She looked accusingly at Glendon, who immediately became awkward. To
her it was delicious. A shy young man, with the body of a giant,
who was one of the kings of bruisers, and who read poetry, and went
to art exhibits, and experimented with color photography! Of a surety
there was no abysmal brute here. His very shyness she divined now was
due to sensitiveness and not stupidity. Shakespeare's Sonnets! This
was a phase that would bear investigation. But Stubener stole the
opportunity away and was back chanting his everlasting statistics.
A few minutes later, and most unwittingly, she opened up the biggest
lead of all. That first sharp attraction toward him had begun to stir
again after the discovery of the Sonnets. The magnificent frame of his,
the handsome face, the chaste lips, the clear-looking eyes, the fine
forehead which the short crop of blond hair did not hide, the aura
of physical well-being and cleanness which he seemed to emanate--all
this, and more that she sensed, drew her as she had never been drawn
by any man, and yet through her mind kept running the nasty rumors
that she had heard only the day before at the "Courier-Journal" office.
"You were right," she said. "There is something more important to
talk about. There is something in my mind I want you to reconcile
for me. Do you mind?"
Pat shook his head.
"If I am frank?--abominably frank? I've heard the men, sometimes,
talking of particular fights and of the betting odds, and, while I
gave no heed to it at the time, it seemed to me it was firmly agreed
that there was a great deal of trickery and cheating connected with
the sport. Now, when I look at you, for instance, I find it hard to
understand how you can be a party to such cheating. I can understand
your liking the sport for a sport, as well as for the money it brings
you, but I can't understand--"
"There's nothing to understand," Stubener broke in, while Pat's lips
were wreathed in a gentle, tolerant smile. "It's all fairy tales,
this talk about faking, about fixed fights, and all that rot. There's
nothing to it, Miss Sangster, I assure you. And now let me tell
you about how I discovered Mr. Glendon. It was a letter I got from
his father--"
But Maud Sangster refused to be side-tracked, and addressed herself
to Pat.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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