upon earnest
repetition.

"You can't treat him like this!"

"Can't?" asked Perry Blair. "I just have."

Devereau didn't like that tone. He was just discovering a lot of
things about his light-weight champion which he didn't like. But he
kept his temper. He was famed for that. Famed for his oily smoothness
under provocation.

"Sure! Your mistake--and my fault. But it ain't too late to square
it," he said. "You just send over word that you'll be pleased to death
to be at his dinner, and it'll still be all right. I'll square it.
And don't you worry. You won't be bored. Pig-iron's dinners
are--now--well--" He closed an obscene lid. "A good time will be had
by all! And Pig-iron will be pleased to have you there. Pig-iron, he
likes to entertain the latest celebrities."

Blair's voice made him start.

"He can't entertain me," said Perry. "Not a little bit."

And suddenly with that Devereau was suave no longer. He leaped up and
thumped upon a desk. He slitted his pale eyes.

"Say, what d'yuh think you are?" he raved. "Talking to me like that!"

Blair did not attempt to shout him down, and yet he made himself heard.

"Not Pig-iron Dunham's man," he answered. "Nor yet yours. Are you
thinking to tell me how I shall talk?"

Devereau could not have told why his rage was so red. Why he hated the
other so swiftly. But he mastered his voice. He had seen something
like this coming, not so unpleasant, however, or so difficult to
handle. He had imagined when the time came they would talk it over,
amicably, like good business men. But that was out of the question
now. It had always been out of the question, but he'd realized that
tardily. But they'd have it out. There could be no better time.

"No?" he drawled. "No?" Sarcasm lent his words a sing-song quality.

"No? Not Dunham's man? Not mine? Well-well! Ha-ha!"

And then, savagely:

"So that's it! It's true, heh? They been trying to tell me so for
weeks, all up and down the line, and I been telling 'em they'd got you
wrong. The swelled head, is it? But pardon me, Mr. Blair. Who am I
to speak thus to the world's champion? Delusions of grandeur, I should
say. Pardon my coarseness!" Sudden laughter split wide his lips.

"Champion!" he bawled. "World's champion! Oh, my Gawd!"

Perry sat silent and watched him. Little by little he recognized that
this was not acting. This was real. He waited and watched.

"So you been follow