Slade which immediately gets terrible rosey. This dizzy boloney squawks that he lost to me on a fluke punch, challenges me for a return bout, and when I don't answer he claims the light-heavyweight title. This makes me laugh, as I know I can take Gunner Slade every day in the week if necessary and I guess the Gunner knows it too, or else he's a fellow which is opposed to learning by experience.
However, there is one baby which don't get no merriment out of my leaving the ring and that's Nate Shapiro.
When Nate reads all that stuff in the New York papers he comes to me in a high rage.
"You wanna quit this clownin', kid," he says, waving a newspaper at me. "We got a quarter-million-dollar year starin' us right in the face and this applesauce you're givin' out about leavin' the ring is gettin' the promoters nervous—you ought to see the wires I got this mornin'. I been busy phonin' the New York papers for the last three hours, tellin' 'em your retirement is April Fool!"
"Nate, I am not clowning," I says, gently but firmly. "I have fought my last box fight, and that's all there is to it! I promised Judy I would call it a day when I win the light-heavyweight championship of the world. Well, I win it, so I'm through. Let's say it was a fool promise—all right, I made it and I got to keep it. Anyways, having won the title, what else is there for me to shoot at as a boxer?"
"What else is they for you to shoot at?" howls Nate, when he can talk. "They's a million dollars for you to
