“Go ahead and say what you were going to,” said Joe with a queer little shake in his voice; “and then, you dirty mucker, I’ll give you a lesson in manners!”
Finn Clancy would have tackled a Dago armed with a knife or a construction hand holding a shovel without an instant’s hesitation, for he was quite devoid of physical fear and a scrapper to his fingers’ tips. But to have a quiet, brown-eyed young man suddenly leap a desk in an orderly business office and challenge him was so surprising that he paused.
He took careful note of the steady, watchful eyes, the sweep of the lean jaw, the two brown fists swinging to just the slightest oscillation of the tensed forearms, and the poise of the body on the gripping feet; and he knew that if his tongue uttered the words on the tip of it those fists would smash into him with all the driving power of a very fine pair of shoulders behind them.
Knowing it, his lips opened to speak the words; and Joe Kent, who had mastered the difficult art of starting a punch from wherever his hand happened to be, tautened his arm and shoulder muscles to steel.
John Clancy intervened.
“There’s enough of this,” he said. “Dry up, Finn. For why wud ye start rough-house wid the lad? An’ you, Kent, ’tis wan punch ye’d have, an’ then he’d kill ye.” He pushed roughly between them and took his brother by the shoulder. “Come on out o’ here, Finn, now. Lave him be, I tell ye!”
“I won’t,” said Finn. “I’ll tell him what I think iv him. An’ if he makes a pass at me, Jawn, I’ll break him acrost me knee!”
“An’ be pulled f’r it, wid yer name in the papers, an’ a fine, an’ a lawyer to pay, an’ all,” said his brother bitterly. “Have some sense. I’ll not stand f’r it, an’ I warn ye!”
“Let him go, and stand out of the way!” cried Joe. “There’ll be no law about it, Clancy, I promise you that, whichever way it goes.” His blood was dancing in his veins and he laughed nastily in the surge of his anger. He fairly hungered to whirl two-handed into this big, beefy Irishman, and give or take a first-class licking.
John Clancy put his open hand on his brother’s breast and pushed him back. “Ye’re a pair of fools,” he announced dispassionately. “Can’t ye talk over a business matter widout scrappin’? Be ashamed! It’s little good ye’ve done yerself, Kent, this day. Finn, come on out of here!”