“Respect!” Hoppy exploded. “Dem bums was dogging it. I could beat bot’ deir brains out togedder wit’ bot’ hands tied behind me.” He simmered with righteous outrage. “I only hope de Masked Angel don’t knock out Torpedo Smith too quick. We oughta let him stay for at least a coupla rounds so maybe we’ll see some fightin’.”
“If there’s any fighting to be seen,” Simon said absently, “at least we’re in a good position to see it.”
The chiselled leanness of cheekbone and jaw were picked out vividly as he lighted a cigarette. Pat, glancing at the flame momentarily reflected in those mocking blue eyes, felt a familiar surge of yearning and pride. For he was a very reincarnation of those privateers who once knew the Spanish Main, a modern buccaneer consecrated to the gods of gay and perilous adventure, a cavalier as variable as a chameleon, who would always be at once the surest and the most elusive thing in her life.
“Yeah,” Hoppy agreed grudgingly. “Dey ain’t nut’n wrong wit’ de seats. Ya must have some drag with de promoter, boss.”
“I’ve never even met him.”
Simon wasn’t listening really. His eyes were angled to his left, gazing through a meditative plume of smoke to where Steve Nelson was rising about a dozen seats away and climbing into the ring to be introduced as the champion who would defend his title against the winner of tonight’s bout. However, it wasn’t Nelson whom Simon was watching. It was the girl in the seat beside Nelson — a girl with curly raven hair, big green eyes, and a nose whose snub pertness was an infinitely lovelier reproduction of her Irish sire’s well-publicised proboscis.
“I suppose he just thought this would be a nice way to introduce himself,” Patricia mocked. “Three little ringside tickets, that’s all. Sent by special messenger, no less. Compliments of Mike Grady and the Manhattan Arena!”
The girl with the raven hair had turned and, for a brief instant, met Simon’s gaze. He spoke without taking his eyes off her.
“Pat, darling, you’re taking too much for granted. It wasn’t Mike who sent them.”
“No?”