"Clear out, puppy!" he shouted, imperatively. "This is my meat! When people get to slinging knives, there's no more sense in handling them with gloves!"
The debonaire laziness was gone from Brice's voice and manner. His face was dead-white. His eyes were blazing. His mouth was a mere gash in the grim face. Even as he spoke, he had thrust the snarling collie away, and was at the beach-comber.
No longer was it a question of boxing or of half-jesting horseplay. The use of the knife had put this fight on a new plane. And, like a wild beast, Gavin Brice was attacking his big foe. But, unlike a wild beast, he kept his head, as he charged.
Disregarding the menace of the huge arms, he came to grips, without striking a single blow. Around him the beach-comber flung his constricting grasp. But this time the grip was worthless.
For, Brice's left shoulder jutted out in such manner as to keep the arms from getting their former hold around the body itself, and Brice's right elbow held off the grip on the other side. At the same time the top of Brice's head buried itself under the beachcomber's chin, forcing the giant's jaw upward and backward. Then, safe inside his opponent's guard, he abandoned his effort to stave off the giant's hold, and passed his own arms about the other's waist, his hands meeting under the small of the larger man's back.
The beach comber tried now to use his freed arms to gain the grip that had once been so effective. But his clasp could close only over the slope of Brice's back and could find no purchase.
While the man was groping for the right hold, Gavin threw all his own power into a single move. Tightening his underhold, and drawing in on the small of the giant's back, he raised himself on his toes, and pressed the top of his head, with all his might, against the bottom of the beach-comber's chin.
The trick was not new. But it was fearsomely effective. It was, as Gavin had explained, all a question of leverage. The giant's waist was drawn forward, His chin, simultaneously, was shoved backward. Such a dual cross pressure was due, eventually, to mean one of two things:—either the snapping of the spine or else the breaking of the neck. Unless the grip could be broken, there was no earthly help for its victim.
The beach comber, in agony of straining spine and throat, thrashed wildly to free himself. He strove to batter the tenacious little man to senselessness. But he could hit nothing but the sloping back, or aim clumsily cramped hooks for the top and sides of Gavin's protected head.
Meantime, the pressure was increasing, with a coldly scientific precision. Human nature could not endure it. In his extremity, the beach comber attempted the same ruse that had been so successful for Brice. He slumped, in pseudo-helplessness. The only result was to enable Gavin to tighten his hold, unopposed by the tensing of the enemy's wall of muscles.