Page:Fighting blood (IA fightingblood00witw).pdf/144

 He says Battling Lee's in bad shape and the ironworkers will surely mob us if I knock him cold in the next round and they go broke on the fight. A lot of swell sportsmen, hey? The referee's advice is to take a draw and beat it. Nate looks out at the ugly crowd and tells me he thinks the referee's right. Besides, he adds, I can see out of only one eye now, and if by any chance Lee comes around during the rest, he'll probably knock me kicking in the next frame.

I just let Nate go on talking without paying the slightest of attention. I'm thinking of that moleson Battling Lee's chin which'm going to sight at for the knockout in the next round. I'll bring his guard down with a left to the stomach and then I'll crash him with a right hook to the chin! That's what I keep saying to myself over and over. . . left to the body and right to the chin, left to the body and right to the chin. Even humming it to the air of "Casey Jones." When Nate stops for breath I says all his conversation to me is that much apple sauce. Then I says they must be some way he can get my right eye open. Nate grabs my head and turns around so's I can see the threatening mob. He says he's been in these kind of jams at mining camps, and he's positive we'll never leave town alive if I knock Battling Lee for a row of silos.

I says let's stop Lee first and then we'll take on the ironworkers. This Lee has played put and take with me for seven rounds and he's fouled me at least a half dozen times. O. K. Now it's my turn. Am I going to let a mob of burn sports do me out of my fun? Let 'em try to stop me! Anyways, they ain't no such thing