It was all he had time to say. For the next few minutes he was too busy to talk. The Speranzas, father and son, possessed temperament; also they possessed temper. Sam's face, usually placid and good-natured, for Sam was by no means a bad fellow in his way, was fiery red. Albert's, on the contrary, went perfectly white. He seemed to settle back on his heels and from there almost to fly at his insulter. Five minutes or so later they were both dusty and dirty and dishevelled and bruised, but Sam was pretty thoroughly licked. For one thing, he had been taken by surprise by his adversary's quickness; for another, Albert's compulsory training in athletics at school gave him an advantage. He was by no means an unscarred victor, but victor he was. Sam was defeated, and very much astonished. He leaned against the cranberry house and held on to his nose. It had been a large nose in the beginning, it was larger now. Albert stood before him, his face--where it was not a pleasing combination of black and blue--still white. “If you--if you speak of my father or me again like that,” he panted, “I'll--I'll kill you!” Then he strode off, a bit wobbly on his legs, but with dignity. Oddly enough, no one except the two most interested ever knew of this encounter. Albert, of course, did not tell. He was rather ashamed of it. For the son of Miguel Carlos Speranza to conquer dragons was a worthy and heroic business, but there seemed to be mighty little heroism in licking Sam Thatcher behind 'Lije Doane's cranberry shack. And Sam did not tell. Gertie next day confided that she didn't care two cents for that stuck-up Al Speranza, anyway; she had let him see her home only because Sam had danced so many times with Elsie Wixon at the ball that night. So Sam said nothing concerning the fight, explaining the condition of his nose by saying that he had run into something in the dark. And he did not appear to hold a grudge against his conqueror; on the contrary when others spoke of the latter as a “sissy,” Sam defended him. “He may be a dude,” said Sam; “I don't say he ain't. But he ain't no sissy.” When pressed to tell why he was so certain, his answer was: “Because he don't act like one.” It was not a convincing answer, the general opinion being that that was exactly how Al Speranza did act.