His hand came away from his pocket and he made a sudden gesture, still laughing, toward Rand's face. The trapper jerked back quickly. Then a great booming swell of laughter went up, even the slow rumble of Kootanie George's voice and the tinkling tremulo of Ernestine Dumont's joining it Ramon Garcia had brought out his gloves and had drawn them on before Rand had understood.
In size and physique Rand was the average there. The young Mexican was the shortest, slightest man in the house. But none knows better than the dwellers in the North Woods that it is unwise to judge men by mere size of body. It is well to look to the eyes of one's antagonist.
Garcia sprang forward and slapped Rand's face so that the face burned and the sound of the blow was like a pistol shot in the quiet room. And as Rand's return threshing blow sought him he sprang away, laughing.
"For calling me Greaser," he cried lightly. "When I have said out loud that I am Ramon Garcia."
Bellowing curses Rand charged at him again. Garcia avoided and seemed to have no difficulty whatever in so doing.
"Will you open the door, señor?" he called to a man standing near the entrance.
"He wants to have an open trail to run," jeered Rand. And again striking heavily his blow found the empty air and a second resounding slap reddened his other cheek.
"For calling me a breed," taunted Garcia, so that all might hear the words with the slap of the open hand. "Me who have the blood of kings, blue like the skies."
The man standing at the door … it chanced to be young Frank Marquette … obeyed Garcia's command silently and promptly. Rand, his rage flaring ever higher as men drawing chairs and tables out of the way laughed at him and as the Mexican's sallies taunted him, hurled himself forward purposing to get his enemy in a corner of the room. But at the best the trapper was awkward and Ramon Garcia's little feet in his little boots carried him much as the fabled winged sandals bore the hero Perseus in his encounter with the dragon. Not once had Rand landed a square blow; not once had Garcia been where the big red fists looked for him. And while Rand breathed heavily, Ramon Garcia, whose soul was as deeply steeped in the dramatic as Père Marquette's in colour, sang maddening little snatches of love songs and stole swift glances now and then at Ernestine Dumont.
From the beginning it was clear that Garcia was playing with the other. But the end, coming swiftly, was not what men had looked for. A great gasp went up at it, followed by a shout of applause and a roar of laughter. Garcia had tantalised his antagonist, but beyond slapping his face twice had not touched him. He skipped about him like a French dancing master and so allowed Rand to make a fool of himself for the moment. Presently, so had the Mexican engineered it, they were not five steps from the open door and the way was clear. One instant he had seemed about to draw back again, to avoid Rand as he had avoided him so many times.