Page:Fighting blood (IA fightingblood00witw).pdf/217

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

of me—look at that offer from London. I got a following, I get big money for my services, and the sport writers rate me among the leading fighters in the game. If I was to step down before I've win the light heavyweight championship of the world, I'd feel I hadn't played my hand out. It would slow me up in anything I tried after leaving the ring, Judy, it would for a fact! This is the first chance I've had to get to the top in anything. Let me go through with it and if I do win the title I'll quit the ring and tackle some other game with a bigger future. Having been a champ at one trade will help me a hundred per cent to be a champ at another!'

"Well, maybe you're right, Gale," says Judy after a minute, which I use in thinking how long will I have to wait and what will I have to do to get her. "But I don't quite agree with the reasoning that makes your fighting a necessity to your future success. However, good luck to you, and I'll continue to help you in any way Ican. What books have you been reading lately?"

Glad to change the subject, I tell her, and after trying me out on what I've already waded through she lays out my reading course for the coming week. Before I leave, I tell her the $12,000 Pelham sedan is out, as far asl amconcerned. Judy was right, there's no two ways about it. What a sapolio I'd of been to pay that much jack for a car which I needed the same way I needed another forehead. Like she said, the money was commencing to go to my head—where I suppose there was the most room!

While Nate was trying to make up our minds about