knowing how
the other could explode into violent rage. It was dangerous, that rage,
but it could also make a man blindly careless.

There was an inarticulate sound from Deklay, a dusky swelling in the
man's face. He spat, as might an enraged puma, and rushed at Travis who
did not quite manage to avoid the lunge, falling back with a smarting
slash across the ribs.

"The bull gores!" Deklay bellowed. "Horns toss the Fox!"

He rushed again, elated by the sight of the trickling wound on Travis'
side. But the slighter man slipped away.

Travis knew he must be careful in such evasions. One foot across the
ridged circle and he was finished as much as if Deklay's blade had found
its mark. Travis tried a thrust of his own, and his foot came down hard
on a sharp pebble. Through the sole of his moccasin pain shot upward,
caused him to stumble. Again the scarlet flame of a wound, down his
shoulder and forearm this time.

Well, there was one trick, he knew. Travis tossed the knife into the
air, caught it with his left hand. Deklay was now facing a left-handed
fighter and must adjust to that.

"Paw, bull, rattle your horns!" Travis cried. "The Fox still shows his
teeth!"

Deklay recovered from his instant of surprise. With a cry which was
indeed like the bellow of an old range bull, he rushed into grapple,
sure of his superior strength against a younger and already wounded man.

Travis ducked, one knee thumping the ground. He groped out with his
right hand, caught up a handful of earth, and flung it into the dusky
brown face. Again it seemed that luck was on his side. That handful
could not be as blinding as sand, but some bit of the shower landed in
Deklay's eye.

For a space of seconds Deklay was wide open--open for a blow which would
rip him up the middle, the blow Travis could not and would not deliver.

Instead, he took the offensive recklessly, springing straight for his
opponent. As the earth-grimed fingers of one hand clawed into Deklay's
face, he struck with the other, not with the point of the knife but with
its shaft. But Deklay, already only half conscious from the blow, had
his own chance. He fell to the ground, leaving his knife behind, two
inches of steel between Travis' ribs.

Somehow--he didn't know from where he drew that strength--Travis kept
his feet and took one step and then another, out of the circle until the
comforting brace of a tree trunk was against his bare back. Was he
finished--?

He fou