“Let him alone, old pard,” Buffalo Bill said soothingly. “I’ll take him on, if one of us must. I guess your muscles aren’t quite as tough, or your limbs as supple as they used to be when you were a young man.”
“You be everlastingly gol-durned, Billy Cody!” exclaimed Nick, now thoroughly incensed. “I kalk’late I kin tackle a blamed Indian still, even if I hev come ter be an old man. You let him get at me—an’ don’t you or Bill Hickok butt in.”
“All right! Go as far as you like, but try not to quite kill him,” laughed Cody.
Nick Wharton advanced into the center of the ring of redskins, in which his adversary was already standing in an attitude of defiant challenge.
Old Nick was a husky fellow, despite his age, but he did not look the physical equal of the red man, who was a giant over six feet tall, with muscles that stood out like masses of whipcord all over his arms and legs.
“I guess I may be a gone coon,” said the old trapper, as he removed his hunting jacket and stared critically at his opponent. “I used ter be powerful strong on the wrassle onct, but I guess I’m weakening a bit now. In all my wrasslin’ days, I reckon I never hit up agin’ a tougher proposition than thet thar redskin.”
Old Nick advanced boldly to the encounter, but his anticipation was soon justified.
The redskin rushed suddenly forward and had him in a resistless grip almost before he understood what was happening. He tried to struggle, but, with a mighty heave, the Indian sent him squarely to the ground and rose from his prostrate body with a sarcastic laugh.
“Will either of the other palefaces wrestle with Leaping Dog now?” he asked.