Page:The Leather Pushers (1921).pdf/290

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rights to the head and Roberts again put his left to the sore nose. Hamilton looked very tired and tried to make the Kid box with him, but Roberts was impatient to end matters and peppered his man with short, joltin' lefts and rights to the wind, wearin' him down so's to get a fair crack at the jaw. The chance come fin'ly when a smash over the heart doubled Hamilton up. The Kid coolly jabbed a openin' with his left, measured the punch-drunk ex-amateur champ and with a right uppercut to the button sent him crashin' through the ropes as advertised—and it wasn't on the side of the ring where the mattress was, either!

The mob is millin' out through the doors, havin' been furnished with somethin' to talk about for months, and we're all gathered about Hamilton which is sittin' on his stool, just comin' to life. Knockout Burns pushes through the jam to his side.

"Well, you big double-crossin' tramp!" he snarls at the beaten Hamilton. "Are you satisfied now, eh? Woof—what a proper pastin' you drawed for yourself! It takes a lickin' like that to show you false alarms where you git off. I bet you won't look at a boxin' glove again till the day you die. It's a good thing I wasn't in there with you, I'd of cut you to ribbons, just to be nasty!"

Hamilton looks up at Burns, starin' him steadily in the eye like he's tryin' to remember where he seen him before. Then his teeth comes together with a click, he gets up slowly and pushes away the guys which wants to help him.

"Put up your hands!" he says huskily.

"Why, you—" begins the astonished Burns—and