“So it is,” assented Bed Badger, heartily enough.  “But what about it in the case of a sneak like Ripley?  If he didn’t have other fellows’ fists to fear he’d be unbearable.”

“He is, anyway,” muttered Dick, just before his head was covered by the sweater that Badger was helping him remove.

“You’ve been doing a lot of running this afternoon, gentlemen,” declared Thompson, as the two combatants came toward him.  “Do you each feel as though you had fighting wind left?”

“I’ve got as much as the other fellow,” replied Dick.

“Don’t you dare refer to me as a ’fellow’!” ordered Ripley, scowling.

“I’ll call you a girl, then, if you prefer,” proposed Dick, with a tantalizing grin.

“You don’t know how to talk to gentlemen,” retorted Fred, harshly.

“Be silent, both of you,” ordered Thompson, sternly.  “You can do your talking in another way.

“Can’t begin too soon for me,” uttered Ripley.

“One minute rounds for you, gentlemen,” continued Thompson, then turned to another upper classman, requesting him to hold the watch.  “Now are you ready?”

Ripley grunted, Dick nodded.

“Ready, then!  Shake hands!”

“I won’t,” replied Dick, sturdily, ere Fred could speak.  The latter, though he, too, would have refused, went white with rage.

“Take your places, then,” directed Thompson, briskly.  “Ready!  Time!”

Fred Ripley put up a really splendid guard as he advanced warily upon the freshman.  Dick’s guard, at the outset, was not as good.  They feinted for two or three passes, then Ripley let out a short-arm jab that caught Dick Prescott on the end of the nose.  Blood began to drip.

Ripley’s eyes danced.  “I’ll black both eyes, too, before I put you out,” he threatened, in a low tone, as he fought in for another opening.

“Brag’s a good dog,” retorted Dick, quietly.  The blow, though it had stung, had served to make him only the more cool.  He was watching, cat-like, for Ripley’s style of attack.  That style was a good one, from the “scientific” view-point, if Ripley could maintain it without excitement and all the while keep his wind.

But would he?  The freshman, though not much of a lover of fighting, had made some study of the art.  Moreover, Dick had a dogged coolness that went far in the arena.

Suddenly, Dick let go such a seemingly careless shoulder blow with his left, straight for Ripley’s face, that Fred almost lazily threw up his right arm to stop it.  But to have that right out of the way was just what Prescott was playing for.  Quick as thought Dick’s right flew out, colliding with Ripley’s mid-wind with a force that brought a groan from the taller fighter.  Dick might have followed it up, but he chivalrously sprang back, waiting for Fred to make the first sign of renewal of combat.

“Time!” came from the boy with the watch.