"Nick-looking boy—who is he?" asks the other dame, lookin' after him.
Duke slaps his hands together all of a sudden and gazes at her like a guy gettin' his first flash at his hour-old son. Then he looks after Adams, grins and claps his hands again.
"Who is he?" repeats the dame.
De Vronde sneers.
"Really," he says, "your interest is surprising. That fellow is my—"
"Shut up!" roars Duke, springin' to the runnin'-board. "Here!" he goes on, talkin' fast. "I'm gonna shoot them two interiors in half a hour, so you better call this joy ride off!" He turns to the strange dame and speaks very polite, "Miss Vincent will show you everything; if you want anything, just 'phone the office."
When they're gone, Duke turns to me and grins.
"I often heard you say you made Scanlan welterweight champ," he says, "by pickin' the guys he was to fight till he got where he could lick 'em all. Well, I'm gonna do the same thing for our friend Mister Jack Adams, valet for Edmund De Vronde, the salesladies' joy. I'm goin' in that boy's corner from this day on, and, when I get through, he'll be a champ!"
"What?" I says. "Train a guy like that for the ring? Why—"
"I see you don't make me," he interrupts, "which is just as well, because you'd be liable to ball the whole thing up, if you did. This kid Adams has got symptoms of bein' a he-man in his face. He's hit the bumps good and hard and right now he's down, takin' a long count. Now whether he needs to be helped or kicked to his feet, I don't know, but I'm the baby that's gonna stand him up!"