The Abysmal Brute | Page 8

laughed at the action, and it guessed hilariously at what
Kelly must have said.
Back in his corner, and waiting the gong, Pat turned to Stubener.
"Why is he angry with me?" he asked.
He ain't," Stubener answered. That's his way, trying to scare you. It's
just mouth-fighting."
"It isn't boxing," was Pat's comment; and Stubener, with a quick glance,
noted that his eyes were as mildly blue as ever.
"Be careful," the manager warned, as the gong for the first round
sounded and Pat stood up. "He's liable to come at you like a
man-eater."
And like a man-eater Kelly did come at him, rushing across the ring in
wild fury. Pat, who in his easy way had advanced only a couple of
paces, gauged the other's momentum, side-stepped, and brought his
stiff-arched right across to the jaw. Then he stood and looked on with a

great curiosity. The fight was over. Kelly had fallen like a stricken
bullock to the floor, and there he lay without movement while the
referee, bending over him, shouted the ten seconds in his unheeding ear.
When Kelly's seconds came to lift him, Pat was before them. Gathering
the huge, inert bulk of the man in his arms, he carried him to his corner
and deposited him on the stool and in the arms of his seconds.
Half a minute later, Kelly's head lifted and his eyes wavered open. He
looked about him stupidly and then to one of his seconds.
"What happened?" he queried hoarsely. "Did the roof fall on me?"
CHAPTER IV
As a result of his fight with Kelly, though the general opinion was that
he had won by a fluke, Pat was matched with Rufe Mason. This took
place three weeks later, and the Sierra Club audience at Dreamland
Rink failed to see what happened. Rufe Mason was a heavyweight,
noted locally for his cleverness. When the gong for the first round
sounded, both men met in the center of the ring. Neither rushed. Nor
did they strike a blow. They felt around each other, their arms bent,
their gloves so close together that they almost touched. This lasted for
perhaps five seconds. Then it happened, and so quickly that not one in
a hundred of the audience saw. Rufe Mason made a feint with his right.
It was obviously not a real feint, but a feeler, a mere tenative
threatening of a possible blow. It was at this instant that Pat losed his
punch. So close together were they that the distance the blow traveled
was a scant eight inches. It was a short-arm left jolt, and it was
acccomplished by a twist of the left forearm and a thrust of the shoulder.
It landed flush on the point of the chin and the astounded audience saw
Rufe Mason's legs crumple under him as his body sank to the floor. But
the referee had seen, and he promptly proceeded to count him out.
Again Pat carried his opponent to his corner, and it was ten minutes
before Rufe Mason, supported by his seconds, with sagging knees and
rolling, glassy eyes, was able to move down the aisle through the
stupified and incredulous audience on the way to his dressing room.

"No wonder," he told a reporter, "that Rough-House Kelly thought the
roof hit him."
After Chub Collins had been put out in the twelfth second of the first
round of a fifteen-round contest, Stubener felt compelled to speak to
Pat.
"Do you know what they're calling you now?" he asked.
Pat shook his head.
"One punch Glendon."
Pat smiled politely. He was little interested in what he was called. He
had certain work cut out which he must do ere he could win back his
mountains, and he was phlegmatically doing it, that was all.
"It won't do," his manager continued, with an ominous shake of the
head. "You can't go on putting your men out so quickly. You must give
them more time."
"I'm here to fight, ain't I?" Pat demanded in surprise.
Again Stubener shook his head.
"It's this way, Pat. You've got to be big and generous in the fighting
game. Don't get all the other fighters sore. And it's not fair to the
audience. They want a run for their money. Besides, no one will fight
you. They'll all be scared out. And you can't draw crowds with
ten-second fights. I leave it to you. Would you pay a dollar, or five, to
see a ten-second fight?"
Pat was convinced, and he promised to give the audiences the requisite
run for their money, though he stated that, personally, he preferred
going fishing to witnessing a hundred rounds of fighting.
And still, Pat had got practically nowhere in the game. The local sports
laughed when his name