Page:Hugh Pendexter--Kings of the Missouri.djvu/114

 would be useless as the man's sheer weight would carry any ordinary antagonist down to defeat. Nor did Lander believe his sturdiest blows could register any effect on the round, shaggy head. He eyed the waistline speculatively. That man's abdomen was laced with muscles built up during long mountain trips. So far as Lander could perceive there was no vulnerable point, neither jaw nor wind. But because of the man's height he decided to play for the wind.

"Do you feel fit?" Prevost kindly inquired after ten minutes had elapsed.

Lander nodded and stepped quickly forward to meet Porker. The latter eyed him sardonically and waited for him to come within reach, and then flung out his flail of a hand. Lander passed under it and drove his right into the pit of the bully's stomach, and as he delivered the blow he realized he was adapting the pose of a knife-fighter, and he remembered Papa Clair's parting advice to "keep behind the point." The blow resounded loudly and drove a grunt from Porker. Some of the men set up a cheer but Lander felt the resilient muscles give and come back under his fist and knew that mode of attack was as useless as to beat a buffalo with the