"I wish I could get away from all this," she'd said, with appropriate wistfulness. "I'm dead sick of it--sick of it all. I wish I could go away--somewhere--anywhere where things are clean. Where there are trees and growing grass--" It was a very good speech. She knew it must be because she had heard a high-priced leading lady utter it in a three-dollar-and-a-half Broadway success. And it proved effective uttered by Felicity. For it fooled Perry. Fooled him badly just when he had begun to speculate a little concerning her soul himself. Perry believed her. But then it is easy for any woman to fool any man. Twice as easy when he wants so badly to be fooled. Perry cursed his lack of ready money. And then Dunham sent for him. And he went, hiding his eagerness. They held the conversation in Dunham's book-lined office. The books were never used; the office saw strange usage. And the conference was short. "Ready to be a good boy?" Dunham asked. Perry rose to leave. "Sit down," said Dunham. "That was intended as a joke. My mistake." But it angered him; angered him almost as much as it did to look upon the boy's unsquandered youth. "I've got something for you at last," he offered. "If you care to take it." "I'll listen," said Perry. So Dunham drew readily upon invention. "We've talked it over," he said. "Devereau and I and some of the other boys. And we've decided that there's nothing in it for any of us as the situation now stands. The title's too obscured. You claim it. So does Montague. So we've decided to offer you a match with--" "I've challenged Montague," Perry interrupted. "He paid no attention to it." "Not Montague," Dunham corrected silkily. "Holliday." And instantly Perry knew what Dunham hoped to do. "Why not Montague?" he asked. "Why not Holliday?" countered Dunham, his voice silkier still. And Perry couldn't very well say because Montague was a boxer first and a fighter afterward. He couldn't say because he knew they considered Holliday, young, wicked, punishing, even more certain to whip him. He hesitated. "But you're going to whip Holliday," Dunham went on tentatively, as if sure of what was in the other's mind. Perry watched him. "We're going to see to that. It'll be a twenty-round fight to a decision. Somewhere in the South. But you'll stop Holliday in the eighth round." "I fight fair," said Perry, "or I don't fight at all." "Don't get excited." Dunham was laughing at him a little, not pleasantly. "You'll be no party to anything--ah--iniquitous. Beat him before that if you're able. But it'll come in the eighth, don't doubt that. I'm just telling you beforehand so that you'll lose no sleep in case you're afraid of Holliday." That was a thrust. "I'm telling you so you needn't kill yourself training to get ready, though you don't look over-fed." That was another. Yet Perry felt that he had balanced them both when he looked the huge man's jelly-bulk up and down.