Page:The Leather Pushers (1921).pdf/86

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

apart from the fact that you ain't got a Chinaman's chance with this guy, I don't know of any club which would put the match on. The only way we could get the fight is because Dummy Carney would be tickled silly to have you flattened on account of him losin' you. But they'd be no dough in it—you don't mean nothin' around here, understand? And—"

"That's what I have a manager for," he interrupts. Your job is to make my name mean something here until I get a fight. Now get busy and use your imagination, or I'll go it alone!"

Well, we argued back and forth till the inmates of the adjoinin' rooms got sick of the thing and threatened reprisals, and the night clerk called up with the information that they was runnin' a hotel and not a dance hall. At three in the a. m. we called it a night after the Kid had agreed to fight one tramp before Kennedy, and I had promised to make his name as well known as Georgie Cohan's in and around Manhattan.

The Kid bein' young, healthy, and care free was unconscious a minute after he hit the hay, but I laid awake gazin' at the ceilin' for quite some space tryin' to dope out a scheme that would get us très bien publicity and beaucoup pennies. Along around the time they shoot you in the army—sunrise—I got it, and a little while later, when I heard Kid Roberts splashin' around in the bathroom, I bust in on him and revealed all.

At first he registered the greatest of disgust, but as I continued on with the layout his face cleared, and when I wound up outa breath he slaps me on the back and grins.