I'll be down in a second." The girl obeyed, and so it fell out that there was no witness to that burn-side encounter.

It was a complex fight and it lasted for more than a second.

Two of the men had the grace to feel ashamed of themselves half-way through, and retired from the contest with shaky limbs and aching faces.

The third had to be assisted to his feet in the end by his antagonist.

It was not a good fight, for the three were pasty-faced, overgrown young men, in no training and stupid with liquor.
But they pressed hard on Lewis for a little, till he was compelled in self-defence to treat them as fair opponents.
He came down the road in a quarter of an hour with a huge rent in his coat-sleeve and a small cut on his forehead.