Fred Fearnots New Ranch | Page 9

this gentleman refuses."
"All right, I refuse," said the gentleman who had lost.
"Then I'll take it and put up a hundred dollars," said the second man.
"Well, that calls for ten thousand from me," replied Terry, and again he waited for a good shot.
Finally another gull came flying over, about twice as high as the first two.
Terry was going to wait for another chance, when the bettor angrily exclaimed that he must want a bird to alight on the muzzle of his revolver.
"Why, surely you don't expect to have me shoot at a bird that is really out of range, do you?"
"No, but that wasn't out of range."
"My friend, you don't know anything about distance on either land or water. That gull is at least a hundred yards above us," and nearly every man on the deck agreed with Terry, but the bettor became rather sarcastic and asked if he expected the bird to knock his hat off with one of its wings.
"Here comes another one," sung out somebody, and, looking up, they saw another gull about the same height from the deck. The bettor remarked:
"Oh, he's too high."
Everybody recognized the sneer in his tone. Terry, however, raised his revolver and fired, and the gull came fluttering, down with one of its wings actually cut off.
The bettor's friends at once began sympathizing with him, but he looked at Terry and asked if he considered that a good shot.
"Yes, I consider that pretty good," said Terry. "I brought him down, and the bet was that I couldn't hit him. I consider it a good shot because he was up so high that he could scarcely have been brought down even with a shotgun."
Neither side had put up any money in that last bet, but the gambler insisted that it wasn't a fair shot, and that he thought Terry ought to make another trial.
"No, sir," said Terry, "not for ten thousand dollars. I never play with a man of your stripe."
"Oh, you don't like my stripe, eh?"
"No, I don't. All marksmen will agree that I brought the bird down fairly. I didn't agree to shoot his head off as I did the first one, but simply to bring him down. Now, if you will take the vote of the passengers and they don't agree with me ten to one it is no bet."
The gambler tried to argue about it rather than take the vote, but Terry walked away and refused to talk with him. He was a big six-footer, weighing pretty nearly two hundred pounds.
When Terry turned his back on him and refused to talk with him he placed his hand on Terry's shoulder and turned him square around so as to face him telling him that if he meant to insult him he would throw him overboard.
Quick as a flash Terry said:
"To be frank with you, sir, I do mean to insult you. I denounce you as a dishonorable man, who won't play fair if it costs you a few hundred dollars."
With that the man aimed a blow at Terry's face with his big fist, but Terry easily parried it and gave him three or four blows in rapid succession on his chest in return, causing him to stagger back against another man, who kindly held him up.
"That's right," said Terry. "Hold him up," and in the next few seconds Terry put in three or four more blows on his solar plexus, and down he sank on the deck scarcely able to breathe.
Some friends of the man took him up and carried him into the main saloon, where others assisted him to his cabin. The captain heard of the trouble and came out on the deck to make inquiries as to whom was to blame.
He soon got the straight story of it, and at once went to the fellow's cabin and told him that if he made any more trouble on board his ship he would have him put in irons until they reached the end of the voyage.
Quite a number of gentlemen then asked Fearnot if his friend was a professional fighter.
"No," Fred replied. "He is a Wall Street broker, and is also my partner in a ranch down in Texas."
Both the Elon girls expressed their amazement at his fighting qualities.
"Oh, that's nothing," said Evelyn. "He hasn't been whipped since he was fifteen years old. I knew that that big fellow would be severely punished if he struck brother. Now, if he had struck Mr. Fearnot, he would have fared even worse; for Fred is probably one of the strongest men of his size in the United States, so far as physical abilities are concerned."
Of course, there was no more shooting that day. The ship's surgeon said that the man who had tackled Olcott would not be able to appear on deck