The captain’s last words of advice to the crew was to keep their noses clean and stay out of trouble, as the islanders were known to be pleasant but not the kind to put up with rowdy outsiders, having detained many, including the crew of none other than Christopher Columbus himself.
As Austin stepped off the Argo’s tender in the shadow of the Forte de São Brás, he wondered what that reputation might mean for his good friend Joe Zavala. Joe was a solid citizen, but he tended to immerse himself in the social scene wherever he went, and while Joe wasn’t a troublemaker, he liked mischief and he loved his fun.
When Kurt arrived at the shop where the Barracuda was being prepared, Joe was nowhere to be found. A security guard laughed when asked about him.
“You’re just in time to see him fight,” the guard said. “Over at the rec center, if he hasn’t been knocked out by now.”
Kurt took this news suspiciously, got directions to the recreation center, and double-timed it over there.
Stepping inside, Kurt found his way to a large gymnasium from which the sounds of an excited crowd were flowing.
He opened the door to find a crowd of two or three hundred sitting on bleachers arranged around a boxing ring. It wasn’t exactly Madison Square Garden, but the place was packed.
At the sound of the bell, the crowd rose and cheered and stamped their feet until the building shook. Kurt heard the scuffling sounds of feet on canvas and then the thwap-thump of fists in padded gloves exchanging blows.
He made his way down the aisle and got a glimpse of the action in the ring. He saw Joe Zavala in red trunks. His friend’s short black hair was all but hidden under the protective headgear he wore. But as Joe shuffled back and forth, moving lightly on his feet, his rugged, rangy frame and his tanned, well-muscled arms and shoulders glistened with the sheen of sweat.
Across from Joe, in black trunks and headgear, Kurt saw a larger man. In fact, he looked like some version of the Norse god Thor. At least six-foot-four, with blond hair, blue eyes, and a chiseled physique, Joe’s opponent moved with far less grace but threw punches like bolts of thunder.
Joe dodged one, ducked another, and then backpedaled away. For a moment he looked a little bit like middleweight champion Oscar De La Hoya — a comparison that would have made Joe proud. Then he stepped in, landed a few punches that seemed to have no effect, and suddenly looked less like the middleweight superstar as a thundering right hand from Thor caught him in the side of the head.
The crowd gasped, especially a line of women in the front row. Joe stumbled away, grabbed the ropes in front of the women, adjusted his headgear, and smiled. Then he turned and kept moving until the bell rang again.
By the time Joe reached his corner, Kurt was already there.
Joe’s trainer gave him water and hit him with the smelling salts.
Between deep breaths and a few more sips of water, Joe spoke. “About time you showed up.”
“Yeah,” Kurt said. “Looks like you’re wearing him down,” he added. “If he keeps hitting you in the head like that, his arms are gonna get tired.”
Joe swished the water around in his mouth, spat some out, and then looked over at Kurt. “I got him right where I want him.”
Kurt nodded, finding that doubtful. Joe had boxed in high school, college, and the Navy, but that was a long time ago.
“At least you have some fans,” Kurt said, nodding toward the front row, which included a group ranging in age from a college girl with a flower in her hair to several women that might have been Joe’s match in years to a pair of older women who were way overdressed and too well made-up for such an event.
“Let me guess,” Kurt said. “You’re fighting to defend their collective honor.”
“Nothing like that,” Joe said, as his trainer dunked Joe’s mouth guard and then stuffed it back in his mouth. “I ram ober sombone’s cow.”
The bell pinged, and Joe stood, clapped his gloves together, and went back out to do battle.
Joe’s words had been muffled by the mouth guard, but it sounded to Kurt like he’d said I ran over someone’s cow.
This round went quickly, with Joe dodging the thunderbolts and then landing a few jabs on Thor’s midsection. He might as well have been punching a stone wall. When Joe made it back, he was noticeably winded.
“You ran over a cow?” Kurt asked.
“Actually, I just bumped into him,” Joe said breathing hard.
“Was it the God of Thunder’s cow?” Kurt asked, nodding toward Joe’s opponent.
“No,” Joe said. “One of the ranchers here.”
Kurt did not feel the fog of confusion lifting. “How does that turn into a boxing match?”
“There are rules here,” Joe said, “but no fences. The cows wander everywhere, out onto the roads and everything. If you hit a cow at night, it’s the cow’s fault. But if you hit a cow in the day, it’s your fault. I bumped into one at dusk. Apparently, that’s, ah… una zona gris: a gray area.”
“So you have to fight to the death in a cage match?” Kurt said, joking.
“Does this look like a fight to the death?” Joe asked.
“Well…”
“The guy whose cow I hit owns the gym. The Scandinavian guy over there moved here and became the local amateur champ a year ago. The islanders like him but would rather see someone else as champ, someone who looks more like them.”
Kurt smiled. With his Latin background, Joe looked far more like the islanders than Thor did.
The bell rang again, and Joe answered it, stepping up and trying to get inside the Scandinavian man’s long reach. It was dangerous work, but aside from a few glancing blows Joe seemed to be holding his own, and the Scandinavian seemed to be slowing.
Joe sat down again, and Kurt changed the subject.
“I need to talk to you about the Barracuda,” he said.
“What about it?”
“Can it dive to sixteen thousand feet?”
Joe shook his head. “It’s not a bathysphere, Kurt. It’s designed for speed.”
“But could you modify it to do the job?”
“Yeah,” Joe said. “By putting it inside a bathysphere.”
Kurt went silent. Joe was a genius with machines. Still, he could work only within the laws of physics.
Joe rinsed his mouth and spat.
“Okay, I’ll bite,” he said. “What’s on the bottom of the Atlantic that you want to take a look at?”
“You heard about what happened the other day?”
Joe nodded. “A ship almost fell on your head.”
“It did,” Kurt said. “I’d like to get a better look at it now that it’s all safe and sound on the bottom.”
The bell rang, and Joe stood, his eyes on Kurt. He seemed to be thinking. “There might be a way,” he said, a gleam shining in his eyes.
By that moment, Joe had lingered too long. The God of Thunder had roamed across the ring.
“Look out,” Joe’s cornerman shouted.
Joe turned and ducked, covering up, as the haymaker glanced off his raised arm. He stepped back into the ropes, protecting himself, as the other fighter fired blows at him, left and right.
Suddenly, Kurt felt horrible for his friend, as what was supposed to be a friendly match looked more like a one-sided beating. Partly his fault for distracting Joe. If it had been a wrestling match, he’d have grabbed a folding chair and slammed it over Thor’s shoulders. But he guessed that wouldn’t do for Queensbury rules.
Thor’s gloves made a heavy thumping sound as they slammed into Joe’s arms, ribs, and head.
“Rope-a-dope,” Kurt shouted, throwing out the only boxing advice he could think of.
His voice was drowned out by the roar of the crowd. Meanwhile, Joe’s cheerleaders gasped. The older women looked away as if they couldn’t watch.