d affection.

"It's a shame to take the money!" it mocked. "Why don't you eat 'm,
Ponta? Go on in an' eat 'm!"

In the one-minute intermissions Ponta's seconds worked over him as they
had not worked before. Their calm trust in his tremendous vitality had
been betrayed. Genevieve watched their excited efforts, while she
listened to the white-faced second cautioning Joe.

"Take your time," he was saying. "You've got 'm, but you got to take
your time. I've seen 'm fight. He's got a punch to the end of the
count. I've seen 'm knocked out and clean batty, an' go on punching just
the same. Mickey Sullivan had 'm goin'. Puts 'm to the mat as fast as
he crawls up, six times, an' then leaves an opening. Ponta reaches for
his jaw, an two minutes afterward Mickey's openin' his eyes an' askin'
what's doin'. So you've got to watch 'm. No goin' in an' absorbin' one
of them lucky punches, now. I got money on this fight, but I don't call
it mine till he's counted out."

Ponta was being doused with water. As the gong sounded, one of his
seconds inverted a water bottle on his head. He started toward the
centre of the ring, and the second followed him for several steps,
keeping the bottle still inverted. The referee shouted at him, and he
fled the ring, dropping the bottle as he fled. It rolled over and over,
the water gurgling out upon the canvas till the referee, with a quick
flirt of his toe, sent the bottle rolling through the ropes.

In all the previous rounds Genevieve had not seen Joe's fighting face
which had been prefigured to her that morning in the department store.
Sometimes his face had been quite boyish; other times, when taking his
fiercest punishment, it had been bleak and gray; and still later, when
living through and clutching and holding on, it had taken on a wistful
expression. But now, out of danger himself and as he forced the fight,
his fighting face came upon him. She saw it and shuddered. It removed
him so far from her. She had thought she knew him, all of him, and held
him in the hollow of her hand; but this she did not know--this face of
steel, this mouth of steel, these eyes of steel flashing the light and
glitter of steel. It seemed to her the passionless face of an avenging
angel, stamped only with the purpose of the Lord.

Ponta attempted one of his old-time rushes, but was stopped on the mouth.
Implacable, insistent, ever menacing, never letting him rest, Joe
followed him up. T