But he was not just now concerned with her! He meant to ignore her until he had given his mind to other matters! He was still shouting in that wonderful, golden voice of his; to every name in a calendar not of saints he laid his tongue as he read Babe Deveril's title clear for him. And, name to name, Babe Deveril checked off with him, hurling back anathema and epithet as good as came his way.... Lynette understood that both men had forgotten her. To them, passion-gripped as they were, it was as though she did not exist and had never existed. And yet it was largely because of her that they were gathering themselves to fly at each other! Man inconsistent and therefore man. Otherwise something either higher or lower; either of a devil-order or a god-order. But as it is ... better as it is ... something of god and devil and altogether--man. And children of a sort, in their hearts. For, before a blow was struck, they called names! So fast did the words fly, so hot and furious were they, that she had the curious sense that their battle would end as it began, in insults and mutterings. But when Timber-Wolf had shouted: "Sneak and cur and coward ... a man to rifle another man's pockets, after that other had played square and been generous with you...." And when Deveril, his hands still lifted, while in his heart he could have wept for a club lost, shouted back: "Cur and coward yourself ... with a rifle against a man who has nothing ..." then she saw that the last word had been spoken and that blows were inevitable. She drew back swiftly, as any onlooker must give room to two big wild-wood beasts. "Coward? Bruce Standing a coward? Why, damn your dirty soul...." Bruce Standing caught his rifle by the end of the barrel; at first Lynette, and Deveril also, thought that he meant to use it as a club. But instead he flourished it about his head but the once, and hurled it so far from him that it went, flashing in the sunlight, above a pine top and fell far away somewhere down the slope. Never in all his life had Bruce Standing had any man even think of naming him coward. As well name sunlight darkness. For all men who knew Bruce Standing, and all men who for the first and only time looked him square in the eyes, knew of him that he was fearless. Thus with a gesture ... he abandoned wordy outpourings of wrath and hurled himself into flesh-and-blood combat. He did not turn to right or left for the dwindling camp-fire; he came straight through it, his two long arms outstretched, seeking Deveril. And Babe Deveril, the moment he saw how the rifle sped through the air and understood his kinsman's challenge, leaped forward eagerly to the meeting with him. Their four boots began scattering firebrands....