gave way.  Only one blow took effect, but that reached the bigger boy’s face and brought a veritable howl of rage from him.  Like a windmill, thick arms swinging, he bored in to Penny.  The latter retreated, guarding well, but Beaufort’s blows were heavy ones, the ground was slippery with fallen leaves, and Penny, missing his footing, measured his length, his head narrowly escaping collision with a tree as he fell.  With a grunt of triumph, Beaufort sprang toward him and aimed a blow.  But Clint, boiling with rage, dashed between.

“Let him up!” he cried.

“Get away!” growled Beaufort, leading at Clint.  Clint swung his shoulders aside and the blow passed harmlessly.  Penny scrambled to his feet.

“My fight, Beaufort!” he panted.  “Let him alone!”

Beaufort turned to Penny again, and again they went at it.  It was in-fighting now.  Short, quick jabs for the face and head followed each other in rapid succession.  Then they clinched, Beaufort’s stout right arm holding Penny against him and his left fist seeking lodgment against Penny’s face.  But Penny, squirming, kept his head down and the blows fell harmlessly on his skull.  Then, wrenching himself free, Penny stumbled out of the way, pale and dizzy.  Beaufort plunged toward him again wildly.  Penny stood still then.  A feint at the stomach, and Beaufort for an instant dropped his guard.  Then, and it all happened too quickly for Clint to follow, Penny’s left shot out, there was a grunt from Beaufort, another lightning-like blow straight from Penny’s shoulder and the bully went down on his back, one big leg waving in air as he tumbled.  And in the same instant a voice, cold and measured, broke the stillness.

“Durkin!  That’s enough of that!”

Mr. Daley and Mr. Conklin stepped onto the scene.

CHAPTER XXIII

CLINT HAS STAGE-FRIGHT

The instructor and the physical director had approached without a sound of warning, and Penny, Clint and Dreer, the latter exhibiting an evident desire to efface himself, stared in surprise for a moment.  And at the same time Beaufort, raising himself weakly on one elbow, gazed bewilderedly from Penny to the faces of the newcomers.

“I’m not through,” he muttered thickly.  “Wait—­a minute!”

“I think you are through, Beaufort,” said Mr. Daley coldly.  “Pick up your coat, please, and put it on.  Durkin, do the same.”

Silently they obeyed, Mr. Conklin helping the dazed Beaufort to his unsteady feet.  He had a bleeding nose and one eye looked far from its best.  For his part, Penny, although evidently distressed, showed only a bruised cheek.

“Don’t go, Dreer,” said Mr. Daley.  Dreer halted in his elaborately uninterested departure.  “Now, then, boys, what does this mean?  Don’t you know that fighting is barred here?  And don’t you think that, if you had to try to kill each other like two wild animals, you might—­er—­have chosen some day other than the Sabbath?”