I
PAUSED
in front of the store for a moment, peering through the window. My reflection peered back at me, my hair gleaming with a bluish tinge from the glass that made it almost white. The store was empty, only one man behind the small cages. I walked in.
The man looked up at me. “What d’yuh want, kid?” he asked in a surly voice.
“I want to see Mr. Fields,” I replied.
“Beat it, kid,” the man snapped. “Fields ain’t got no time for punks.”
I stared at him coldly. “He’ll see me,” I said levelly. “I’m Danny Fisher.”
I could see his eyes widen slightly. “The fighter?” he asked, a note of respect coming into his voice.
I nodded. The man picked up a phone and spoke into it quickly. People were beginning to recognize my name. I liked that. It meant I wasn’t a nobody any more. But it wouldn’t last. After the next fight I’d be just another name again, another guy who tried and didn’t make it. I’d be forgotten.
He put down the phone and gestured at the door in the back. “Fields said for you to go right up.”
I turned silently and went through the door. The horse room was empty. It was still morning, too early for the players to be out. I went through it and up the stairway, stopped in front of Fields’s door, and knocked. The door swung open and Ronnie stood there. Her eyes widened and she stepped back.
“Come in,” she said.
I brushed past her into the room. It was empty and I turned back to her. “Where is he, Ronnie?” I asked.
“Shaving. He’ll be out in a minute.” She came toward me quickly. “Spit was up here this morning,” she whispered, her face close to mine. “He told Maxie what you did. Maxie was boiling.”
I smiled. “He’ll get over it, Ronnie.”
Her hand caught at mine. “Last night you called me Sarah. I thought you weren’t coming back.”
“That was last night,” I said in a low voice. “I changed my mind.”
Her eyes dipped into mine. “Danny,” she asked breathlessly, “did you come back on account of me?”
I closed my memory. “Yeah, Ronnie,” I said flatly, shaking off her hand. “For you—and money.”
“You’ll get both,” Fields’s voice boomed from the doorway. I turned toward him as he came into the room. “I said you were a smart boy, Danny. I knew you’d be back.”
He was wearing a lounge robe of pure red silk. It was tied around his big middle with a contrasting blue cord, and yellow pyjama trousers stuck out beneath it. His blue jowls were shiny from the soap, and a big cigar was already clenched between his teeth. He looked as I always thought Maxie Fields would look.
“I hear you pay good, Mr. Fields,” I said quietly. “I came back to see if what I heard was true.”
He dropped into a chair in front of me and looked up into my face. He was smiling, but his eyes hadn’t changed; they remained crafty. “You did a job on Spit,” he said softly, ignoring my statement. “I don’t like my boys handled that way.”
I kept my face impassive. “Spit used to be my friend,” I said slowly. “We did a couple of jobs together. But he broke the contract when he spied on me. I don’t like that from a friend.”
“He was doing what I told him,” Fields said gently.
“That’s okay with me—now,” I said, my voice as gentle as his. “But not before, when he was supposed to be my friend.”
The room was silent except for the sound of Fields sucking on his cigar. I stared into his eyes, wondering what was going on behind them. He was no fool; I knew that. I knew he had understood what I had said. But I didn’t know whether he would buy it.
At last he took a match from his pocket, struck it, and held it to his cigar. “Ronnie, get me some orange juice,” he said between puffs.
Slowly she started from the room. “And get some for Danny too,” he called after her. “That won’t break his training.”
When the door closed behind her, he turned to me, chuckling. “She treat you right?” he asked.
I allowed myself the flicker of a smile to hide the surge of relief coursing through me. “Good enough.”
Fields laughed aloud. “I told her I’d beat hell outta her if she didn’t.”
I dropped into the chair opposite him. “How much?” I asked.
Fields put on a look of pretended innocence. “How much for what?”
“For throwin’ the fight,” I said bluntly.
Fields chuckled again. “Bright boy,” he rasped. “You catch on quick.”
“Sure,” I said caustically, growing more sure of myself. “Mr. Fields don’t waste time unless there’s a buck in it for him. I can do worse than follow him. What’s in it for me?”
Ronnie came back into the room with a glass of orange juice in each hand. Silently she handed one to each of us. I tasted it. It was good. It had the taste that only freshly squeezed oranges could have. It had been a long time since I’d had orange juice. Oranges were pretty expensive. I drained my glass.
Fields was sipping his juice slowly, his eyes watching me
appraisingly
. Finally he spoke. “What do yuh say to five C’s?”
I shook my head. I was on home grounds. I knew a bargain when I saw one. “You’ll have to do better than that.”
He finished his juice and leaned forward in his seat. “What do you think it’s worth?”
“A grand,” I said swiftly. That would leave him with a clean three according to his words.
He waved his cigar at me. “Seven-fifty. And the doll here.”
“Talk money,” I smiled.
“Seven-fifty’s a lot of dough,” Fields grumbled.
“Not enough.” I told him. “It’s gotta look good. That means I gotta take a helluva beating to make three grand for you.”
He got to his feet suddenly, came over to my chair, and looked down at me. His hand clapped down on my shoulder heavily. “Okay, Danny,” he boomed. “A grand it is. You get the dough right after the fight.”
I shook my head. “Uh-uh. Half before an half after.”
He laughed aloud and turned to Ronnie. “I told yuh the kid was sharp.” He turned back to me. “Deal. Pick it up the afternoon before the fight. You can come aroun’ the day after for the rest.”
I rose to my feet slowly, keeping my eyes veiled and cautious. I didn’t want him to know how good I felt. “You got yourself a boy, Mr. Fields,” I said, starting for the door. “I’ll be seein’ yuh.”
“Danny.” Ronnie’s voice turned me around. “You’ll be coming back?”
My gaze swung from her to Fields and then back to her. “Sure, I’ll be coming back,” I said carefully. “For the dough!”
Fields’s laughter boomed in the room. “The kid also makes with the fast answer.”
Her face flushed angrily and she took a quick, threatening step toward me, her hand raised to slap me. I caught her arm in mid air and held it tight. For a second we stood staring into each other’s eyes.
My voice was low; it carried only to her ears. “Let it go, Sarah,” I said. “We can’t afford dreams.”
I released my grip and her arm fell slowly to her side. There was something in her eyes that almost seemed like tears, but I wasn’t sure, for she turned her back on me and walked over to Fields. “You’re right, Max,” she said, her back to me. “He is a bright kid. Too bright.”
I closed the door behind me and started down the stairway. Someone was coming up and I stood aside to let him pass. It was Spit.
His eyes were startled as he recognized me. Instinctively his hand shot to his pocket and came out with a switch knife.
I smiled slowly, watching him carefully. “I wouldn’t if I were you, Spit,” I said softly. “The boss might not like it.”
He glanced quickly up at Fields’s door, then back at me. Indecision showed on his face. I didn’t dare take my eyes from him. Suddenly Fields’s voice bellowed out into the hallway: “Goddammit! Spit, where the hell are you?”
Quickly the knife disappeared back into Spit’s pocket. “Comin’, boss,” he called out, and hurried on up the stairs.
I watched him enter Fields’s apartment before I continued down the stairway. It was a bright, clear day and I decided to run over to Nellie’s house. It was early and there might be just enough time for me to see her before she left for work.
And the way I felt, seeing her could do me nothing but good.
I
AWOKE
that morning to the drone of my father’s voice. I lay sleepily on the bed, vaguely trying to puzzle out his words. Suddenly I was wide awake. Today was the day. Tomorrow it would be over and I would go back to normal. Back to being a nobody.
I swung my feet over the side of the bed, found my slippers, and stood up, stretching. Maybe it was better so. The old man should be happy then. He would have his dough and I would be through fighting. Then maybe things would be quiet around here. This last week
between
fights had been hell; Papa had picked on me all the time.
I tied my bathrobe around me and went into the bathroom. I looked in the mirror and fingered my face. No sense in shaving today, it would only leave my skin too tender and easy to cut. I was willing to lose, but I didn’t want to bleed to death into the bargain.
I brushed my teeth, washed my face, and combed my hair. I decided
to leave the shower till later this afternoon when I was down at the gym. They had hot water down there. As I went back to my room, the sound of Papa’s voice followed me through the hall. I dressed and went to the kitchen.
Papa’s voice died away as I came into the room. He looked up at me coldly over the rim of his coffee cup.
Mamma hurried over to me. “Sit down and have some coffee.”
Silently I sat down at the table opposite Papa. “Hi, Mimi,” I said as she came into the room. Things were so bad I was even talking to her.
Her smile was warm and genuine. “Hi ya, Champ,” she jested. “You going to win tonight?”
Papa’s fist slammed down on the table. “Goddammit!” he shouted. “Has everybody in this house gone crazy? I don’t want to hear no more fight talk, I tell you!”
Mimi turned a stubborn face toward him. “He’s my brother,” she said quietly. “I’ll say what I want to him.”
I could see Papa’s jaw fall. I think it was the first time in her life that Mimi had ever spoken back to him. He sputtered for breath as
Mamma
’s hand fell restrainingly on his shoulder.
“No arguments this morning, Harry,” she said firmly. “Please, no arguments.”
“B-but you heard what she said?” Papa seemed confused.
“Harry!” Mamma’s voice was sharp and nervous. “Let’s eat our breakfast in peace.”
A tense silence fell across the room, broken only by the clinking sound of the dishes as they moved to and from the table. I ate quickly and silently; then I pushed my chair back from the table and stood up. “Well,” I said, looking down at them, “I gotta go to the gym.”
No one spoke. I forced a smile to my face. “Anybody here gonna wish me luck?” I asked. I knew it wouldn’t make any difference, but it would be a nice thing to take with me.
Mimi grabbed at my hand, reached up, and kissed me. “Good luck, Danny,” she said.
I smiled gratefully at her, then turned to Papa. His head was bent over his plate. He didn’t look at me.
I turned to Mamma. Her eyes were wide and anxious. “You’ll be careful, Danny?”
I nodded silently. A lump came into my throat as I looked at her. Suddenly I could see all the changes the last few years had wrought in her. She pulled my face down to her and kissed my cheek. She was crying.
I fished in my pocket. “I got two tickets for you,” I said, holding them toward her.
Papa’s voice rasped at me. “We don’t want them!” He stared angrily at me. “Take them back!”
I still held the tickets in my hand. “I got them for you,” I said.
“You heard me! We don’t want them!”
I glanced at Mamma and she shook her head slightly. Slowly I returned the tickets to my pocket and started for the door.
“Danny!” Papa’s voice called me back.
I spun around hopefully. I was sure he’d changed his mind. My hand was already in my pocket taking out the tickets again. Then I saw his face and knew nothing had changed. It was white and grim, and his eyes stared hollowly at me.
“You still going to fight tonight?”
I nodded.
“After what I told you?”
“I got to, Pa,” I said flatly.
His voice was cold and empty. “Give me your key, Danny.” He held his hand out to me.
I stared at him for a moment, then at Mamma. Automatically she turned to Papa. “Harry, not now.”
Papa’s voice quavered hollowly. “I told him if he fought again he would not come back here. I meant it.”
“But, Harry,” Mamma pleaded, “he’s only a child.”
Papa’s voice burst into rage. It filled the small kitchen like thunder in a summer storm. “He’s man enough to kill somebody! He’s old enough to decide what he wants! I took enough trying to make something for him. I’m not going to take any more!” He looked at me. “You got one more chance!”
I stared at him for one blazing moment. All I kept thinking was that he was my father, that I had sprung from him, from his blood, and now he didn’t care. Almost with surprise I saw the key fly from my fingers and ring crazily on the table in front of him. I stared at its shining silver brightness for a second and then turned and went out the door.
I stood in front of Fields’s desk as he counted out the money and dropped it on the desk. There was no smile on his lips now; the eyes, almost hidden in their rolls of fat, were crafty and cold. He pushed at the money with a pudgy finger. “There it is, kid,” he said in his husky voice. “Pick it up.”
I looked down at it: five crisp new one-hundred-dollar bills. I picked it up. It felt good in my hands. Papa would sing a different song
when I showed him this. I folded it and stuck it in my pocket “Thanks,” I said grudgingly.
He smiled. “Don’t thank me, Danny,” he said quietly. “And don’t cross me.”
I looked at him in surprise. “I wouldn’t do that,” I answered quickly.
“I didn’t think you would either,” Fields said, gesturing with his hand, “but Spit thought you might.”
I looked at Spit, who was leaning against the wall, cleaning his nails with his switch knife. He met my gaze. His eyes were cold and wary.
“What ever gave him the idea he could think?” I asked Fields sarcastically.
Fields laughed loudly. His chair creaked as he got out of it. He came around the desk to me and clapped a heavy hand on my shoulder. “Bright boy,” he said, geniality back in his voice. “Just don’t forget that’s my dough you’re wearin’.”
“I won’t forget, Mr. Fields,” I said, starting for the door.
“There’s one more thing I don’t want yuh to forget, Danny,” he called after me.
From the doorway he looked immensely gross and powerful, standing there in front of his desk. This was the Maxie Fields I had heard about.
“What’s that?” I asked.
His eyes seemed to open suddenly, revealing colourless agate irises and beady pupils. “I’ll be watchin’ yuh,” he replied, his voice heavy and menacing.
The hoarse shouting of the crowd came down to the dressing-room and beat against my ears. It was a heavy, monotonous sea of sound, a cry as old as time. People screamed like this in the jungle when two animals fought; they screamed like this in the Colosseum on Cæsar’s holidays. Five thousand years hadn’t changed them.
I turned my head on the table so that my arms covered my ears and deadened the sound, but I couldn’t keep it out altogether. It was there, only fainter now, just below the range of hearing, but it would come back the minute I turned my head.
A buzzer sounded sharply in the room. I felt Spritzer’s hand on my back. “That’s us, kid.”
I sat up and swung my feet off the table. There was a lump of lead in my stomach. I swallowed hard.
“Nervous, kid?” Spritzer was smiling.
I nodded my head.
“It’ll pass,” he said confidently. “Every fighter gets it first time in the Garden. There’s something about the place.”
I wondered what he would say if he knew. It wasn’t the place that threw me; it was the fight I was going to throw. We came out of the dressing-room and stood on the edge of a ramp, from which I looked out into the Garden. It was a sea of anonymous faces awaiting decision on the bout just ended. Sam was somewhere out there, Fields too. And Nellie, even she had come. Only my father and mother—they had not come.
The roar of the crowd grew louder as the verdict was announced. “Come on, Danny,” Spritzer said. We started down the ramp to the white flood of light that was the ring.
I could hear them yelling. Some of them were even calling my name. I followed Spritzer stolidly, my head down, my face framed by the big white towel like bunkers on a horse. I could hear Zep’s excited breathing near me. His voice rose above the roar of the crowd. “Look, Danny!” he said excitedly. “There’s Nellie!”
I raised my head and saw her smiling at me, a tremulously sweet and anxious smile, and then she was lost in a sea of other faces.
I was at the ring now and climbing through the ropes. The bright white lights burned into my eyes after the dimness of the ramp. I bunked rapidly. The announcer called my name and I moved out into the centre of the ring. I heard his voice, but I wasn’t listening to him; I knew his little speech by heart.
“Break clean when I tell you…. Go to the nearest neutral corner in event of a knockdown…. Back to your corner an’ come out fightin’, an’ may the best man win.”
Ha ha! That was a joke. May the best man win! I slipped out of my robe. That lump in my belly was the five hundred bucks in my pocket.
Spritzer’s voice was in my ear. “Stop worryin’, kid,” he was saying. “The worst that kin happen is that you lose this one.”
I looked up at him in surprise. He was more right than he knew. My biggest worry was somebody’s clipping the five C’s from my trousers back there in the dressing-room. The fight wasn’t anything to worry about, I had already picked the winner.
I looked across the ring curiously. When I was out there in the centre of the ring listening to the referee, I hadn’t looked at the kid I was going to fight. He was staring at me with a tight, nervous look on his face. I smiled at him. He didn’t have a thing to be nervous about if he only knew it. He was Tony Gardella, an Italian kid fighting out of the Bronx.
The bell sounded. I moved out to the centre of the ring feeling
curiously lightfooted and sure of myself. Knowing that I was going to lose this fight gave me a confidence I could win it that I never really felt before. I had stopped worrying about what might happen, since I already knew the answer.
I jabbed with my left to feel the kid out, wondering if he really had it. He was slow in countering and automatically I threw a fast right under his guard. The kid staggered on his feet. Instinctively I moved in for the kill. The crowd was roaring in my ears. I had him and I knew it. Then I remembered: I couldn’t finish it. I was supposed to lose. I let him slip into a clinch and tie me up. I faked some light
punches
to Gardella’s back and kidneys. As I felt his strength returning, I shoved him away, and kept him away for the rest of the round. I couldn’t take any chances on hurting him.
The bell sounded and I came back to my corner. Spritzer was boiling, he was shouting at me: “Yuh had ’im, why didn’t yuh follow him up?”
“I couldn’t get set,” I answered quickly. I would have to be more careful or he would get wise.
“Shut up!” he snarled. “Save yer breath!”
When the bell sounded, Gardella came out of his corner cautiously. I lowered my guard slightly and waited for him to come in. He hung back carefully, staying just out of range. I stared at him in amazement. How in hell did he expect to win this fight? By my knocking myself out? I moved toward him. Maybe I could lead him into it. He backed away. It was getting to be harder to lose this fight than to win it.
The crowd was booing by the time we went back to our corners. I sat down on the little stool, my head down, my eyes fixed on the canvas.
Spritzer was yelling again. “Rush him. Don’t give him time to get away. Yuh hurt him. That’s why he was bicyclin’.”
At the bell I came out of my corner quickly and was more than halfway across the ring when I met him. He was throwing punches wildly. He, too, had orders to fight. I blocked a few of them by reflex. How this kid ever got to the finals I would never know; he was easy. It was a shame to let a joker like this win, but I had to. I had made a deal. Purposely I dragged my guard for a moment. His punches tore past my arm. There was a strange, sweet pain in them, a kind of
reward
. It was as if I were two people and one of them was glad the other was taking a licking.
It was time for me to counter. I had to make it look good. I shot a wide, whistling right. It was blocked easily and I was jarred by a blow in the stomach. The kid smiled confidently at me. That burned me.
He had no right to feel like that. I’d give him a few shots to teach him a little respect. I stabbed with my left and tried to follow through with a right uppercut, but he got away from it easily.
I was getting sore. I followed his dancing figure. Blows were stinging me, but I shrugged them off. I was going to give this baby one shot to let him know who was boss; then he could have the Goddam fight.
There was a sudden, blinding explosion in my face and I felt myself go down to my knees. I tried to get up, but my legs weren’t working. I shook my head savagely and caught the referee’s count. Seven! I could feel the strength returning to my legs. Eight! I could get up now, my head was clear again. I knew I could. Nine! But what for? I was going to lose anyway. I might as well stay down for the count.
But I was on my feet when the referee’s hand started going up. What the devil did I do that for? I should have stayed down. The referee had me by the wrists, wiping my gloves on his shirt. He stepped back and Gardella came rushing at me. The bell rang and I quickly stepped aside and went back to my corner.
I slumped on to the stool. I wished Spritzer, yelling in my ear, would shut up. There was no use in it. Suddenly his words were tearing into my gut: “What d’yuh wanna be, Danny? A bum all yer life? A nobody? You kin take this boy. Shake the lead out and take ’im!”
I raised my head and stared across the ring. Gardella was grinning confidently. Me a bum, a nobody? That was just what would happen. I would be like everybody else on the East Side, nameless, faceless, another guy lost in the shuffle.