Quick as a goat on my feet, and as soon to see a storm coming up as any sailor, I leaped backward from the blow; and next, before Sheeny Joe recovered himself, I was upon him with a wrestler's twitch and trip that tossed him high in the air like a rag. He struck on his head and shoulders, the chimb of a cask against which he rolled cutting a fine gash in his scalp.
With a whirl of oaths, Sheeny Joe tried to scramble to his feet; he was shaken with rage and wonder to be thus outfaced and worsted by a boy. As he gained his knees, and before he might straighten to his ignoble feet, I dealt him a crashing blow between the eyes, or rather, on the bridge of the nose, which latter feature for Sheeny Joe grew curved and beaky. The blow was of the sort that boxers style a “hook,” and one nothing good to stop. Over Sheeny Joe went with the kicking force of it, and lay against the tier of casks, bleeding like tragedy, beaten, and yelling “murder!”
Sheeny Joe, bleeding and roaring, and I by no means glutted, but still hungry for his harm, were instantly the center of a gaping crowd that came about us like a whirlpool. With the others arrived an officer of the police.
“W'at's the row here?” demanded the officer.
“Take him to the station!” cried Sheeny Joe, picking himself up, a dripping picture of blood; “he struck me with a knuckle duster.”
“Not so fast, officer,” put in a reputable old gentleman. “Hear the lad's story first. The fellow was saying something to this girl. Nor does he look as though it could have been for her benefit.”
“Tell me about it, youngster,” said the officer, not unkindly. My age and weight, as against those of Sheeny Joe, told with this agent of the peace, who at heart was a fair man. “Tell me what there is to this shindy.”
“Why don't you take him in?” screamed Sheeny Joe. “W'at have you to do with his story?”
“Well, there's two ends to an alley,” retorted the officer warmly. “I'll hear what the boy has to say. Do you think you're goin' to do all the talkin'?”
“The first thing you'll know,” cried Sheeny Joe fiercely, “I'll have them pewter buttons off your coat.”