t might have
killed me. No thanks to you that it didn't. Your intentions were good
enough."

Agnew began to bluster, but in a low tone.

"I'm not used to being accused of such things. How do you know there was
anything the matter with the shell? Are you hunting for trouble?"

"That was the trick of an Apache, Agnew!"

"Don't let the proprietor hear you," Agnew begged, and his voice was
again as smooth as silk. "What is the use of rowing? I say that I did
nothing of the kind, and you're a fool for thinking so. Whoever hinted
that to you lied."

"I allow you might as well say that I lied!"

Agnew pushed toward the wall and put his hands into his pockets. Badger,
thinking he meant to draw a weapon, gave him no further time, but leaped
on him across the table with the rush of a cyclone. Agnew went down
under that rush, but he clutched the Westerner, and began to struggle,
at the same time sending up a sharp call for help. In a moment the
proprietor and the bartender were on the scene.

"None of this!" cried the proprietor, grabbing Badger by the shoulders,
and, with the bartender's assistance, bodily dragging him off the
threshing, writhing form of Agnew. Morton did not seem in any hurry to
be released or rescued, however, and hung to Badger's coat and vest with
the tenacity of the under dog that fails to appreciate the fact that it
is overmatched.

"No fighting in here!" panted the proprietor. "This ain't no
boxing-club! See! I'm glad to have gents come in and make themselves to
home, but I can't allow any fighting!"

Agnew slid toward the door, seeming anxious to escape. The next moment
he was out in the barroom, and then he vanished into the street.

"I'll pay for the damages," said Badger, choking down his wrath. "He
went to draw a gun on me, and I jumped on him, that's all. A man is a
fool to let another get the drop on him, and I allow I don't intend to.
You bet I don't. I'll see him again, and when I do I reckon we'll have a
settlement."

CHAPTER XII.

AGNEW'S TRICK.

When the Westerner saw Agnew again they were in one of the college
lecture-rooms and an examination was in progress. Of course, they did
not speak to each other. Badger believed that Agnew had kept away from
him since their warlike encounter of the night before. The fact that
Agnew was also a sophomore had long been a disturbing thought to the
Westerner. Badger had class pride. He sometimes declared that he was a
sophomore of t