“Who's goin' to fight?” asked Dick Bond more pointedly.
“I'm goin' to fight Fan Brown,” said Ed.
There was a load of ferocity in the way he said it, which showed that Ed, himself, had a latent hunger for battle.
“I guess I'll go 'long and see it,” said Dick Bond pipingly.
“How do you want to fight?” asked Ed of Fan Brown when each had buttoned up his coat tight to the chin. “Stand up, or rough and tumble?”
“Rough and tumble,” said Fan Brown savagely.
“All right!”
“Now, boys,” said Dick Bond when all was ready, “I'll give the word and then you're goin' to fight until one of you says 'enough.' And remember! there's no bitin' no gougin', no scratchin'.”
“Bitin' goes?” declared Fan Brown, in a fashion of savage interrogatory.
“Bitin' don't go!” replied the lean little referee, “and if you offer to bite or gouge, Fan Brown, I'll break your neck. You'll never go back to Hinckley short of being carried in a blanket.”