"Let it alone!" gasped the warrior. "He ain't giving me a bit o' trouble."
The reluctant Dawson obeyed.
Slike, his body writhing like that of a scotched snake, could not budge his pinned-down knife hand. Inch by inch Billy dragged his own body forward and upward until he was resting on his knees with Slike between his legs.
"Leggo that knife!" he directed.
Slike's reaction was humanly natural. At least, there were no hobbles on his tongue.
"Well, all right, if you say so," Billy told him, and rejoiced to perceive the top of a small rock not six inches from Slike's knife hand.
He forced the knife hand inward toward the rock. Then he proceeded, with all his might, to batter the back of Slike's hand against the pointed top of the rock. Slike's face changed at the first blow; at the second he involuntarily groaned; at the third his fingers unclosed. The knife tinkled on the rock.
Billy pounced on the knife, threw it yards away and scrambled to his feet. "Get up, Slike! Stand on your feet! Come and get it!"
Whatever other thing Slike was, he was certainly no coward. Instead he was a glutton for punishment. He jerked himself to his feet and ran headlong into a straight-arm blow that made his nose bleed and his neck ache. As has been said, Slike had no science. Neither had Billy. In which respect the fight was equal. But Slike was only fighting for himself. Billy was fighting not only for himself but to revenge Slike's treatment of the girl he loved.
When he flattened Slike's nose, pleasure ensued—for Billy. It was joy to his heart when the next blow landed on Slike's right eye and laid him all along the grass. Three times Billy knocked Slike down, and three times the killer hopped to his feet and came back for more. But after the third knockdown it was noticeable that Slike was appreciably slower and considerably more cautious. His face was a sight. One eye was completely closed. His nose was broken, his lips cut and two teeth were missing.