they helped the Allies take control of North Africa, and while it is possible that the two of them could have served in the military (if one follows the idea that the films take place around the time they were made and that the characters are the same ages as their actors), some of the others reported as being present would have been far too young, such as Myron.
Another interesting observation is that, while Sach and Slip are quite willing to give their real names, Duke never has been forthcoming with his. The only times when he is called Stanislaus are in Fighting Trouble (by Mrs. Kelly), Hot Shots (on his office door), and Looking for Danger (by Lester Bradfield, from the War Department). This seems to indicate that he does not care for his given name, for whatever reason.
Information Gained from the Author's Mind: Duke grew up in the Bowery along with Slip and Sach and the three of them were very close. As a child, Duke was carefree and more innocent, and quite willing to let Slip be the leader---until he started getting his own ideas about how he thought things could be run better. He and Slip argued over this and eventually had a falling out, but Duke still remained close to Sach even after Duke dropped out of the gang that Slip was forming. He and Slip finally smoothed things over a bit, but there was always an undercurrent of tension between them afterward.
He lived alone with only his alcoholic father for company---and that was not very much. His mother had deserted them for another man, leaving him bitter against women through most of his childhood years and on into adolescence (though he did eventually get over his hang-up). Often Mr. Coveleskie had his gambling friends over to the house and they would smoke and drink late into the night. Duke would either hide in his room while they were there or else stay out of the house completely, knowing that he would not be missed. It was these events that largely made him vow to not bother with either smoking or drinking as he grew older.
His father did not approve of Duke's friendships with the others and often threatened to hurt Duke if he would not stay away. This approach did not work, however, and finally a gambling friend of Mr. Coveleskie's told Duke that his friends would be hurt if he did not comply with his father's wishes. Duke never liked his father's friends, and he fully believed that the man would harm Slip and Sach if he got the chance, but he still did not want to give in to their unfair wishes. The only reason why Duke's father did not like Slip and Sach, after all, was because he wanted Duke to follow in his crooked footsteps and Duke's friends were keeping him on a straight and narrow path.
One night his father was furious over the situation and was drinking heavily as he was driving the car with Duke as an unwilling passenger. Catching sight of Sach crossing the street, the man tried to run him down, and Duke grabbed the wheel desperately to swerve the vehicle away. It ended up crashing against a telephone pole, and while Mr. Coveleskie escaped with a few scratches, Duke was badly hurt and ended up in a coma. He awoke and recovered, but now he realized how serious his father was about keeping him away from Sach and Slip. He did not doubt that if his father encountered either of them again while being intoxicated, he would again try to harm them, and so Duke began to distance himself from them to try to protect them. They did not know the reason for Duke's subdued behavior and instead wondered if it was due to the car crash. They were partially right, but did not know that Mr. Coveleskie had deliberately tried to kill Sach.
Duke was around twelve at this time, and he was struggling with his confusion over who he was. He was no longer a child, and as he became an adolescent, his father tried all the more to get Duke to be more like him. He took his son to gambling joints, to the horse races, and to anywhere else he could where he hoped to have an influence on his mind. And even though Duke was trying to resist, it was difficult. He did not have anyone to turn to for advice or a counter-influence.
Until he met Muggs McGinnis. Muggs was everything Duke was not---confident in himself, tough, and able to stand up to people. He was a sort of surrogate father/brother figure for the confused youth, though he did not want to be, and Duke grew to idolize him. He was not an official member of Muggs' gang, The East Side Kids, but he was willing to work with them in any way possible, even if it was merely as a gofer or hanger-on. He took to wearing a pinned-up fedora, as Muggs did, and sometimes would imitate his actions and repeat what he would say. Though Muggs was briefly flattered, it soon became a complete annoyance, and he hated it.
After Duke had been with them for a while (using a nickname for his given name Stanislaus: "Stash"), there was an incident where Muggs found himself in quite a bit of trouble. Using his sister as insurance, some local criminals forced Muggs to help them steal electronics from a warehouse. Rumors started circulating that Muggs had gone bad, but Duke refused to believe it. Muggs was not like his father. He could not be.
Wanting to know the truth, Duke followed Muggs out to the warehouse one night and hid to watch what happened. When he saw Muggs helping the men load boxes into the truck, it was too much. He ran out, distraught, and demanded to know what was going on and how Muggs could betray everyone in this way. He had thought Muggs was different, someone he could look up to, someone who was not mixed up in all the crime and corruption that his father was. Muggs, not wanting to deal with this right now, screamed for Duke to go away. But as the truck started to drive off, Duke vainly chased after it, and one of the men shot him in the leg. Disgusted by them, annoyed with Duke, and upset with the entire situation, Muggs tried to get off the truck but was warned that his sister would be hurt if he did not continue to follow through, and then was held there at gunpoint.
Duke tried and failed several times to drag himself along, favoring his uninjured leg, but he could not get very far before he had to concede defeat. He was later rescued by some of the other East Side Kids and taken back to their clubhouse to recover, where he learned the truth behind Muggs' actions from Danny. Upset and horrified, Duke wanted to figure out a way to solve the problem and help Muggs, but they could not arrive at a satisfactory conclusion. Muggs later was able to rescue his sister and to get the criminals brought to justice, with the aid of most of the other boys. Duke was unable to do much to help, due to his injury.
When his leg had finally healed and he could walk again without limping, Duke was confronted by Muggs, who told him how much he hated being idolized and imitated and that he was only human just like everyone else. Duke could not hope to learn who he was by trying so hard to be like him, he said, and until Duke could learn who he was, Muggs would not respect him. Feeling disillusioned and having had his feelings hurt by Muggs' harsh words, Duke left the gang.
He was bitter for some time afterwards as he roamed the streets of New York, trying to piece together his identity. Eventually it all came to a head when he was forced to stand up to his father and flat-out tell him that he would never be like him, no matter what happened. In a rage, Mr. Coveleskie threw Duke out of the house (though this was only temporary).
As he again began to wander about, he stumbled upon a small group of boys around his same age who were having trouble with a bully. Annoyed and angry, Duke fought him and managed to win through a combination of punches and skills. The boys were all very grateful and they wanted Duke to be their leader. Duke did not feel that he was qualified, but as they continued to praise him enthusiastically, he felt a burst of pride and finally accepted their request.
Duke soon learned that being a leader was very difficult, and he came to have much more respect for Slip and Muggs due to his experiences. Then one of the younger members started idolizing him the same way he had once idolized Muggs, and he started to realize what it was like to be in the other person's shoes. Slowly, as the days went on, Duke came to the knowledge that Muggs had been right all along, which he never would have understood so clearly if he had not been put through the experience of being the one who was looked up to. Though he did not lead the group for very long, and stopped once it was fall and the boys returned to the boarding school that their aunt was sending them to, it was something that left a great impression on him and he took the knowledge he had gained as he went on to other things.
Humbled and much more mature, he returned to the East Side Kids' clubhouse to speak with Muggs. The gang's leader was impressed by what Duke had learned and by how much he had mentally grown up, and he welcomed him back into the club as a full-fledged member. Duke remained with them for a couple more years, until his father went into business with a couple of other friends in Brooklyn and moved there with Duke.
Duke unwillingly stayed with Mr. Coveleskie until the day he turned eighteen, upon which they had another fight and essentially disowned each other. After that, Duke continued to work at the job he had gotten as a copy boy at a local newspaper and got his own apartment. He had finished high school, and wanted to go to college, but was not able to earn the money. During a scandal at the paper, he was fired and finally decided to return back to his boyhood home.
He had always been the youngest member of the East Side Kids, and when he went back to the Bowery, the others had gone their separate ways. But now that his father was not there to interfere, Duke looked for Sach and Slip again and found them. He did not join the Bowery Boys again, but he renewed his friendships with the others and would sometimes help them on their adventures, the same as Gabe did.
When Slip became aware that he would have to go away for a time to take care of an injured cousin, and that the others would not be able to come along, he asked Duke to take over as the temporary leader. This came as a shock to Duke, since Slip had not thought him capable before, but Slip explained that he had been observing Duke recently and that he could see that his friend had matured. He also had suspected that the "Stash" boy he had heard of sometimes was Duke, but he had never been able to prove it, until Duke expressed amazement that Slip knew of the leadership positions he had held when he had been younger. He accepted the request, and soon took over as leader of the Bowery Boys.
It took Duke a while to be able to gain the respect and trust of the Boys, and of the landlady Mrs. Kelly, all of whom were still reeling from Slip's departure. He was often compared unfairly to his predecessor, and there were many complaints that he was lazy and passing the buck. Sach, though he was friendly to Duke, sometimes would try to lead the gang himself, leading Duke to believe that Sach felt that he should have given the leadership position instead. He could understand their reluctance to accept a new leader after so many years, but it was still frustrating. After all, he was doing the best he could.
He especially had trouble getting along with Mrs. Kelly, who always seemed to be praising Sach up and ignoring his shortcomings while putting Duke down and never acknowledging his positive traits. Duke felt certain that she hated him, and during a misadventure in Bavaria everything finally came to a head after a plan of Duke's went awry and caused everyone to get into trouble. He started to believe that perhaps he was not the leader that the Boys needed and he and Sach got into a heated argument over it and about Slip. When Mrs. Kelly then came to break up the arguing, she started to scold Duke again and he demanded to know why she could not accept him for who he was and why she instead had to despise him for who he was not.
She then revealed to him, in private, that she did not hate him at all, but that she saw so much of his father in him and it worried her. She had once had a romantic relationship with Duke's father, not knowing that he was married at the time. As soon as she had learned, she had parted ways with him and had not heard anything about him or any Coveleskies until Duke had shown up wanting room and board at her boarding house. She had instantly realized whose son he must be and hoped desperately that Duke was not the same sort of lazy gambler that his father was. When she came down hard on him, it was because she was afraid that he did possess those traits and might develope them further.
Duke was stunned by these revelations, especially that Mrs. Kelly had known his father so well, but he assured her that he had worked hard to not be like his father. He admitted that sometimes he fell short and that sometimes he did look at the results of horse races and the like, but it was only for curiosity's sake. He had already determined not to fall into the same gambling pit as his father had, and he had struggled to work hard and to be a good leader. Mrs. Kelly then told him that he could not give up or he would indeed be like his father. Duke then was able to think of a plan of action that would get himself and the others out of their predicament, and the others helped him carry it out and finally accepted him as the leader. After that experience, Duke and Mrs. Kelly became especially close.
Eventually Slip returned, right in the middle of another disaster, and he and Duke argued over who would be the leader, the stress of the situation releasing all of their pent-up tension from years before. That soon erupted into an argument over which of them was Sach's best friend. They finally decided that both of them could be Sach's best friend, but neither of them have stepped down as the leader, so now they have been awkwardly trying to direct the Boys together.
And here's that thing I've been writing on Duke, at least this is it until I decide what else to put. XD
Name: Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie
Age: Unknown; perhaps in his mid to late twenties
Memorable Quotes: "I'd like to bawl you out, but I haven't got the time!" --- Hot Shots
"You get those carpets cleaned or I'll cut your ears off! And that's no bull!" --- Hold That Hypnotist (Yeah, I was surprised to hear him say that in a movie from the fifties. XD; Another time I'm almost positive he said "Oh my God!" after accidentally punching Sach....)
"The next time I wanna listen to an idiot, I'll listen to myself!" --- Hold That Hypnotist
"Just remember, this man is here for a rest cure. If you don't cut it out, I'll be here for a rest cure!" --- Spook Chasers
"... ROCKHEAD!" --- Looking for Danger
"I know I promised to share everything with you, but I draw the line at the chopping block!" --- Looking for Danger
Information Gained from the Films: Stanislaus Coveleskie, nicknamed "Duke", is Slip's replacement and Sach's other best friend. He's a fast-talking wise guy and generally comes off as more educated, polished, and refined than his predecessor. He also is notorious for seeming rather on edge, which is perhaps an indication of how taxing it is to lead the gang. He seems to have a better command of the English language than Slip does, though every now and then his vocabulary seems to slip (no pun intended). He also has been known to lay back and command the others in doing work, even though he is quite willing to join in himself.
Like Slip, Duke tends to show his affection for Sach in unusual ways. While Slip tends to strike the simple-minded young man with his hat (and sometimes his hand), Duke prefers to tease him by pursuing him with all manner of weapons. Sach knows that Duke will never actually harm him with the swords, or the pickaxes, or whatever his fancy is at the moment, but he runs anyway, as that's all part of the game. They have also been known to engage in mock battles. Their relationship is that of two very close brothers who seem to be at odds frequently but who are always there for each other.
Duke is a logical, scientific sort of person, disbelieving in ghosts, reincarnation, and the powers of hypnosis/regression, though if he finds research and facts that seem to back up elements of the paranormal he will be more open-minded. He is not easily duped, and generally serves as the voice of reason among the Boys.
Duke enjoys the card game gin rummy and considers himself to be quite good at it. He also has been known to check up in the newspapers on the results of the horse races, though merely out of curiosity. He does not tend to gamble, and only tried it a few times when Sach seemed to have knowledge of which horse would win. He does not drink, and he cannot handle smoking cigars without dissolving into a fit of coughing. He does not smoke cigarettes either, and seems to disapprove of Sach doing thusly, as he once remarked upon seeing Sach smoking, "What is this? A smoke signal?"
He tends to fabricate stories in order to get out of tight spots or to tease and bewilder---or for all of the above. He made up the story of his and Sach's service in WWII and of how they helped the Allies take control of North Africa, and while it is possible that the two of them could have served in the military (if one follows the idea that the films take place around the time they were made and that the characters are the same ages as their actors), some of the others reported as being present would have been far too young, such as Myron.
Another interesting observation is that, while Sach and Slip are quite willing to give their real names, Duke never has been forthcoming with his. The only times when he is called Stanislaus are in Fighting Trouble (by Mrs. Kelly), Hot Shots (on his office door), and Looking for Danger (by Lester Bradfield, from the War Department). This seems to indicate that he does not care for his given name, for whatever reason.
Information Gained from the Author's Mind: Duke grew up in the Bowery along with Slip and Sach and the three of them were very close. As a child, Duke was carefree and more innocent, and quite willing to let Slip be the leader---until he started getting his own ideas about how he thought things could be run better. He and Slip argued over this and eventually had a falling out, but Duke still remained close to Sach even after Duke dropped out of the gang that Slip was forming. He and Slip finally smoothed things over a bit, but there was always an undercurrent of tension between them afterward.
He lived alone with only his alcoholic father for company---and that was not very much. His mother had deserted them for another man, leaving him bitter against women through most of his childhood years and on into adolescence (though he did eventually get over his hang-up). Often Mr. Coveleskie had his gambling friends over to the house and they would smoke and drink late into the night. Duke would either hide in his room while they were there or else stay out of the house completely, knowing that he would not be missed. It was these events that largely made him vow to not bother with either smoking or drinking as he grew older.
His father did not approve of Duke's friendships with the others and often threatened to hurt Duke if he would not stay away. This approach did not work, however, and finally a gambling friend of Mr. Coveleskie's told Duke that his friends would be hurt if he did not comply with his father's wishes. Duke never liked his father's friends, and he fully believed that the man would harm Slip and Sach if he got the chance, but he still did not want to give in to their unfair wishes. The only reason why Duke's father did not like Slip and Sach, after all, was because he wanted Duke to follow in his crooked footsteps and Duke's friends were keeping him on a straight and narrow path.
One night his father was furious over the situation and was drinking heavily as he was driving the car with Duke as an unwilling passenger. Catching sight of Sach crossing the street, the man tried to run him down, and Duke grabbed the wheel desperately to swerve the vehicle away. It ended up crashing against a telephone pole, and while Mr. Coveleskie escaped with a few scratches, Duke was badly hurt and ended up in a coma. He awoke and recovered, but now he realized how serious his father was about keeping him away from Sach and Slip. He did not doubt that if his father encountered either of them again while being intoxicated, he would again try to harm them, and so Duke began to distance himself from them to try to protect them. They did not know the reason for Duke's subdued behavior and instead wondered if it was due to the car crash. They were partially right, but did not know that Mr. Coveleskie had deliberately tried to kill Sach.
Duke was around twelve at this time, and he was struggling with his confusion over who he was. He was no longer a child, and as he became an adolescent, his father tried all the more to get Duke to be more like him. He took his son to gambling joints, to the horse races, and to anywhere else he could where he hoped to have an influence on his mind. And even though Duke was trying to resist, it was difficult. He did not have anyone to turn to for advice or a counter-influence.
Until he met Muggs McGinnis. Muggs was everything Duke was not---confident in himself, tough, and able to stand up to people. He was a sort of surrogate father/brother figure for the confused youth, though he did not want to be, and Duke grew to idolize him. He was not an official member of Muggs' gang, The East Side Kids, but he was willing to work with them in any way possible, even if it was merely as a gofer or hanger-on. He took to wearing a pinned-up fedora, as Muggs did, and sometimes would imitate his actions and repeat what he would say. Though Muggs was briefly flattered, it soon became a complete annoyance, and he hated it.
After Duke had been with them for a while (using a nickname for his given name Stanislaus: "Stash"), there was an incident where Muggs found himself in quite a bit of trouble. Using his sister as insurance, some local criminals forced Muggs to help them steal electronics from a warehouse. Rumors started circulating that Muggs had gone bad, but Duke refused to believe it. Muggs was not like his father. He could not be.
Wanting to know the truth, Duke followed Muggs out to the warehouse one night and hid to watch what happened. When he saw Muggs helping the men load boxes into the truck, it was too much. He ran out, distraught, and demanded to know what was going on and how Muggs could betray everyone in this way. He had thought Muggs was different, someone he could look up to, someone who was not mixed up in all the crime and corruption that his father was. Muggs, not wanting to deal with this right now, screamed for Duke to go away. But as the truck started to drive off, Duke vainly chased after it, and one of the men shot him in the leg. Disgusted by them, annoyed with Duke, and upset with the entire situation, Muggs tried to get off the truck but was warned that his sister would be hurt if he did not continue to follow through, and then was held there at gunpoint.
Duke tried and failed several times to drag himself along, favoring his uninjured leg, but he could not get very far before he had to concede defeat. He was later rescued by some of the other East Side Kids and taken back to their clubhouse to recover, where he learned the truth behind Muggs' actions from Danny. Upset and horrified, Duke wanted to figure out a way to solve the problem and help Muggs, but they could not arrive at a satisfactory conclusion. Muggs later was able to rescue his sister and to get the criminals brought to justice, with the aid of most of the other boys. Duke was unable to do much to help, due to his injury.
When his leg had finally healed and he could walk again without limping, Duke was confronted by Muggs, who told him how much he hated being idolized and imitated and that he was only human just like everyone else. Duke could not hope to learn who he was by trying so hard to be like him, he said, and until Duke could learn who he was, Muggs would not respect him. Feeling disillusioned and having had his feelings hurt by Muggs' harsh words, Duke left the gang.
He was bitter for some time afterwards as he roamed the streets of New York, trying to piece together his identity. Eventually it all came to a head when he was forced to stand up to his father and flat-out tell him that he would never be like him, no matter what happened. In a rage, Mr. Coveleskie threw Duke out of the house (though this was only temporary).
As he again began to wander about, he stumbled upon a small group of boys around his same age who were having trouble with a bully. Annoyed and angry, Duke fought him and managed to win through a combination of punches and skills. The boys were all very grateful and they wanted Duke to be their leader. Duke did not feel that he was qualified, but as they continued to praise him enthusiastically, he felt a burst of pride and finally accepted their request.
Duke soon learned that being a leader was very difficult, and he came to have much more respect for Slip and Muggs due to his experiences. Then one of the younger members started idolizing him the same way he had once idolized Muggs, and he started to realize what it was like to be in the other person's shoes. Slowly, as the days went on, Duke came to the knowledge that Muggs had been right all along, which he never would have understood so clearly if he had not been put through the experience of being the one who was looked up to. Though he did not lead the group for very long, and stopped once it was fall and the boys returned to the boarding school that their aunt was sending them to, it was something that left a great impression on him and he took the knowledge he had gained as he went on to other things.
Humbled and much more mature, he returned to the East Side Kids' clubhouse to speak with Muggs. The gang's leader was impressed by what Duke had learned and by how much he had mentally grown up, and he welcomed him back into the club as a full-fledged member. Duke remained with them for a couple more years, until his father went into business with a couple of other friends in Brooklyn and moved there with Duke.
Duke unwillingly stayed with Mr. Coveleskie until the day he turned eighteen, upon which they had another fight and essentially disowned each other. After that, Duke continued to work at the job he had gotten as a copy boy at a local newspaper and got his own apartment. He had finished high school, and wanted to go to college, but was not able to earn the money. During a scandal at the paper, he was fired and finally decided to return back to his boyhood home.
He had always been the youngest member of the East Side Kids, and when he went back to the Bowery, the others had gone their separate ways. But now that his father was not there to interfere, Duke looked for Sach and Slip again and found them. He did not join the Bowery Boys again, but he renewed his friendships with the others and would sometimes help them on their adventures, the same as Gabe did.
When Slip became aware that he would have to go away for a time to take care of an injured cousin, and that the others would not be able to come along, he asked Duke to take over as the temporary leader. This came as a shock to Duke, since Slip had not thought him capable before, but Slip explained that he had been observing Duke recently and that he could see that his friend had matured. He also had suspected that the "Stash" boy he had heard of sometimes was Duke, but he had never been able to prove it, until Duke expressed amazement that Slip knew of the leadership positions he had held when he had been younger. He accepted the request, and soon took over as leader of the Bowery Boys.
It took Duke a while to be able to gain the respect and trust of the Boys, and of the landlady Mrs. Kelly, all of whom were still reeling from Slip's departure. He was often compared unfairly to his predecessor, and there were many complaints that he was lazy and passing the buck. Sach, though he was friendly to Duke, sometimes would try to lead the gang himself, leading Duke to believe that Sach felt that he should have given the leadership position instead. He could understand their reluctance to accept a new leader after so many years, but it was still frustrating. After all, he was doing the best he could.
He especially had trouble getting along with Mrs. Kelly, who always seemed to be praising Sach up and ignoring his shortcomings while putting Duke down and never acknowledging his positive traits. Duke felt certain that she hated him, and during a misadventure in Bavaria everything finally came to a head after a plan of Duke's went awry and caused everyone to get into trouble. He started to believe that perhaps he was not the leader that the Boys needed and he and Sach got into a heated argument over it and about Slip. When Mrs. Kelly then came to break up the arguing, she started to scold Duke again and he demanded to know why she could not accept him for who he was and why she instead had to despise him for who he was not.
She then revealed to him, in private, that she did not hate him at all, but that she saw so much of his father in him and it worried her. She had once had a romantic relationship with Duke's father, not knowing that he was married at the time. As soon as she had learned, she had parted ways with him and had not heard anything about him or any Coveleskies until Duke had shown up wanting room and board at her boarding house. She had instantly realized whose son he must be and hoped desperately that Duke was not the same sort of lazy gambler that his father was. When she came down hard on him, it was because she was afraid that he did possess those traits and might develope them further.
Duke was stunned by these revelations, especially that Mrs. Kelly had known his father so well, but he assured her that he had worked hard to not be like his father. He admitted that sometimes he fell short and that sometimes he did look at the results of horse races and the like, but it was only for curiosity's sake. He had already determined not to fall into the same gambling pit as his father had, and he had struggled to work hard and to be a good leader. Mrs. Kelly then told him that he could not give up or he would indeed be like his father. Duke then was able to think of a plan of action that would get himself and the others out of their predicament, and the others helped him carry it out and finally accepted him as the leader. After that experience, Duke and Mrs. Kelly became especially close.
Eventually Slip returned, right in the middle of another disaster, and he and Duke argued over who would be the leader, the stress of the situation releasing all of their pent-up tension from years before. That soon erupted into an argument over which of them was Sach's best friend. They finally decided that both of them could be Sach's best friend, but neither of them have stepped down as the leader, so now they have been awkwardly trying to direct the Boys together.
