Jack slipped out of his coat and tossed it on the desk.  Even in that moment, while Kirby was concentrating for the attack, the rough rider found time to regret that so good-looking a youth, one so gallantly poised and so gracefully graceless, should be a black-hearted scamp.

“Hop to it!” invited the college man.  Under thick dark lashes his black eyes danced with excitement.

Kirby lashed out with his right, hard and straight.  His cousin ducked with the easy grace of a man who has spent many hours on a ballroom floor.  The cattleman struck again.  Jack caught the blow and deflected it, at the same time uppercutting swiftly for the chin.  The counter landed flush on Kirby’s cheek and flung him back to the wall.

He grinned, and plunged again.  A driving left caught him off balance and flung him from his feet.  He was up again instantly, shaking his head to clear it of the dizziness that sang there.

It came to him that he must use his brains against this expert boxer or suffer a knockout.  He must wear Jack out, let him spend his strength in attack, watch for the chance that was bound to come if he could weather the storm long enough.

Not at all loath, Jack took the offensive.  He went to work coolly to put out his foe.  He landed three for one, timing and placing his blows carefully to get the maximum effect.  A second time Kirby hit the floor.

Jack hoped he would stay down.  The clubman was a little out of condition.  He was beginning to breathe fast.  His cousin had landed hard two or three times on the body.  Back of each of these blows there had been a punishing force.  Cunningham knew he had to win soon if at all.

But Kirby had not the least intention of quitting.  He was the tough product of wind and sun and hard work.  He bored in and asked for more, still playing for his opponent’s wind.  Kirby knew he was the stronger man, in far better condition.  He could afford to wait—­and Jack could not.  He killed the boxer’s attacks with deadly counter-blows, moving in and out lithely as a cat.

The rough rider landed close to the solar plexus.  Jack winced and gave ground.  Kirby’s fist got home again.  He crowded Jack, feeling that his man was weakening.

Jack rallied for one last desperate set-to, hoping for a chance blow to knock Kirby out.  He scored a dozen times.  Lane gave ground, slowly, watchfully, guarding as best he could.

Then his brown fist shot out and up.  It moved scarcely six inches, straight for the college boxer’s chin.  Jack’s knees sagged.  He went down, rolled over, and lay still.

Kirby found water and brought it back.  Jack was sitting up, his back propped against the wall.  He swallowed a gulp or two and splashed the rest on his face.

“I’ll say you can hit like the kick of a mule,” he said.  “If you’d been a reasonable human, I ought to have got you, at that.  Don’t you ever stay down?”