For a full minute Frank's eyes looked full into Rabig's. And in the silent duel Rabig's eyes were the first to waver. Then Frank spoke.
"No," he said, quietly. "Brawling isn't in my line. I won't fight—not here or now."
There was a sigh of disappointment from the onlookers who had been keyed up in delighted anticipation, and Rabig, though his eyes had fallen before the glint in Frank's, resumed his swaggering air.
"Afraid to fight, eh?" he sneered.
Before a reply could be made, Mr. Thomas, the junior member of the firm, came out from his private office and the gathering dispersed.
"Why didn't you trim him, Frank?" asked Bart curiously, as they walked down the street together. "I wanted to see you wipe up the ground with him. You could have done it too. You've got as much muscle as he has and ten times the grit. I fairly ached to see you sail into him."
"Well," said Frank, thoughtfully, "there were two reasons. In the first place, I didn't care to soil my hands with the fellow and put myself on his level. Then again, you know how sensitive my mother is, and she'd have hated to see me get mixed up in a shop brawl. But Rabig has his coming to him, and he'll get it sooner or later."
"Sooner, I hope," returned Bart. "If you don't, I'll do it myself. That "Deutschland Uber Alles" stuff of his is getting on my nerves. Just now it's the ambition of my life to lick a Hun."
"You may have the chance sooner than you think," laughed Frank. "Germany's just about got to the end of her rope with us. Let her sink just one more ship and she'll find out what she's up against."
"It can't come too soon for me," responded Bart, and as just then they reached the junction of the streets where their ways parted Bart went on and Frank turned into the quiet street on which his home was located.