to meet him halfway: anything I said would be used against me.
I grinned at his red face, and suggested to the woman, solemnly:
“I think if you’d dip him in blueing he’d come out the same color as the other pup.”
As silly as that was, it served. Billie reared up on his feet and curled his paws into fists.
“Me and you’ll take a walk,” he decided; “out where there’s space enough.”
I got up, pushed my chair back with a foot, and quoted “Red” Burns to him: “If you’re close enough, there’s room enough.”
He wasn’t a man you had to talk to much. We went around and around.
It was fists at first. He started it by throwing his right at my head. I went in under it and gave him all I had in a right and left to the belly. He swallowed his chew of tobacco. But he didn’t bend. Few big men are as strong as they look. Billie was.