Page:The Leather Pushers (1921).pdf/295

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two or three times a month, looked worth a bet against the champ to all the wise crackers. All but me. I figured the Kid could climb into a ring with the two of 'em and knock 'em both dead!

Followin' several weeks of felonious assault on each other in the newspapers, Enright and McCabe is matched to mingle for twenty frames, the winner to get first crack at Kid Roberts and the world's heavyweight championship. This mêlée attracted no more attention than the invasion of Belgium, and by the time the brawny young men clambered into the ring to toss gloves at each other you couldn't of bought your way inside the clubhouse had your name been Jack Rockefeller.

Me and Kid Roberts was among the important guests, jammed right up against the lower ropes with the workin' sport writers, and after the announcer has lashed the customers into a murderous rage by introducin' everybody but Christopher Columbus, his eyes falls on Kid Roberts. In another minute the Kid is bein' helped through the ropes in his dazzlin dress suit, without which he wouldn't even go to the corner for a newspaper after six p. m.

The announcer got as far as "We have with us to-night—" when the roar killed him off and he quit. The mob had been sittin' for hours waitin' for Enright and McCabe to start in killin' each other. It was on edge and didn't want to meet nobody. Again, Kid Roberts hadn't defended his title for a year, and no champion can hold his popularity which don't fight early and often. The Kid's dress suit hit 'em all wrong, too. They wanted to see him in a business suit—fightin'