Free Collection 1999 - Beyond The Great Snow Mountains (v5.0) by Louis L’Amour Page A

laughed, then blushed. “I’m in a hurry to get back, too, Ward. Or shall we wait?”
    “No,” he smiled, “I’ve heard that Cheyenne is a good town for weddings!”

SIDESHOW CHAMPION
----
    W HEN MARK LANNING looked at me and asked if I would take the Ludlow fight, I knew what he was thinking, and just what he had in mind. He also knew that there was only one answer I could give.
    “Sure, I’ll take it,” I said. “I’ll fight Van Ludlow any place, for money, marbles, or chalk.”
    But it was going to be for money. Lanning knew that, for that’s what the game is about. Also, it had to be money because I was right behind the eight ball for lack of it.
    Telling the truth: if I hadn’t needed the cash as bad as I did, I would never have taken the fight. Not me, Danny McClure.
    I’d been ducking Ludlow for two years. Not because I didn’t want a shot at the title, but because of Lanning and some of the crowd behind him.
    Mark Lanning had moved in on the fight game in Zenith by way of the slot machine racket. He was a short, fat man who wore a gold-plated coin on his watch chain. That coin fascinated me. It was so much like the guy himself, all front and polish, and underneath about as cheap as they come.
    However, Mark Lanning was
the
promoter in Zenith. And Duck Miller, who was manager for Van Ludlow, was merely an errand boy for Mark. About the only thing Lanning didn’t control in the fight game by that time was me. I was the uncrowned middleweight champ and everybody said I was the best boy in the division. Without taking any bows, I can say yes to that one.
    The champ, Gordie Carrasco, was strictly from cheese. He won the title on a foul, skipped a couple of tough ones, and beat three boys on decisions. Not that he couldn’t go. Nobody ever gets within shouting distance of any kind of title unless he’s good. But Gordie wasn’t as good as Ludlow by a long ways. He wasn’t as good as Tommy Spalla, either. And he wasn’t as good as me.
    Ludlow was a different kinda deal. I give the guy that. He had everything and maybe a little more. Now no real boxer ever believes anybody is really better than he is. Naturally, I considered myself to be the better fighter. But he was good, just plenty good, and anybody who beat him would have to go the distance and give it all he had. Van Ludlow was fast. He was smart, and he could punch. Added to it, he was one of the dirtiest fighters in the business.
    That wasn’t so bad. A lot of good fighters have been rough. It isn’t always malicious. It’s just they want to win. It’s just the high degree of competitive instinct, and because among top grade fighting men the fight’s the thing, and a rule here or there doesn’t matter so much. Jack Dempsey never failed to use every advantage in the book, so did Harry Greb, and for my money they were two of the best who ever lived.
    If it had just been Ludlow, I’d have fought him long ago. It was Lanning I was ducking. Odd as it may seem, I’m an honest guy. Now I’ve carried a losing fighter or two when it really didn’t matter much, but I never gypped a better, and my fights weren’t for sale. Nor did I ever buy any myself. I won them in the ring and liked it that way.
    The crowd around Lanning was getting a stranglehold on the fight game. I didn’t like to see that bunch of crooks, gunmen, and chiselers edging in everywhere. I had ducked the fights with Ludlow because I knew that when I went in there with him, I was the last chance honest fighting had in Zenith or anywhere nearby. I was going to be fighting every dirty trick Lanning and his crowd could figure out. The referee and the judges would be against me. The timekeeper would be for Ludlow. If there was any way Lanning could get me into the ring without a chance, he’d try it.
    Yet, I was taking the fight.
    The reason was simple enough. My ranch, the only thing in the world I cared about, was mortgaged to the hilt. I’d blown my savings on that ranch, then