“Say, pard,” said a cowboy to Jack, as he crossed the room, “I axes yer pardon fer buttin’ in, but yer lost ther front part o’ yer coat tails.”

“That’s all right,” answered Jack.  “Can’t help it, don’t you know.  I left the blooming coat hanging on the line at home to air, and a goat came along and ate the front half of the tails off before I could get to it.  I was just on my way to apologize to the master of ceremonies for it.  You see, it is the only coat I have, and I was bound to come to the ball.”

“Ha, ha! that’s on you, ‘Honk,’” laughed the cowboy’s friends, who had overheard the conversation, and Jack passed on, the boys alluding to him as a “game little shrimp,” for the news of his summary punishment of Creviss had got abroad.

But Jack was not through yet.  He went into the men’s dressing room to leave his hat.  As he was coming out he was met by a crowd of town youths, friends of Creviss.  There was no one else about.

They scowled and sneered at Jack, and one of them bumped into him.

“Heah, fellah, that will do,” said Jack, with his Bostonese drawl.  “You’re solid; you’re no sponge.”

“I ain’t, eh?” answered the bully.  “I’ll tell yer, Mr. Slate, you’re covered with bad marks what I don’t like, an’ I’m just the sponge to wipe them off.”

“Step lively, then,” said Jack, “for I’ve an engagement to dance the next waltz.”

“I’ll waltz you all you’ll need this evenin’.”

But before he had finished speaking Ben Tremont stepped around the corner.

“Hello, Jack!  What is this I see?” said Ben.  “Disgracing yourself by talking with these hoodlums.”

“Yas, deah boy,” drawled Jack.  “This—­er, what shall I call him?—­stopped me to tell me he was going to rub the marks off me, at the same time wittily making a pun on my name.  I was just telling him to hurry, or I’d miss the next waltz.”

“Well, I’ll take the job off your hands.  Stella was asking for you a moment ago.”

“Yes, run along to your Stella,” said the hoodlum.  “I reckon she’s pining for the sassiety o’ another dude.”

That was where he made the mistake of his life.

It didn’t really make much difference what these fellows said about themselves, but the boys would not permit Stella’s name to be bandied about by the roughs.

So swiftly, that they didn’t know what had happened to them, both Ben and Jack sailed into them.

They went sprawling like tenpins before the ball as Ben jumped in among them and mowed them down with his powerful blows, while Jack, hovering like a torpedo boat around a battleship, sent in several of the telling blows Ted had taught him during the boxing lessons at Moon Valley.

The fight was soon over, and Ben and Jack slipped quietly back into the ballroom, leaving a well-thrashed crowd to stanch bloody noses, and patch up swollen lips and black eyes as best they could.