“You won’t strike hard—not at first, anyway—will you?” she breathed.
“Not at all,” Johnny smiled, “but you’ll have to be careful about one thing; practice calls for boxing that is as near the real thing as possible. I mean that I’ll seem to be going to deal you a real knock-out blow, but I’ll ‘pull the blow,’ as they say, just before it lands, so it will be a mere tap. The thing you’ll have to be a little careful about is running into those ‘hay makers,’ otherwise they may prove to be the real thing in spite of all I can do to avoid it.”
“I’ll try,” Gwen smiled back. “Are you ready?” She tapped him playfully on the nose.
“Ready!” Johnny squared away.
From the start, Gwen’s boxing was a baffling mystery to the boy. She seemed to fairly dance on air. Her foot movements were marvelous. Now she was here; now there; now in another corner of the ring. Johnny had been called the fastest boy of the ring, but Gwen was faster. For some time he did not reach her even with a light tap.
But time taught him new tricks and brought back to his mind many half-forgotten old ones. He began to realize that, although her face protection was perfect, she was exposing her chest.
“That’s where her lesson begins,” he told himself, and at once began tapping her over the heart with ever increasing force until she threw down her hands with a sharp, “Oh-wee!”
“Time’s up,” laughed Johnny, throwing himself down upon the mat and inviting her to do the same.
“You see,” he explained, when they had caught their breath, “you box the way you do your tight rope work. It’s great stuff. I never saw a lady boxer your equal.”
Gwen gave him a happy smile.