Roger refused to go into a clinch, meeting his antagonist's rushes with straight lefts, and following with futile swings of his right. The tough was too skilled to be caught with a solid blow. Once Roger landed full on the jaw with what he expected to be a knockout and the blow glanced harmlessly, as the man rolled his head back with the trained pugilist's skill. Roger realized that it would be no short fight, and he thought of the man he had knocked into the canal. The fight had raged down the spoil bank, and he glanced around and saw the leader clawing his way up the bank. The pause nearly proved fatal. Roger's opponent leaped in and caught his head in chancery. "Hand it to him!" screamed the tough to his partner in the ditch. "Shoot him in the back!" With a mighty lunge Roger flung himself and his opponent to the ground as a pistol snapped viciously and a steel-jacketed bullet zipped over his head. "Look out, Hig!" he shouted. "Stay under your man." "Turn 'im over!" The leader who had crawled upon the spoil bank fired again and missed. "Can't yah turn him up so I can get a crack at 'im?" Roger felt the tough beneath him exerting all his energy. Slowly, surely he felt himself being turned. Then out from the sawgrass came the roar of a rifle, and a heavy slug whined over the gunman's head. Bang! Another shot. Then the voice of Blease, the squatter: "Next shot, I'll hold a foot lower. Throw that gun in the ditch. Throw it, you----" Bang! "That's right--Now get 'em boys, get 'em!" Bare feet came drumming down the dirt of the spoil bank. A huge Bahama black was in the lead of his fellows. He leaped like something wild, his machete flashing in the sun. The gunman cried out and tumbled to safety in the ditch. The black men came with a rush. The fight was over. Panting, grinning, their teeth and eyeballs gleaming, the negroes stood aside awaiting orders. "I'll be darned," said Roger, puzzled. "Boys, how did you ever come here?" "Dat white man"--a grinning negro pointed to where Blease had fired from the jungle--"he say he shoot us if we don' come." Higgins had searched the two strangers and taken a revolver from each. "All right, boys," said Roger. "You can get right back to work. The show's over." From the opposite sides of the canal Roger and the leader of the trio glared at one another. "Well," said Payne, "you tried to run a bluff and it didn't work. What's the idea?" The man swore again and replied: "What's the idear, huh? That's what I want to know. You'll get yours for this--coming on people's land and starting a roughhouse." Roger stared stupidly across the canal at the speaker, incomprehension taking the place of anger. "Oh," he said at last, "it's all a mistake. You got on the wrong tract: this is my land." "Like ---- it is!" "What?"