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Abysmal Brute - Jack London · Oliver Twist

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  Speaker 1: Chapters one and two of The Abysmal Brute. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Warren Cotty Gurnee, Illinois. The Abysmal Brute by
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  Speaker 1: Jack London. Chapter one. Sam Stubner ran through his mail
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  Speaker 1: carelessly and rapidly as became a manager of prize fighters.
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  Speaker 1: He was accustomed to a various and bizarre correspondents. Every crank,
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  Speaker 1: sport near sport and reformer seemed to have ideas to
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  Speaker 1: impart to him, from dire threats against his life to
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  Speaker 1: milder threats such as pushing in the front of his face,
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  Speaker 1: from rabbit foot fetishes to the lucky horseshoes, from dinky
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  Speaker 1: jerkwater bids to the quarter of a million dollar offers
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  Speaker 1: of irresponsible nobodies. He knew the whole run of the
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  Speaker 1: surprise portion of his mail in his time, having received
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  Speaker 1: a razor strap made from the skin of a lynched
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  Speaker 1: negro and a finger withered and sun dried cut from
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  Speaker 1: the body of a white man found in Death Valley.
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  Speaker 1: He was of the opinion that never again would the
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  Speaker 1: postman bring him anything that could startle him. But this
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  Speaker 1: morning he opened a letter that he read a second time,
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  Speaker 1: put away in his pocket, and took out for a
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  Speaker 1: third reading. It was postmarked from some unheard of post
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  Speaker 1: office in Siskew County, and it ran, Dear Sam, you
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  Speaker 1: don't know me except my reputation. You come after my time,
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  Speaker 1: and I've been out of the game a long time.
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  Speaker 1: But take it from me, I ain't been asleep. I've
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  Speaker 1: followed the whole game, and I've followed you from the
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  Speaker 1: time kl Hoffman knocked you out to your last handling
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  Speaker 1: of Nat Belsen, and I take it you're the niftiest
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  Speaker 1: thing in the line of managers that ever came down
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  Speaker 1: the pike. I got a proposition for you. I got
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  Speaker 1: the greatest unknown that ever happened. This ain't con it's
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  Speaker 1: the straight goods. What do you think of a husky
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  Speaker 1: that tips the scales at two hundred and twenty pounds
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  Speaker 1: fighting weight, is twenty two years old and can hit
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  Speaker 1: a kick twice as hard as my best ever. That's him,
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  Speaker 1: my boy, young Pat Glendon. That's the name he'll fight under.
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  Speaker 1: I've planned it all out now. The best thing you
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  Speaker 1: can do is hit the first train and come up here.
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  Speaker 1: I bred him, and I trained him all that I
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  Speaker 1: ever had in my head. I've hammered into his and
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  Speaker 1: maybe you won't believe it, but he's added to it.
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  Speaker 1: He's a born fighter. He's a wonder at time and distance.
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  Speaker 1: He just knows to the second and the inch, and
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  Speaker 1: he don't have to think about it at all. His
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  Speaker 1: six inch jolt is more the real sleep medicine than
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  Speaker 1: the full arm swing of most keezers talk about the
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  Speaker 1: hope of the white race. This is him. Come and
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  Speaker 1: take a peep. When you was managing Jeffreys, you was
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  Speaker 1: crazy about hunting. Come along and I'll give you some
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  Speaker 1: real hunting and fishing that will make your moving picture
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  Speaker 1: winnings look like thirty cents. I'll send young Pat out
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  Speaker 1: with you. I ain't able to get around, That's why
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  Speaker 1: I'm sending for you. I was going to manage him myself,
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  Speaker 1: but it ain't no use. I'm all in and likely
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  Speaker 1: to pass out any time, so get to move on.
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  Speaker 1: I want you to manage him. There's a fortune in
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  Speaker 1: it for both of you. But I want to draw
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  Speaker 1: up the contract yours truly. Pat Glendon. Stubner was puzzled.
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  Speaker 1: It seemed, on the face of it a joke. The
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  Speaker 1: men in the fighting game were notorious jokers, and he
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  Speaker 1: tried to discern the fine hand of Corbett or the
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  Speaker 1: big friendly paw of Fitzsimmons in the screed before him.
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  Speaker 1: But if it were genuine, he knew it was worth
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  Speaker 1: looking into. Pat Glendon was before his time, though as
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  Speaker 1: a cub he had once seen Old Pat spar at
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  Speaker 1: the Benefit for j Even then he was called Old
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  Speaker 1: Pat and had been out of the ring for years.
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  Speaker 1: He had antedated Sullivan and the old London Prize ring rules,
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  Speaker 1: though his last fading battles had been put up under
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  Speaker 1: the incoming Marquis of Queensberry rules. What ring follower did
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  Speaker 1: not know of Pac London? Though few were alive who
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  Speaker 1: had seen him in his prime, and there were not
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  Speaker 1: many more who had seen him at all. Yet his
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  Speaker 1: name had come down in the history of the ring,
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  Speaker 1: and no sporting writers lexicon was complete without it. His
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  Speaker 1: fame was paradoxical. No man was honored higher, and yet
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  Speaker 1: he had never attained championship honors. He had been unfortunate
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  Speaker 1: and had been known as the unlucky fighter. Four times
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  Speaker 1: he all but won the heavy championship, and each time
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  Speaker 1: he had deserved to win it. There was the time
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  Speaker 1: on the barge in San Francisco Bay when at the
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  Speaker 1: moment he had the champion going, he snapped his own forearm,
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  Speaker 1: and on the island in the Thames, slashing about in
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  Speaker 1: six inches of rising tide, he broke a leg. At
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  Speaker 1: a similar stage in a winning fight in Texas. Too,
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  Speaker 1: there was the never to be forgotten day when the
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  Speaker 1: police broke in just as he had his man going
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  Speaker 1: in all certainty. And finally, there was the fight in
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  Speaker 1: the Mechanics Pavilion in San Francisco when he was secretly
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  Speaker 1: jobbed from the first by a gun fighting bad man
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  Speaker 1: of a referee backed by a small syndicate of betters.
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  Speaker 1: Pat Glendon had had no accidents in that fight, but
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  Speaker 1: when he had knocked his man cold with a right
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  Speaker 1: to the jaw and a li to the solar plexus,
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  Speaker 1: the referee calmly disqualified him for fouling. Every ringside witness,
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  Speaker 1: every sporting expert, and the whole sporting world knew there
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  Speaker 1: had been no foul. Yet, like all fighters, Pat Glendon
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  Speaker 1: had agreed to abide by the decision of the referee.
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  Speaker 1: Pat abided and accepted it as in keeping with the
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  Speaker 1: rest of his bad luck. This was Pat Glendon. What
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  Speaker 1: bothered Stubner was whether or not Pat had written the letter.
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  Speaker 1: He carried it downtown with him. What's become of Pat Glendon?
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  Speaker 1: Such was his greeting to all sports that morning. Nobody
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  Speaker 1: seemed to know. Some thought he must be dead, but
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  Speaker 1: none knew positively. The fight editor of a morning daily
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  Speaker 1: looked up the records and was able to stay that
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  Speaker 1: his death had not been noted. It was from Tim
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  Speaker 1: Donovan that he got a clue. Sure, and he ain't dead,
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  Speaker 1: said Donovan. How could that be? A man of his
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  Speaker 1: make that never boozed or blew himself. He made money,
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  Speaker 1: and what's more, he saved it and invested it. Didn't
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  Speaker 1: he have three saloons at the one time? And wasn't
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  Speaker 1: he making slathers of money with him when he sold out?
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  Speaker 1: Now that I'm thinking, that was the last time I
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  Speaker 1: laid eyes on him when he sold them out twas
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  Speaker 1: all of twenty years and more goole his wife had
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  Speaker 1: just died. I met him headin for the fairy where
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  Speaker 1: away old Sport says I, it's me for the woods,
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  Speaker 1: says he, I've quit. Goodbye, tim me boy, And I've
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  Speaker 1: never seen him from that day to this. Of course
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  Speaker 1: he ain't dead. You say when his wife died? Did
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  Speaker 1: he have any children? Stubner queried one, a little baby.
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  Speaker 1: He was lugging it in his arms that very day.
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  Speaker 1: Was it a boy? How should I be known? It
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  Speaker 1: was then that Sam Stubner reached a decision, and that
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  Speaker 1: night found him in a pullman, speeding toward the wilds
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  Speaker 1: of northern California. Chapter two. Stubner was dropped off the
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  Speaker 1: overland at deer Lick in the early morning, and he
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  Speaker 1: kicked his heels for an hour before the One Saloon
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  Speaker 1: opened its doors. No, the saloon keeper didn't know anything
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  Speaker 1: about Pac London, had never heard of him, and if
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  Speaker 1: he was in that part of the country, he must
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  Speaker 1: be out beyond somewhere. Neither had the one hanger on
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  Speaker 1: ever heard of Pac London. At the hotel, the same
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  Speaker 1: ignorance obtained, and it was not until the storekeeper and
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  Speaker 1: post master opened up that Stubner struck the trail. Oh, yes,
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  Speaker 1: Pac London lived out beyond. You took the stage at
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  Speaker 1: Alpine which was forty miles and which was a logging
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  Speaker 1: camp from Alpine. On horseback, he rode up Antelope Valley
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  Speaker 1: and crossed the divide to Bear Creek. Pac London lived
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  Speaker 1: somewhere beyond that the people at Alpine would know. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: there was a young Pat. The storekeeper had seen him.
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  Speaker 1: He had been in to deer Lick two years back.
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  Speaker 1: Old Pat had not put in an appearance for five years.
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  Speaker 1: He bought his supplies at the store and always paid
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  Speaker 1: by check. And he was a white haired, strange old man.
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  Speaker 1: That was all the storekeeper knew. But the folks at
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  Speaker 1: Alpine could give him directions. It looked good to Stubner.
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  Speaker 1: Beyond doubt there was a young Pac London as well
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  Speaker 1: as an old one living out beyond. That night the
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  Speaker 1: manager spent at the logging camp of Alpine, and early
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  Speaker 1: the following morning he rode a mountain Cayus up Antelope Valley.
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  Speaker 1: He rode over the divide and down Bear Creek. He
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  Speaker 1: rode all day through the wildest roughest country he had
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  Speaker 1: ever seen, and at sunset turned up Pinto Valley on
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  Speaker 1: a trail so stiff and narrow that more than once
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  Speaker 1: he elected to get off and walk. It was eleven
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  Speaker 1: o'clock when he dismounted before a log cabin and was
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  Speaker 1: greeted by the baying of two huge deer hounds. Then
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  Speaker 1: Pat Glendon opened the door, fell on his neck and
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  Speaker 1: took him in. I knew you'd come, sam me boy,
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  Speaker 1: said Pat the while he limped about building a fire,
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  Speaker 1: boiling coffee and frying a big bear steak. The young
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  Speaker 1: an ain't home the night. We was gettin short of meat,
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  Speaker 1: and he went out about sundown to pick up a deer.
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  Speaker 1: But I'll say no more. Wait till you see him.
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  Speaker 1: He'll be home in the morn and then you can
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  Speaker 1: try him out. There's the gloves, but wait till you
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  Speaker 1: see him. As for me, I'm finished eighty one come
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  Speaker 1: next January, and pretty good for our next bruiser. But
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  Speaker 1: I never wasted meself, Sam, nor kept late hours and
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  Speaker 1: burned the candle at all ends. I had a damn
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  Speaker 1: good candle An made the most of it, as you'll
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  Speaker 1: grant at lookin' at me. And I've taught the same
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  Speaker 1: to the young un. What do you think of a
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  Speaker 1: lad of twenty two that's never had a drink in
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  Speaker 1: his life, nor tasted tobacco. That's him. He's a giant,
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  Speaker 1: and he's lived natural all his days. Wait till he
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  Speaker 1: takes you after deer, he'll break your heart. Travelin light
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  Speaker 1: him a carryin' the outfit and a big buck deer
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  Speaker 1: be like. He's a child of the open air and
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  Speaker 1: winter nor summer. Has he slept under a roof the
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  Speaker 1: open for him, as I taught him. The one thing
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  Speaker 1: that worries me is how he'll take to sleepin' in houses,
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  Speaker 1: and how he'll stand the tobacco smoke of the ring
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  Speaker 1: tis a terrible thing, that smoke when you're fighting hard
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  Speaker 1: and gasping for air. But no more, sam me, boy,
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  Speaker 1: you're tired and sure should be sleepin'. Wait do you
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  Speaker 1: see him? That's all? Wait do you see him? But
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  Speaker 1: the garrulousness of age was on old Pat and it
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  Speaker 1: was long before he permitted Stubner's eyes to close. He
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  Speaker 1: can run a deer down with his own legs. That
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  Speaker 1: young'un he broke out again. Tis the dandy training for
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  Speaker 1: the lungs. The hunter's life. He don't know much of else,
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  Speaker 1: though he's read a few books at times, and poetry stuff.
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  Speaker 1: He's just plain pure natural, as you'll see when you
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  Speaker 1: clap eyes on him. He's got the old Irish strong
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  Speaker 1: in him. Sometimes the way he moons about it's thinkin strong.
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  Speaker 1: I am that he believes in the fairies and such like.
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  Speaker 1: He's a nature lover, if ever there was one an.
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  Speaker 1: He's a feared of cities. He's read about him. But
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  Speaker 1: the biggest he was ever in was dear Lick. He
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  Speaker 1: misliked the many people, and his report was that they'd
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  Speaker 1: stand weedin out. That was two years agone, the first
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  Speaker 1: and the last time he's seen a locomotive in a
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  Speaker 1: train of cars. Sometimes it's wrong, I'm thinkin' I am
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  Speaker 1: bringing him up a natural. It's givin him wind an
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  Speaker 1: stammin on the strength of wild bulls. No city grown
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  Speaker 1: man can have a look in against him. I'm willin
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  Speaker 1: to grant that Jeffrey's at his best, could have worried
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  Speaker 1: the youngun a bit, but only a bit. The young
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  Speaker 1: un could have broke him like a straw. And he
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  Speaker 1: don't look it. That's the everlasting wonder of it. He's
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  Speaker 1: only a fine seeming young husky, but it's the quality
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  Speaker 1: of his muscle that's different. But wait, ye you see him.
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  Speaker 1: That's all a strange liking the boy has for posies
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  Speaker 1: and little meadows, a bit of pine with the moon
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  Speaker 1: beyond Windy's sunsets are the sun of morns from the
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  Speaker 1: top of Old Baldy. And he has a hankering for
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  Speaker 1: the drawing of pictures of things, and of spoutin' about
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  Speaker 1: Lucifer Knight from the poetry books he got from the
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  Speaker 1: red headed school teacher. But tis only his youngness. I'll
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  Speaker 1: settle down to the game once we get him started,
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  Speaker 1: But watch out for grouches when it first comes to
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  Speaker 1: livin in a city for him a good thing. He's
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  Speaker 1: woman shy. They'll not bother him for years. He can't
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  Speaker 1: bring himself to understand the creatures, and damn few of
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  Speaker 1: them as he's at that twells the school teacher over
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  Speaker 1: at Samson's flat that put the poetry stuff in his head.
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  Speaker 1: She was clean, daffy over the young'un an. He never
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  Speaker 1: a known a warm haired girl. She was not a
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  Speaker 1: mountain girl, but from down in the flatlands. And as
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  Speaker 1: time went by she was fair desperate, and the way
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  Speaker 1: she went after him was shameless. And what do you
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  Speaker 1: think the boy did when he tumbled to it. He
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  Speaker 1: was scared as a check rabbit. He took blankets and
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  Speaker 1: ammunition and hiked for tall timber. Not for a month
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  Speaker 1: did I lay eyes on him. And then he sneaked
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  Speaker 1: in after dark and was gone in the morn. Nor
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  Speaker 1: would he as much as peep at her letters. Burnham,
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  Speaker 1: he said, And Burnham I did twice. She wrote over
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  Speaker 1: on a cayuse, all the way from Samson's flat, and
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  Speaker 1: I was sorry for the young creature. She was fair
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  Speaker 1: hungry for the boy, and she looked at in her face.
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  Speaker 1: And at the end of three months she gave up
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  Speaker 1: school and went back to her own country. And then
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  Speaker 1: it was that the boy came home to the shack
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  Speaker 1: to live again. Women have been the ruination of many
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  Speaker 1: a good fighter, but they won't be of him. He
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  Speaker 1: blushes like a girl of anything young in skirts, looks
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  Speaker 1: at him a second time or too long the first one,
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  Speaker 1: and they all look at him. But Whenny fights, when
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  Speaker 1: he fights, God, it's the old savage irish that flares
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  Speaker 1: in him and drives the fists of him. Not that
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  Speaker 1: he goes off his base. Don't walk away with that.
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  Speaker 1: At my best eye was never as cool as he
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  Speaker 1: I missed out twas the wrath of me that brought
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  Speaker 1: the accident. But he's an iceberg. He's hot and cold
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  Speaker 1: at the one time, a live wire and an ice chest.
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  Speaker 1: Stubner was dozing when the old man's mumble aroused him.
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  Speaker 1: He listened drowsily. He made a man of him. By God,
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  Speaker 1: I made a man of him, with the two fists
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  Speaker 1: of him and the upstanding leg him in the straight
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  Speaker 1: sea and eyes. And I know the game in my head,
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  Speaker 1: and I've kept up with the times and the modern changes.
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  Speaker 1: The crouch sure he knows all the styles and economies.
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  Speaker 1: He never moves two inches when an inch and a
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  Speaker 1: half will do the turn. And when he wants, he
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: can spring like a buck kangaroo in fighting. Wait do
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: you see better than his out fighting? And he could
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  Speaker 1: shore a sparred with Peter Jackson and outfoot at Corbett
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  Speaker 1: at his best. I tell you I've taught him at
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  Speaker 1: all to the last trick, and he's improved on the teaching.
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  Speaker 1: He's a fair genius at the game, and he's had
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: plenty of husky mountain men to try out on. I
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  Speaker 1: gave him the fancy work, and they gave him the sloggin.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing shy or delicate about them. Roaring bulls and big
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: grizzly bears. That's what they are when it comes to
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: hugging and a clinch or swinging rough like in the rushes.
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  Speaker 1: And he plays with him, man, do you hear me?
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  Speaker 1: He plays with him like you and me would play
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  Speaker 1: with little puppy dogs. Another time, Stubner awoke to hear
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  Speaker 1: the old man mumbling. Tis the funny thing. He don't
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  Speaker 1: take fightin' seriously. It's that easy to him. He thinks
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  Speaker 1: it's play. But wait till he's tapped a swift one,
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  Speaker 1: that's all. Wait, and you'll see him throw on the
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  Speaker 1: juice in that cold storage plant of his and turn
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  Speaker 1: loose the prettiest scientific wallopin that ever you laid eyes on.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: In the shivery gray of mountain dawn, Stubner was routed
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  Speaker 1: from his blankets by old Pat. He's coming up the trail, now,
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  Speaker 1: was the horse whisper. Out's with ye, and take your
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: first peep at the biggest fightin' man the ring has
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  Speaker 1: ever seen, or we'll ever see in a thousand years. Again.
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  Speaker 1: The manager peered through the open door, rubbing the sleep
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  Speaker 1: from his heavy eyes and saw a young giant walk
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  Speaker 1: into the clearing. In one hand was a rifle across
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  Speaker 1: his shoulders a heavy deer under which he moved as
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  Speaker 1: if it were weightless. He was dressed roughly in blue
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  Speaker 1: overalls and a woolen shirt open at the throat. Coat
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  Speaker 1: he had none, and on his feet instead of brogans,
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: were moccasins. Stubner noted that his walk was smooth and catlike,
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  Speaker 1: without suggestion of his two hundred and twenty pounds of weight,
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  Speaker 1: to which that of the deer was added. The fight
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  Speaker 1: manager was impressed from the first glimpse. Formidable the young
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: fellow certainly was, but the manager sensed the strangeness and
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: unusualness of him. He was a new type, something different
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  Speaker 1: from the run of fighters. He seemed a creature of
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: the wild, more a night roaming figure from some old
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  Speaker 1: fairy story or folk tale than a twentieth century youth.
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  Speaker 1: A thing Stubner quickly discovered was that young Pat was
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  Speaker 1: not much of a talker. He acknowledged Old Pad's introduction
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  Speaker 1: with a grip of the hand, but without speech, and
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: silently set to work at building the fire and getting breakfast.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: To his father's direct questions he answered in monosyllables, as
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: for instance, when asked where he had picked up the
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  Speaker 1: deer south Fork was all he vowshafed eleven miles across
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: the mountains. The old man exposited pridefully to Stubner, and
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: a trail that had break your heart. Breakfast consisted of
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: black coffee, sour dough, bread, and an immense quantity of
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: bear meat broiled over the coals. Of this, the young
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: fellow ate ravenously, and Stubner divined that both the Glenns
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: were accustomed to an almost straight meat diet. Old Pat
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: did all the talking, though it was not till the
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: meal was ended that he broached the subject he had
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: at heart, Pat Boy, He began, you know who the
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: gentleman is. Young Pat nodded and cast a quick comprehensive
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: glance at the manager. Well, he'll be taking you away
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: with him and down to San Francisco. I'd sooner stay here, dad,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: was the answer. Stubner felt a prick of disappointment. It
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: was a wild goose chase. After all, this was no fighter,
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: eager and fretting to be at it. His huge bronze
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: counted for nothing. It was nothing new it was the
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: big fellows that usually had the streak of fat. But
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: Old Pat's Celtic wrath flared up and his voice was
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: harsh with command. You'll go down to the cities and
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: fights me. Boy, that's what I've trained you for, and
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: you'll do it, all right, was the unexpected response, rumbled
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: apathetically from the deep chest. And fights like hell, the
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: old man added again. Stubner felt disappointment at the absence
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: of flash and fire in the young man's eyes as
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: he answered, all right, when do we start? Oh Sam, here,
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: he'll be wantin a little huntin' and to fish a bit,
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: as well as to try you out with the gloves.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: He looked at Sam, who nodded, suppose you strip and
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: give him a taste of your quality. An hour later,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Sam Stubner had his eyes opened. An ex spighter himself
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: a heavyweight at that he was even a better judge
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: of fighters, and never had he seen one strip to
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: like advantage. See the softness of him, Old Pat chanted,
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: 'tis the truth. Look at the slope of the shoulders
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: and the lungs of him, clean, all clean to the
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: last drop and ounce of him. You're looking at a
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: man Sam, the like of which was never seen before.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: Not a muscle of him bound. No weight lifter or
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: sandow exercise artists there see the fat snakes of muscles,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: a crawling, soft and lazy like Wait, do you see
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: them flashin' like a strikin' rattler. He's good for forty rounds,
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: this blessed instant or a hundred go to it time.
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: They went to it for three minute rounds with a
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: minute rests, and Sam Stubner was immediately undeceived. Here was
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: no streak of fat, no apathy, only a lazy, good
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: natured play of gloves and tricks with a brusque stiffness
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: and harsh sharpness in the contacts that he knew belonged
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: only to the trained and instinctive fighting man he easy. Now, Easy,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: Old Pat warned, Sam's not the man he used to be.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: This nettled Sam as it was intended to do, and
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: he played his most famous trick and favorite punch, a
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: faint for a clinch and a right rip to the stomach.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: But quickly as it was delivered, Young Pat saw it,
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: and though it landed, his body was going away. The
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Next time, his body did not go away, as the
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: rip started, he moved forward and twisted his left hip
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: to meet it. It was only a matter of several inches,
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: yet it blocked the blow, and thereafter, try as he would,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: Stubner's glove got no farther than that hip. Stubner had
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: roughed it with big men in his time, and in
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: exhibition bouts had creditably held his own, but there was
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: no holding his own here. Young Pat played with him,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: and in the clinches made him feel as powerful as
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: a baby, landing on him seemingly at will, locking and
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: blocking with masterful accuracy, and scarcely noticing or acknowledging his existence.
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: Half the time, Young Pat seemed to spend in gazing
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: off and out at the landscape in a dreamy sort
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: of way. And right here Stubner made another mistake. He
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: took it for a trick of Old Pat's training, tried
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: to sneak in a short arm jolt, found his arm
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: in a lightning lock, and had both his ears cuffed
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: for his pains. The instinct for a blow, the old
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: man chortled, tis not put on. I'm telling you he's
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: a whiz. He knows a blow without the lookin' when
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: it starts, and where the speed and space and niceness
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: of it, and'tis nothing I ever showed him. 'tis inspiration.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: He was so born. Once in a clinch, the fight
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: manager healed his glove on Young Pat's mouth, and there
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: was just a hint of viciousness in the manner of
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: doing it. A moment later and the next clinch, Sam
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: received the heel of the other's glove on his own mouth.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: There was nothing snappy about it, but the pressure, stolidly
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: lazy as it was, put his head back to the
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: joints cracked, and for the moment he thought his neck
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: was broken. He slacked his body and dropped his arms
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: in token that the bout was over felt the instant
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: release and staggered. Clear, he'll he'll do, he gasped, looking
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: the admiration he lacked the breath to utter. Old Pat's
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: eyes were brightly moist with pride and triumph. And what
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: you'll be thinking to happen when some of the gay
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: and ugly ones tries to rough it on him? He asked?
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: He'll kill them? Sure, was Stubner's verdict. No, he's too
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: cool for that, but he'll just hurt them some for
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: their dirtiness. Let's draw up the contract, said the manager. Wait,
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: you know the whole worth of him? Old Pat answered,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: tis strong terms. I'll be making you come too. Go
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: for a dear hunt with the boy over the hills
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: and learn the lungs and the legs of him. Then
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: we'll sign up ironclad and regular. Stubnor was gone two
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: days on that hunt, and he learned all and more
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: than Old Pat had promised, and came back a very
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: weary and very humble man. The young fellow's innocence of
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: the world had been startling to the case hardened manager,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: but he had found him nobody's full virgin. Though his
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: mind was untouched by all save a narrow mountain experience. Nevertheless,
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: he had proved possession of a natural keenness and shrewdness
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: far beyond the average. In a way, he was a
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: mystery to Sam, who could not understand his terrible equanimity
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: of temper. Nothing ruffled him or worried him, and his
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: patience was of an enduring primitiveness. He never swore, not
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: even the feudal and emasculated cusswords of sissy boys. I'd
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: swear all right if I wanted to, he had explained
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: when challenged by his companion. But I guess I've never
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: come to needing it. When I do, I'll swear. I
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: suppose Old Pat, resolutely adhering to his decision, said goodbye
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: at the cabin. It won't be long, Pat boy, and
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: I'll be reading about you in the papers. I'd like
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: to go along, but I'm afeared. It's me for the
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: mountains till the end. And then, drawing the manager aside,
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: the old man turned loose on him, almost savagely. Remember
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: what I've been telling you over and over. The boy's
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: clean and he's honest. He knows nothing of the rottenness
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: of the game. I kept it all away from him.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: I tell you, he don't know the meaning of fake.
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: He knows only the bravery and romance and glory of fighting.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: And I've filled him up with tales of the old
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: ring heroes, though little enough, God knows it set him afire. Man, man,
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: I'm telling you that I clipped the fight columns from
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: the newspapers to keep it away from him, him thinking
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: I was wanting them for my scrapbook. He don't know
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: a man ever lay down or through a fight, So
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: don't you get him in anything that ain't straight, don't
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: turn the boy's stomach. That's why I put in the
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: null and void clause. The first rottenness and the contracts
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: broke of it self. No snide division of stake money,
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: no secret arrangements with the moving picture men for guaranteed distance.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: There's slathers of money for the both of you. But
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: play it square or you lose. Understand, and whatever you'll
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: be doing, watch out for the women, was Old Pat's
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: parting admonishment. Young Pat astride his horse and reining in
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: dutifully to hear women and his death and damnation. Remember that.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: But when you do find the one, the only one,
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: hang on to her. She'll be worth more than glory
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: and money. But first be sure. And when you're sure,
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: don't let her slip through your fingers. Grab her with
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: the two hands of you and hang on. Hang on.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: If all the world goes to smash and smithereens Pat boy.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: How good woman is? How good woman tis? The first
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: word in the last end of chapters one and two,
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: chapters three, four and five of The Abysmal Brute by
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: Jack London. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: Chapter three, Once in San Francisco, Sam Stubner's troubles began.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: Not that young Pat had a nasty temper or was grouchy,
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: as his father had feared. On the contrary, he was
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: phenomenally sweet and mild, but he was homesick for his
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: beloved mountains. Also, he was secretly appalled by the city,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: though he trod its roaring streets imperturbable as a red Indian.
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: I came down here to fight, he announced. At the
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: end of the first week. Where's Jim Hanford? Stubnor whistled
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: A big champion like him, wouldn't look at you, was
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: his answer. Go and get a reputation, is what he'd say.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I can lick him, but the public doesn't know that.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: If you licked him, you'd be champion of the world,
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: and no champion ever became so with his first fight.
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: I can, but the public doesn't know it. Pat. It
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: wouldn't come to see you fight. And it's the crowd
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: that brings the money in the big purses. That's why
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: Jim Hanford wouldn't consider you for a second. There'd be
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: nothing in it for him. Besides, he's getting three thousand
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: a week right now in Vaudeville. With a contract for
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: twenty five weeks. Do you think he'd chucked that for
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: a go with the man no one ever heard of.
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: You've got to do something first, make a record. You've
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: got to begin on the local dubs that nobody ever
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: heard of, guys like Chub Collins, rough House, Kelly and
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: the Flying Dutchman. When you've put them away, you're only
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: started on the first round of the latter. But after
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: that you'll go up like a balloon. I'll meet those
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: three named in the same ring, one after the other.
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: Was Pat's decision make the arrangements. Accordingly, Stubnor laughed, what's wrong.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: Don't you think I can put them away? I know
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: you can, Stubnor assured him, but it can't be arranged
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: that way. You've got to take them one at a time. Besides,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: remember I know the game and I'm managing you. This
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: proposition has to be worked up, and I'm the boy
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: that knows how. If we're lucky, you may get to
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: the top in a couple of years and be the
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: champion with a mint of money. Pat sighed at the prospect,
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: then brightened up. And after that I can retire and
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: go back home to the old man, he said. Stubnor
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: was about to reply, but checked himself strange as what
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: was this championship material. He felt confident that when the
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: top was reached, it would prove very similar to that
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: of all the others who had gone before. Besides, two
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: years was a long way off, and there was much
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: to be done in the meantime. When Pat fell to
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: moping around his quarters reading endless poetry books and novels
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: drawn from the public library, Stubner sent him off to
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: live on a contra Costa ranch across the bay, under
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: the watchful eye of Spider Walsh. At the end of
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: a week, Spider whispered that the job was a cinch.
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: His charge was away and over the hills from dawn
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: till dark, whipping the streams for trout, shooting quail and rabbits,
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: and pursuing the one, lone and crafty buck, famous for
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: having survived a decade of hunters. It was the Spider
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: who waxed lazy and fat, while his charge kept himself
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: in condition. As Stubner expected, his unknown was laughed at
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: by the fight club managers. Were not the woods full
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: of unknowns who were always breaking out with championship rashes
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: a preliminary say of four rounds. Yes, they would grant
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: him that, but the main event never. Stubner was resolved
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: that young Pat should make his debut in nothing less
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: than a main event, and by the prestige of his
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: own name, he at last managed it. With much misgiving.
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: The Mission Club agreed that Pat Glendon could go fifteen
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: rounds with rough House Kelly for a purse of one
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: hundred dollars. It was the custom of young fighters to
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: assume the names of old ring heroes, so no one
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: suspected that he was the son of the great Pat Glendon.
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: While Stubner held his peace, it was a good press
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: surprise packet to spring later came the night of the fight,
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: after a month of waiting. Stubner's anxiety was keen. His
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: professional reputation was staked that his man would make a showing,
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: and he was astounded to see Pat, seated in his
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: corner a bare five minutes, lose the healthy color from
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: his cheeks, which turned a sickly yellow. Cheer up boy,
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: Stubner said, slapping him on the shoulder the first time
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: in the ring is always strange, and Kelly has a
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: way of letting his opponent wait for him on the
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: chance of getting stage fright. It isn't that, Pat answered,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: it's the tobacco smoke. I'm not used to it, and
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: it's making me fair sick. His manager experienced the quick
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: shock of relief. A man who turned sick from mental causes,
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: even if he were a Samson, could never win to
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: place in the prize ring. As for the tobacco smoke,
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: the youngster would have to get used to it. That
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: was all. Young Pat's entrance into the ring had been
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: met with silence, but when rough House Kelly crawled through
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: the ropes, his greeting was uproarious. He did not belie
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: his name. He was a ferocious looking man, black and hairy,
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: with huge, naughty muscles, weighing a full two hundred pounds.
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: Pat looked across at him curiously and received a savage scowl.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: After both had been introduced to the audience, they shook hands,
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: and even as their gloves gripped, Kelly ground his teeth,
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: convulsed his face with an expression of rage and muttered,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: you've got your nerve with ye. He flung Pat's hand
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: roughly from his and hissed, I'll ye eat you up, ye, pup.
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: The audience laughed at the action, and it guessed hilariously
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: at what Kelly must have said. Back in his corner
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: and waiting the gong, Pat turned to Stubner. Why is
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: he angry with me? He asked, He ain't, Stubner answered,
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: that's his way trying to scare you. It's just mouth fighting.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: It isn't boxing, was Pat's comment, and Stubner, with a
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: quick glance, noted that his eyes were as mildly blue
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: as ever. Be careful, the manager warned, as the gong
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: for the first round sounded, and Pat stood up. He's
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: liable to comment, you like a man eater, And like
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: a man eater. Kelly did come at him, rushing across
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: the ring in a wild fury. Pat, who in his
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: easy way had advanced only a couple of paces, gaged
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: the other's momentum, sidestepped and brought his stiff arched right
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: across to the jaw. Then he stood and looked on
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: with a great curiosity. The fight was over. Kelly had
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: fallen like a stricken bullock, to the floor, and there
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: he lay without movement, while the referee, bending over him,
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: shouted the ten seconds in his unheeding ear. When Kelly's
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: seconds came to lift him, Pat was before them, Gathering
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: the huge, inert bulk of the man in his arms.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: He carried him to his corner and deposited him on
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: the stool and in the arms of his seconds. Half
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: a minute later, Kelly's head lifted and his eyes wavered open.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: He looked about him stupidly, and then to one of
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: his seconds, I haven't he queried hoarsely. Did the roof
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: fall on me? Chapter four. As a result of his
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: fight with Kelly, though the general opinion was that he
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: had won by a fluke, Pat was matched with Rufe Mason.
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: This took place three weeks later, and the Sea the
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: Ara Club audience at Dreamland Rink failed to see what happened.
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: Rufe Mason was a heavyweight noted locally for his cleverness.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: When the gong for the first round sounded, both men
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: met in the center of the ring. Neither rushed, nor
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: did they strike a blow. They felt around each other,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: their arms bent, their gloves so close together that they
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: all most touched. This lasted for perhaps five seconds. Then
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: it happened, and so quickly that not one in a
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: hundred of the audience saw Rufe Mason made a feint
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: with his right It was obviously not a real feint,
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: but a feeler, a mere tentative threatening of a possible blow.
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: It was at this instant that Pat loosed his punch.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: So close were they that the distance the blow traveled
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: was a scant eight inches. It was a short arm
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: left jolt, and it was accomplished by a twist of
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: the left forearm and the thrust of the shoulder. It
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: landed flush on the point of the chin, and the
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: astounded audience saw Rufe Mason's legs crump under him as
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: his body sank to the floor. But the referee had
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: seen and he promptly proceeded to count him out again.
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: Pat carried his opponent to his corner, and it was
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: ten minutes before Rufe Mason, supported by his seconds, with
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: sagging knees and rolling glassy eyes, was able to move
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: down the aisle through the stupefied and incredulous audience. On
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: the way to his dressing room. No wonder, he told
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: a reporter that rough House Kelly thought the roof hit him.
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: After Chub Collins had been put out in the twelfth
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: second of the first round of a fifteen round contest,
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: Stubner felt compelled to speak to Pat. Do you know
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: what they're calling you now? He asked. Pat shook his
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: head one punch glendon. Pat smiled politely. He was little
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: interested in what he was called. He had certain work
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: cut out which he must do ere he could win
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: back to his mountains, and he was phlegmatically doing it.
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: That was all. It won't do, his manager continued with
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: an ominous shake of the head. You can't go on
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: putting your men out so quickly. You must give them
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: more time. I'm here to fight, ain't I, Pat demanded
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: in surprise. Again, Stubner shook his head. It's this way, Pat,
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: You've got to be big and generous in the fighting game.
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: Don't get all the other fighters sore. And it's not
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: fair to the audience. They want a run for their money. Besides,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: no one will fight you. They'll all be scared out,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: and you can't draw crowds with ten second fights. I
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: leave it to you. Would you pay a dollar or
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: five to see a ten second fight? Pat was convinced,
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: and he promised to give future audiences the requisite run
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: for their money, though he stated personally He preferred going
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: fishing to witnessing one hundred rounds of fighting, and still
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: Pat had got practically nowhere in the game. The local
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: sports laughed when his name was mentioned. It called to
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: mind funny fights in rough House Kelly's remark about the roof.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: Nobody knew how Pat could fight. They had never seen him.
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: Where was his wind, his stamina, his ability to mix
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: it with rough customers Through long, grueling contests, he had
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: demonstrated nothing but the possession of a lucky punch and
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: depressing proclivity for flukes. So it was that his fourth
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: match was arranged with Pete Soasso, a Portuguese fighter from Butchertown,
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: known only for the amazing tricks he pla the ring.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: Pat did not train for the fight. Instead, he made
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: a flying and sorrowful trip to the mountains to bury
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: his father. Old Pat had known well the condition of
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: his heart, and it had stopped suddenly on him. Young
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: Pat arrived in San Francisco with so close the margin
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: of time that he changed into his fighting dogs directly
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: from his traveling suit, and even then the audience was
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: kept waiting ten minutes. Remember give him a chance, Stupner
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: cautioned him, as he climbed through the ropes. Play with him,
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: but do it seriously. Let him go ten or twelve rounds,
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: then get him. Pat obeyed instructions, and though it would
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: have been easy enough to put Sasso out, so tricky
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: was he that to stand up to him and not
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: put him out. Kept his hands full. It was a
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: pretty exhibition, and the audience was delighted. Sassa's whirlwind attacks, faints, retreats,
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: and rushes required all Pat's science to protect himself, and
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: even then he did not escape unscathed. Stubner praised him
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: in the minute rests, and all would have been well
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: had not Sasso, in the fourth round, played one of
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: his most spectacular tricks. Pat, in a mix up, had
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: landed a hook to Sasso's jaw, when, to his amazement,
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: the latter dropped his hands and reeled backward, eyes, rolling legs,
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: bending and giving in a high state of grogginess. Pat
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: could not understand it had not been a knockout blow,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: and yet there was his man, all ready to fall
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: to the mat. Pat dropped his own hands and wonderingly
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: watched his reeling opponent. Sasso staggered away, almost fell, recovered
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: and staggered obliquely and blindly forward again. For the first
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: and the last time in his fighting career, Pat was
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: caught off his guard. He actually stepped aside to let
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: the rearling man go by. Steel reeling Sausa suddenly loosed
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: his right Pat received it full on his jaw, with
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: an impact that rattled all his teeth. A great roar
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: of delight went up from the audience, but Pat did
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: not hear. He saw only Sauso before him, grinning and defiant,
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: and not the least bit groggy. Pat was hurt by
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: the blow, but vastly more outraged by the trick. All
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: the wrath that his father ever had surged up in him.
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: He shook his head as if to get rid of
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: the shock of the blow, and steadied himself before his man.
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: It all occurred in the next second, with a feint
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: that drew his opponent. Pat fetched his left to the
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: solar plexus, almost at the same instant, whipping his right
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: across to the jaw. The latter blow landed on Sasso's mouth,
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: ere his falling body struck the floor. The club doctors
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: worked half an hour to bring him to After that,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: they put eleven stitches in his mouth and packed him
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: off in an ambulance. I'm sorry, Pat told his manager.
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid I lost my temper. I'll never do it
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: again in the ring. Dad always cautioned me about it.
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: He said it made him lose more than one battle.
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: I didn't know I could lose my temper that way,
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: but now that I know, I'll keep it in control.
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: And Stubner believed him. He was coming to the stage
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: where he could believe anything about his young charge. You
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: don't need to get angry, he said, You're so thoroughly
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: the master of your man at any stage, at any
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: inch or second of the fight, Pat affirmed, And you
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: can put them out and any time you want, sure
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: I can. I don't want to bow. But I just
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: seemed to possess the ability my eyes show me, the
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: opening that my skill knows how to make, and time
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: and distance or second nature to me. Dad called it
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: a gift, but I thought he was blarneying me. Now
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: that I've been up against these men, I guess he
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: was right. He said I had the mind and muscle
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: correlation at any inch or second of the fight, Stubner
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: repeated musingly. Pat nodded, and Stubner, absolutely believing him, caught
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: a vision of a golden future that should have fetched
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: old Pat out of his grave. Well, don't forget, we've
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: got to give the crowd a run for its money,
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: he said. We'll fix it up between us. How many
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: rounds a fight should go? Now? Your next bout will
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: be with the flying Dutchman. Suppose you let it run
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: the full fifteen and put him out in the last round.
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: That will give you a chance to make a showing
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: as well. All right, Sam, was the answer. It will
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: be a test for you, Stubnor warned, you may fail
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: to put him out in that last round. Watch me,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: Pat paused to put weight to his promise and picked
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: up a volume of Longfellow. If I don't, I'll never
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: read poetry again. And that's going some you, pett it is,
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: his manager proclaimed jubilantly. Though what you see in such
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: stuff is beyond me. Pat sighed, but did not reply.
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: In all his life he had found but one person
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: who cared for poetry, and that had been the red
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: haired school teacher who scared him off into the woods.
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: Chapter five, Where are you going? Stubnor demanded, in surprise,
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: looking at his watch, Pat with his hand on the door.
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: Knob paused and turned around to the Academy of Sciences.
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: He said, there's a professor who's going to give a
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: lecture there on Browning tonight, and Browning is the sort
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: of writer you need assistance with. Sometimes I think I
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: ought to go to night school. But great scott Man,
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: exclaimed the horrified manager. You're on with the flying Dutchman tonight.
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: I know it, but I won't enter the ring a
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: moment before half past nine or quarter to ten. Lecture
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: will be over at nine fifteen. If you want to
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: make sure, come around and pick me up in your machine.
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: Stubner shrugged his shoulders helplessly. You've got no kick coming,
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: Pat assured him. Dad used to tell me a man's
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: worst time was in the hours just before a fight,
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: and that many a fight was lost by a man's
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: breaking down right there with nothing to do but think
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: and be anxious. Well, you'll never need to worry about
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: me that way, you ought to be. Glad. I can
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: go off to a lecture and later that night, in
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: the course of wachshing fifteen splendid rounds, Stubner chuckled to
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: himself more than once that the idea of what that
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: audience of sports would think. Did it know that this
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: magnificent young prize fighter had come to the ring directly
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: from a Browning lecture. The Flying Dutchman was a young
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: Swede who possessed and unwonted willingness to fight, and who
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: was blessed with phenomenal endurance. He never rested, was always
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: on the offensive, and rushed and fought from gong to gong.
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: In the outfighting, his arms whirled about like flails in
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: the in fighting, he was forever shouldering or half wrestling,
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: and starting blows whenever he could get a hand free.
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: From start to finish, he was a whirlwind, hence his name.
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: His failing was his lack of judgment in time and distance. Nevertheless,
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: he had won many fights by virtue of landing one
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: in each dozen or so of the unending fuselades of
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: punches he delivered. Pat was strong upon him. The caution
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: that he must not put his opponent out was kept busy.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: Nor though he escaped vital damage, could he avoid entirely
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: those eternal flying gloves. But it was good training, and
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: in a mild way he enjoyed the contest. Could you
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: get him now, Stubnor whispered in his ear during the
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: minute rest at the end of the fifth round. Sure,
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: was Pat's answer. You know he's never been knocked out
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: by anyone, Stubnor warned. A couple of rounds later. Then
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid I'll have to break my knuckles. Pat smiled.
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: I know the punch I've got in me, and when
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: I landed, something's got to go. If he won't, my
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: knuckles will. Do you think you could get him now,
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: Stubnor asked, at the end of the thirteenth round. Time
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: I tell you well, then Pat, let him run to
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: the fifteenth. In the fourteenth round, the Flying Dutchman exceeded himself.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: At the stroke of the gong. He rushed clear across
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: the ring to the opposite corner, where Pat was leisurely
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: getting to his feet. The house cheered, for it knew
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: the Flying Dutchman had cut loose. Pat, catching the fun
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: of it, whimsically decided to meet the terrific onslaught with
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: a holy passive defense and not to strike a blow.
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: Nor did he strike a blow nor faint a blow.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: During the three minutes of whirlwind that followed. He gave
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: a rare exhibition of stalling, sometimes hugging his bowed face
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: with his left arm his abdomen with his right, at
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: other times changing is the point of attack, changed so
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: that both gloves were held at either side of his face,
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: or both elbows and four arms guarded his midsection, and
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: all the time moving about clumsily shouldering or half falling
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: forward against his opponent and clogging his efforts himself, never
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: striking nor threatening to strike the while rocking with the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: impacts of the storming blows that beat upon his various guards.
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: The devil's own tattoo. Those close at the ringside saw
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: and appreciated, but the rest of the audience fooled arose
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: to its feet and roared its applause in the mistaken
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: notion that Pat helpless was receiving a terrible beating. With
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: the end of the round, the audience dumbfounded sank back
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: into its seats as Pat walked steadily to his corner.
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: It was not understandable he should have been beaten to
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: a pulp, and yet nothing had happened to him. Now
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: are you going to get him? Stubnor anxiously inside ten seconds?
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: Was Pat's confident assertion. Watch me. There was no trick
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: about it. When the gong struck and Pat bounded to
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: his feet, he advertised it unmistakably that for the first
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: time in the fight he was starting after his man.
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: Not one onlooker misunderstood. The Flying Dutchman read the advertisement too, and,
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: for the first time in his career, as they met
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: in the center of the ring, visibly hesitated for a
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: fraction of a second. They faced each other in position.
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: Then the Flying Dutchman leaped forward upon his man, and
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: Pat with a timed right cross, dropped him cold as
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: he leapt. It was after this battle that pack Linden
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: started on his upward rush to fame. The sports and
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: the sporting writers took him up for the first time.
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: The Flying Dutchman had been knocked out. His conqueror had
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: proved a wizard of defense. His previous victories had not
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: been flukes. He had a kick in both his hands.
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: Giant that he was, he would go far. The time
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: was already past. The writers asserted for him to waste
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: himself on the third raiders and chopping blocks. Where were
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: Ben Menzies, REGs Read, Bill Tarwater and Ernest Lawson. It
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: was time for them to meet this young cub that
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: had suddenly shown himself a fighter of quality. Where was
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: his manager anyway? That he was not issuing the challenges?
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: And then fame came in a day for Stubner divulged
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: the secret that his man was none other than the
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: son of Pat Glenden, Old Pat, the old time ring hero,
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: Young Pat Glendon. He was promptly christened, and sports and
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: writers flocked about him to admire him and back him
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: and write him up. Beginning with Ben Menzies and finishing
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: with Bill Tarwater, he challenged, fought, and knocked out the
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: four second Raiders. To do this, he was compelled to
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: travel the battles taking place in Goldfield, Denver, Texas, and
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: New York. To accomplish it required months for the bigger
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: fights were not easily arranged, and the men themselves demanded
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: more time for training. The second year saw him running
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: to cover and disposing of the half dozen big fighters
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: that clustered just beneath the top of the heavyweight ladder.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: On this top, firmly planted stood big Jim Hanford, the
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: undefeated world champion. Here on the top rungs, progress was slower,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: though Stubner was indefatigable in issuing challenges and in promoting
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: sporting opinion to force the man to fight. Will King
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: was disposed of in England, and Glendon pursued dude Tom
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: Harrison halfway around the world to defeat him on boxing
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: day in Australia. But the purses grew larger and larger.
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: In place of one hundred dollars such as his first
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: battles had earned him, he was now receiving from twenty
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: to thirty thousand dollars a fight, as well as equally
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: large sums from the moving picturemen. Stubner took his manager's
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: percentage of all this according to the terms of the
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: contract Old Pat had drawn up, and both he and Glendon,
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: despite their heavy expenses, were waxing rich. This was due
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: more than anything else, to the clean lives they lived.
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: They were not wasters. Stubner was attracted to real estate,
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: and his holdings in San Francisco, consisting of building flats
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: and apartment houses, were bigger than Glendon ever dreamed. There
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: was a secret syndicate of betters, however, which could have
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: made an accurate guess at the size of Stubner's holdings.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: While heavy bonus after heavy bonus of which Glendon never heard,
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: was paid over to his manager by the moving picturemen.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: Stubner's most serious task was in maintaining the innocence of
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: his young gladiator, nor did he find it difficult. Glendon,
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: who had nothing to do with the business end, was
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: little interested. Besides, wherever his travels took him, he spent
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: his spare time in hunting and fishing. He rarely mingled
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: with those of the sporting world. Was notoriously shy and secluded,
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: and preferred art galleries and books of verse to sporting gossip. Also,
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: his trainers and sparring partners were rigorously instructed by the
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: manager to keep their tongues away from the slightest hints
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: of ring rottenness. In every way stupe intervened between Glendon
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: and the world. He was never even interviewed, save in
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: Stubner's presence. Only once was Glendon approached. It was just
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: prior to his battle with Henderson, and an offer of
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: one hundred thousand was made to him to throw the fight.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: It was made hurriedly in swift whispers in a hotel corridor,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: and it was fortunate for the man that pat controlled
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: his temper and shouldered past him without reply. He brought
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: the tale of it to Stubner, who said, it's only conn, Pat.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: They were trying to josh you, he noted the blue
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: eyes blaze, and maybe worse than that. If they could
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: have got you to fall for it, there might have
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: been a big sensation in the papers that would have
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: finished you. But I doubt it. Such things don't happen anymore.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: It's a myth, that's what it is that has come
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: down from the middle history of the ring. There has
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: been in the past, but no fighter or manager of
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: reputation would dare anything of the sort today. Why, Pat,
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: the men in the game are as clean and straight
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: as those in professional baseball, than which there is nothing
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: cleaner or straighter. And all the while he talked, Stubner
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: knew in his heart that the forthcoming fight with Henderson
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: was not to be shorter than twelve rounds this for
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: the moving pictures, and not longer than the fourteenth round.
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: And he knew furthermore, so big were the stakes involved,
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: that Henderson himself was pledged not to last beyond the
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: fourteenth and Glendon never approached again dismissed the matter from
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: his mind and went out to spend the afternoon in
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: taking color photographs. The camera had become his latest hobby,
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: loving pictures, yet unable to paint, he had compromised by
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: taking up photography. In his hand baggage was one grip
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: packed with books on the subject, and he spent long
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: hours in the dark room, realizing for himself the various processes.
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: Never had there been a great fighter who was as
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: aloof from the fighting world as he. Because he had
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: little to say with those he encountered, he was called
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: sullen and unsocial, and out of this a newspaper reputation
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: took form that was not an exaggeration so much as
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: it was an entire misconception. Boiled down, his character in
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: print was that of an ox muscled and dumbly stupid brute,
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: and Juan Callo, sporting writer, dubbed him the Abysmal Brute.
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: The name stuck, the rest of the fraternity hailed it
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: with delight, and thereafter Glendon's name never appeared in print
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: unconnected with it, often in a headline or under a photograph.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: The Abysmal Brute, capitalized and without quotation marks, appeared alone.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: All the world knew who was this brute. This made
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: him draw into himself closer than ever, While it developed
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: a bitter prejudice against newspaper folk regarding fighting itself, his
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: earlier mild interest grew stronger. The men he now fought
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: were anything but dubs, and victory did not come so easily.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: They were picked men, experienced ring generals, and each battle
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: was a problem. There were occasions when he found it
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: impossible to put them out in any designated later round
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: of a fight. Thus, with Sulzberger, the gigantic German, try
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: as he would in the eighteenth round, he failed to
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: get him. In the nineteenth it was the same story,
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: and not till the twentieth did he manage to break
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: through the baffling guard and drop him. Glendon's in increasing
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: enjoyments of the game was accompanied by severe and prolonged training,
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: never dissipating, spending much of his time on hunting trips
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: in the hills. He was practically always in the pink
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: of condition, and unlike his father, no unfortunate accidents marred
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: his career. He never broke a bone, nor injured so
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: much as a knuckle. One thing that Stubner noted with
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: secret glee was that his young fighter no longer talked
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: of going permanently back to his mountains when he had
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: won the championship away from Jim Hanford end of chapters three,
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: four and five, Chapter six and seven of The Abysmal
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: Brute by Jack London. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: public domain. Chapter six. The summation of his career was
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: rapidly approaching. The great Champion had even publicly intimated his
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: readiness to take on Glendon as soon as the latter
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: had disposed. Of the three or four aspirants for the
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: championship who intervened in six months, Pat managed to put
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: away Kid McGrath and Philadelphia Jack McBride, and there remained
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: only Nat Powers and Tom Cannam, and all would have
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: been well had not a certain society girl gone adventuring
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 1: into journalism, and had not Stubner agreed to an interview
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: with the woman reporter of the San Francisco Courier Journal.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: Her work was always published over the name of Maud Sangster,
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: which by the way, was her own name. The Sangsters
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: were a notoriously wealthy family. The founder, old Jacob Sangster,
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: had packed his blankets and worked as a farm hand
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: in the West, he had discovered an inexhaustible borax deposit
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: in Nevada, and from hauling it out by mule teams,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: had built a railroad to do the freighting. Following that,
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: he had poured the profits of borax into the purchase
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: of hundreds and thousands of square miles of timberlands in California, Oregon,
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: and Washington. Still later, he had combined politics with business,
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: bought statesmen, judges, and machines, and become a captain of
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: complicated industry. And after that he had died full of
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: honor and pessimism, leaving his name a muddy blot for
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: future historians to smudge, and also leaving a matter of
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: a couple of hundreds of millions for his four sons
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: to squabble over. The legal, industrial, and political battles that
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: followed vexed and amused California for a generation, and culminated
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: in deadly hatred and unspeaking terms between the four sons.
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: The youngest, Theodore, in middle life, experienced a change of heart,
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: sold out his stock, farms and racing stables, and plunged
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: into a fight with all the corrupt powers of his
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: native state. Including most of its millionaires, in a quixotic
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: attempt to purge it of the infamy which had been
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: implanted by old Jacob Sangster. Maud Sangster was Theodore's oldest daughter.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: The Sangster stock uniformly red fighters among the men and
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: beauties among the women. Nor was Maud an exception. Also,
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: she must have inherited some of the virus of adventure
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: from the Sangster breed, for she had come to womanhood
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: and done a multitude of things of which no woman
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: in her position should have been guilty a match. In
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: ten thousand, she remained unmarried, had sojourned in Europe without
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: bringing home a nobleman for spouse, and had declined a
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: goodly portion of her own set at home. She had
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: gone in for outdoor sports, won the tennis championship of
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: the state, kept a society weekly's agog with her unconventionalities,
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: walked from San Matea to Santa Cruz against time on
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: a wager, and once caused a sensation by playing polo
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: in a men's team at a private Berlin game practice game. Incidentally,
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: she had gone in for art and maintained a studio
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: in San Francisco's Latin quarter. All this had been of
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: little moment until her father's reform attack. Became acute, passionately independent,
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: never yet having met the man to whom she could
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: gladly submit, and bored by those who had aspired. She
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: resented her father's interference with her way of life and
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: put the climax on all her social misdeeds by leaving
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: home and going to work on the Courier Journal. Beginning
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: at twenty dollars a week, her salary had swiftly risen
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: to fifty. Her work was principally musical, dramatic, and art criticism,
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: although she was not above mere journalistic stunts if they
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: promised to be sufficiently interesting. Thus, she scooped the big
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: interview with Morgan at a time when he was being
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: feutally trailed by a dozen New York Star journalists, went
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: down to the bottom of the Golden Gate in a
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: diver suit and flew with Rude the Birdman when he
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: broke all records of continuous flight by reaching as far
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: as Riverside. Now it must not be imagined that Maud
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: Sangster was a hard bitten Amazon. On the contrary, she
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: was a gray eyed, slender, young woman of three or
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: four and twenty, of medium stature, and possessing uncommonly small
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: hands and feet for an outdoor woman or any other
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: kind of woman. Also, far in excess of most outdoor women,
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: she knew how to be daintily feminine. It was on
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: her own suggestion that she received the editor's commission to
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: interview Pat Glendon. With the exception of having caught a
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: glimpse once of Bob Fitzsimmons in evening dress at the
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: Palace Grille, she had never seen a prize fighter in
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: her life, nor was she curious to see one. At least,
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: she had not been curious until young Pat Glendon came
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: to San Francisco to train for his fight with Nat Powers.
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: Then his newspaper reputation had aroused her. The abysmal brute
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: it certainly must be worth seeing. From what she read
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: of him, she gleaned that he was a man monster,
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: profoundly stupid, and with the sullenness and ferocity of a
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: jungle beast. True, his publisher photographs did not show all that,
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: but they did show the hugeness of braun that might
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: be expected to go with it, and so accompanied by
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: a staff photographer. She went out to the training quarters
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: at the Cliffhouse on the hour, appointed by Stubner. The
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: real estate owner was having trouble. Pat was rebellious. He
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: sat one big leg dangling over the side of the
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: armchair and Shakespeare's sonnets face downward on his knee or
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: rating against the new woman. What do they want to
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: come butting into the game for, he demanded. It's not
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: their place. What do they know about it? Anyway? The
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: men are bad enough as it is. I'm not a
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: holy show. This woman's coming here to make me one.
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: I never have stood for women around the training quarters,
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: and I don't care if she is a reporter, but
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: she's not an ordinary reporter. Stubner interposed, you've heard of
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: the sanctus the millionaires. Pat nodded, Well, she's one of them.
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: She's high society and all that stuff. She could be
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: running with the Blingham crowd now if she wanted to,
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: instead of working for wages. Her old man's worth fifty millions.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: If he's worth a cent, then what's she working on
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: a paper for? Keeping some poor devil out of a job.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: She and the old man fell out, had a tiff
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: or something about the time he started to clean up
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: San Francisco. She quit, that's all, left home and got
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: a job. And let me tell you one thing, Pat,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: she can everlastingly sling English. There isn't a pen pusher
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: on the coast can touch her when she gets going.
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: Pat began to show interest, and Stubner hurried on. She
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: writes poetry too, the regular Lottida stuff, just like you.
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: Only I guess hers is better because she published a
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: whole book of it once, and she writes up the shows.
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: She interviews it every big actor that hits this burg.
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: I've seen her name in the papers. Pat commented, Sure
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: you have, and you're honored Pat by her coming to
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: interview you. It won't bother you any I'll stick right
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: by and give her most of the dope myself. You
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: know I've always done that. Pat looked his gratitude. And
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: another thing, Pat, don't forget. You've got to put up
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: with this interviewing. It's part of your business. It's big advertising,
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: and it comes free. We can't buy it. It interests people,
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: draws the crowds, and it's crowds that pile up the
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: gate receipts. He stopped and listened, then looked at his watch.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: I think that's her now. I'll go and get her
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: and bring her in. I'll tip it off to her
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: to cut it short, you know, and it won't take long.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: He turned in the doorway, and be decent, Pat, don't
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: shut up like a clam. Talk a bit to her
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: when she asks you questions. Pat put the sonnets on
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: the table, took up a newspap vapor, and was apparently
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: deep in its contents when the two entered the room
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: and he stood up. The meeting was a mutual shock.
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: When blue eyes met gray, it was almost as if
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: the man and the woman shouted triumphantly to each other,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: as if each had found something sought and unexpected. But
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: this was for the instant only each had anticipated in
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: the other something so totally different that the next moment,
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: the clear cry of recognition gave way to confusion, as
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: is the way of women. She was the first to
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: achieve control, and she did it without having given any
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: outward signal that she had ever lost it. She advanced
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: most of the distance across the floor to meet Glendon.
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: As for him, he scarcely knew how he stumbled through
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: the introduction. Here was a woman, a woman. He had
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: not known that such a creature could exist. The few
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: women he had noticed had never prefigured this. He wondered
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: what Old Pat's judgment would have been of her if
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: she was the sword he had recommended to hang on
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: to With both his hands, he discovered that in some
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: way he was holding her hand. He looked at it,
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: curious and fascinated, marveling at its fragility. She, on the
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: other hand, had proceeded to obliterate the echoes of that
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: first clear call. It had been a peculiar experience. That
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: was all this sudden outrush of her toward this strange man.
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: For was not he the abysmal brute of the prize ring,
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: the great fighting, stupid bulk of a male animal who
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: hammered up his fellow males in the same stupid order.
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: She smiled at the way he continued to hold her hand.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: I'll have it back, please, mister Glendon, she said, I
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 1: I really need it, you know. He looked at her blankly,
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: followed her gaze to her imprisoned hand, and dropped it
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: in a rush of awkwardness that sent the blood in
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: a manifest blush to his face. She noted the blush,
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: and the thought came to her that he did not
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: seem quite the uncouth brute she had pictured. She could
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: not conceive of a brute blushing at anything, and also
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: she found herself pleased with the fact that he lacked
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: the easy glibness to murmur an apology. But the way
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: he devoured her with his eyes was disconcerting. He stared
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: at her as if in a trance, while his cheeks
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: flushed even more redly. Stubner, by this time had fetched
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: a chair for her, and Glendon automatically sank down into his.
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: He's in fine shape, Miss Sangster. In fine shape, the
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: manager was saying. That's right, isn't it, Pat never felt
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: better in your life. Glendon was bothered by this. His
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: brows contracted in a troubled way, and he made no reply.
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: I've wanted to meet you for a long time, mister Glennon,
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: Miss Sangster said, I never interviewed a pugilist before, so
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: if I don't go about it expertly, you'll forgive me.
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 1: I'm sure. Maybe you'd better start in by seeing him
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: in action, was the manager's suggestion. While he's getting into
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: his fighting dogs, I can tell you a lot about him.
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 1: Fresh stuff too. We'll call in Walsh Pat and go
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: a couple of rounds. We'll do nothing of the sort,
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: Glendon growled roughly, and just the way an abysmal brute
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: should go ahead with the interview. The business went ahead unsatisfactorily.
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: Stubner did most of the talking and suggesting, which was
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: sufficient to irritate Maud Sangster, while Pat volunteered nothing. She
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: studied his fine countenance, the eyes clear blue and wide apart,
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: the well modeled, almost aquallin nose, the firm chased lips
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 1: that were sweet in a masculine way in their curl
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: at the corners, and that gave no hint of any sullenness.
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: It was a baffling personality, she concluded. If what the
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: paper said of him was so. In vain she sought
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: for ear marks of the brute, and in vain she
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: attempted to establish contacts. For one thing, she knew too
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: little about price fighters and the ring, and whenever she
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: opened up a lead, it was promptly snatched away by
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 1: the information oozing Stubner. It must be most interesting, this
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: life of a pugilist, she said, once, adding with a sigh.
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 1: I wish I knew more about it. Tell me why
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: do you fight? Oh aside for money reasons? This latter
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: to Forestall Stubner, do you enjoy fighting? Are you stirred
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 1: by it? By pitting yourself against other men? I hardly
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 1: know how to express what I mean, so you must
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: be patient with me. Pat and Stubner began speaking together,
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: but for once Pat bore his manager down. I didn't
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: care for it at first, you see, it was too
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: dead easy for him, Stubner interrupted. But later Pat went on,
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 1: when I encountered the better fighters, the real, big, clever ones,
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: where I was more on your medal, she suggested, Yes,
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: that's it, more on my medal, I found. I did
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: care for it, a great deal in fact. But still
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 1: it's not so absorbing to me as it might be.
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: You see, while each battle is a sort of a
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: problem which I must work out with my wits and muscle,
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: yet to me the issue is never in doubt. He's
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: never had a fight go to a decision, Stubner proclaimed,
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: He's won every battle by the knockout route. And it's
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: this certainty of the outcome that robs it of what
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: I imagine must be its finest thrills. Pat concluded, maybe
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: you'll get some of them thrills when you go up
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: against Jim Hanford, said the manager. Pat smiled, but did
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: not speak. Tell me some more. She urged more about
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: the way you feel when you are fighting, and then
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: Pat amazed his manager, Miss Sangster and himself by blurting out,
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 1: it seems to me I don't want to talk with
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: you on such things. It's as if there are things
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: more important for you and me to talk about. I
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: He stopped abruptly, aware of what he was saying, but
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: unaware of why he was saying it. Yes, she cried eagerly,
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: that's it. This is what makes a good interview, the
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: real personality, you know. But Pat remained tongue tied, and
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: Stubner wandered away on a statistical comparison of his champion's weights,
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: measurements and expansions with those of Sandou, the Terrible Turk, Jeffreys,
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: and the other modern strong men. This was of little
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 1: interest to Maud Sangster, and she showed that she was bored.
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: Her eyes chanced to rest on the Sonnets. She picked
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: the book up and glanced inquiringly at Stubner. That's Pats,
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: he said. He goes in for that kind of stuff
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: and color photography and art exhibits and such things. But
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: for Heaven's sakes, don't publish anything about it. It would
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: ruin his reputation. She looked accusingly at Glendon, who immediately
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: became awkward. To her, it was delicious, a shy young
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: man with the body of a giant, who was one
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 1: of the kings of Bruisers, and who read poetry and
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: went to art exhibits and experimented with color photography. Of
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: a surety, there was no abusinal brute here. His very shyness,
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: she divined, now, was due to sensitiveness and not stupidity.
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: Shakespeare's Sonnets. This was a phase that would bear investigation,
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: but Stubner stole the opportunity away and was back chanting
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: his everlasting statistics. A few minutes later, and most unwittingly,
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: she opened up the biggest lead of all. That first
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: sharp attraction toward him had begun to stir again after
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: the discovery of the Sonnets. The magnificent frame of his,
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: the handsome face, the chased lips, the clear looking eyes,
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: the fine forehead which the short crop of blonde hair
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: did not hide the aura of physical well being and
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: cleanness which he seemed to emanate. All this and more
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 1: that she sensed drew her as she had never been
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: drawn by any man, And yet through her mind kept
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: running the nasty rumors that she had heard only the
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: day before at the Courier Journal office. You were right,
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: she said, there is something more important to talk about.
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: There is something in my mind. I want you to
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: reconcile for me. Do you mind, Pat shook his head.
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: If I am frank, abominably frank. I've heard that men
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: sometimes talking of particular fights and of the betting odds,
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: And while I gave no heed to it, at the time,
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: it seemed to me it was firmly agreed that there
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 1: was a great deal of trickery and cheating connected with
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: the sport. Now, when I look at you, for instance,
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 1: I find it hard to understand how you can be
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: a party to such cheating. I can understand your liking
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 1: the sport for a sport, as well as for the
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: money it brings you, but I can't understand there is
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: nothing to understand. Stubner broke in while Pat's lips were
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: wreathed in a gentle, tolerant smile. It's all fairy tales.
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 1: This talk about faking, about fixed fights and all that brought.
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: There's nothing to it, Miss Sangster, I assure you. And
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: now let me tell you about how I discovered mister Glendon.
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: It was a letter I got from his father. But
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: Maud Sangster refused to be sidetracked and addressed herself to
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: pat listen. I remember one case particularly. It was some
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 1: fight that took place several months ago. I forget the contestants.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: One of the editors of the Courier Journal told me
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 1: he intended to make a good winning He didn't hope,
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: he said he intended. He said he was on the
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 1: inside and was betting on the number of rounds. He
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: told me the fight would end in the nineteenth. This
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: was the night before, and the next day he triumphantly
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: called my attention to the fact that it had ended
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: in that very round. I didn't think anything up one
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: way or the other. I was not interested in prize
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: fighting then, but I am now. At the time it
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: seemed quite in accord with the vague conception I had
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: about fighting. So you see, it isn't all fairy tales,
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: is it? I know that fight? Glendon said. It was
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 1: Owen and Meurgwether, and it did end in the nineteenth round, Sam,
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: And she said she heard that round name the day before.
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 1: How do you account for it, Sam? How do you
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: account for a man picking a lucky lottery ticket? The
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: manager evaded, while getting his wits together to answer, that's
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: the very point. Men who study form and condition and
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 1: seconds and rules and such things often pick the number
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: of rounds, just as men have been known to pick
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: hundred to one shots in the races. And don't forget
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: one thing. For every man that wins, there's another that loses.
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: There's another that didn't pick. Right, Miss Sangster, I assure you,
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: on my honor that faking and fixing in the fight
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 1: game is is non existent. What's your opinion, mister Glendon,
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: she asked, the same as mine. Stubner snatched the answer.
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: He knows what I say is true, every word of it.
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: He's never fought anything but a straight fight in his life.
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: Isn't that right? Pat? Yes, it's right, Pat affirmed. And
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: the peculiar thing to Maud Sangster was that she was
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: convinced he spoke the truth She brushed her forehead with
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: her hand, as if to rid herself of the puzzlement
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: that clouded her brain. Listen, she said, last night, the
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: same editor told me that your forthcoming fight was arranged
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: to the very round in which it would end. Stubnor
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: was verging on a panic, but Pat's speech saved him
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: from replying. Then the editor lies. Pat's voice spoomed. Now,
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: for the first time, he did not lie before about
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: that other fight. She challenged, what round did he say
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: my fight with Nat Powers would end in? Before she
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: could answer, the manager was into the thick of it.
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: Oh rats, Pat, he cried, Shut up, It's only the
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 1: regular run of ring rumors. Let's get on with this interview.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: He was ignored by Glendon, whose eyes bent on hers
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: were no longer mildly blue, but harsh and imperative. She
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 1: was sure now that she had stumbled on something tremendous,
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: something that would explain all that had baffled her. At
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: the same time, she thrilled to the mastery of his
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: voice and gaze. Here was a male man who would
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: take hold of life and shake out of it what
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: he wanted. What round did the editor say? Glendon reiterated,
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: his demand. For the love of Mike, pat stopped this foolishness.
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 1: Stubner broke in, I wish you would give me a
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: chance to answer, Maud Sangster said, I guess I'm able
• 1:29:08
  Speaker 1: to talk with miss Sangster. Glyndon added, you get out, Sam,
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 1: go off and take care of that photographer. They looked
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: at each other for a tense, silent moment. Then the
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: manager moved slowly to the door, opened it and turned
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: his head to listen. And now what round did he say?
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 1: I hope I haven't made a mistake, she said tremulously.
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: But I am very sure that he said the sixteenth round.
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: She saw surprise and anger leap into Glendon's face, and
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: the anger and accusation in the glance he cast at
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: his manager, and she knew the blow had driven home
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: and there was reason for his anger. He knew he
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: had talked it over with Stubnor, and they had reached
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: a decision to give the audience a good run one
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 1: for its money without unnecessarily prolonging the fight, and to
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: end it in the sixteenth And here was a woman
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: from a newspaper office naming the very round Stubner in
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 1: the doorway looked limp and pale, and it was evident
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: he was holding himself together by an effort. I'll see
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: you later, Pat told him, shut the door behind you.
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 1: The door closed, and the two were left alone. Glendon
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: did not speak. The expression on his face was frankly
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: one of trouble and perplexity. Well, she asked. He got
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: up and towered above her, then sat down again, moistening
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: his lips with his tongue. I'll tell you one thing,
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: he finally said. The fight won't end in the sixteenth round.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: She did not speak, but her unconvinced and quizzical smile
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 1: hurt him. You wait and see, miss Sangster, and you'll
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: see that editor man is mistaken. You mean the program
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: is to be changed, she queried audaciously. He quivered to
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: the cut of her words. I am not accustomed to lying,
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: he said, stiffly, even to women. Neither have you to me,
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: nor have you denied the program is to be changed. Perhaps,
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 1: mister Glendon, I am stupid, but I fail to see
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: the difference in what number the final round occurs. So
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: long as it is predetermined and known, I'll tell you
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: that round, and not another soul shall know. She shrugged
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: her shoulders and smiled. It sounds to me very much
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 1: like a racing tip. They are always given that way,
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: you know. Furthermore, I am not quite stupid, and I
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: know there is something wrong here. Why were you made
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: angry by my naming around? Why were you angry with
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: your manager? Why did you send him from the room
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: for reply? Glendon walked over to the window as if
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: to look out where he changed his mind and partly turned,
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: and she knew without seeing that he was studying her face.
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: He came back and sat down. You said, I haven't
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 1: lied to you, miss Sangster, and you were right. I haven't.
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 1: He paused, groping painfully for a correct statement of the situation.
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 1: Now do you think you can believe what I'm going
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: to tell you? Will you take the word of a
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 1: prize fighter? She nodded gravely, looking him straight in the
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 1: eyes and certain that what he was about to tell
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: was the truth. I've always fought straight and square. I've
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 1: never touched a piece of dirty money in my life,
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: nor attempted a dirty trick. Now I can go on
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: from that. You've shaken me up pretty badly by what
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 1: you told me. I don't know what to make of it.
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 1: I can't pass a snap judgment on it. I don't
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 1: know what it looks bad. That's what troubles me. Foresee, you,
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 1: Stubner and I have talked this fight over and it
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 1: was understood between us that I would end the fight
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: in the sixteenth round. Now you bring the same word.
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: How did that editor know? Not for me? Stubner must
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 1: have let it out. And unless he stopped to debate
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 1: the problem, unless that editor is a lucky guesser, I
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: can't make up my mind about it. I'll have to
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: keep my eyes open and wait and learn. Every word
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 1: I've given you is straight. And there's my hand on
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: it again. He towered out of his chair and over
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: to her. Her small hand was gripped in his big
• 1:33:54
  Speaker 1: one as she arose to meet him, and, after a
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 1: fair straight look into the eyes between them, both glanced
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 1: unconsciously at the clasped hands. She felt that she had
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: never been more aware that she was a woman. The
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: sex emphasis of those two hands, the soft and fragile
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: feminine and the heavy, muscular masculine, was startling. Glendon was
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 1: the first to speak. You could be hurt so easily,
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: he said, and at the same time, she felt the
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 1: firmness of his grip, almost caressingly relax she remembered that
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: the old Prussian king's love for giants, and laughed at
• 1:34:39
  Speaker 1: the incongruity of the thought association as she withdrew her hand.
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 1: I am glad you came here today, he said, then
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 1: hurried on awkwardly to make an explanation, which the warm
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: light of admiration in his eyes belied. I mean, because
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: maybe you have opened my eyes to the crooked dealing
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: that has been going going on. You have surprised me,
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 1: she urged. It seemed to me that it is so
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: generally understood that prize fighting is full of crookedness that
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: I cannot understand how you, one of its chief exponents,
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: could be ignorant of it. I thought, as a matter
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: of course, that you would know all about it, and
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: now you have convinced me that you never dreamed of it.
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 1: You must be different from other fighters, he nodded his head.
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: That explains it, I guess, And that's what comes of
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 1: keeping away from it, from the other fighters and promoters
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 1: and sports. It was easy to pull the wool over
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: my eyes. Yet it remains to be seen whether it
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: really has been pulled over or not. You see, I'm
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: going to find out for myself and change it, she queried,
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 1: rather breathlessly, convinced somehow that he could do anything he
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: set out to accomplish. No quit, it, was his answer.
• 1:36:05
  Speaker 1: If it isn't straight, I won't have anything more to
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 1: do with it. And one thing is certain, this coming
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 1: fight with neat Powers won't end in the sixteenth round.
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: If there is any truth in that editor's tip, they'll
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: all be fooled. Instead of putting him out in the sixteenth,
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: I'll let the fight run on into the twenties. You
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 1: wait and see, and I'm not to tell the editor.
• 1:36:29
  Speaker 1: She was on her feet now, preparing to go. Certainly
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 1: not if he is only guessing. Let him take his chances,
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: and if there's anything rotten about it, he deserves to
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: lose all he bets. This is to be a little
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: secret between you and me. I'll tell you what i'll do.
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: I'll name the round to you. It won't run into
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 1: the twenties. I'll stop nat Powers in the eighteenth and
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: I'll not whisper it, she assured him. I'd like to
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: ask you a favor, he said, tentatively. Maybe it's a
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 1: big favor. She showed her acquiescence in her face, as
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: if it were already granted, and he went on, of course,
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: I know you won't use this faking in the interview,
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 1: but I want more than that. I don't want you
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: to publish anything at all. She gave him a quick
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: look with her searching gray eyes, then surprised herself by
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: her answer. Certainly, she said, it will not be published.
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: I won't write a line of it. I knew it,
• 1:37:38
  Speaker 1: he said, simply. For the moment, she was disappointed by
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 1: the lack of thanks, and the next moment she was
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 1: glad that he had not thanked her. She sensed the
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 1: different foundation he was building under this meeting of an
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 1: hour with her, and she became daringly explorative. How did
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 1: you know it, she asked, I don't know. He shook
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 1: his head. I can't explain it. I knew it as
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 1: a matter of course. Somehow it seems to me I
• 1:38:11
  Speaker 1: know a lot about you and me. But why not
• 1:38:15
  Speaker 1: publish the interview? As your manager says, it is good advertising.
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 1: I know it, he answered, slowly, but I don't want
• 1:38:24
  Speaker 1: to know you that way. I think it would hurt
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: if you should publish it. I don't want to think
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: that I knew you professionally. I'd like to remember our
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 1: talk here as a talk between a man and a woman.
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 1: I don't know whether you understand what I'm driving at,
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 1: but it's the way I feel. I want to remember
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 1: this just as a man and a woman. As he spoke,
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: in his eyes was all the expression with which a
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 1: man looks at a woman. She felt the force and
• 1:38:58
  Speaker 1: beat of him, and she felt strangely tongue tied and
• 1:39:02
  Speaker 1: awkward before this man, who had been reputed tongue tied
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: and awkward. He could certainly talk straighter to the point
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: and more convincingly than most men, And what struck her
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 1: most forcibly was her own inborn certainty that it was
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: mere naive and simple frankness on his part, and not
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: a practiced artfulness. He saw her into her machine and
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 1: gave her another thrill when he said goodbye once again.
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: Their hands were clasped as he said, someday I'll see
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: you again. I want to see you again. Somehow, I
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: have a feeling that the last word has not been
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: said between us. As the machine rolled away, she was
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 1: aware of a similar feeling. She had not seen the
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 1: last of this very disquieting Pat Glendon, king of the
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: Bruis and abysmal brute. Back in the training quarters, Glendon
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 1: encountered his perturbed manager, What did you fire me out for?
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: Stubnor demanded, We are finished a hell of them as
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 1: you've made. You've never stood for meeting a reporter alone before,
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 1: and now you'll see when that interview comes out. Glendon,
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: who had been regarding him with cool amusement, made as
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: if to turn and pass on, and then changed his mind.
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 1: It won't come out, he said. Stubner looked up sharply.
• 1:40:37
  Speaker 1: I ask her not to, Glendon explained. Then Stubner exploded
• 1:40:43
  Speaker 1: as if she'd kill a juicy thing like that. Glendon
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 1: became very cold, and his voice was harsh and grating.
• 1:40:51
  Speaker 1: It won't be published, she told me so, And to
• 1:40:55
  Speaker 1: doubt it is to call her a liar. The Irish
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 1: flame was in his eyes, and by that and by
• 1:41:03
  Speaker 1: the unconscious clinching of his passioned, wrought hands, Stubner, who
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 1: knew the strength of them and of the man he faced,
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 1: no longer dared to doubt. Chapter seven. It did not
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: take stubanor long to find out that Glendon intended extending
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 1: the distance of the fight, though try as he would
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 1: he could get no hint of the number of the round.
• 1:41:28
  Speaker 1: He wasted no time, however, and privily clinched certain arrangements
• 1:41:34
  Speaker 1: with that Powers and that Powers's manager. Powers had a
• 1:41:38
  Speaker 1: faithful following of betters, and the betting syndicate was not
• 1:41:43
  Speaker 1: to be denied its harvest. On the night of the fight,
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 1: Maud's tangster was guilty of a more daring unconventionality than
• 1:41:52
  Speaker 1: any she had yet committed, though no whisper of it
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: leaked out to shock society. Under the protect action of
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 1: the editor, she occupied a ringside seat. Her hair and
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 1: most of her face were hidden under a slouch hat,
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 1: while she wore a man's long overcoat that fell to
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 1: her heels. Entering in the thick of the crowd, she
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 1: was not noticed, nor did the newspaper men in the
• 1:42:19
  Speaker 1: press seats against the ring directly in front of her
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: recognize her, as was the growing custom. There were no
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 1: preliminary bouts, and she had barely gained her seat when
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 1: roars of applause announced the arrival of Gnat Powers. He
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: came down the aisle in the midst of a seconds,
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 1: and she was almost frightened by the formidable bulk of him.
• 1:42:44
  Speaker 1: Yet he leaped the ropes as lightly as a man
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: half his weight and grinned acknowledgment to the tumultuous greeting
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 1: that arose from all the house. He was not pretty, too,
• 1:42:56
  Speaker 1: cauliflower ears attested his profession and its attendant brutality, while
• 1:43:02
  Speaker 1: his broken nose had been so often spread over his
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: face as to defy the surgeon's art to reconstruct it.
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: Another uproar heralded the arrival of Glendon, and she watched
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 1: him eagerly as he went through the ropes to his corner.
• 1:43:20
  Speaker 1: But it was not until the tedious time of announcements, introductions,
• 1:43:24
  Speaker 1: and challenges was over that the two men threw off
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: their wraps and faced each other in ring costume. Concentrated
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 1: upon them from overhead was the white glare of many
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: electric lights, this for the benefit of the moving picture cameras,
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 1: and she felt, as she looked at the two sharply
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 1: contrasted men, that it was in Glendon that she saw
• 1:43:49
  Speaker 1: the thoroughbred, and in Powers the abysmal brute. Both looked
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: their parts, Glendon clean cut in face and form, softly
• 1:44:00
  Speaker 1: and massively beautiful, Powers almost asymmetrically rugged and heavily matted
• 1:44:06
  Speaker 1: with hair. As they made their preliminary pose for the cameras,
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: confronting each other in fighting attitudes, it chanced that Glendon's
• 1:44:16
  Speaker 1: gaze dropped down through the ropes and rested on her face.
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: Though he gave no sign, she knew with a swift
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 1: leap of the heart that he had recognized her. The
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 1: next moment the gong sounded, the announcer cried, let her go,
• 1:44:34
  Speaker 1: and the battle was on. It was a good fight.
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 1: There was no blood, no marring, and both were clever.
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 1: Half of the first round was spent in feeling each
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: other out, but Maud Sangster found the play in faint
• 1:44:48
  Speaker 1: and tap of the gloves sufficiently exciting. During some of
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 1: the fiercer rallies in later stages of the fight, the
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 1: editor was compelled to touch her arm to remind her
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: who she was and where she was. Powers fought easily
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 1: and cleanly, as became the hero of half a hundred
• 1:45:07
  Speaker 1: ring battles, and an admiring Clack applauded his every cleverness.
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: Yet he did not unduly exert himself, save in occasional
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: strenuous rallies that brought the audience yelling to its feet
• 1:45:21
  Speaker 1: in the mistaken notion that he was getting his man.
• 1:45:25
  Speaker 1: It was at such a moment, when her unpracticed eye
• 1:45:28
  Speaker 1: could not inform her that Glendon was escaping serious damage,
• 1:45:33
  Speaker 1: that the editor leaned to her and said, young patswell
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 1: win all right. He's a comer and they can't stop him.
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 1: But he'll win in the sixteenth and not before or after,
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 1: she asked. She almost laughed at the certitude of her
• 1:45:49
  Speaker 1: companion's negative. She knew better. Powers was noted for hunting
• 1:45:54
  Speaker 1: his man from moment to moment and round to round,
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 1: and Glendon was content to accede to this program. His
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 1: defense was admirable, and he threw in just enough of
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 1: offense to wet the edge of the audience's interest. Though
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 1: he knew he was scheduled to lose, Powers had had
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: too long a ring experience to hesitate from knocking his
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 1: man out if the opportunity offered. He had had the
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 1: double cross worked too often on him to be cherry
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: in working it on others. If he got his chance,
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: he was prepared to knock his man out and let
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 1: the syndicate Go Hang. Thanks to clever press publicity, the
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 1: idea was prevalent that at last, young Glendon had met
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: his master in his heart. Powers, however, knew that it
• 1:46:45
  Speaker 1: was himself who had encountered the better man more than once.
• 1:46:49
  Speaker 1: In the faster infighting. He received the weight of punches
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: that he knew had been deliberately made no heavier on
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: Glendon's part. There were times and times when a slip
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 1: or air of judgment could have exposed him to one
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 1: of his antagonists sledge hammer blows and lost him the fight.
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: Yet his was that almost miraculous power of accurate timing
• 1:47:14
  Speaker 1: and distancing, and his confidence was not shaken by the
• 1:47:18
  Speaker 1: several close shaves he experienced. He had never lost a fight,
• 1:47:23
  Speaker 1: never been knocked down, and he had always been so
• 1:47:26
  Speaker 1: thoroughly the master of the man he faced that such
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 1: a possibility was unthinkable. At the end of the fifteenth round,
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: both men were in good condition, though Powers was breathing
• 1:47:39
  Speaker 1: a trifle heavily, and there were men in the ringside
• 1:47:42
  Speaker 1: seats offering odds that he would blow up. It was
• 1:47:46
  Speaker 1: just before the gong for the sixteenth round struck that Stubner,
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 1: leaning in over Glendon from behind in his corner whispered,
• 1:47:55
  Speaker 1: are you going to get him now? Glendon, with the
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 1: back toss of his head, shook it and laughed mockingly
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: up into his manager's anxious face. With a stroke of
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: the gong for the sixteenth round, Glendon was surprised to
• 1:48:10
  Speaker 1: see Powers cut loose. From the first second. It was
• 1:48:13
  Speaker 1: a tornado of fighting, and Glendon was hard put to
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 1: escape serious damage. He blocked, clinched, ducked, sidestepped, was rushed
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 1: backward against the ropes, and was met by fresh rushes
• 1:48:26
  Speaker 1: when he surged out to center. Several times Powers left
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 1: inviting openings, but Glendon refused to loose the lightning bolt
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 1: of a blow that would drop his man. He was
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 1: reserving that blow for two rounds later. Not in the
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: whole fight had he ever exerted his full strength nor
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: struck with the force that was in him. For two
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: minutes without the slightest let up, Powers went at him
• 1:48:52
  Speaker 1: hammer and tongs. In another minute the round would be
• 1:48:55
  Speaker 1: over and the Bedding syndicate hard hit. But that minute
• 1:49:00
  Speaker 1: was not to be. They had just come together in
• 1:49:03
  Speaker 1: the center of the ring. It was as ordinary a
• 1:49:06
  Speaker 1: clinch as any in the fight, save that Powers was
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 1: struggling and roughing at every instant. Glendon whipped his left
• 1:49:13
  Speaker 1: over in a crisp but easy jolt to the side
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 1: of the face. It was like any of a score
• 1:49:18
  Speaker 1: of similar jolts he had already delivered in the course
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 1: of the fight. To his amazement, he felt Powers go
• 1:49:25
  Speaker 1: limp in his arms and begin sinking to the floor
• 1:49:28
  Speaker 1: on sagging, sprattling legs that refused to bear his weight.
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: He struck the floor with a thump, rolled half over
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 1: on his side, and lay with closed eyes and motionless.
• 1:49:41
  Speaker 1: The referee, bending over him, was shouting the count. At
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 1: the cry of nine, Powers quivered as if making a
• 1:49:49
  Speaker 1: vain effort to rise ten and out, cried the referee.
• 1:49:55
  Speaker 1: He caught Glendon's hand and raised it aloft to the
• 1:49:59
  Speaker 1: roar audience in token that he was the winner for
• 1:50:03
  Speaker 1: the first time in the ring. Glendon was dazed. It
• 1:50:07
  Speaker 1: had not been a knockout blow. He could stake his
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: life on that. It had not been to the jaw,
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: but to the side of the face, and he knew
• 1:50:16
  Speaker 1: it had gone there and nowhere else. Yet the man
• 1:50:20
  Speaker 1: was out, had been counted out, and he had faked
• 1:50:24
  Speaker 1: it beautifully. That final thump on the floor had been
• 1:50:27
  Speaker 1: a convincing masterpiece to the audience. It was indubitably a knockout,
• 1:50:33
  Speaker 1: and the moving picture machines would perpetuate the lie. The
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: editor had called the turn, after all, and a crooked
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 1: turn it was. Glendon shot a swift glance through the
• 1:50:45
  Speaker 1: ropes to the face of Maud Sangster. She was looking
• 1:50:48
  Speaker 1: straight at him, but her eyes were bleak and hard,
• 1:50:53
  Speaker 1: and there was neither recognition nor expression in them. Even
• 1:50:58
  Speaker 1: as he looked. She turned away unconcernedly and said something
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: to the man beside her. Powers's seconds were carrying him
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 1: to his corner, a seeming limp wreck of a man.
• 1:51:10
  Speaker 1: Glendon's seconds were advancing upon him to congratulate him and
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 1: to remove his gloves, but Stubner was ahead of them.
• 1:51:18
  Speaker 1: His face was beaming as he caught Glendon's right glove
• 1:51:21
  Speaker 1: in both his hands and cried, good boy, Pat, I
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 1: knew you'd do it. Glendon pulled his glove away, and
• 1:51:29
  Speaker 1: for the first time in the years they had been together,
• 1:51:33
  Speaker 1: his manager heard him swear. You go to hell, he said,
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: and turned to hold out his hands for his seconds
• 1:51:42
  Speaker 1: to pull off the gloves end of chapters six and
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: seven chapters eight and nine of The Abysmal Brute by
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 1: Jack London. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:52:04
  Speaker 1: Chapter eight. That night, after receiving the editor's final dictum
• 1:52:11
  Speaker 1: that there was not a square fighter in the game,
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 1: Maud Sangster cried quietly for a moment on the edge
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 1: of her bed, grew angry, and went to sleep, hugely
• 1:52:23
  Speaker 1: disgusted with herself, prize fighters, and the world in general.
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 1: The next afternoon she began work on an interview with
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 1: Henry Addison that was destined never to be finished. It
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 1: was in the private room that was accorded her at
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 1: the Courier Journal office that the thing happened. She had
• 1:52:46
  Speaker 1: paused in her writing to glance at a headline in
• 1:52:49
  Speaker 1: the afternoon paper announcing that Glendon was matched with Tom
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 1: Cannam when one of the door boys brought in a card.
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 1: It was Glendon's. Tell him I can't be seen, she
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 1: told the boy. In a minute, he was back. He
• 1:53:07
  Speaker 1: says he's coming in anyway, but he'd rather have your permission.
• 1:53:12
  Speaker 1: Did you tell him I was busy, she asked, yes'm,
• 1:53:16
  Speaker 1: but he said he was coming just the same. She
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: made no answer, and the boy, his eyes shining with
• 1:53:23
  Speaker 1: admiration for the importunate visitor, rattled on, I know him.
• 1:53:29
  Speaker 1: He's an awful big guy. If he started rough Housin,
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 1: he could clean the whole office out. He's young Glendon
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: who won the fight last night. Very well, then bring
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 1: him in. We don't want the office cleaned out, you know.
• 1:53:44
  Speaker 1: No greetings were exchanged. When Glendon entered. She was as
• 1:53:49
  Speaker 1: cold and inhospitable as a gray day, and neither invited
• 1:53:53
  Speaker 1: him to a chair nor recognized him, with her eyes
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 1: sitting half turned away from him at her desk and
• 1:54:01
  Speaker 1: waiting for him to state his business. He gave no
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 1: sign of how this cavalier treatment affected him, but plunged
• 1:54:09
  Speaker 1: directly into his subject. I want to talk to you,
• 1:54:14
  Speaker 1: he said shortly. That fight it did end in that round.
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 1: She shrugged her shoulders. I knew it would, you didn't,
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 1: he retorted, you didn't, I didn't. She turned and looked
• 1:54:30
  Speaker 1: at him with quiet affectation of boredom. What is the use,
• 1:54:36
  Speaker 1: she asked? Prize fighting is prize fighting, and we all
• 1:54:40
  Speaker 1: know what it means. The fight did end in the round.
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 1: I told you it would, it did? He agreed, but
• 1:54:48
  Speaker 1: you didn't know it would in all the world. You
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 1: and I were at least two that new powers wouldn't
• 1:54:56
  Speaker 1: be knocked out in the sixteenth She remained silent. I
• 1:55:01
  Speaker 1: say you knew he wouldn't. He spoke peremptorily, and when
• 1:55:07
  Speaker 1: she still declined to speak, stepped nearer to her. Answer me,
• 1:55:13
  Speaker 1: he commanded. She nodded her head, But he was, she insisted,
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: he wasn't. He wasn't knocked out at all. Do you
• 1:55:24
  Speaker 1: get that I'm going to tell you about it and
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 1: you are going to listen? I didn't lie to you.
• 1:55:30
  Speaker 1: Do you get that I didn't lie to you. I
• 1:55:33
  Speaker 1: was a fool, and they fooled me, and you along
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 1: with me. You thought you saw him knocked out. Yet
• 1:55:40
  Speaker 1: the blow eyestruck was not heavy enough. It didn't hit
• 1:55:43
  Speaker 1: him in the right place either. He made believe it did.
• 1:55:47
  Speaker 1: He faked that knockout. He paused and looked at her expectantly,
• 1:55:53
  Speaker 1: and somehow, with a leap and thrill, she knew that
• 1:55:57
  Speaker 1: she believed him, and she felt pervaded by a warm
• 1:56:01
  Speaker 1: happiness at the reinstatement of this man who meant nothing
• 1:56:05
  Speaker 1: to her and whom she had seen but twice in
• 1:56:08
  Speaker 1: her life. Well, he demanded, and she thrilled anew at
• 1:56:14
  Speaker 1: the compellingness of him. She stood up and her hand
• 1:56:18
  Speaker 1: went out to his. I believe you, she said, and
• 1:56:23
  Speaker 1: I am glad, most glad. It was a longer grip
• 1:56:28
  Speaker 1: than she had anticipated. He looked at her with eyes
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: that burned, and to which her own unconsciously answered back.
• 1:56:37
  Speaker 1: Never was there such a man, was her thought. Her
• 1:56:42
  Speaker 1: eyes dropped first, and his followed, so that, as before,
• 1:56:48
  Speaker 1: both gazed at the clasped hands. He made a movement
• 1:56:53
  Speaker 1: of his whole body toward her, impulsive and involuntary, as
• 1:56:59
  Speaker 1: if to gather her to him. Then checked himself abruptly
• 1:57:03
  Speaker 1: with an unmistakable effort. She saw it, and felt the
• 1:57:08
  Speaker 1: pull of his hand as it started to draw her
• 1:57:10
  Speaker 1: to him, and, to her amazement, she felt the desire
• 1:57:15
  Speaker 1: to yield, the desire almost overwhelmingly to be drawn into
• 1:57:20
  Speaker 1: the strong circle of those arms. And had he compelled,
• 1:57:26
  Speaker 1: she knew that she would not have refrained. She was
• 1:57:30
  Speaker 1: almost dizzy when he checked himself, and with the closing
• 1:57:34
  Speaker 1: of his fingers that half crushed hers, dropped her hand
• 1:57:38
  Speaker 1: almost flung it from him. God, he breathed, you are
• 1:57:44
  Speaker 1: made for me. He turned partly away from her, sweeping
• 1:57:48
  Speaker 1: his hand to his forehead. She knew she would hate
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 1: him forever if he dared one stammered word of apology
• 1:57:55
  Speaker 1: or explanation. But he seemed to have the way always
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: of doing the right thing where she was concerned. She
• 1:58:04
  Speaker 1: sank into her chair, and he into another, first, drawing
• 1:58:09
  Speaker 1: it around so as to face her across the corner
• 1:58:11
  Speaker 1: of the desk. I spent last night in a Turkish bath,
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: he said. I sent for an old, broken down bruiser.
• 1:58:20
  Speaker 1: He was a friend of my father in the old days.
• 1:58:23
  Speaker 1: I knew there couldn't be a thing about the ring
• 1:58:25
  Speaker 1: he didn't know, and I made him talk. The funny
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 1: thing was that it was all I could do to
• 1:58:32
  Speaker 1: convince him that I didn't know the things I asked
• 1:58:35
  Speaker 1: him about. He called me the babe in the woods.
• 1:58:39
  Speaker 1: I guess he was right. I was raised in the woods,
• 1:58:43
  Speaker 1: and woods is about all I know. Well. I received
• 1:58:47
  Speaker 1: an education from that old man last night. The ring
• 1:58:51
  Speaker 1: is rotten, heer than you told me. It seems everybody
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 1: connected with it is crooked. The very supervisors that grant
• 1:58:59
  Speaker 1: the fight hermits off of the promoters and the promoters,
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 1: managers and fighters graft off of each other and off
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: the public. It's down to a system in one way,
• 1:59:13
  Speaker 1: and on the other hand, they're always Do you know
• 1:59:16
  Speaker 1: what the double cross is? She nodded. Well, they don't
• 1:59:20
  Speaker 1: seem to miss a chance to give each other the
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: double cross. The stuff that old man told me took
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 1: my breath away. And here I have been in the
• 1:59:29
  Speaker 1: thick of it for several years and knew nothing of it.
• 1:59:33
  Speaker 1: I was a real babe in the woods, and yet
• 1:59:36
  Speaker 1: I can see how I've been fooled. I was so
• 1:59:40
  Speaker 1: made that nobody could stop me. I was bound to win,
• 1:59:45
  Speaker 1: and thanks to Stubnor, everything crooked was kept away from me.
• 1:59:50
  Speaker 1: This morning I cornered Spider Walsh and made him talk.
• 1:59:54
  Speaker 1: He was my first trainer, you know, and he followed
• 1:59:57
  Speaker 1: Stubner's instructions. They kept me in ignorance. Besides, I didn't
• 2:00:04
  Speaker 1: herd with the sporting crowd. I spent my time hunting
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: and fishing and monkeying with cameras and such things. Do
• 2:00:11
  Speaker 1: you know what Walsh and Stubner called me between themselves,
• 2:00:14
  Speaker 1: the Virgin. I only learned it this morning from Walsh,
• 2:00:18
  Speaker 1: and it was like pulling teeth, and they were right.
• 2:00:22
  Speaker 1: I was a little innocent lamb, and Stubner was using
• 2:00:27
  Speaker 1: me for crookedness too, only I didn't know it. I
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 1: can look back now and see how it was worked.
• 2:00:34
  Speaker 1: But you see, I wasn't interested enough in the game
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: to be suspicious. I was born with a good body
• 2:00:41
  Speaker 1: and a cool head, and I was raised in the open,
• 2:00:44
  Speaker 1: and I was taught by my father, who knew more
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 1: about fighting than any man living or dead. It was
• 2:00:50
  Speaker 1: too easy. The ring didn't absorb me. There was never
• 2:00:55
  Speaker 1: any doubt of the outcome. But I'm done with it now.
• 2:01:00
  Speaker 1: She pointed to the headline announcing his match with Tom Kinnam.
• 2:01:04
  Speaker 1: That's Stubner's work, he explained. It was programmed months ago.
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 1: But I don't care. I'm heading for the mountains. I've quit.
• 2:01:15
  Speaker 1: She glanced at the unfinished interview on the desk and sighed.
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 1: How lordly men are, she said, masters of destiny? They
• 2:01:26
  Speaker 1: do as they please, from what I've heard, He interrupted,
• 2:01:30
  Speaker 1: You've done pretty much as you please. It's one of
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 1: the things I like about you, and what has struck
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: me hard from the first was the way you and
• 2:01:39
  Speaker 1: I understand each other. He broke off and looked at
• 2:01:43
  Speaker 1: her with burning eyes. Well, the ring did one thing
• 2:01:48
  Speaker 1: for me, he went on. It made me acquainted with you.
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: And when you find the one woman, there's just one
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 1: thing to do. Take her in your two hands, and
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: don't let go. Come on, let us start for the mountains.
• 2:02:06
  Speaker 1: It had come with the suddenness of a thunderclap, and
• 2:02:09
  Speaker 1: yet she felt that she had been expecting it. Her
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 1: heart was beating up and almost choking her in a
• 2:02:15
  Speaker 1: strangely delicious way. Here, at least was the primitive and
• 2:02:20
  Speaker 1: the simple with a vengeance. Then, too, it seemed a dream.
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 1: Such things did not take place in modern newspaper offices.
• 2:02:30
  Speaker 1: Love could not be made in such fashion. It only
• 2:02:34
  Speaker 1: so occurred on the stage and in novels. He had
• 2:02:39
  Speaker 1: arisen and was holding out both hands to her. I
• 2:02:43
  Speaker 1: don't dare, she said, in a whisper, half to herself.
• 2:02:47
  Speaker 1: I don't dare, and thereat. She was stung by the
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 1: quick contempt that flashed in his eyes, but that swiftly
• 2:02:56
  Speaker 1: changed to open incredulity. You did anything you wanted, he
• 2:03:01
  Speaker 1: was saying. I know that it's not a case of dare,
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 1: but of want? Do you want? She had arisen and
• 2:03:11
  Speaker 1: was now swaying, as if in a dream. It flashed
• 2:03:16
  Speaker 1: into her mind to wonder if it were hypnotism. She
• 2:03:20
  Speaker 1: wanted to glance about her at the familiar objects of
• 2:03:23
  Speaker 1: the room in order to identify herself with reality, but
• 2:03:27
  Speaker 1: she could not take her eyes from his, nor did
• 2:03:31
  Speaker 1: she speak. He had stepped beside her. His hand was
• 2:03:36
  Speaker 1: on her arm, and she leaned toward him involuntarily. It
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: was all part of the dream, and it was no
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 1: longer hers to question anything. It was the great dare.
• 2:03:48
  Speaker 1: He was right, She could dare what she wanted, and
• 2:03:53
  Speaker 1: she did want. He was helping her into her jacket.
• 2:03:58
  Speaker 1: She was thrusting the hatpins through her hair, and even
• 2:04:01
  Speaker 1: as she realized it, she found herself walking beside him
• 2:04:06
  Speaker 1: through the opened door. The flight of the Duchess and
• 2:04:10
  Speaker 1: the statue in the bust darted through her mind. Then
• 2:04:15
  Speaker 1: she remembered wearing. What's become of wearing? She murmured land
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 1: travel or seafaring? He murmured back, and to her, this kindred,
• 2:04:27
  Speaker 1: sufficient note was a vindication of her madness. At the
• 2:04:31
  Speaker 1: entrance of the building, he raised his hand to call
• 2:04:34
  Speaker 1: a taxi, but was stopped by her touch on his arm.
• 2:04:39
  Speaker 1: Where are we going, she breathed to the fairy. We've
• 2:04:44
  Speaker 1: just time to catch that Sacramento train. But I can't
• 2:04:48
  Speaker 1: go this way, she protested. I I haven't even a
• 2:04:52
  Speaker 1: change of handkerchiefs. He held up his hand again before replying,
• 2:04:58
  Speaker 1: you can shop in sacrament We'll get married there and
• 2:05:02
  Speaker 1: catch the night overland north. I'll arrange everything by telegraph
• 2:05:06
  Speaker 1: from the train. As the cab drew to the curb,
• 2:05:10
  Speaker 1: she looked quickly about her at the familiar street and
• 2:05:14
  Speaker 1: the familiar throng, then with almost a flurry of alarm,
• 2:05:18
  Speaker 1: into Glendon's face. I don't know a thing about you,
• 2:05:23
  Speaker 1: she said. We know everything about each other, was his answer.
• 2:05:29
  Speaker 1: She felt the support and urge of his arms and
• 2:05:33
  Speaker 1: lifted her foot to the step. The next moment the
• 2:05:36
  Speaker 1: door had closed, he was beside her, and the cab
• 2:05:41
  Speaker 1: was heading down Market Street. He passed his arm around her,
• 2:05:45
  Speaker 1: drew her close, and kissed her. When next she glimpsed
• 2:05:50
  Speaker 1: his face, she was certain that it was dyed with
• 2:05:53
  Speaker 1: a faint blush. I I've heard there was an art
• 2:05:57
  Speaker 1: in kissing, he stammered. I don't know anything about it myself,
• 2:06:03
  Speaker 1: but I'll learn. You see, You're the first woman I
• 2:06:07
  Speaker 1: ever kissed. Chapter nine, where a jagged peak of rock
• 2:06:14
  Speaker 1: thrust above the vast virgin forest reclined a man and
• 2:06:19
  Speaker 1: a woman. Beneath them on the edge of the trees
• 2:06:23
  Speaker 1: were tethered two horses. Behind each saddle were a pair
• 2:06:27
  Speaker 1: of small saddle bags. The trees were monotonously huge, towering
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: hundreds of feet into the air. They ran from eight
• 2:06:37
  Speaker 1: to ten and twelve feet in diameter. Many were much larger.
• 2:06:42
  Speaker 1: All morning they had toiled up the divide through this
• 2:06:45
  Speaker 1: unbroken forest, and this peak of rock had been the
• 2:06:49
  Speaker 1: first spot where they could get out of the forest.
• 2:06:52
  Speaker 1: In order to see the forest beneath them and away
• 2:06:57
  Speaker 1: far as they could see, they rained upon range of
• 2:07:01
  Speaker 1: haze and purpled mountains. There was no end to these ranges.
• 2:07:06
  Speaker 1: They rose, one behind another to the dim, distant skyline,
• 2:07:12
  Speaker 1: where they faded away with a vague promise of unending
• 2:07:15
  Speaker 1: extension beyond. There were no clearings in the forest, north, south, east,
• 2:07:22
  Speaker 1: and west, untouched, unbroken, it covered the land with its
• 2:07:27
  Speaker 1: mighty growth. They lay, feasting their eyes on the sight.
• 2:07:33
  Speaker 1: Her hand clasped in one of his. For this was
• 2:07:37
  Speaker 1: their honeymoon, and these were the redwoods of Mendocino, across
• 2:07:43
  Speaker 1: from Shasta. They had come with horses and saddle bags
• 2:07:47
  Speaker 1: and down through the wilds of the coast counties, and
• 2:07:51
  Speaker 1: they had no plan except to continue until some other
• 2:07:55
  Speaker 1: plan entered their heads. They were roughly dressed, she in
• 2:08:00
  Speaker 1: travel stained khaki, he in overalls and woolen shirt. The
• 2:08:05
  Speaker 1: latter was open at the sunburnt neck, and in his hugeness,
• 2:08:10
  Speaker 1: he seemed a fit dweller among the forest giants, while
• 2:08:14
  Speaker 1: for her, as a dweller with him, there were no
• 2:08:18
  Speaker 1: signs of aught else but happiness. Well, big man, she said,
• 2:08:24
  Speaker 1: propping herself up on an elbow to gaze at him.
• 2:08:28
  Speaker 1: It is more wonderful than you promised, and we are
• 2:08:31
  Speaker 1: going through it together, and there's a lot of the
• 2:08:34
  Speaker 1: rest of the world will go through together, he answered,
• 2:08:38
  Speaker 1: shifting his position so as to get her hand in
• 2:08:41
  Speaker 1: both of his. But not till we finished with this,
• 2:08:46
  Speaker 1: she urged. I seem never to grow tired of the
• 2:08:49
  Speaker 1: big woods and of you. He slid effortlessly into a
• 2:08:54
  Speaker 1: sitting posture and gathered her into his arms. Oh you
• 2:08:59
  Speaker 1: love her, she whispered. And I had given up hope
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 1: of finding such a one, and I never hoped at all.
• 2:09:08
  Speaker 1: I must just have known all the time that I
• 2:09:11
  Speaker 1: was going to find you. Glad Her answer was a
• 2:09:15
  Speaker 1: soft pressure where her hand rested on his neck, and
• 2:09:19
  Speaker 1: for long minutes they looked out over the great Woods
• 2:09:22
  Speaker 1: and dreamed. You remember I told you how I ran
• 2:09:27
  Speaker 1: away from the red haired school teacher. That was the
• 2:09:30
  Speaker 1: first time I saw this country. I was on foot,
• 2:09:34
  Speaker 1: but forty or fifty miles a day was play for me.
• 2:09:38
  Speaker 1: I was a regular Indian. I wasn't thinking about you then.
• 2:09:42
  Speaker 1: Game was pretty scarce in the Redwoods, but there was
• 2:09:46
  Speaker 1: plenty of fine trout. That was when I camped on
• 2:09:49
  Speaker 1: these rocks. I didn't dream that some day i'd be
• 2:09:52
  Speaker 1: back with you. You and be a champion of the
• 2:09:57
  Speaker 1: ring too, she suggested. No, I didn't think about that
• 2:10:02
  Speaker 1: at all. Dad had always told me that I was
• 2:10:05
  Speaker 1: going to be and I took it for granted. You see,
• 2:10:09
  Speaker 1: he was very wise, he was a great man. But
• 2:10:13
  Speaker 1: he didn't see you leaving the ring. I don't know.
• 2:10:17
  Speaker 1: He was so careful in hiding his crookedness from me
• 2:10:20
  Speaker 1: that I think he feared it. I've told you about
• 2:10:23
  Speaker 1: the contract with a stubner. Dad put in that clause
• 2:10:26
  Speaker 1: about crookedness. The first crooked thing my manager did was
• 2:10:30
  Speaker 1: to break the contract. And yet you are going to
• 2:10:33
  Speaker 1: fight this Tom Cannam, Is it worth while? He looked
• 2:10:38
  Speaker 1: at her quickly. Don't you want me to, dear lover?
• 2:10:43
  Speaker 1: I want you to do whatever you want, so she said,
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: and to herself, her words still ringing in her ears,
• 2:10:52
  Speaker 1: she marveled that she, not least among the stubbornly independent
• 2:10:56
  Speaker 1: of the breed of sangster, should utter them. Yet she
• 2:11:00
  Speaker 1: knew they were true, and she was glad. It will
• 2:11:05
  Speaker 1: be fun. He said, But I don't understand all the
• 2:11:09
  Speaker 1: gleeful details. I haven't worked them out yet. You might
• 2:11:13
  Speaker 1: help me. In the first place, I'm going to double
• 2:11:16
  Speaker 1: cross Stupnor and the betting syndicate. It will be part
• 2:11:20
  Speaker 1: of the joke. I'm going to put Canam out in
• 2:11:23
  Speaker 1: the first round for the first time. I shall be
• 2:11:26
  Speaker 1: really angry when I fight poor Tom Cannam, who's as
• 2:11:30
  Speaker 1: crooked as the rest. Will be the chief sacrifice, you see.
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 1: I intend to make a speech in the ring. It's unusual,
• 2:11:39
  Speaker 1: but it will be a success for I am going
• 2:11:41
  Speaker 1: to tell the audience all the inside workings of the game.
• 2:11:45
  Speaker 1: It's a good game too, but they're running it on
• 2:11:47
  Speaker 1: business principles and that's what spoils it. But there, I'm
• 2:11:52
  Speaker 1: giving the speech to you instead of at the ring.
• 2:11:56
  Speaker 1: I wish I could be there to hear, she said.
• 2:12:00
  Speaker 1: He looked at her and debated, I'd like to have you,
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: but it's sure to be a rough time. There is
• 2:12:07
  Speaker 1: no telling what may happen when I start my program,
• 2:12:11
  Speaker 1: but I'll come straight to you as soon as it's over,
• 2:12:14
  Speaker 1: and it will be the last appearance of young Glendon
• 2:12:16
  Speaker 1: in the ring, in any ring. But dear, you've never
• 2:12:22
  Speaker 1: made a speech in your life, she objected, you might fail.
• 2:12:27
  Speaker 1: He shook his head positively. I'm irish, he announced. And
• 2:12:33
  Speaker 1: what irishman was there who couldn't speak? He paused to
• 2:12:37
  Speaker 1: laugh merrily. Stubner thinks I'm crazy, says, A man can't
• 2:12:42
  Speaker 1: train on matrimony a lot. He knows about matrimony or
• 2:12:47
  Speaker 1: me or you, or anything except real estate and fixed fights.
• 2:12:51
  Speaker 1: But I'll show him that night, and poor Tom too.
• 2:12:56
  Speaker 1: I really feel sorry for tom My. Dear abysmal brute
• 2:13:00
  Speaker 1: is going to behave most abysmally and brutally, I fear,
• 2:13:05
  Speaker 1: She murmured. He laughed. I'm going to make a noble
• 2:13:09
  Speaker 1: attempt at it, positively my last appearance, you know, and
• 2:13:14
  Speaker 1: then it will be you you. But if you don't
• 2:13:17
  Speaker 1: want that last appearance, say the word, of course, I
• 2:13:21
  Speaker 1: want it big man. I want my big Man for
• 2:13:25
  Speaker 1: himself and to be himself. He must be himself. If
• 2:13:30
  Speaker 1: you want this, I want it for you and for
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 1: myself too. Suppose I said I wanted to go on
• 2:13:36
  Speaker 1: the stage, or to the South seas or to the
• 2:13:39
  Speaker 1: North Pole, he answered, slowly, almost solemnly. Then I'd say
• 2:13:47
  Speaker 1: go ahead, because you are you and must be yourself
• 2:13:53
  Speaker 1: and do whatever you want. I love you because you
• 2:13:58
  Speaker 1: are you, and we're both a silly pair of lovers,
• 2:14:03
  Speaker 1: she said, when his embrace had relaxed. Isn't it great?
• 2:14:08
  Speaker 1: He cried. He stood up, measured the sun with his eye,
• 2:14:13
  Speaker 1: and extended his hand out over the big woods that
• 2:14:16
  Speaker 1: covered the serried Purple Ranges. We've got to sleep out
• 2:14:20
  Speaker 1: there somewhere. It's thirty miles to the nearest camp. End
• 2:14:26
  Speaker 1: of chapters eight and nine, Chapter ten of The Abysmal
• 2:14:36
  Speaker 1: Brute by Jack London. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 2:14:41
  Speaker 1: public domain. Chapter ten. Who of all the sports present,
• 2:14:48
  Speaker 1: we'll ever forget the memorable night at the Golden Gate
• 2:14:52
  Speaker 1: Arena when young Glendon put Tom Knom to sleep, and
• 2:14:57
  Speaker 1: an even greater one than Tom Knnom kept the audience
• 2:15:01
  Speaker 1: on the ragged edge of riot for an hour, caused
• 2:15:05
  Speaker 1: the subsequent graft investigation of the supervisors, and the indictments
• 2:15:10
  Speaker 1: of the contractors and the building commissioners, and pretty generally
• 2:15:15
  Speaker 1: disrupted the whole fight game. It was a complete surprise.
• 2:15:21
  Speaker 1: Not even Stubner had the slightest apprehension of what was coming.
• 2:15:26
  Speaker 1: It was true that his man had been insubordinate after
• 2:15:30
  Speaker 1: the Nat Powers affair and had run off and got married,
• 2:15:34
  Speaker 1: but all that was over. Young Pat had done the expected,
• 2:15:39
  Speaker 1: swallowed the inevitable crookedness of the ring, and come back
• 2:15:43
  Speaker 1: into it again. The Golden Gate Arena was new, This
• 2:15:49
  Speaker 1: was its first fight, and it was the biggest building
• 2:15:53
  Speaker 1: of the kind San Francisco had ever erected. It seated
• 2:15:57
  Speaker 1: twenty five thousand, and every seat was occupied. Sports had
• 2:16:03
  Speaker 1: traveled from all the world to be present, and they
• 2:16:06
  Speaker 1: had paid fifty dollars for their ringside seats. The cheapest
• 2:16:10
  Speaker 1: seat in the house had sold for five dollars. The
• 2:16:15
  Speaker 1: old familiar roar of applause went up when Billy Morgan,
• 2:16:19
  Speaker 1: the veteran announcer, climbed through the ropes and bared his
• 2:16:23
  Speaker 1: gray head. As he opened his mouth to speak, a
• 2:16:28
  Speaker 1: heavy crash came from a near section where several tiers
• 2:16:33
  Speaker 1: of low seats had collapsed. The crowd broke into loud
• 2:16:37
  Speaker 1: laughter and shouted jocular regrets and advice to the victims,
• 2:16:42
  Speaker 1: none of whom had been hurt. The crash of the
• 2:16:45
  Speaker 1: seats and the hilarious uproar caused the Captain of police
• 2:16:50
  Speaker 1: in charge to look at one of his lieutenants and
• 2:16:54
  Speaker 1: lift his brows in token that they would have their
• 2:16:57
  Speaker 1: hands full and a lively night. One by one, welcomed
• 2:17:03
  Speaker 1: by uproarious applause, seven doughty old ring heroes climbed through
• 2:17:08
  Speaker 1: the ropes to be introduced. They were all ex heavyweight
• 2:17:12
  Speaker 1: champions of the world. Billy Morgan accompanied each presentation to
• 2:17:17
  Speaker 1: the audience with an appropriate phrase. One was hailed as
• 2:17:23
  Speaker 1: honest John and old reliable. Another was the squarest two
• 2:17:28
  Speaker 1: fisted fighter the ring ever saw, and of others, the
• 2:17:32
  Speaker 1: hero of a hundred battles and never threw one and
• 2:17:36
  Speaker 1: never lay down, the gamest of the old Guard, the
• 2:17:40
  Speaker 1: only one who ever came back, the greatest warrior of
• 2:17:44
  Speaker 1: them all, and the hardest not in the ring to crack.
• 2:17:49
  Speaker 1: All this took time. A speech was insisted on from
• 2:17:54
  Speaker 1: each of them, and they mumbled and muttered in reply,
• 2:17:58
  Speaker 1: with proud blushes and awkward shamblings. The longest speech was
• 2:18:02
  Speaker 1: from Old Reliable and lasted nearly a minute. Then they
• 2:18:07
  Speaker 1: had to be photographed. The ring filled up with celebrities,
• 2:18:11
  Speaker 1: with champion wrestlers, famous conditioners and veteran timekeepers and referees.
• 2:18:18
  Speaker 1: Lightweights and middleweights swarmed. Everybody seemed to be challenging everybody
• 2:18:25
  Speaker 1: that Powers was there demanding a return match from young Glendon,
• 2:18:30
  Speaker 1: and so were all the other Shining Lights whom Glendon
• 2:18:33
  Speaker 1: had snuffed out. Also. They all challenged Jim Hanford, who
• 2:18:38
  Speaker 1: in turn had to make his statement, which was to
• 2:18:42
  Speaker 1: the effect that he would accord the next fight to
• 2:18:46
  Speaker 1: the winner of the one that was about to take place.
• 2:18:49
  Speaker 1: The audience immediately proceeded to name the winner, half of
• 2:18:53
  Speaker 1: it wildly crying Glendon and the other half Powers. In
• 2:18:59
  Speaker 1: the midst of the pandemonium, another tier of seats went down,
• 2:19:04
  Speaker 1: and half a dozen rows were on between cheated ticket
• 2:19:07
  Speaker 1: holders and the stewards who had been reaping a fat harvest.
• 2:19:12
  Speaker 1: The captain dispatched a message to headquarters for additional police details.
• 2:19:19
  Speaker 1: The crowd was feeling good when Canam and Glendon made
• 2:19:22
  Speaker 1: their ring entrances. The arena resembled a national political convention.
• 2:19:28
  Speaker 1: Each was cheered for a solid five minutes. The ring
• 2:19:32
  Speaker 1: was now cleared. Glendon sat in his corner, surrounded by
• 2:19:36
  Speaker 1: his seconds. As usual, Stubner was at his back. Canam
• 2:19:41
  Speaker 1: was introduced first, and after he had scraped and ducked
• 2:19:45
  Speaker 1: his head, he was compelled to respond to cries for
• 2:19:48
  Speaker 1: a speech. He stammered and halted, but managed to grind
• 2:19:53
  Speaker 1: out several ideas. I'm proud to be here tonight, he said,
• 2:19:59
  Speaker 1: and found space to capture another thought while the applause
• 2:20:03
  Speaker 1: was thundering. I fought square. I've fought square all my life.
• 2:20:09
  Speaker 1: Nobody can deny that. And I'm going to do my
• 2:20:12
  Speaker 1: best tonight. There were loud cries of that's right, Tom,
• 2:20:17
  Speaker 1: we know that. Good boy, Tom, You're the boy to
• 2:20:20
  Speaker 1: fetch the bacon home. Then came Glendon's turn. From him likewise,
• 2:20:27
  Speaker 1: a speech was demanded, though for principles to give speeches
• 2:20:31
  Speaker 1: was an unprecedented thing in the prize ring. Billy Morgan
• 2:20:35
  Speaker 1: held up his hand for silence, and in a clear,
• 2:20:38
  Speaker 1: powerful voice, Glendon began. Everybody has told you they were
• 2:20:44
  Speaker 1: proud to be here tonight, he said, I am not.
• 2:20:50
  Speaker 1: The audience was startled, and he paused long enough to
• 2:20:54
  Speaker 1: let it sink home. I am not proud of my company.
• 2:20:59
  Speaker 1: You wanted to speak each I'll give you a real one.
• 2:21:02
  Speaker 1: This is my last fight. After tonight, I leave the
• 2:21:06
  Speaker 1: ring for good. Why I have already told you I
• 2:21:11
  Speaker 1: don't like my company. The prize ring is so crooked
• 2:21:16
  Speaker 1: that no man engaged in it can hide behind a corkscrew.
• 2:21:21
  Speaker 1: It is rotten to the core from the little professional
• 2:21:24
  Speaker 1: clubs right up to this affair tonight. The low rumble
• 2:21:29
  Speaker 1: of astonishment that had been rising at this point burst
• 2:21:33
  Speaker 1: into a roar. There were loud boos and hisses, and
• 2:21:37
  Speaker 1: many began crying, go on with the fight, We want
• 2:21:40
  Speaker 1: the fight. Why don't you fight? Glendon Waiting noted that
• 2:21:46
  Speaker 1: the principal disturbers near the ring were promoters and managers
• 2:21:50
  Speaker 1: and fighters. In vain did he strive to make himself heard.
• 2:21:55
  Speaker 1: The audience was divided, half crying out fight and the
• 2:22:00
  Speaker 1: the other half speech speech. Ten minutes of hopeless madness prevailed. Stubner,
• 2:22:07
  Speaker 1: the referee, the owner of the arena, and the promoter
• 2:22:11
  Speaker 1: of the fight pleaded with Glendon to go on with
• 2:22:14
  Speaker 1: the fight. When he refused, the referee declared that he
• 2:22:18
  Speaker 1: would award the fight in forfeit to Cannam if Glendon
• 2:22:22
  Speaker 1: did not fight. You can't do it. The latter retorted,
• 2:22:27
  Speaker 1: I'll sue you in all the courts if you try
• 2:22:29
  Speaker 1: that on, and I'll not promise you that you'll survive
• 2:22:32
  Speaker 1: this crowd if you cheat it out of a fight. Besides,
• 2:22:36
  Speaker 1: I'm going to fight, but before I do, I'm going
• 2:22:39
  Speaker 1: to finish my speech. But it's against the rules, protested
• 2:22:44
  Speaker 1: the referee. It's nothing of the sort. There's not a
• 2:22:48
  Speaker 1: word in the rules again stringside speeches. Every big fighter
• 2:22:52
  Speaker 1: here tonight has made a speech, only a few words,
• 2:22:57
  Speaker 1: shouted the promoter in Glendon's ear. But you're given a lecture.
• 2:23:02
  Speaker 1: There's nothing in the rules against lectures. Glendon answered, And
• 2:23:06
  Speaker 1: now you fellows, get out of the ring or I'll
• 2:23:09
  Speaker 1: throw you out. The promoter apoplectic and struggling, was dropped
• 2:23:15
  Speaker 1: over the ropes by his coat caller. He was a
• 2:23:18
  Speaker 1: large man, but so easily had Glindon done it with
• 2:23:21
  Speaker 1: one hand that the audience went wild with delight. The
• 2:23:26
  Speaker 1: cries for a speech increased in volume. Stubner and the
• 2:23:30
  Speaker 1: owner beat a wise retreat. Glyndon held up his hand
• 2:23:34
  Speaker 1: to be heard, whereupon those that shouted for the fight
• 2:23:38
  Speaker 1: redoubled their efforts. Two or three tiers of seats crashed down,
• 2:23:43
  Speaker 1: and numbers who had thus lost their places added to
• 2:23:47
  Speaker 1: the turmoil by making a concerted rush to squeeze in
• 2:23:50
  Speaker 1: on the still intact seats, while those behind, blocked from
• 2:23:55
  Speaker 1: sight of the ring yelled and raved for them to
• 2:23:59
  Speaker 1: sit down. Glendon walked to the ropes and spoke to
• 2:24:03
  Speaker 1: the police captain. He was compelled to bend over and
• 2:24:06
  Speaker 1: shout in his ear. If I don't give this speech,
• 2:24:10
  Speaker 1: he said, this crowd will wreck the place. If they
• 2:24:14
  Speaker 1: break loose. You can never hold them. You know that.
• 2:24:17
  Speaker 1: Now you've got to help. You keep the ring clear,
• 2:24:20
  Speaker 1: and I'll silence the crowd. He went back to the
• 2:24:24
  Speaker 1: center of the ring and again held up his hands.
• 2:24:27
  Speaker 1: You want that speech, he shouted, in a tremendous voice.
• 2:24:33
  Speaker 1: Hundreds near the ring heard him and cried yes, then
• 2:24:37
  Speaker 1: let every man who wants to hear shut up the
• 2:24:40
  Speaker 1: noisemaker next to him. The advice was taken so that
• 2:24:45
  Speaker 1: when he repeated it, his voice penetrated farther. Again and
• 2:24:49
  Speaker 1: again he shouted it, and slowly zoned by zone. The
• 2:24:54
  Speaker 1: silence pressed outward from the ring, accompanied by a muffled
• 2:24:59
  Speaker 1: undertone of smacks and thuds and scuffles as the obstrepperas
• 2:25:03
  Speaker 1: were subdued by their neighbors. Almost had all confusion been smothered,
• 2:25:09
  Speaker 1: when a tier of seats near the ring went down.
• 2:25:12
  Speaker 1: This was greeted by fresh roars of laughter, which of
• 2:25:16
  Speaker 1: itself died away, so that a lone voice far back
• 2:25:21
  Speaker 1: was heard distinctly as it piped go on, Glendon, where
• 2:25:25
  Speaker 1: with you? Glendon had the celt's intuitive knowledge of the
• 2:25:29
  Speaker 1: psychology of the crowd. He knew that what had been
• 2:25:33
  Speaker 1: a vast, disorderly mob five minutes before was now tightly
• 2:25:38
  Speaker 1: in hand, and for added effect, he deliberately delayed. Yet
• 2:25:44
  Speaker 1: the delay was just long enough and not a second
• 2:25:48
  Speaker 1: too long. For thirty seconds, the silence was complete, and
• 2:25:53
  Speaker 1: the effect produced was one of awe. Then, just as
• 2:25:59
  Speaker 1: the first faint hints of restlessness came to his ears,
• 2:26:02
  Speaker 1: he began to speak. When I finished this speech, he said,
• 2:26:09
  Speaker 1: I am going to fight. I promise you it will
• 2:26:12
  Speaker 1: be a real fight, one of the few real fights
• 2:26:15
  Speaker 1: you have ever seen. I am going to get my
• 2:26:18
  Speaker 1: man in the shortest possible time. Billy Morgan, in making
• 2:26:23
  Speaker 1: his final announcement, will tell you that it is to
• 2:26:26
  Speaker 1: be a forty five round contest. Let me tell you
• 2:26:29
  Speaker 1: that it will be nearer forty five seconds. When I
• 2:26:34
  Speaker 1: was interrupted, I was telling you that the ring was rotten.
• 2:26:37
  Speaker 1: It is from top to bottom. It is run on
• 2:26:41
  Speaker 1: business principles. And you all know what business principles are.
• 2:26:46
  Speaker 1: Enough said, you are the suckers, every last one of
• 2:26:51
  Speaker 1: you that is not making anything out of it. Why
• 2:26:54
  Speaker 1: are the seats falling down tonight? Graft like the fight game?
• 2:26:59
  Speaker 1: They were built on business principles. He now held the
• 2:27:03
  Speaker 1: audience stronger than ever and knew it. There are three
• 2:27:08
  Speaker 1: men squeezed on two seats. I can see that everywhere.
• 2:27:12
  Speaker 1: What does it mean the stewards don't get any wages.
• 2:27:17
  Speaker 1: They are supposed to graft business principles Again, you pay
• 2:27:23
  Speaker 1: of course you pay. How are the fight permits obtained?
• 2:27:29
  Speaker 1: And now let me ask you. If the men who
• 2:27:31
  Speaker 1: build the seats graft, if the steward's graft, if the
• 2:27:35
  Speaker 1: authority's graft, why shouldn't those higher up in the fight
• 2:27:39
  Speaker 1: game graft? They do, and you pay, And let me
• 2:27:45
  Speaker 1: tell you it is not the fault of the fighters.
• 2:27:48
  Speaker 1: They don't run the game. The promoters and managers run it.
• 2:27:52
  Speaker 1: They're the businessmen. The fighters are only fighters. They begin
• 2:27:57
  Speaker 1: honestly enough, but the managers and promotors make them give
• 2:28:01
  Speaker 1: in or kick them out. There have been straight fighters,
• 2:28:05
  Speaker 1: and there are now a few, but they don't earn
• 2:28:09
  Speaker 1: much as a rule, I guess there have been straight managers.
• 2:28:13
  Speaker 1: Mine is about the best of the boiling. But just
• 2:28:16
  Speaker 1: ask him how much he's got salted down in real
• 2:28:19
  Speaker 1: estate and apartment houses. Here the uproar began to drown.
• 2:28:24
  Speaker 1: His voice led every man who wants to hear shut up.
• 2:28:28
  Speaker 1: The man alongside of him. Clinton instructed again, like the
• 2:28:34
  Speaker 1: murmur of a surf. There was a rustling of smacks
• 2:28:38
  Speaker 1: and thuds and scuffles, and the house quieted down. Why
• 2:28:43
  Speaker 1: does every fighter work overtime insisting that he's always fought square.
• 2:28:48
  Speaker 1: Why are they called honest John's and honest bills, and
• 2:28:52
  Speaker 1: honest blacksmiths and all the rest. Doesn't it ever strike
• 2:28:56
  Speaker 1: you that they seem to be afraid of something. When
• 2:28:59
  Speaker 1: a man comes to you shouting he is honest, you
• 2:29:02
  Speaker 1: get suspicious. But when a prize fighter passes the same
• 2:29:06
  Speaker 1: dope out to you, you swallow it down. May the
• 2:29:11
  Speaker 1: best man win? How often have you heard Billy Morgan
• 2:29:14
  Speaker 1: say that? Let me tell you that the best man
• 2:29:18
  Speaker 1: doesn't win so often, and when he does, it's usually
• 2:29:22
  Speaker 1: arranged for him. Most of the grudge fights you've heard
• 2:29:26
  Speaker 1: or seen were arranged too. It's a program. The whole
• 2:29:30
  Speaker 1: thing is programmed. Do you think the promoters and managers
• 2:29:34
  Speaker 1: are in it for their health. They're not. They're businessmen. Tom,
• 2:29:39
  Speaker 1: Dick and Harry are three fighters. Dick is the best
• 2:29:42
  Speaker 1: man in two fights, he could prove it. But what
• 2:29:46
  Speaker 1: happens Tom licks Harry, Dick licks Tom, Harry licks Dick.
• 2:29:52
  Speaker 1: Nothing proved. Then come the return matches. Harry looks Tom,
• 2:29:58
  Speaker 1: Tom licks Dick, Dick Harry nothing proved. Then they try again.
• 2:30:04
  Speaker 1: Dick is kicking, says he wants to get along in
• 2:30:07
  Speaker 1: the game. So Dick licks Tom and Dick licks Harry.
• 2:30:12
  Speaker 1: Eight fights to prove Dick the best man when two
• 2:30:15
  Speaker 1: could have done it. All arranged a regular program, and
• 2:30:20
  Speaker 1: you pay for it, And when your seats don't break down,
• 2:30:23
  Speaker 1: you get robbed of them by the stewards. It is
• 2:30:26
  Speaker 1: a good game too, if it were only square. The
• 2:30:30
  Speaker 1: fighters would be square if they had a chance. But
• 2:30:33
  Speaker 1: the graft is too big. When a handful of men
• 2:30:37
  Speaker 1: can divide up three quarters of a million dollars on
• 2:30:39
  Speaker 1: three fights, A wild outburst compelled him to stop. Out
• 2:30:45
  Speaker 1: of the medley of cries from all over the house,
• 2:30:48
  Speaker 1: he could distinguish, such as what million dollars? What three fights?
• 2:30:53
  Speaker 1: Tell us? Go on? Likewise, there were boos and hisses
• 2:30:58
  Speaker 1: and cries of muckraker, muckraker? Do you want to hear?
• 2:31:03
  Speaker 1: Glendon shouted, Then keep order once more, he compelled the
• 2:31:09
  Speaker 1: impress of half minutes of silence. What is Jim Hanford planning?
• 2:31:14
  Speaker 1: What is the program? His crowd and mind are framing up.
• 2:31:18
  Speaker 1: They know I've got him. He knows I've got him.
• 2:31:21
  Speaker 1: I can whip him in one fight, but he's the
• 2:31:24
  Speaker 1: champion of the world. If I don't give into the program.
• 2:31:28
  Speaker 1: They'll never give me a chance to fight him. The
• 2:31:31
  Speaker 1: program calls for three fights. I am the win the
• 2:31:34
  Speaker 1: first fight. It will be pulled off in Nevada. If
• 2:31:37
  Speaker 1: San Francisco won't stand for it, we are to make
• 2:31:40
  Speaker 1: it a good fight. To make it good, each of
• 2:31:43
  Speaker 1: us will put up a side bed of twenty thousand.
• 2:31:47
  Speaker 1: It will be real money, but it won't be a
• 2:31:49
  Speaker 1: real bet. Each gets his own slipped back to him.
• 2:31:53
  Speaker 1: The same way with the purse. We'll divide it evenly,
• 2:31:57
  Speaker 1: though the public division will be thirty five sixty five.
• 2:32:01
  Speaker 1: The purse, the moving picture royalties, the advertisements, and all
• 2:32:06
  Speaker 1: the rest of the drags won't be a cent less
• 2:32:09
  Speaker 1: than two hundred and fifty thousand. We'll divide it and
• 2:32:13
  Speaker 1: go to work on the return match. Hanford will win
• 2:32:16
  Speaker 1: that and we divide again. Then comes the third fight.
• 2:32:21
  Speaker 1: I win as I have every right to, and we
• 2:32:24
  Speaker 1: have taken three quarters of a million out of the
• 2:32:26
  Speaker 1: pockets of the fighting public. That's the program, but the
• 2:32:30
  Speaker 1: money is dirty, and that's why I am quitting the
• 2:32:34
  Speaker 1: ring tonight. It was at this moment that Jim Hanford,
• 2:32:39
  Speaker 1: kicking a clinging policeman back among the seat holders. Heaved
• 2:32:43
  Speaker 1: his huge frame through the ropes, bellowing, it's a lie.
• 2:32:49
  Speaker 1: He rushed like an infuriated bull at Glendon, who sprang back,
• 2:32:54
  Speaker 1: and then, instead of meeting the rush, ducked cleanly away.
• 2:33:00
  Speaker 1: Unable to check himself, the big man fetched up against
• 2:33:04
  Speaker 1: the ropes, flung back by the spring of them. He
• 2:33:08
  Speaker 1: was turning to make another rush when Glendon landed him. Glendon, cool,
• 2:33:14
  Speaker 1: clear seeing, distanced his man perfectly to the jaw and
• 2:33:18
  Speaker 1: struck the first full strength blow of his career. All
• 2:33:23
  Speaker 1: his strength and his reserve of strength went into that
• 2:33:27
  Speaker 1: one smashing, muscular explosion. Hanford was dead in the air
• 2:33:34
  Speaker 1: insofar as on consciousness may resemble death, so far as
• 2:33:39
  Speaker 1: he was concerned, he ceased at the moment of contact
• 2:33:43
  Speaker 1: with Glendon's fist. His feet left the floor, and he
• 2:33:47
  Speaker 1: was in the air until he struck the topmost rope.
• 2:33:50
  Speaker 1: His inert body sprawled across it, sagged at the middle,
• 2:33:55
  Speaker 1: and fell through the ropes and down out of the ring,
• 2:33:58
  Speaker 1: upon the heads of the men in the press seats.
• 2:34:02
  Speaker 1: The audience broke loose. It had already seen more than
• 2:34:06
  Speaker 1: it had paid to see. For the great Jim Hanford,
• 2:34:10
  Speaker 1: the world champion had been knocked out. It was unofficial,
• 2:34:15
  Speaker 1: but it had been with a single punch. Never had
• 2:34:18
  Speaker 1: there been such a night in Fistiana. Glendon looked ruefully
• 2:34:23
  Speaker 1: at his damaged knuckles, cast a glance through the ropes
• 2:34:27
  Speaker 1: to where Hanford was groggily coming to, and held up
• 2:34:31
  Speaker 1: his hands. He had clinched his right to be heard,
• 2:34:34
  Speaker 1: and the audience grew still when I began to fight,
• 2:34:40
  Speaker 1: he said, they called me one punch, Glendon. You saw
• 2:34:45
  Speaker 1: that punch a moment ago. I always had that punch.
• 2:34:49
  Speaker 1: I went after my men and got them on the jump,
• 2:34:52
  Speaker 1: though I was careful not to hit with all my might.
• 2:34:55
  Speaker 1: Then I was educated. My manager told me it wasn't
• 2:34:59
  Speaker 1: fair to the He advised me to make long fights
• 2:35:03
  Speaker 1: so that the crowd could get a run for its money.
• 2:35:06
  Speaker 1: I was a fool, a mutt. I was a green
• 2:35:10
  Speaker 1: lad from the mountains. So help me God, I swallowed
• 2:35:14
  Speaker 1: it as the truth. My manager used to talk over
• 2:35:17
  Speaker 1: with me what round I would put my man out in.
• 2:35:21
  Speaker 1: Then he tipped it off to the betting syndicate, and
• 2:35:24
  Speaker 1: the betting syndicate went to it. Of course, you paid,
• 2:35:29
  Speaker 1: But I am glad for one thing. I never touched
• 2:35:32
  Speaker 1: a cent of the money. They didn't dare offer it
• 2:35:35
  Speaker 1: to me because they knew it would give the game away.
• 2:35:40
  Speaker 1: You remember my fight with net Powers. I never knocked
• 2:35:44
  Speaker 1: him out. I had got suspicious, so the gang framed
• 2:35:48
  Speaker 1: it up with him. I didn't know. I intended to
• 2:35:52
  Speaker 1: let him go a couple of rounds over the sixteenth.
• 2:35:55
  Speaker 1: That last punch in the sixteenth didn't shake him, but
• 2:35:59
  Speaker 1: he faked the knockout just the same and fooled all
• 2:36:03
  Speaker 1: of you. How about tonight? A voice called out, is
• 2:36:08
  Speaker 1: it a frame up? It is? Was Glendon's answer. How's
• 2:36:13
  Speaker 1: the syndicate betting that Canom will last to the fourteenth?
• 2:36:18
  Speaker 1: Hows and hoots went up for the last time. Glinton
• 2:36:22
  Speaker 1: held up his hand for silence. I'm almost done now,
• 2:36:27
  Speaker 1: but I want to tell you one thing. The syndicate
• 2:36:30
  Speaker 1: gets landed tonight. This is to be a square fight.
• 2:36:35
  Speaker 1: Tom Canom won't last till the fourteenth round. He won't
• 2:36:38
  Speaker 1: last the first round. Canom sprang to his feet in
• 2:36:43
  Speaker 1: his corner and cried out in a fury, you'll cad
• 2:36:46
  Speaker 1: to that. The man don't live. Who can get me
• 2:36:49
  Speaker 1: in one round? Glendon ignored him and went on once
• 2:36:55
  Speaker 1: now in my life, I have struck with all my strength.
• 2:36:58
  Speaker 1: You saw that moment ago when I caught Hanford tonight
• 2:37:03
  Speaker 1: for the second time. I am going to hit with
• 2:37:06
  Speaker 1: all my strength, that is, if Canom doesn't jump through
• 2:37:10
  Speaker 1: the ropes right now and get away. And now I'm ready.
• 2:37:16
  Speaker 1: He went to his corner and held out his hands
• 2:37:18
  Speaker 1: for his gloves. In the opposite corner, Canom raged, while
• 2:37:24
  Speaker 1: his seconds tried vainly to calm him. At last, Billy
• 2:37:28
  Speaker 1: Morgan managed to make the final announcement. This will be
• 2:37:33
  Speaker 1: a forty five round contest. He shouted, Marquis of Queensbury rolls,
• 2:37:40
  Speaker 1: and may the best man win. Let her go. The
• 2:37:45
  Speaker 1: gong struck. The two men advanced. Glendon's right hand was
• 2:37:50
  Speaker 1: extended for the customary shake, but Canom, with an angry
• 2:37:54
  Speaker 1: toss of the head, refused to take it. To the
• 2:37:58
  Speaker 1: general surprise, he did not rush. Angry though he was,
• 2:38:04
  Speaker 1: He fought carefully, his touched pride impelling him to bend
• 2:38:08
  Speaker 1: every effort to last out the round. Several times he struck,
• 2:38:13
  Speaker 1: but he struck cautiously, never relaxing his defense. Glendon hunted
• 2:38:19
  Speaker 1: him about the ring, ever advancing with the remorseless tap
• 2:38:23
  Speaker 1: tap of his left foot. Yet he struck no blows
• 2:38:28
  Speaker 1: nor attempted to strike. He even dropped his hands to
• 2:38:31
  Speaker 1: his sides and hunted the other defenselessly in an effort
• 2:38:35
  Speaker 1: to draw him out. Canom grinned defiantly, but declined to
• 2:38:40
  Speaker 1: take advantage of the proffered opening. Two minutes passed, and
• 2:38:46
  Speaker 1: then a change came over Glendon. By every muscle, by
• 2:38:52
  Speaker 1: every line of his face, he advertised that the moment
• 2:38:56
  Speaker 1: had come for him to get his man acting. It was,
• 2:39:01
  Speaker 1: and it was well acted. He seemed to have become
• 2:39:05
  Speaker 1: a thing of steel, as hard and pitiless as steel.
• 2:39:10
  Speaker 1: The effect was apparent on Canom, who redoubled his caution.
• 2:39:15
  Speaker 1: Glendon quickly worked him into a corner and heard it
• 2:39:19
  Speaker 1: and held him there. Still. He struck no blow nor
• 2:39:23
  Speaker 1: attempted to strike, and the suspense on Canom's part grew
• 2:39:28
  Speaker 1: painful in vain. He tried to work out of the corner,
• 2:39:32
  Speaker 1: while he could not summon resolution to rush upon his
• 2:39:36
  Speaker 1: opponent in an attempt to gain the respite of a clinch.
• 2:39:40
  Speaker 1: Then it came a swift series of simple feints that
• 2:39:45
  Speaker 1: were muscle flashes. Canom was dazzled, so was the audience.
• 2:39:51
  Speaker 1: No two of the onlookers could agree afterward as to
• 2:39:55
  Speaker 1: what took place. Canom ducked one faint and at the
• 2:39:59
  Speaker 1: same time threw up his faceguard to meet another feint
• 2:40:02
  Speaker 1: for his jaw. He also attempted to change position with
• 2:40:06
  Speaker 1: his legs. Ringside witnesses swore that they saw Glendon start
• 2:40:11
  Speaker 1: to blow from his right hip and leaped forward like
• 2:40:14
  Speaker 1: a tiger to add the weight of his body to it.
• 2:40:18
  Speaker 1: Be that as it may. The blow caught Knam on
• 2:40:21
  Speaker 1: the point of the chin at the moment of his
• 2:40:23
  Speaker 1: shift of position, and like Hanford, he was unconscious in
• 2:40:29
  Speaker 1: the air before he struck the ropes and fell through
• 2:40:33
  Speaker 1: on the heads of the reporters. Of what happened afterward
• 2:40:38
  Speaker 1: that night in the Golden Gate Arena, columns in the
• 2:40:41
  Speaker 1: newspapers were unable adequately to describe. The police kept the
• 2:40:46
  Speaker 1: ring clear, but they could not save the arena. It
• 2:40:51
  Speaker 1: was not a riot, it was an orgy. Not a
• 2:40:54
  Speaker 1: seat was left standing all over the Great Hall by
• 2:40:59
  Speaker 1: main strength, crowding and jostling to lay hands on beams
• 2:41:03
  Speaker 1: and boards. The crowd uprooted and overturned prize fighters sought
• 2:41:09
  Speaker 1: protection of the police, but there were not enough police
• 2:41:13
  Speaker 1: to escort them out, and fighters, managers and promoters were
• 2:41:18
  Speaker 1: beaten and battered. Jim Hanford alone was spared, his jaw
• 2:41:25
  Speaker 1: prodigiously swollen, earned him this mercy. Outside. When finally driven
• 2:41:31
  Speaker 1: from the building, the crowd fell upon a new seven
• 2:41:35
  Speaker 1: thousand dollar motor car belonging to a well known fight promoter,
• 2:41:40
  Speaker 1: and reduced it to scrap iron and kindlingwood. Glendon, unable
• 2:41:46
  Speaker 1: to dress amid the wreckage of dressing rooms, gained his automobile,
• 2:41:51
  Speaker 1: still in his ring costume and wrapped in a bathrobe,
• 2:41:55
  Speaker 1: but failed to escape by weight of numbers. The crowd
• 2:41:59
  Speaker 1: caught and held his machine. The police were too busy
• 2:42:03
  Speaker 1: to rescue him, and in the end a compromise was effected,
• 2:42:09
  Speaker 1: whereby the car was permitted to proceed at a walk,
• 2:42:13
  Speaker 1: escorted by five thousand cheering madmen. It was midnight when
• 2:42:19
  Speaker 1: this storm swept past Union Square and down upon the
• 2:42:23
  Speaker 1: Saint Francis. Cries for a speech went up, and though
• 2:42:28
  Speaker 1: at the hotel entrance, Glendon was good naturedly restrained from escaping.
• 2:42:34
  Speaker 1: He even tried leaping out upon the heads of the enthusiasts,
• 2:42:38
  Speaker 1: but his feet never touched the pavement. On heads and
• 2:42:42
  Speaker 1: shoulders clutched at and uplifted by every hand that could
• 2:42:47
  Speaker 1: touch his body. He went back through the air to
• 2:42:50
  Speaker 1: the machine. Then he gave his speech, and maud Glendon,
• 2:42:56
  Speaker 1: looking down from an upper window at her young hercules
• 2:43:00
  Speaker 1: towering on the seat of the automobile, knew, as she
• 2:43:05
  Speaker 1: always knew, that he meant it when he repeated that
• 2:43:10
  Speaker 1: he had fought his last fight and retired from the
• 2:43:13
  Speaker 1: ring forever. End of Chapter ten, end of The Abysmal
• 2:43:21
  Speaker 1: Brute by Jack London