"We'll have to arrange this duel.

There is no other way for it." Between the ages of sixteen and twenty-three blood runs hot and swift in the veins of a youth.

It is then that he will do many wild and reckless things--things which will cause him to stand appalled when he considers them in after years.
Frank believed that in order to retain his own self respect and the respect of his comrades he must meet Diamond and give him satisfaction in any manner he might designate.
But there was another reason why Frank was so willing to meet the Virginian.

Merriwell was an expert fencer.

At Fardale he had been the champion of the school, and he had taken some lessons while traveling.
He had thoroughly studied the trick of disarming his adversary, a trick which is known to every French fencing master, but is thought little of by them.
He believed that he could repeatedly disarm Diamond.
His adventures in various parts of the world had made him somewhat less cautious than he naturally would have been and so he trusted everything to his ability to get the best of the Virginian.
Roland Ditson longed to force Merriwell to squeal.