Winner Take All

"'If you had been on the level I could have respected you,' I said. 'If you had told me, sure this is a selfish world and we are of it, I'd have liked you fine. I'm strong for a rascal, if he's an honest rascal. But I hate a hypocrite.'

"I'd got 'em between me and the ropes where I wanted 'em, at last.

"'I've wasted two whole years,' I shot it over from the shoulder. 'Two whole years, trying to compete with them'—I nodded toward the Avenue—'according to their own rules. And you've been coaching me, when all the while you knew I was licked, that way, before I started. Now let them compete with me, according to my rules, for a change. Let them run to their dressmakers and order their gowns a little lower and their skirts a little higher and lie to themselves and say they must keep in style, when they know they've got to keep their men and don't care how they do it. Let them try it—damn 'em!'

"I shouldn't have cussed. But I couldn't help it. I was bitter. If they'd only been frank and man-to-man about it. The toughest birds in the world stand in the middle of the ring and shake hands before they try to murder each other. If they'd just said, 'This is no pretty game, this is a finish fight,' I'd have loved 'em for it. I guess women can't be frank and man-to-man.

"One set of rewards for me—and one for them! Abstract for me—and concrete for them! Two sets of rules! It's time some authority drafted a new set, to cover both ends of this deal. But in the meantime—'I don't want to play that way,' I said. 'I'd rather fight!'"

Abruptly she stopped.

"And I've been fighting ever since," she spoke in a less urgent fashion. "And I'm going to keep on fighting—right up to the end. But you—is that the kind of stuff they slipped you too, Cele?"

Cecille had been listening without a sound, her eyes clinging to Felicity's face, which was twisted, somewhat awry.

"Is that what they slipped you too?"

Cecille licked her lips. They were dry.

"I—I guess so."

"And that suits you? You think that's fair and square?"

"I don't know," Cecille whispered dully. "I don't know."

"Then it's time you found out," Felicity flung at her fiercely. "I had to. It was put up to me just as cold. I didn't want to, any more than you do. They aren't my rules; they're theirs! But I had to decide. And it's time you figured it out."

Again Cecille touched her lip with the tip of her tongue.

"I've been trying to," she faltered. "But I—it don't seem to me as though I want as much as you do. I'd be content with oh-so-little. With a home, and a—and a man from whom I didn't shrink when he touched me and—and—" She could go no further. That was too vivid, too intimate.

It was Felicity who displayed her feelings at the end. And already she was beginning to scorn herself for having paraded them.

"Oh-so-little!" she mocked. She did not mean to be derisive. "Just that! Just a home—just a man—a real man—content!"

"Would you be?" Cecille asked the question unaware of the other's irony.

"Say, who do you think I am," she asked, "to try to dictate terms like that to life? What do you think I am? A champion? Because that's what you're talking now. The whole purse—or nothing! I know my limits. I'm going to be glad to get a fair percentage split for my share. A home! A man! Content! I get you at last, Cecille. It's you who'd better come to. For whether you know it or not, you're talking winner—take—all!"

She rose then. She shrugged her arms and stretched them high above her head, and all visible emotion slipped from her like a discarded garment.

"And that's that!" she stated easily. She went back to the mirror and adjusted her veil. Then came a brief and awkward moment.

"Well, I guess I'll be going," she said. "The rent's paid a month in advance. Don't let that Shylock landlord gyp you."

"I won't," said Cecille.

"Well, I guess I'll be going." She picked up her bag. They did not kiss each other.

"Well—so-long."

"I—I wish you—" Cecille checked herself. She had been about to say I wish you happiness. She meant that, yet clumsily she changed it.

"I wish you luck."

At that Felicity paused.

"Does this hat look all right?"

Cecille nodded. And then she was gone.

So Felicity passes. No dark river. No swift oblivion. No agony of remorse. Those who may feel that her history is incomplete, that they have been robbed of their full meed of vindictive satisfaction, I must refer back to an earlier paragraph. And to those who may say, Here is a dangerous departure from the formula for such tales, there is only one honest retort. Felicity isn't a figment of fancy. Felicity's from the life.

Cecille sat quiet after Felicity had gone, until darkness crept into the room. She rose then, mechanically, and prepared and ate some supper. Later Perry Blair came and she found that pressing as her own problem seemed she could still think first of him. She would not tell him now of Felicity's dereliction. He needed a single mind to face his coming struggle. He would learn of it soon enough.

Later still they went out and walked, till he had only time enough left in which to catch his train. Both of them were silent. Neither felt any inclination to talk. But Cecille's brain had been as uncannily busy as that of one who lies awake throughout a white and sleepless night. And she had believed this bodiless activity to be the process of sound reasoning; she had found some security in the conclusions she had formed.

But when they turned back toward the apartment the whole brilliant structure proved treacherous. It toppled. She was back where she had started, cornered, driven now for time. She couldn't stand it. He would go—and he'd never come back. Never! What was there in it for her? What was she waiting for?

Play the game? Fight? She knew she wasn't clever like Felicity, but she conceived what she thought was a desperate expedient, nor realized that it was pitifully transparent. There was no elevator in their building. Perry had a habit of striking matches to light the darker portions of the stairs, though that was silly. She'd told him; she knew every step of the way. But to-night when he struck the first one, she raced ahead. When it flickered and suddenly went out, she crumpled. At her cry, which brought him swiftly, he found her a little heap upon the stair. Her ankle was doubled beneath her.

"I've twisted it," she said.

She wasn't clever, like Felicity, and yet how simple it was!

He picked her up. He carried her like no weight at all. And she lay very close against him, her head on his crooked elbow, her arms about his neck. They had left a light burning in the box of a sitting-room. And as he entered there Perry Blair, looking down at her delicately parted lips and faintly fatigue-penciled eyes, breathed deeply once, and smiled.

He'd been quickly skeptical; he was certain now. No one who had just twisted an ankle was content and serene as that.

And that was when Perry Blair first saw Cecille Manners—first saw her with seeing eyes. He looked down at her and in that instant learned how infinitely precious and flagrantly bold girlhood like hers could be.

He carried her to a couch. She lay quiet, her eyes still closed. But when, after a glance at his watch, he would have tried to ascertain the extent of the damage, which he knew was no damage at all, she sprang erect, and flamed at him, and struck his hands aside.

"No!" she gasped. "No!"

And then she put her hands upon her face.

"I didn't twist it." Her very voice was dreary. "I just couldn't face it, that was all. I thought maybe, if you carried me upstairs—if once you felt me in your arms—ugh!" She made a sound, a gesture as of nausea. And yet, after a moment, with surprising steadiness:

"Had you just as soon go now? I wish—I wish you'd go."

He gave her her wish so quietly that when she looked again she was surprised not to see him still there. In the lower hall he stopped a moment and stood with his head on one side as a man stands who listens. He made as if to climb the stairs again, and shook his head. Holliday came first, and he'd have to hurry.

In the box of a sitting-room above Cecille sat and also listened. But she made no move as if to follow. She just half stretched her arms toward the stairway when finally she knew that he was gone.

"Oh!" she cried then. "Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Oh, God!"

CHAPTER XI

POTS AND PANS!

The rest tells more quickly by far.

A raised, roped platform—two lithe bodies—a pavilion of white faces. Not the first round, nor the second, nor the seventh. The intermission which followed it rather, and a crowd grown strangely silent.

Perry Blair went back to his seat at the clang of the bell. Jack English was in his corner, and Hamilton, for he had been unwilling to trust anyone else. And lying back under their hurried, efficient ministrations he looked out upon the banks of faces.

They were tense; it was easy to see that, just as it was easy to sense that theirs was no ordinary tension. And he understood what it meant. Word had seeped from tier to tier, spread like a drop of ink in a glass of water, until it had colored the entire mass. Only a very select few were "in the know" of what that eighth round had been planned to develop, yet they somehow had leavened the whole audience with anticipation, by an indefinite word or two.

"The eighth," they were whispering among themselves. "Watch this now; here's where something happens!"

They had hooted Perry as he entered the ring; saluted him with catcalls and a few out-and-out hisses. He'd wondered then if any other champion had ever been saluted in just that fashion before; he'd tried to smile. He wasn't trying any more.

But Holliday was. Across in his corner Holliday was nodding to his handlers and grinning widely, just as he had grinned all through the fight so far. And so far it had been a mild battle, a showy thing of pretty footwork and flashy boxing. But it hadn't been harmful to either of them. Holliday, it appeared, had been quite content to let it go along that way from round to round, though it was the style of fighting best suited to his opponent. And he had proved himself faster at it, cleverer, than Perry had expected.

Yet it was not Holliday's cleverness, but his bounding, surging strength which compelled his thoughts. Strength like that, which tossed him like a chip in the clinches, was no new thing to him. He'd often been handled that way, with the same ease, by men heavier than himself,—by Jack English, for example. And Holliday was heavier; he knew that he had given away pounds in the weighing in; that there had been crookedness at the scales, but he hadn't tried to prove it. Yet Holliday was stronger even than Jack English, unbelievably stronger. And Perry knew now that he was about to test that strength to the uttermost. Holliday had romped with the roughness of a great puppy; now it was going to be different. It was going to be the destruction-rush of a young bull.

English too felt what was coming, just as he did; just as did the whole quiet house. English wasn't trying hard to hide his anxiety.

"He's strong," he was saying. "Boy, he's strong! Keep away from him—keep away from him all you can. For if he ever backs you into a corner he's going to knock you dead!"

Perry nodded. He meant to, if he could. He was going to try to keep away. And on the other side of the ring Holliday was talking easily out of the corner of his mouth.

"This guy's no set-up," he was saying. "He's faster than a fool. But kin he hit—that's what I'm wondering. Kin he hit? An' that's what I'm going to find out."

And then the bell, and the whole house leaning forward.

They came slowly from their corners, Holliday bull-necked, compact, a grinning menace, Perry lighter, whiter, sober. The first minute of that round was a repetition of all those that had gone before; lightning feints, nimble dancing steps, the cautious trickery of antagonists feeling each other out.

And yet the house, contrary to custom, did not grow impatient of such tactics and call loudly for more damaging effort. It waited. A minute and a half passed—two minutes—and they were going faster—faster. And then Holliday, grinning into Perry's face, winked broadly and swung wildly with his right. Perry stepped easily inside the blow and put his left to the other's face. It was a light blow, Perry knew that. There was no snap, no sting in it. But immediately Holliday winced as though it had hurt him and for the first time gave ground.

He followed Holliday up. This was the round in which Holliday was to quit, the round upon which Perry had had his mind riveted for weeks. He wondered—had Dunham after all been on the level with his promised crookedness? He followed Holliday up, carefully. And again a wild right swing, a light step inside, a light left to the face. And then Holliday, holding him with disturbing ease in a clinch, pressed his mouth close to Perry's ear.

"Shoot it over, now," he muttered. "Shoot it—don't pull it. It mustn't look too raw. I'm going to open up—start it from the floor!"

They clung in the clinch. The referee tore at them, raving at them to break. He pried them apart at last and passed between them to make the breaking cleaner. And as he did so, Holliday dropped his guard.

"Shoot it!" he hissed.

Perry wondered—but he knew better! He therefore merely made as if to set himself for the punch. He drove his right hand to the other's chin. But in that same instant as he took the blow Holliday lashed back at him, ferociously. Had Perry swung with all he had; had he been going with his punch; had he even been set firmly upon his feet to deliver it, Holliday's treacherous hook would have dropped him for the count.

As it was, though he had gone limply back, it spun him round and hurled him down. But it did not hurt him much. Lying half-raised on one hand, waiting out the count, he was thinking how like an explosion the roar from the audience had been. How moblike and blood-hungry. How the crowd hated him!

And Holliday was laughing down at him, leering. Double-crossed? Did Holliday think he was that credulous? But he had tested Holliday's strength and feared it more than ever. When finally he had to rise he dodged the other with a swift, sideways wriggle. The bell sounded almost immediately.

English was less worried than before, which was queer.

"That's the stuff," he praised. "Keep away and let him wear himself out. Let him beat himself."

But Perry questioned whether he was going to be able to keep away, and there was another angle to it, too.

"He'll be sure now that I can't hurt him," he thought. And that was exactly what Holliday at that moment was telling his seconds.

"Yu' got that, didn't you?" he demanded, again from the corner of his mouth. "Flush on the chin I took it. And it never made me blink. Hit? He couldn't dent cream cheese. If I'd ever a'ripped one into him like that I'd a'torn away half his lid. Watch this, now—watch this, because it's going to be good!"

And it was from his viewpoint and from the viewpoint of the partisan spectators. At the bell's call Holliday rushed across the ring, guard wide, gloves flailing. It was a spectacular rush, but Perry eluded him easily and slipped agilely away. Holliday whirled and blundered after him. Perry ducked under his swinging arms and danced again into the open. And then Holliday staged it, the scene which was going to be good.

Abruptly he ceased to pursue. He stopped and stood flat-footed in the middle of the ring, hands hanging idle at his hips, scowling after his opponent.

"Hey, you!" he bellowed, so loudly that his voice reached the rafters. "Wat t'ell do yu' think this is—puss-in-the-corner? Cut out the marathon, and come on and fight."

Indeed it was good; it was one of those dearly desired comedy moments which Holliday knew would grow epic in the re-telling. Holliday was a good showman. There were more cat-calls, more jeers, and cries of, "Yellow—yellow!"

And then Holliday went after him—and the house went mad. He blundered no longer in his pursuit, no longer played to the crowd. Like a blast of vengeance he struck Perry, enveloped him, smothered him in a fury of blows.

Perry tried to get away and couldn't get away. From the center of the ring to the ropes he was battered, staggering. He went down, and struggled up. And went down again.

He made no attempt to strike back, nor would that have availed him much. Holliday had tested his strength and was contemptuous of it. Holliday was boring in and in with crushing blows that tore past glove and guard.

The house was now a screaming, tossing bedlam, the ring a welter. He heard English barking at him. Cover up! He was covered up. Blam! He dropped and rolled away and came again erect. And blam! He was covered up, as much as any man could cover. And then a glove sank into the pit of his stomach and doubled him over, sickened him, racked him with white-hot pain.

He got away again. Fight? They were shouting at him to fight. Did they think he wasn't fighting? He was fighting with brain and heart and body to live this wild storm through. Again Holliday got him in a corner. Holliday's bull-strength was not believable. Again he got him just above the belt. And he couldn't help it this time—this time he had to do it. He dropped a little his guard. And then it happened. It struck him then. The roof came down!

As he lay head on the arm curled under him he knew it must have been the roof. By nothing else could he have been so smitten. The roof must have fallen, though the faces around him were still tossing and swaying, though the referee stood counting above him, though there was no wreckage. And the clarity of his mind astonished and pleased him. A brick roof—sure! A brick roof! That was unusual, very unusual. But it had to be that. It was a brick without a doubt which had struck him.

He knew the house was roaring—was sure of it—and yet he couldn't hear them at all. And that was strange, because he could hear the referee; he could hear Jack English. Jack was pleading—good old Jack!—begging him to get up. Apparently Jack didn't know that the roof had come down and stopped the fight. But the referee? Would he toll on endlessly before he noticed it? He should know; he'd been close at hand when it happened. He felt a warm emotion, a sense of comradeship, for the referee. He'd surely been square; he'd made Holliday break clean. He felt an impulse to joke with the referee, to banter him, and bid him count a million if he wanted to.

And then another thought. How easily he was thinking! With what precision! Yellow! They might think him yellow, even if the roof had fallen, if he didn't get up. They might think—At that he rolled over and discovered that there were miles of bodiless space between his head and his feet. It made the latter hard to handle, but he managed it doggedly. He climbed to his knees and wavered erect. And on the stroke of ten Holliday smashed him down again.

Yellow? Well, he'd get right up this time. He started to; he even staggered after Holliday who now appeared to be the one who wouldn't stand and fight, when he felt English dragging him back. Even English was against him. Holding his arms! Bound he'd lose! He lashed out at English; and then, like a distant echo, he remembered the sound of a bell.

He let them put him upon his stool and stretch him out. Let them work over him frantically. The brick from the roof apparently had cut above one eye, almost to the bone. But English was fixing it—good old English! He shouldn't have lost his temper and swung on English like that. English was propping the lid open and sticking it so with adhesive.

And then there was the bell. How light his legs felt, and his arms! And he'd doubted that the adhesive would do much; with the first savage slash Holliday tore it away and the lid hung closed again. But he could see from the other eye even though that seemed but a puffy mass. There was a slit from which he could look out upon an insane, tumultuous world.

So he complimented himself upon his cunning. They thought Holliday had blinded him; had closed both his eyes so that he could not see at all, did they? Well, he could! Oh, he was foolin' 'em. Champion!

Once he'd looked that word up in a dictionary, just after he whipped Fanchette; looked it up a little sheepishly, though he was alone at the time. Champion:—One who by beating all rivals has obtained an acknowledged supremacy. Then Devereau and Dunham were right. According to that he wasn't a champion. Nobody acknowledged him. But he'd teach 'em a better definition. A champion was someone who could go right on fighting when everybody was cheering for the other guy. A champion was somebody who could fool 'em that easy!—that complete! You bet! Who could fight and think at the same time, that clearly!—that logically!—like he was doing.

But he fell down often. Yet that didn't prevent this reasoning things out. And he didn't wait now for the count, either. He'd get right up each time, he'd decided, so that they could not call him yellow. They hated him so. But he knew the answer to that, too, at last. And that gave him something to laugh at, the way Holliday had grinned. Honesty was the best policy! He fair rocked with glee—and got up again!

Now English had him by the arm. He wouldn't hit English—English meant well if he wasn't a champion. He'd follow English docilely and sit down as he was ordered. He must have missed the bell again.

But English's crying, his whimpering, bothered him. It was a sniffling, wild-beast whine. That's the way a wolf or a tiger would sound, outside the circle of a fire's glow, unable to help its kitten or cub. But it annoyed him just the same—took his mind off important things. And what had English to cry over anyway? The roof hadn't fallen on him.

There was something about that that he hadn't yet got quite straight in his mind. If he could—if he could—A brick roof didn't sound right. If he could just force his brain a little further. It was urgent—he could fight better—it had a direct bearing on the fight. But there was that damned bell again. It interrupted him; broke in upon his train of reasoning. But he'd get up and fight some more. That was what they'd paid their money to see. He'd fight and try to think it out at the same time.

He rose and coughed, sick at his stomach—and sat suddenly down. But Holliday'd not hit him so hard that time, it seemed. Just pushed him maybe. That was the game—let him wear himself out! He got up again. Then he noticed another thing. The crowd had been screaming, "Kill him! Kill him!" for hours and hours. Now each time that Holliday struck him they groaned. Well, maybe it was time for him to hit Holliday; maybe that was what was the matter. He'd try to accommodate 'em. He pushed the referee aside and swung. But his glove met nothing. The floor came up and hit him in the face, that was all. Funny floor! Funny roof! No place to hold a prizefight. And where was Holliday, anyway? Holliday'd been playing for his good eye, till that was practically closed, too, and he couldn't see distinctly, couldn't see much of anything. He'd grope for him—he did it—and got up again!

They were shouting something else now. Could not suit 'em. "Take him out—take him out!" Who, him? He cursed at them, nor knew that he merely gibbered from frightful lips. They'd not rob him that way of his title! Then he saw Hamilton pick up a towel and start to toss it into the ring. Lucky he was near him! He grabbed that towel and flung it away—and fell down heavily—and got up again!

He wanted to curse Hamilton, too, but didn't have the time. He seemed to be hurtling to one side of the ring and then the other, yet effortlessly, as lightly as thistle-down. Couldn't stop for anything—Holliday insisted on fighting right along. He couldn't remember it was so long since he had laid a glove on Holliday.

And then again a lull. What was it? The end of a round, or the beginning of one? He'd better not sit down, or Devereau and Dunham would tell 'em he was yellow, and they'd believe. End of a round, apparently. English was crying over him again, whimpering helplessly. He wished they'd dispense entirely with the bell. Just fight right along—could keep your mind on things that way; he was awful sick—just noticed that!

And then he heard Hamilton trying to square himself for what he'd tried to do with the towel.