to make him mad, and that did not take much time or trouble. Jay
rushed him.

"No wrasslin'," called Ira quietly, at the same time stopping the rush
with a left-hand swing on Jay's chin that made the head wabble.

"I reckon he must be left-handed," thought the wondering Allaphair. There
are persons who literally do grind their teeth with rage and it is audible.
The girl heard Jay's now.

"He's goin' to kill him," she thought, and she got ready to do her part,
for with a terrible, hoarse grunt Jay had rushed. Like a greased rod of
steel the boy writhed loose from the big, crooked talons that reached for
his throat, and his right fist, knobbed on the end of another bar of steel,
came up under Jay's bent head with every ounce of the whole weight behind
it in the blow. It caught the big man on the point of the chin. Jay's head
snapped up and back violently, his feet left the ground, and his big body
thudded the road.

[Illustration]

"My God, he's knocked him down! My God, he's knocked him down!" muttered
the amazed girl. "You got him down!" she cried. "Jump on him an' stomp
him!" He turned one startled look toward her and--it is incredible--the
look even at that moment was shy; but he stood still, for Ira had picked
up the ethics as well as the skill of the art, of which nothing was known
in Happy Valley or elsewhere in the hills. So he stood still, his hands
open, and waited. For a while Jay did not move, and his eyes, when they
did open, looked dazed. He rose slowly, and as things came back to him his
face became suddenly distorted. Nothing alive could humiliate him that way
and still live; he meant to kill now.

"Look out!" screamed the girl. Jay rushed for the gun and Ira darted
after him; but there was a quicker flash from the bushes, and Jay found
his own gun pointed at his own breast and behind it Allaphair's black
eyes searing him.

"Huh!" she grunted contemptuously, and the silence was absolute while she
broke the pistol, emptied the cartridges into her hand, and threw them far
over into the bushes.

"Less go on home, Iry," she said, and a few steps away she turned and
tossed the gun at Jay's feet. He stooped, picked it up, and, twirling
it in his hand, looked foolishly after them. Presently he grinned, for
at bottom Jay was a man. And two hours later, amid much wonder and many
guffaws, he was telling the tale:

"The damned leetle spindle-shank licked me--licked _me_! An' I'll back
him agin anybody in H