The bully’s friend applauded loudly, roaring at the top of his voice, “Marry ’em, Wash.  Marry ’em.  You can do hit as good as a parson!  You’d make a good parson.  Let’s see how’d you go at hit.”

The notion tickled the fancy of the giant, for it offered a way to make Sammy share the humiliation more fully.  “Git down an’ come here t’ yer honey,” he said to the girl.  “Git down, I say,” he repeated, when the young woman made no motion to obey.

“Indeed, I will not,” replied Sammy shortly.

Her tone and manner angered Gibbs, and dropping Ollie he started toward the girl to take her from the horse by force.  As he reached the pony’s side, Sammy raised her whip and with all her strength struck him full across the face.  The big ruffian drew back with a bellow of pain and anger.  Then he started toward her again.  “I’ll tame you, you wild cat,” he yelled.  And Sammy raised her whip again.

But before Gibbs could touch the girl, a powerful hand caught him by the shoulder.  “I reckon you’ve had fun enough, Wash Gibbs,” remarked Young Matt in his slow way.  “I ain’t interfering between man and man, but you’d best keep your dirty hands off that lady.”

The young woman’s heart leaped at the sound of that deep calm voice that carried such a suggestion of power.  And she saw that the blue eyes under the tumbled red brown locks were shining now like points of polished steel.  The strong man’s soul was rejoicing with the fierce joy of battle.

The big bully drew back a step, and glared at the man who had come between him and his victim; the man whom, for every reason, he hated.  Lifting his huge paws, he said in a voice hoarse with deadly menace, “Dirty, be they?  By hell, I’ll wash ’em.  An’ hit won’t be water that’ll clean ’em, neither.  Don’t you know that no man ever crosses my trail an’ lives?”

The other returned easily, “Oh, shucks!  Get into your wagon and drive on.  You ain’t on Roark now.  You’re on Fall Creek, and over here you ain’t no bigger’n anybody else.”

While Young Matt was speaking, Gibbs backed slowly away, and, as the young man finished, suddenly drew the pistol he had taken from Ollie.  With a quickness and lightness astonishing in one of his bulk and usually slow movements, the mountaineer leaped upon his big enemy.  There was a short, sharp struggle, and Wash staggered backward, leaving the shining weapon in Young Matt’s hand.  “It might go off, you know,” said the young fellow quietly, as he tossed the gun on the ground at Ollie’s feet.

With a mad roar, Gibbs recovered himself and rushed at his antagonist.  It was a terrific struggle; not the skillful sparring of trained fighters, but the rough and tumble battling of primitive giants.  It was the climax of long months of hatred; the meeting of two who were by every instinct mortal enemies.  Ollie shrank back in terror, but Sammy leaned forward in the saddle, her beautiful figure tense, her lips parted, and her face flushed with excitement.