Page:Fighting blood (IA fightingblood00witw).pdf/74

 I could see and feel how awkward I was the minute Kelly put up his hands. He stuck out his left glove, and it connected with my nose, bringing salty water out of both my eyes. Then his right thudded into my stomach, and I commence to feel terrible sick. Kelly stepped in and clinched with me, roughing me around while he whispers hoarsely in my ear: "That's just for a starter, you big yokel! I'm gonna slap you for a Chinese ash can and send you back to that slab in Jersey on a shutter!"

Up to that time I hadn't been a bit sore. I didn't mind getting hurt. I expected to at first, knowing nothing at all about the fine points of the game. But this kind of stuff's different! I wrenched away from Kelly and swung my left glove at his jaw. He ducked his head and I missed a mile. Then he come up grinning under my arms, landing both his hands to my face—hard. I think I see a opening and I drive my right hand into it. It hit the air, and the next thing I know I am sitting on the floor, which for some reason is going around and around and around!

"Time!" hollers Shapiro and bends over me, dousing me with a wet sponge. "I hope 'at showed you somethin', kid," he says. "Never lead with your right—it leaves you wide open for the other guy's counter. Y'see, Kelly just stepped aside and dropped you with a left hook. Well, 'at's all for now!"

"You better keep that baby in a hothouse!" snarls Kelly, looking terrible disappointed. "He'll never get nowheres. He's got a glass jaw and he's as yellah as all the lemons in the world!"