"What you want is a good, hard wallop, you lop-sided ignoramus, and mebbe you'll get it if you get too gay with me!" Had Gaul turned then and seen Herb and Roy standing observant across the company street he would have been less blustering, but now he had to talk loud to offset Shoemaker's wit.
But lanky Jed wasted no more repartee on that evidently quarrelsome fellow, the sting of whose sarcasm he had repeatedly felt before. He only laughed, then grew suddenly grave. He thrust his long face almost against that of Gaul.
"I'm a-waitin' fer thet wallop!" he invited.
Gaul was more of a moral coward than a physical one; he could never have it said that he refused such a dare, especially from an ignorant guy who surely could know nothing of the manly art. And so Gaul made the mistake of drawing back for a swinging punch and in that second Jed's face was withdrawn and with one swift leap upward, which stunt previously no one would have given him credit for, he shot out two long legs the extremities of which caught Gaul in the chest and sent him to earth in a heap. The others had to lift him to his feet.
[CHAPTER VIII]
Getting Over and On
This encounter, though witnessed by only a half dozen, gave Jed Shoemaker a new standing in the camp.
The shoot came off and it was a success in that a fine degree of nearly equal interest in the contesting teams was shown.