Psmith was one of those people who lend a dignity to everything theytouch. Under his auspices the most unpromising ventures became somehowenveloped in an atmosphere of measured stateliness. On the presentoccasion, what would have been, without his guiding hand, a mereunscientific scramble, took on something of the impressive formalityof the National Sporting Club.
"The rounds," he said, producing a watch, as they passed through agate into a field a couple of hundred yards from the house gate, "willbe of three minutes' duration, with a minute rest in between. A manwho is down will have ten seconds in which to rise. Are you ready,Comrades Adair and Jackson? Very well, then. Time."After which, it was a pity that the actual fight did not quite live upto its referee's introduction. Dramatically, there should have beencautious sparring for openings and a number of tensely contestedrounds, as if it had been the final of a boxing competition. Butschool fights, when they do occur--which is only once in a decadenowadays, unless you count junior school scuffles--are the outcome ofweeks of suppressed bad blood, and are consequently brief and furious.
In a boxing competition, however much one may want to win, one doesnot dislike one's opponent. Up to the moment when "time" was called,one was probably warmly attached to him, and at the end of the lastround one expects to resume that attitude of mind. In a fight eachparty, as a rule, hates the other.
So it happened that there was nothing formal or cautious about thepresent battle. All Adair wanted was to get at Mike, and all Mikewanted was to get at Adair. Directly Psmith called "time," they rushedtogether as if they meant to end the thing in half a minute.
It was this that saved Mike. In an ordinary contest with the gloves,with his opponent cool and boxing in his true form, he could not havelasted three rounds against Adair. The latter was a clever boxer,while Mike had never had a lesson in his life. If Adair had kept awayand used his head, nothing could have prevented him winning.
As it was, however, he threw away his advantages, much as Tom Browndid at the beginning of his fight with Slogger Williams, and theresult was the same as on that historic occasion. Mike had the greaterstrength, and, thirty seconds from the start, knocked his man cleanoff his feet with an unscientific but powerful right-hander.
This finished Adair's chances. He rose full of fight, but with all thescience knocked out of him. He went in at Mike with both hands. TheIrish blood in him, which for the ordinary events of life made himmerely energetic and dashing, now rendered him reckless. He abandonedall attempt at guarding. It was the Frontal Attack in its most futileform, and as unsuccessful as a frontal attack is apt to be. There wasa swift exchange of blows, in the course of which Mike's left elbow,coming into contact with his opponent's right fist, got a shock whichkept it tingling for the rest of the day; and then Adair went down ina heap.
He got up slowly and with difficulty. For a moment he stood blinkingvaguely. Then he lurched forward at Mike.
In the excitement of a fight--which is, after all, about the mostexciting thing that ever happens to one in the course of one's life--itis difficult for the fighters to see what the spectators see. Wherethe spectators see an assault on an already beaten man, the fighterhimself only sees a legitimate piece of self-defence against anopponent whose chances are equal to his own. Psmith saw, as anybodylooking on would have seen, that Adair was done. Mike's blow had takenhim within a fraction of an inch of the point of the jaw, and he wasall but knocked out. Mike could not see this. All he understood wasthat his man was on his feet again and coming at him, so he hit outwith all his strength; and this time Adair went down and stayed down.
"Brief," said Psmith, coming forward, "but exciting. We may take that,I think, to be the conclusion of the entertainment. I will now have adash at picking up the slain. I shouldn't stop, if I were you. He'llbe sitting up and taking notice soon, and if he sees you he may wantto go on with the combat, which would do him no earthly good. If it'sgoing to be continued in our next, there had better be a bit of aninterval for alterations and repairs first.""Is he hurt much, do you think?" asked Mike. He had seen knock-outsbefore in the ring, but this was the first time he had ever effectedone on his own account, and Adair looked unpleasantly corpse-like.
"_He's_ all right," said Psmith. "In a minute or two he'll beskipping about like a little lambkin. I'll look after him. You go awayand pick flowers."Mike put on his coat and walked back to the house. He was conscious ofa perplexing whirl of new and strange emotions, chief among which wasa curious feeling that he rather liked Adair. He found himselfthinking that Adair was a good chap, that there was something to besaid for his point of view, and that it was a pity he had knocked himabout so much. At the same time, he felt an undeniable thrill of prideat having beaten him. The feat presented that interesting person, MikeJackson, to him in a fresh and pleasing light, as one who had had atough job to face and had carried it through. Jackson, the cricketer,he knew, but Jackson, the deliverer of knock-out blows, was strange tohim, and he found this new acquaintance a man to be respected.
The fight, in fact, had the result which most fights have, if they arefought fairly and until one side has had enough. It revolutionisedMike's view of things. It shook him up, and drained the bad blood outof him. Where, before, he had seemed to himself to be acting withmassive dignity, he now saw that he had simply been sulking like somewretched kid. There had appeared to him something rather fine in hispolicy of refusing to identify himself in any way with Sedleigh, atouch of t............