Page:Fighting blood (IA fightingblood00witw).pdf/189

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

"Perfect!" I says. "The last X-ray shows it's all healed and they's nothing to stop me now from going back into the ring and getting it broke again!"

Judy laughs—like the tinkle of little bells. Then she gets a bit serious. "I hate to think of you going back to the prize ring, Gale," she says. "That was terrible—getting your jaw broken. Why, you might be crippled for life at any time! When are you going to give up boxing? It—it would please me a lot if you would, Gale."

"Judy," I says, "to please you I'd dive off the top of Washington's Monument into a glass of water! You know that. But I got to say it with right hooks till I get a little bigger bank roll and a little better line on what I was born to panic the world at. I don't seem to know just what my trick is yet—I'm what you might call experimenting. I don't want to go back of the soda fountain again, that's a cinch! So I'm just looking around. Boxing is keeping me alive and paying for this synthetic education I'm getting, while I'm trying to find out the thing I do best."

But Judy seems to be peeved. "There are plenty of other things you could do besides boxing," she says slowly, after a minute. She's pulling a cute little handkerchief back and forth between the most beautiful little hands in captivity. "You have a good appearance, personality, and enough intelligence to overcome the—the few rough edges left from your premature contact with the world. I'm sure you would not have the slightest difficulty in getting a good position with a future, almost anywhere. Why—" she