stepped easily inside the blow and put his
left to the other's face. It was a light blow, Perry knew that. There
was no snap, no sting in it. But immediately Holliday winced as though
it had hurt him and for the first time gave ground.

He followed Holliday up. This was the round in which Holliday was to
quit, the round upon which Perry had had his mind riveted for weeks. He
wondered--had Dunham after all been on the level with his promised
crookedness? He followed Holliday up, carefully. And again a wild right
swing, a light step inside, a light left to the face. And then Holliday,
holding him with disturbing ease in a clinch, pressed his mouth close to
Perry's ear.

"Shoot it over, now," he muttered. "Shoot it--don't pull it. It mustn't
look too raw. I'm going to open up--start it from the floor!"

They clung in the clinch. The referee tore at them, raving at them to
break. He pried them apart at last and passed between them to make the
breaking cleaner. And as he did so, Holliday dropped his guard.

"Shoot it!" he hissed.

Perry wondered--but he knew better! He therefore merely made as if to
set himself for the punch. He drove his right hand to the other's chin.
But in that same instant as he took the blow Holliday lashed back at him,
ferociously. Had Perry swung with all he had; had he been going with his
punch; had he even been set firmly upon his feet to deliver it,
Holliday's treacherous hook would have dropped him for the count.

As it was, though he had gone limply back, it spun him round and hurled
him down. But it did not hurt him much. Lying half-raised on one hand,
waiting out the count, he was thinking how like an explosion the roar
from the audience had been. How moblike and blood-hungry. How the crowd
hated him!

And Holliday was laughing down at him, leering. Double-crossed? Did
Holliday think he was that credulous? But he had tested Holliday's
strength and feared it more than ever. When finally he had to rise he
dodged the other with a swift, sideways wriggle. The bell sounded almost
immediately.

English was less worried than before, which was queer.

"That's the stuff," he praised. "Keep away and let him wear himself out.
Let him beat himself."

But Perry questioned whether he was going to be able to keep away, and
there was another angle to it, too.

"He'll be sure now that I can't hurt him," he thought. And that was
exactly what Holliday at that moment was t