Powers was noted for hunting his man from moment to moment and round to
round, and Glendon was content to accede to this program. His defense
was admirable, and he threw in just enough of offense to whet the edge
of the audience's interest. Though he knew he was scheduled to lose,
Powers had had too long a ring experience to hesitate from knocking his
man out if the opportunity offered. He had had the double cross worked
too often on him to be chary in working it on others. If he got his
chance he was prepared to knock his man out and let the syndicate go
hang. Thanks to clever press publicity, the idea was prevalent that at
last Young Glendon had met his master. In his heart, Powers, however,
knew that it was himself who had encountered the better man. More than
once, in the faster in-fighting, he received the weight of punches
that he knew had been deliberately made no heavier.
On Glendon's part, there were times and times when a slip or error
of judgment could have exposed him to one of his antagonist's
sledge-hammer blows and lost him the fight. Yet his was that almost
miraculous power of accurate timing and distancing, and his confidence
was not shaken by the several close shaves he experienced. He had
never lost a fight, never been knocked down, and he had always been
so thoroughly the master of the man he faced, that such a possibility
was unthinkable.
At the end of the fifteenth round, both men were in good condition,
though Powers was breathing a trifle heavily and there were men in
the ringside seats offering odds that he would "blow up."
It was just before the gong for the sixteenth round struck that
Stubener, leaning over Glendon from behind in his corner, whispered:
"Are you going to get him now?"
Glendon, with a back toss of his head, shook it and laughed mockingly
up into his manager's anxious face.
With the stroke of the gong for the sixteenth round, Glendon was
surprised to see Powers cut loose. From the first second it was
a tornado of fighting, and Glendon was hard put to escape serious
damage. He blocked, clinched, ducked, sidestepped, was rushed backward
against the ropes and was met by fresh rushes when he surged out to
center. Several times Powers left inviting openings, but Glendon
refused to loose the lightning-bolt of a blow that would drop his
man. He was reserving that blow for two rounds later. Not in the
whole fight had he ever exerted his full strength, nor struck with
the force that was in him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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