"For the love of Mike, Pat, stop this foolishness," Stubener broke in. "I wish you would give me a chance to answer," Maud Sangster said. "I guess I'm able to talk with Miss Sangster," Glendon added. "You get out, Sam. Go off and take care of that photographer." They looked at each other for a tense, silent moment, then the manager moved slowly to the door, opened it, and turned his head to listen. "And now what round did he say?" "I hope I haven't made a mistake," she said tremulously, "but I am very sure that he said the sixteenth round." She saw surprise and anger leap into Glendon's face, and the anger and accusation in the glance he cast at his manager, and she knew the blow had driven home. And there was reason for his anger. He knew he had talked it over with Stubener, and they had reached a decision to give the audience a good run for its money without unnecessarily prolonging the fight, and to end it in the sixteenth. And here was a woman, from a newspaper office, naming the very round. Stubener, in the doorway, looked limp and pale, and it was evident he was holding himself together by an effort. "I'll see you later," Pat told him. "Shut the door behind you." The door closed, and the two were left alone. Glendon did not speak. The expression on his face was frankly one of trouble and perplexity. "Well?" she asked. He got up and towered above her, then sat down again, moistening his lips with his tongue. "I'll tell you one thing," he finally said "The fight won't end in the sixteenth round." She did not speak, but her unconvinced and quizzical smile hurt him. "You wait and see, Miss Sangster, and you'll see that editor man is mistaken." "You mean the program is to be changed?" she queried audaciously. He quivered to the cut of her words. "I am not accustomed to lying," he said stiffly, "even to women." "Neither have you to me, nor have you denied the program is to be changed. Perhaps, Mr. Glendon, I am stupid, but I fail to see the difference in what number the final round occurs so long as it is predetermined and known." "I'll tell you that round, and not another soul shall know." She shrugged her shoulders and smiled. "It sounds to me very much like a racing tip. They are always given that way, you know. Furthermore, I am not quite stupid, and I know there is something wrong here. Why were you made angry by my naming the round? Why were you angry with your manager? Why did you send him from the room?" For reply, Glendon walked over to the window, as if to look out, where he changed his mind and partly turned, and she knew, without seeing, that he was studying her face. He came back and sat down. "You've said I haven't lied to you, Miss Sangster, and you were right. I haven't." He paused, groping painfully for a correct statement of the situation. "Now do you think you can believe what I am going to tell you? Will you take the word of a ... prize-fighter?"