Part 45 (1/2)
Charlie smiled, and held out his hand--”You see,” he said, ”that at least I understand the civilities of the ring.”
There was an approving laugh at this as the champions shook hands and stood on guard.
”I am quite willing even yet,” said Charlie, while in this att.i.tude, ”to settle this matter without fighting if you'll only agree to leave Zook alone in future.”
This was a clear showing of the white feather in the opinion of Stoker, who replied with a thundering, ”No!” and at the same moment made a savage blow at Charlie's face.
Our hero was prepared for it. He put his head quickly to one side, let the blow pa.s.s, and with his left hand lightly tapped the bridge of his opponent's nose.
”Hah! a hammytoor!” exclaimed the ex-pugilist in some surprise.
Charlie said nothing, but replied with the grim smile with which in school-days he had been wont to indicate that he meant mischief. The smile pa.s.sed quickly, however, for even at that moment he would gladly have hailed a truce, so deeply did he feel what he conceived to be the degradation of his position--a feeling which neither his disreputable appearance nor his miserable a.s.sociates had yet been able to produce.
But nothing was further from the intention of Stoker than a truce.
Savages usually attribute forbearance to cowardice. War to the knife was in his heart, and he rushed at Charlie with a shower of slogging blows, which were meant to end the fight at once. But they failed to do so. Our hero nimbly evaded the blows, acting entirely on the defensive, and when Stoker at length paused, panting, the hammytoor was standing before him quite cool, and with the grim look intensified.
”If you _will_ have it--_take_ it!” he exclaimed, and shot forth a blow which one of the juvenile bystanders described as a ”stinger on the beak!”
The owner of the beak felt it so keenly, that he lost temper and made another savage a.s.sault, which was met in much the same way, with this difference, that his opponent delivered several more stingers on the unfortunate beak, which after that would have been more correctly described as a bulb.
Again the ex-pugilist paused for breath, and again the ”hammytoor” stood up before him, smiling more grimly than ever--panting a little, it is true, but quite unscathed about the face, for he had guarded it with great care although he had received some rather severe body blows.
Seeing this, Stoker descended to mean practices, and in his next a.s.sault attempted, and with partial success, to hit below the belt. This roused a spirit of indignation in Charlie, which gave strength to his arm and vigour to his action. The next time Stoker paused for breath, Charlie-- as the juvenile bystander remarked--”went for him,” planted a blow under each eye, a third on his forehead, and a fourth on his chest with such astounding rapidity and force that the man was driven up against the wall with a crash that shook the whole edifice.
Stoker dropped and remained still. There were no seconds, no sponges or calling of time at that encounter. It was altogether an informal episode, and when Charlie saw his antagonist drop, he kneeled down beside him with a feeling of anxiety lest he had killed him.
”My poor man,” he said, ”are you much hurt?”
”Oh! you've no need to fear for me,” said Stoker recovering himself a little, and sitting up--”but I throw up the sponge. Stoker's day is over w'en 'e's knocked out o' time by a hammytoor, and Zook is free to bile 'is pot unmorlested in futur'.”
”Come, it was worth a fight to bring you to that state of mind, my man,”
said Charlie, laughing. ”Here, two of you, help to take him down and wash the blood off him; and I say, youngster,” he added, pulling out his purse and handing a sovereign to the juvenile bystander already mentioned, ”go out and buy sausages for the whole company.”
The boy stared at the coin in his hand in mute surprise, while the rest of the ring looked at each other with various expressions, for Charlie, in the rebound of feeling caused by his opponent's sudden recovery and submission, had totally forgotten his _role_ and was ordering the people about like one accustomed to command.
As part of the orders were of such a satisfactory nature, the people did not object, and, to the everlasting honour of the juvenile bystander who resisted the temptation to bolt with the gold, a splendid supper of pork sausages was smoking on the various tables of the kitchen of that establishment in less than an hour thereafter.
When the late hours of night had arrived, and most of the paupers were asleep in their poor beds, dreaming, perchance, of ”better days” when pork-sausages were not so tremendous a treat, little Zook went to the table at which Charlie sat. He was staring at a newspaper, but in reality was thinking about his vain search, and beginning, if truth must be told, to feel discouraged.
”Charlie,” said Zook, sitting down beside his champion, ”or p'r'aps I should say _Mister_ Charlie, the game's up wi' you, whatever it was.”
”What d'you mean, Zook?”
”Well, I just mean that it's o' no manner o' use your tryin' to sail any longer under false colours in this here establishment.”
”I must still ask you to explain yourself,” said Charlie, with a puzzled look.
”Well, you know,” continued the little man, with a deprecatory glance, ”w'en a man in ragged clo'se orders people here about as if 'e was the commander-in-chief o' the British Army, an' flings yellow boys about as if 'e was chancellor o' the checkers, an orders sa.s.sengers offhand for all 'ands, 'e _may_ be a gentleman--wery likely 'e is,--but 'e ain't a redooced one, such as slopes into lodgin'-'ouse kitchens. W'atever little game may 'ave brought you 'ere, sir, it ain't poverty--an' n.o.body will be fool enough in _this_ 'ouse to believe it is.”