Slowly Martin picked himself up from the ground, a flush of anger darkening his face. "Shut up, you damn fools," he growled, "the whole thing's a trick. There ain't no fair test to it. But if any one of you jackasses, when you get through your braying, wants to try and see how strong he is, I'll fight any three of you in succession, and I'll knock the everlasting stuffing out of you, too." He paused a moment, glaring blackly at the group; then, as an afterthought, added with deliberation: "West--or east. No bar. First come, first served."
His words had a sudden sobering effect upon the crowd. The laughter died away. Gordon felt rather than actually saw all eyes turned curiously in his direction. He hesitated, but only for a moment.
"Oh, the devil," he began good-naturedly, "nobody wants to fight--" but Martin's ill humor was not to be so easily appeased.
"Oh, no," he jeered; "nobody wants to fight, and it's lucky for them they don't. It's lucky for them they're afraid--"
On the instant Gordon stepped forward, an ugly little smile playing around the corners of his mouth. "Meaning me?" he asked quietly.
Martin eyed him malevolently. "Sure," he grinned, with all the disagreeable effrontery he could put into his tone, "meaning you; and why not, I'd like to know."
"Only this," said Gordon in a perfectly level tone; "that you're not the man to use that word quite so freely without knowing first what you're talking about. And you'll apologize to me right away before these gentlemen--or I'll fight you with all the pleasure in life, three-minute rounds, one minute rests, no hitting in clinches, Harrison to referee."
Martin, the lust of battle glowing in his deep-set eyes, breathed a sigh of content. "Come on," was all that he said.
With the readiness born of much experience, Harrison and Stickney in a twinkling had the simple preparations under way. The rough dimensions of a twenty-four-foot ring were paced off; the spectators took their places where corner posts and ropes should have been, and a messenger was despatched to the ball field for the two players' benches there in use. In short order he returned, aided with his burden by many willing hands; behind him trailing some two score eager followers, for in the eyes of the Lake a fist fight still took precedence without competition over all else in the line of true diversion.