The thud of fist on face, the discoloration that rose under the savage blows, the blood that oozed and scattered, proved that the fighting blood of both these mad creatures was up, so that they felt no pain, even as they knew no fear.
In their first fly, as witnesses would have termed it, there was no advantage to either, and both came out well marked.

In the combat of the time and place there were no rules, no periods, no resting times.

Once they were dispatched to it, the fight was the affair of the fighters, with no more than a very limited number of restrictions as to fouls.
They met and broke, bloody, gasping, once, twice, a dozen times.

Banion was fighting slowly, carefully.
"I'll make it free, if you dare!" panted Woodhull at length.
They broke apart once more by mutual need of breath.

He meant he would bar nothing; he would go back to the days of Boone and Kenton and Girty, when hair, eye, any part of the body was fair aim.
"You can't dare me!" rejoined Will Banion.