Part 5 (1/2)
Glendon walked to the ropes and spoke to the police captain. He was compelled to bend over and shout in his ear.
”If I don't give this speech,” he said, ”this crowd will wreck the place. If they break lose you can never hold them, you know that. Now you've got to help. You keep the ring clear and I'll silence the crowd.”
He went back to the center of the ring and again held up his hands.
”You want that speech?” he shouted in a tremendous voice.
Hundreds near the ring heard him and cried ”Yes!”
”Then let every man who wants to hear shut up the noise-maker next to him!”
The advice was taken, so that when he repeated it, his voice penetrated farther. Again and again he shouted it, and slowly, zone by zone, the silence pressed outward from the ring, accompanied by a m.u.f.fled undertone of smacks and thuds and scuffles as the obstreperous were subdued by their neighbors. Almost had all confusion been smothered, when a tier of seats near the ring went down. This was greeted with fresh roars of laughter, which of itself died away, so that a lone voice, far back, was heard distinctly as it piped: ”Go on, Glendon! We're with you!”
Glendon had the Celt's intuitive knowledge of the psychology of the crowd. He knew that what had been a vast disorderly mob five minutes before was now tightly in hand, and for added effect he deliberately delayed. Yet the delay was just long enough and not a second too long. For thirty seconds the silence was complete, and the effect produced was one of awe. Then, just as the first faint hints of restlessness came to his ears, he began to speak: ”When I finish this speech,” he said, ”I am going to fight. I promise you it will be a real fight, one of the few real fights you have ever seen. I am going to get my man in the shortest possible time. Billy Morgan, in making his final announcement, will tell you that it is to be a forty-five-round contest. Let me tell you that it will be nearer forty-five seconds.
”When I was interrupted I was telling you that the ring was rotten. It is--from top to bottom. It is run on business principles, and you all know what business principles are. Enough said. You are the suckers, every last one of you that is not making anything out of it. Why are the seats falling down to-night? Graft. Like the fight game, they were built on business principles.”
He now held the audience stronger than ever, and knew it.
”There are three men squeezed on two seats. I can see that everywhere. What does it mean? Graft. The stewards don't get any wages. They are supposed to graft. Business principles again. You pay. Of course you pay. How are the fight permits obtained? Graft. And now let me ask you: if the men who build the seats graft, if the stewards graft, if the authorities graft, why shouldn't those higher up in the fight game graft? They do. And you pay.
”And let me tell you it is not the fault of the fighters. They don't run it; they're the business men. The fighters are only fighters. They begin honestly enough, but the managers and promoters make them give in or kick them out. There have been straight fighters. And there are now a few, but they don't earn much as a rule. I guess there have been straight managers. Mine is about the best of the boiling. But just ask him how much he's got salted down in real estate and apartment houses.”
Here the uproar began to drown his voice.
”Let every man who wants to hear shut up the man alongside of him!” Glendon instructed.
Again, like the murmur of a surf, there was a rustling of smacks, and thuds, and scuffles, and the house quieted down.
”Why does every fighter work overtime insisting that he's always fought square? Why are they called Honest Johns, and Honest Bills, and Honest Blacksmiths, and all the rest? Doesn't it ever strike you that they seem to be afraid of something? When a man comes to you shouting he is honest, you get suspicious. But when a prize-fighter pa.s.ses the same dope out to you, you swallow it down.
”May the best man win! How often have you heard Billy Morgan say that! Let me tell you that the best man doesn't win so often, and when he does it's usually arranged for him. Most of the grudge fights you've heard or seen were arranged, too. It's a program. The whole thing is programmed. Do you think the promoters and managers are in it for their health? They're not. They're business men.
”Tom, d.i.c.k, and Harry are three fighters. d.i.c.k is the best man. In two fights he could prove it. But what happens? Tom licks Harry. d.i.c.k licks Tom. Harry licks d.i.c.k. Nothing proved. Then come the return matches. Harry licks Tom. Tom licks d.i.c.k. d.i.c.k licks Harry. Nothing proved. Then they try again. d.i.c.k is kicking. Says he wants to get along in the game. So d.i.c.k licks Tom, and d.i.c.k licks Harry. Eight fights to prove d.i.c.k the best man, when two could have done it. All arranged. A regular program. And you pay for it, and when your seats don't break down you get robbed of them by the stewards.
”It's a good game, too, if it were only square. The fighters would be square if they had a chance. But the graft is too big. When a handful of men can divide up three-quarters of a million dollars on three fights--”
A wild outburst compelled him to stop. Out of the medley of cries from all over the house, he could distinguish such as ”What million dollars?” ”What three fights?” ”Tell us!” ”Go on!” Likewise there were boos and hisses, and cries of ”Muckraker! Muckraker!”
”Do you want to hear?” Glendon shouted. ”Then keep order!”
Once more he compelled the impressive half minute of silence.
”What is Jim Hanford planning? What is the program his crowd and mine are framing up? They know I've got him. He knows I've got him. I can whip him in one fight. But he's the champion of the world. If I don't give in to the program, they'll never give me a chance to fight him. The program calls for three fights. I am to win the first fight. It will be pulled off in Nevada if San Francisco won't stand for it. We are to make it a good fight. To make it good, each of us will put up a side bet of twenty thousand. It will be real money, but it won't be a real bet. Each gets his own slipped back to him. The same way with the purse. We'll divide it evenly, though the public division will be thirty-five and sixty-five. The purse, the moving picture royalities, the advertis.e.m.e.nts, and all the rest of the drags won't be a cent less than two hundred and fifty thousand. We'll divide it, and go to work on the return match. Hanford will win that, and we divide again. Then comes the third fight; I win as I have every right to; and we have taken three-quarters of a million out of the pockets of the fighting public. That's the program, but the money is dirty. And that's why I am quitting the ring to-night--”