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By Root 606 0

perhaps, but the ensemble had fallen short of perfection. Bent forward, his bearded, Oberammergau head shielded by a mobile elbow, he swayed within Johnson’s reach, making sharp tangential prods at the blocky thorax and abdomen, like a sculptor seeking the grain of a rock or a physician asking where it hurts. His jabs to the head, as a discerning colleague has noted, lacked sting; they were tentative, adjusting motions. Experience had evidently convinced Moore that the other procedure was wrong; Johnson was the kind of bird you couldn’t suck into a rash gesture. Unlike the novices in the gym, however, Johnson could hit fast and hard; he has knocked out some rough people when they got too temerarious. Examining him so close up is like taking cheese from a set mousetrap. Consequently, even Moore caught a couple at the juncture of the mustache and the imperial, and there was no other way to mark that first round. I thought I caught an expression of slight distaste as he turned away at the bell, but it was more likely self-reproach.

Charlie Johnston, Cheerful Norman, and a grizzled, sailorly-looking man named Bertie Briscoe, Saddler’s trainer, were in Moore’s corner. (Tiny Payne wasn’t in the ring, possibly because he was afraid of weighting it down at one end.) They did not appear discomposed. The Johnson faction in the crowd, though, was howling as if the cerebrator lay weltering in his gore. “Go get him, Harold!” one fellow shouted. “He’s an old man!” “Get fierce, Harold!” another bellowed. “He’s got nothing left!” Johnson didn’t look fierce, though—just meditative. He was trying to figure why Moore was acting as he was. On the margin of my card I find a note, “imp. of H fierce,” which I take to mean the impossibility of Harold’s getting that way, or maybe the impossibility of any Harolds getting that way; if the leaders had switched names, the Saxons might have won the Battle of Hastings.

For the second round, I have just “J,” to remind me that the affair continued in the same pattern. For Round 3, I have a very small, doubtful “M—rtb.” Moore hit the subject a lot of those light, probing punches, but he also landed one smashing right to the body, as if asking, “Is that where it hurts?” And Johnson’s eyes said yes. Moore went away as quietly happy as a doctor who has made a promising diagnosis. After that, I have for Round 4 a larger, more decisive “M—1h;” he hit Mr. Johnson at least one left hook in the chops that it is a pleasure to remember not having received. It was just to keep Johnson’s mind on higher things, because Moore was still directing his main attack at the body. Then, for Round 5, “M—Take it easy, H,” which reflects the fact that while Moore was working calmly at his master scheme, a number of Johnson men in the audience were beginning to yell, “Take it easy, Harold!” as if they feared their man might now do something rash. Apprehension never had less basis. At the same time, an old, iron-gray cove with a political profile was barking, “Press him, Harold, press him!” The fellows who were advising caution now began to address their remarks to this hothead. Johnson himself, between rounds, looked preoccupied, like a habitual loser at roulette who is having a small run of luck. He had hit Moore some showy, noisy ripostes that sounded good as they hit shoulders, and it is possible he was ahead on points then. Certainly he must have thought so. But there was no place to cash in his chips so he could quit a small winner.

Round 6 is marked with the biggest kind of “M” but no details, and 7 with a big “M—Jn n,” which recalls that Moore, jabbing now with dazing snap, had got Johnson’s nose bleeding. It was a wide, flat nose, which bled reluctantly, and the blood appeared to have a sobering effect on its owner. But the more serious blows were still going to the body, and once the challenger’s mouth flew open. He didn’t quit, though. He wasn’t cowardly—merely pessimistic. He still never led, but he had so many leads to counter that he kept busy. Toward the end of the round, Moore lost him. That alarmed me, because