ees, was violently chafing his legs. Joe sat on the stool,
leaning far back into the corner, head thrown back and arms outstretched
on the ropes to give easy expansion to the chest. With wide-open mouth
he was breathing the towel-driven air furnished by two of the seconds,
while listening to the counsel of still another second who talked with
low voice in his ear and at the same time sponged off his face,
shoulders, and chest.

Hardly had all this been accomplished (it had taken no more than several
seconds), when the gong sounded, the seconds scuttled through the ropes
with their paraphernalia, and Joe and Ponta were advancing against each
other to the centre of the ring. Genevieve had no idea that a minute
could be so short. For a moment she felt that this rest had been cut,
and was suspicious of she knew not what.

Ponta lashed out, right and left, savagely as ever, and though Joe
blocked the blows, such was the force of them that he was knocked
backward several steps. Ponta was after him with the spring of a tiger.
In the involuntary effort to maintain equilibrium, Joe had uncovered
himself, flinging one arm out and lifting his head from beneath the
sheltering shoulders. So swiftly had Ponta followed him, that a terrible
swinging blow was coming at his unguarded jaw. He ducked forward and
down, Ponta's fist just missing the back of his head. As he came back to
the perpendicular, Ponta's left fist drove at him in a straight punch
that would have knocked him backward through the ropes. Again, and with
a swiftness an inappreciable fraction of time quicker than Ponta's, he
ducked forward. Ponta's fist grazed the backward slope of the shoulder,
and glanced off into the air. Ponta's right drove straight out, and the
graze was repeated as Joe ducked into the safety of a clinch.

Genevieve sighed with relief, her tense body relaxing and a faintness
coming over her. The crowd was cheering madly. Silverstein was on his
feet, shouting, gesticulating, completely out of himself. And even Mr.
Clausen was yelling his enthusiasm, at the top of his lungs, into the ear
of his nearest neighbor.

The clinch was broken and the fight went on. Joe blocked, and backed,
and slid around the ring, avoiding blows and living somehow through the
whirlwind onslaughts. Rarely did he strike blows himself, for Ponta had
a quick eye and could defend as well as attack, while Joe had no chance
against the other's enormous vitality.