hurried into his coat and out of the dressing-room again so as to be in time to see how the Ripton terror shaped.
It was plainly not a one-sided encounter. Peteiro’s opponent hailed from St Paul’s, a school that has a habit of turning out boxers. At the end of the first round it seemed that honours were even. The great Peteiro had taken as much as he had given, and once had been uncompromisingly floored by the Pauline’s left. But in the second round he began to gain points. For a boy of his weight he had a terrific hit with the right, and three applications of this to the ribs early in the round took much of the sting out of the Pauline’s blows. He fought on with undiminished pluck, but the Riptonian was too strong for him, and the third round was a rout. To quote the
Sheen looked thoughtful at the conclusion of the fight. There was no doubt that Drummond’s antagonist of the previous year was formidable. Yet Sheen believed himself to be the cleverer of the two. At any rate, Peteiro had given no signs of possessing much cunning. To all appearances he was a tough, go-ahead fighter, with a right which would drill a hole in a steel plate. Had he sufficient skill to baffle his (Sheen’s) strong tactics? If only Joe Bevan would come! With Joe in his corner to direct him, he would feel safe.
But of Joe up to the present there were no signs.
Mr Spence came and sat down beside him.
“Well, Sheen,” he said, “so you won your first fight. Keep it up.”
“I’ll try, sir,” said Sheen.
“What do you think of Peteiro?”
“I was just wondering, sir. He hits very hard.”
“Very hard indeed.”
“But he doesn’t look as if he was very clever.”
“Not a bit. Just a plain slogger. That’s all. That’s why Drummond beat him last year in the Feather-Weights. In strength there was no comparison, but Drummond was just too clever for him. You will be the same, Sheen.”
“I hope so, sir,” said Sheen.
After lunch the second act of the performance began. Sheen had to meet a boxer from Harrow who had drawn a bye in the first round of the competition. This proved a harder fight than his first encounter, but by virtue of a stout heart and a straight left he came through it successfully, and there was no doubt as to what the decision would be. Both judges voted for him.
Peteiro demolished a Radleian in his next fight.
By the middle of the afternoon there were three light-weights in the running—Sheen, Peteiro, and a boy from Clifton. Sheen drew the bye, and sparred in an outer room with a soldier, who was inclined to take the thing easily. Sheen, with the thought of the final in his mind, was only too ready to oblige him. They sparred an innocuous three rounds, and the man of war was kind enough to whisper in his ear as they left the room that he hoped he would win the final, and that he himself had a matter of one-and-sixpence with Old Spud Smith on his success.
“For I’m a man,” said the amiable warrior confidentially, “as knows Class when he sees it. You’re Class, sir, that’s what you are.”
This, taken in conjunction with the fact that if the worst came to the worst he had, at any rate, won a medal by having got into the final, cheered Sheen. If only Joe Bevan had appeared he would have been perfectly contented.
But there were no signs of Joe.
XXII
A GOOD FINISH
“Final, Light-Weights,” shouted the referee.
A murmur of interest from the ring-side chairs.
“R. D. Sheen, Wrykyn College.”
Sheen got his full measure of applause this time. His victories in the preliminary bouts had won him favour with the spectators.
“J. Peteiro, Ripton School.”
“Go it, Ripton!” cried a voice from near the door. The referee frowned in the direction of this audacious partisan, and expressed a hope that the audience would kindly refrain from comment during the rounds.
Then he turned to the ring again, and announced the names a second time.
“Sheen—Peteiro.”
The Ripton man was sitting with a hand on each knee, listening to the advice of his school instructor, who had thrust head and shoulders through the ropes, and was busy impressing some point upon him. Sheen found himself noticing the most trivial things with extraordinary clearness. In the front row of the spectators sat a man with a parti-coloured tie. He wondered idly what tie it was. It was rather like one worn by members of Templar’s house at Wrykyn. Why were the ropes of the ring red? He rather liked the colour. There was a man lighting a pipe. Would he blow out the match or extinguish it with a wave of the hand? What a beast Peteiro looked. He really was a nigger. He must look out for that right of his. The straight left. Push it out. Straight left ruled the boxing world. Where was Joe? He must have missed the train. Or perhaps he hadn’t been able to get away. Why did he want to yawn, he wondered.
“Time!”
The Ripton man became suddenly active. He almost ran across the ring. A brief handshake, and he had penned Sheen up in his corner before he had time to leave it. It was evident what advice his instructor had been giving him. He meant to force the pace from the start.
The suddenness of it threw Sheen momentarily off his balance. He seemed to be in a whirl of blows. A sharp
