“You want to fight?”
“One or t’other of us goes on his back in about two minutes.” Fortune began hopping around in his high-heeled boots. “Hit me in the eye!” he begged, sawing the air with his fists.
For a few moments Clancy was astounded. Fortune’s grin was wide and inviting—in fact, he was about the pleasantest slugger Clancy had ever seen.
“Cut out the foolishness,” said Owen. “What reason have I got to fight with you?”
“Shucks! You got to have a reason for every blame’ thing? Climb my neck—if you got the sand! Ain’t I beggin’ hard enough?”
Abruptly Clancy made up his mind to enter heartily into the spirit of the affair. So he sprang erect and sailed into Jimmie Fortune, whom he had just saved from being dashed to pieces at the bottom of the cliff.
Thump, thump, thump!
The sodden fall of fists was heard during a sharp give-and-take. Clancy, who had forgotten more of the “science” than Fortune ever knew, had all the best of it. Fortune clinched; and then Clancy, with a fine exemplification of the old reliable “double grapevine,” laid his antagonist on his back in the middle of the road.
Fortune got up with a joyous laugh, caressing a bruise on his chin with one hand, and, with the other, wiping the dust out of his eyes.
“I reckon you’ll do,” said he. “You’re as good as you look, Clancy, and then some. Let’s be pards, huh? We’ll travel together, and I’ll look after my own board and keep. I’m for Phoenix to find a livin’, same as you. Why not make a stab at the old burg in double harness? I could jest love a feller that slammed me down like that!”