"Put up your guard."
"Aw, go to——"
The word was checked at his lips by Crittenden's fist. In a rage, Reynolds threw his hand behind him, as though he would pull his revolver, but his wrist was caught by sinewy fingers from behind. It was Blackford, smiling into his purple face.
"Hold on!" he said, "save that for a Spaniard."
At once, as a matter of course, the men led the way behind the tents, and made a ring—Blackford, without a word, acting as Crittenden's second. Reynolds was the champion bruiser of the regiment and a boxer of no mean skill, and Blackford looked anxious.
"Worry him, and he'll lose his head. Don't try to do him up too quickly."
Reynolds was coarse, disdainful, and triumphant, but he did not look quite so confident when Crittenden stripped and showed a white body, closely jointed at shoulder and elbow and at knee and thigh, and closely knit with steel-like tendons. The long muscles of his back slipped like eels under his white skin. Blackford looked relieved.
"Do you know the game?"
"A little."
"Worry him and wait till he loses his head—remember, now."