Peekay's lightning left had been sufficient to tell the other fighter he was going to have to work for every point he scored. There had been absolutely no margin of error for the punch and it hadn't needed any. It carried the hallmark of a classic boxer. Jackson's gloves closed noticeably and Peekay realised he had earned the first psychological advantage.
Some fights take time to settle down, the boxers playing out a number of ploys, each probing for weaknesses, testing a theory; but Peekay's left had come so piston straight and so clean and fast that Jackson knew instantly how perfect his opponent's timing was. The games were over and the serious fighting had begun.
The two men traded punches in the centre of the ring for a moment, each scoring, Jackson with a nice right hook and Peekay with a right cross. Both were throwing a lot of leather, but their mutual defences were superb. It was hard to find a fault in either man's technique. It was beautiful boxing and Jackson managed a pay-back for the punch on the mouth when, towards the end of the round, he caught Peekay with a long, raking right flush on the jaw which spun him around. It was a lovely punch and if Peekay hadn't been going backwards it could have done a great deal of damage. The bell went for the end of the first round without either boxer seeming to have gained any advantage. 'Can you see any weaknesses?' Peekay asked Hymie and Dutch.
'It's early times yet, my son. But he's no faster than you. If anything you've got the edge. The left to the mouth, that was magic.'
'He lifts his left shoulder up a fraction, perhaps to protect his jaw,' Hymie said.
Peekay nodded. If Hymie was right, later on in the fight when Jackson had lost a bit of speed he might not see a left cross coming at him quite as quickly. It wasn't the deadliest punch in the book, but behind the right pair of gloves it could do a lot of harm to a fighter slowing down.
The bell went for the second round. Jackson came out hard and scored well with three good punches. He was very fast and put his punches together beautifully; Peekay was hard put to keep him out. Jackson came in a second time, but Peekay tied him up. The referee called for them to break and Peekay got in a beautiful hook under the heart. It was the best punch of the fight so far and he heard Jackson grunt as it landed.
Peekay was a body puncher, preferring gradually to weaken the structure rather than to try and knock it out with one blow. Jackson's inclination was to go for the head. His speed against previous opponents had generally been enough to get through their defence and, with a knock-out punch in both hands, he only needed a couple of good blows to the head to beat an opponent.
But Peekay was too fast and made him miss, which hadn't happened very often in his career. Both boxers were scoring but not doing much damage, although in the second round Jackson hit Peekay with a left jab in the eye and had the satisfaction of seeing it puff up towards the end of the round. It was a close round, but if anything it was Jackson's.
The third through to the seventh were much the same, both boxers learning quickly and punching accurately. Both were fighting at a furious pace. It was going to be a matter of who lasted the distance.
Dutch had doctored Peekay's eye and the swelling had receded. Jackson had tried getting back onto it, but each time he'd thrown a left jab, Peekay's right hook found its mark under the black fighter's heart. Jackson's skin was too dark for the familiar red blotch to show but Peekay knew it was there and Jackson too was aware of what was happening. He dropped his right just a fraction to keep Peekay out, leaving the way to his eye open. Peekay sent a good punch in, testing Jackson's eye.
They came out for the eighth round, meeting in centre ring, both fighters on their toes. Peekay opened up a cut above Jackson's eye; it wasn't big and he wasn't interested in working on it yet. The punch which had opened the eye hadn't been that hard, which meant Jackson had a weakness. Weaknesses are for exploiting later when some of the fight has gone out of your opponent. Jackson's eye would keep.
The black fighter tied Peekay up in a clinch, trying to swing him around on to the ropes. The referee called for them to break and Peekay stepped back. The left hook coming at him seemed to be in slow motion; it caught him flush on the jaw and dropped him sprawling to the canvas. Peekay felt nothing, except that his legs wouldn't work. Above him Sanchez was flicking his fingers into Peekay's face counting him out. At six the pain came into his legs and by eight he was standing, his head clear but his legs still heavy. Jackson came at him and Peekay tried to tie him up, but Jackson hit him with a right hook under the heart and down he went again. But, surprisingly, this time his legs seemed to be getting better and he rested until eight before getting up. Jackson came in hard, his hands wide again, the way he'd started out in the first round. Some guys never learn. This time the straight left from Peekay was right on the point of the chin with the full weight of his shoulder behind it, with Jackson moving into the punch. The black figure simply stopped coming forward and then seem to be propelled backwards, losing his legs from under him he landed on the seat of his pants and lay sprawling on his back. Peekay turned to move to a neutral corner when the bell went for the end of the round.
Jackson's seconds rushed out, dragging the unconscious fighter back into his corner. Jackson's eyes had opened by the time they'd seated him onto his stool. The referee signalled for a doctor but by the time the doctor had climbed into the ring his eyes were clear and he stood, ready to come out fighting.
Peekay felt better. He'd taken two of Jackson's best shots and he was still on his feet. On the other hand, if Jackson hadn't been rescued by the bell the fight would have been over. Jackson wasn't invincible. He'd keep fighting the percentage way, wearing him down,
first with the head then with the heart;
it was familiar territory for Peekay. If he could stay away from Jackson's big punch, he could play in his paddock.
The ninth round was the sort of round good fighters use to pace themselves when they know they've got a long fight on their hands. But in the tenth Jackson caught Peekay on the ropes and put in nine beautiful punches to his opponent's torso, each one slamming into him as though a hole had been punched through his rib cage; the last, a vicious left hook, seemed to lift Peekay's heart up through his rib cage, into his lungs. A terrible pain rose up from his chest, a molten substance rushing up through his mouth and nostrils like a solid object bigger than the spaces through which it was trying to escape. He didn't even sense he'd fallen, only the sensation of rushing head-first down a narrow, stainless-steel tube at great speed with light bouncing off the inside surface of the tube, burning out his eyes, a caterwauling scream echoing down the luminous tube. He came out of the other side of the tunnel like a cork forced out of a bottle, to hear the referee count to seven. To his surprise he was on his haunches with one glove resting on the canvas. But his legs held; the punishing miles running up the mountains in the high altitude were paying off. He stood upright at nine and he could see the surprise, even consternation on Jackson's face as he came in to kill him off. Nobody had ever taken a nine-punch combination from Jackson and got up off the floor.
Somehow, by hanging on grimly, using everything he knew about ringcraft and clinching whenever he could, Peekay managed to get through the remainder of the round. Jackson too was near exhaustion, or Peekay would never have got away with it. Something had to happen; neither of them was capable of fighting another five rounds. The bell went for the end of the tenth round and Peekay moved wearily to his corner.
Hymie towelled him quickly while Togger squeezed a sponge over his head, repeating the process three times so that Hymie's towelling was to no avail. Dutch grabbed a towel and wiped Peekay's head and started to work on his eye which had begun to close again. Daddy Kockle standing behind Peekay was massaging his torso around the heart, the pain of his hands working almost unbearable.
Hymie looked at Dutch and Peekay caught the look in his eye. They were going to throw in the towel. 'Don't, don't do it! We haven't begun to fight yet.'
As though on cue, Mrs Smith's piano started, picking up the very last part of the Zulu chant; instantly Jam Jar's violin cut in and the male voices rose, deep and strong, rising to a crescendo as the bell went for the eleventh round.
Jackson came out as a southpaw, obviously hoping to open up Peekay with his left. Peekay immediately changed to fight him the same way. To his surprise, the shoulder Jackson had kept up high in an orthodox stance he now dropped too low. Jackson threw a left which missed Peekay, but the right cross with which Peekay countered hit Jackson flush on the jaw. The black fighter staggered, grabbing onto the ropes. Peekay moved in and hit him two good right hooks under his heart. Jackson grabbed Peekay into a clinch and they wrestled for a few moments before the referee managed to part them.
Both fighters were oblivious to the roar of the crowd which had continued almost non-stop through the fight. They were witnessing one of the greatest title fights ever seen at the Garden and for the most part they were an audience who knew their boxing. As Jackson and Peekay broke from the clinch Jackson reverted back to an orthodox stance. He'd come off worse in the change of stance and he could feel the tremendous pain building up under his heart. Towards the end of the round Peekay got him with another hook to the heart and Jackson went down. He was in luck again; Peekay had left the punch too late and when the black fighter rose to his feet at the count of nine he had only fifteen seconds to survive to the end of the round. Going into the twelfth round they had two knock-downs each and it was still anyone's fight.
Back in the corner Dutch worked frantically on Peekay's eye, which had now completely closed. Fortunately so had Jackson's, and Dutch realised that the difference in the result of the fight might just depend on which of the two boxers saw the more clearly. Blood from internal bleeding had filled the inside of Peekay's eyelid and Dutch was trying to work it out again before it began to clot too badly, with very little result. 'Cut it, Dutch!'
'No, son, you'll wear the scar all your life; it could be dangerous.'
'For Christ's sake, Dutch! He'll nail me with his left hand if I can't see! His left is better than mine, I'm not seeing it coming half the time. Cut the eye!'
Dutch hesitated, looking to Hymie for help. Time was running out.
'You fixin' to cut that eye? You heard the man!' It was Daddy Kockle. 'Man only get one chance foh immortality; he got to do the decidin' hisself. He say cut, you cut!'
Hymie nodded and Dutch reached into his pocket for a scalpel blade. He tore at the wrapping, but, as he pulled at the paper, the blade slipped from his hands and fell to the floor outside the ring. 'Jesus, Dutch!' Hymie yelled.
Dutch shook his head. 'I ain't got a spare, lad,' he said in dismay.
Togger's hand reached out and grabbed the lion's tooth hanging around Hymie's neck. It was an incisor from a young lion, still keen-edged. He pulled it over Hymie's head. 'Cut!' he yelled.
Dutch took the tooth and sliced into the eyelid; the sudden sharp tear made Peekay wince. The blood flowed quickly, releasing the pressure from the eyelid. Dutch quickly stemmed the wound with a match-head twirled with a tiny hood of cotton wool and laced with adrenalin. He was the best cut-man in Europe and when the bell went Peekay could see clearly through an eye which was no longer bleeding.
Jackson's left eye was still up, leaving him vulnerable.
Peekay was running out of energy. He didn't know how much more he could take or even dish out, whether he could get Jackson with a single punch any more. If he wasted his energy going for Jackson's head, constantly having to batter through his defence, it could be too much.
Jackson had been dropped with the heart punch and it hadn't been all that hard. The punching down-under was beginning to tell. Peekay would leave the black man's head alone; he was tough as nails and it would have to be a very big punch to the cranium to put him down. Peekay knew the punch to do it just wasn't there, he'd spent it earlier in the fight. He would stick to his last, work away at the body, try to get Jackson in the fourteenth. But he'd keep the black man's eye closed, just in case.
Jackson's right eye was badly cut as well as closed, but clever boxer that he was, he kept his damaged eye on Peekay's far side. It was the intelligent thing to do but by doing so he made his first big mistake. He was certain that Peekay would use his left, swinging it round from beyond the peripheral of the closed eye where he couldn't see it coming. He knew Peekay had the punch in his left hand to put him down. Jackson was a headhunter; he couldn't conceive of an advantage such as he was giving Peekay not being taken up. He was a superb boxer and now he made his right hand do the work, protecting his eye. Which was how Peekay figured he'd react. The straight right Jackson kept throwing to keep Peekay away from his damaged eye left the area under his heart exposed every time. Peekay was landing the left hook consistently, hitting Jackson on the spot, squeezing the juice out of him.
They fought this way for the next three rounds, both fighters concentrating on keeping the damage they'd done on the boil. Short punches, not hard, but hard enough to keep doing the work of weakening their opponent. Both were exhausted but the altitude training was beginning to payoff for Peekay; his legs were holding and he was using the breaks between the rounds well, storing up everything he had for the final two rounds.