"Let me go, I say! I want to overtake that fellow!"
Only a few near him understood his words. The majority thought he was merely showing a vigorous protest against the threatened loss of his shirt-tab, and they had no sympathy with anything of that kind, for they had suffered the same humiliation, and were naturally determined to inflict the same thing on every student they could lay their hands on.
"Let go!" Badger shrieked, white with wrath, lunging with his hard right fist.
It struck a student in the face and hurled him crashingly backward. But the next moment the fist and arm were caught and held.
Then began a fierce struggle for the mastery. Time and again the Westerner, whose strength was great, hurled off the men who sought to hold him down. Twice he got on his feet, merely to be tripped and thrown again. Not until he was almost beaten and choked into insensibility were his assailants able to rip open his vest.
Ordinarily, Badger wore a soft silk shirt which had no tab, but on this night he had on a white shirt, whose tab was amputated by a dexterous thrust as soon as the vest was pulled open. Then he was permitted to rise to his feet, reeling, sick, blind with rage and humiliation and a sense of baffled hate.
But his chief thought still was of Donald Pike.
"Which way did he go?" he panted, as soon as he could get his breath.
"Well, your High-Muchness, the cats scattered and the man made himself scarce!" was the scoffing answer, given by the student who had felt the terrible force of Badger's fist. "Perhaps there is another man up in the elm who can tell you!"
Badger did not wait for further nagging, and, as no hands were now extended to oppose him, he made as hasty an exit as he could from the midst of the shouting, laughing, howling throng.