"It's closed to you, all right." Then, as Patches did not move, "Well, are you goin', or have I got to start you ?" He took a threatening step toward the intruder.
"No," returned Patches easily, "I am certainly not going--not just at present--and," he added thoughtfully, "if I were you, I wouldn't try to start _anything_." Something in the extraordinary self-possession of this soft-spoken stranger made the big man hesitate.

"Oh, you wouldn't, heh ?" he returned.

"You mean, I s'pose, that you propose to interfere with my business." "If, by your business, you mean beating a man who is so unable to protect himself, I certainly propose to interfere." For a moment Nick glared at Patches as though doubting his own ears.
Then rage at the tenderfoot's insolence mastered him.

With a vile epithet, he caught the loaded quirt in his hand by its small end, and strode toward the intruder.
But even as the big man swung his wicked weapon aloft, a hard fist, with the weight of a well-trained and well-developed shoulder back of it, found the point of his chin with scientific accuracy.

The force of the blow, augmented as it was by Nick's weight as he was rushing to meet it, was terrific.