"Now, what the dickens is
this?" he cried, and catching two of their necks he pulled their heads
together and then flung them apart.
The three seemed sobered by the apparition. "And what the h-ll is your
business?" they cried conjointly; and one, a dark-browed fellow, doubled
his fists and advanced.
Lewis stood regarding them with a smiling face and very bright, cross
eyes. "Are you by way of insulting this lady? If you weren't drunk,
I'd teach you manners. Get out of this in case I forget myself."
For answer the foremost of the men hit out. A glance convinced Lewis
that there was enough sobriety to make a fight of it. "Miss
Wishart . . . Alice," he cried, "come back and go down to the road
and see to my horse, please. I'll be down in a second."
The girl obeyed, and so it fell out that there was no witness to that
burn-side encounter. It was a complex fight and it lasted for more than
a second. Two of the men had the grace to feel ashamed of themselves
half-way through, and retired from the contest with shaky limbs and
aching faces. The third had to be assisted to his feet in the end by
his antagonist. It was not a good fight, for the three were
pasty-faced, overgrown young men, in no training and stupid with liquor.
But they pressed hard on Lewis for a little, till he was compelled in
self-defence to treat them as fair opponents.
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