paper. Every white man in this village and in hundreds of others which reads the papers, and has heard of both Kid Roberts and Dynamite Jackson, is hopin' you'll take this high-steppin' dinge and knock him dead. I hope you kill him! But if you don't take him on—"
"Just a moment!" butts in the Kid, which ain't batted a eye durin' all of this. "I'm afraid you're exciting yourself unduly, old man. When I first went into this game, I made up my mind that under no circumstances would I ever step into a ring with a colored man. Never mind my reasons—they're ethical and my own. But your contention is absolutely right. A real champion should bar no one, whether it be a contest of brains or brawn! It is my place as challenger to prove beyond a question of a doubt that I am of championship caliber. Very well, I will meet this negro, as far as I'm concerned—to-morrow night!"
Wam!
"Look here, you guys—" I hollers, whilst the reporters is tryin' to mob the Kid and a little bimbo as large as a chicken and with the same kind of a chest is struttin' around and bellerin' about the undaunted white race to a big fat grinnin' Senegambian porter, "I—"
"Shut up, Stupid!" grunts the reporter from the "Evenin' Moan," "or I'll start a conspiracy to keep your name out of the papers. The Kid's the guy I should of talked to in the first place. How a real fighter ever got tied up with a burglar like you is past me! This boy has got to where he is on sheer courage and his own nut. The first time he takes
