«You think football is tougher? Or basketball?»
«Yeah.»
«All right. Try this little exercise, then. Maybe it’ll show you there’s more to fencing than dancing around.»
Mr. Martinez called one of the girls. «Donna, will you show Jimmy here the glove exercise?»
Donna worked the fencing glove off her right hand and held it against the wall a little higher than her shoulder. «You take the on-guard position. When I drop the glove, you lunge and pin it against the wall with the point of your foil before it hits the floor.»
«Is that all? That’s easy!»
She grinned at him. «Try it.»
Jimmy squatted into the on-guard position and held his foil the way Mr. Martinez had shown him. Trying hard to remember how to make a good lunge, he noticed that Donna was smirking, as if she knew something he didn’t. She dropped the glove.
Jimmy lunged smartly. And missed. The glove slithered down the wall and hit the floor.
«Let’s try that again,» he said.
They did. And again. And again. Each time Jimmy’s lunge was too slow to catch the glove against the wall. Once he lost his balance and fell on the seat of his pants.
He mopped sweat from his eyes.
«There’s gotta be a trick to it.»
«No,» Donna said. «You’ve just got to be fast.»
«Let’s see you do it, then.» Jimmy held the glove and Donna speared it. She missed a couple of times, but she hit it more often than she missed. He could feel his face getting red.
«If you can do it, I can do it!»
They reversed positions again, and still Jimmy missed the glove as Donna let it fall. His face twisted into a tight frown of concentration. On guard, watch her hand, lunge! And again he missed.
«Can I tell you something that Mr. Martinez told me last week?» she asked.
«Sure, go ahead.»
«He said I should try to think that the point of my blade is alive, and that it’s pulling me to the target. Stop thinking about making a lunge; don’t worry about your arms and feet at all. Just let the point pull you to the target.»
Shrugging, Jimmy said, «Okay.» But it didn’t make much sense.
She held the glove up against the wall again. Jimmy stared at it and pointed the tip of his foil at it. She dropped it and the blade leaped at it.
«You did it!»
He had caught the glove by a corner of its cuff; a fraction of an inch more and he would have missed it again.
«Let’s try a couple more,» Jimmy said.
He still missed more than he caught, but he hit the glove squarely twice.
«That’s terrific,» Donna said, looking really pleased. «I didn’t hit the glove at all the first day I tried.»
Jimmy’s legs were trembling with exertion. «It’s not as easy,» he puffed, «as it looks.»
Paul came up with a mask under his arm. «You want to try a little fencing?»
Jimmy thought about asking him to wait until he had caught his breath. But he saw the crooked grin on Paul’s face, and answered, «Sure!»
«Okay, put on your mask,» Paul said. «You’re gonna need it!» He cut a «Z» through the air with his blade.
«We’ll fence along this line,» Paul said, pointing to a barely visible, red line along the worn floorboards. «Don’t get too close. That’s the way you break blades, and then you have to pay for a new one. Just try a couple of lunges at me… try to hit my body. Arms and legs and head are foul territory.»
Paul stood fairly straight and held his blade down, to give Jimmy a clear shot. Jimmy lunged and hit him squarely on the chest.
«Not bad!»
They tried a half-dozen lunges. Then Paul showed Jimmy the two simplest parries—the way you blocked your opponent’s blade with your own blade, to make him miss the target.
Jimmy lunged and Paul parried. Then Paul lunged and Jimmy parried, but too late. Paul’s point hit Jimmy on the shoulder. They lunged and parried, and soon they were moving back and forward. Hey, just like the movies! Jimmy suddenly realized he was really fencing. And it was fun.
«Gotcha!»
«Naw, you missed.»
They went at it again, more furiously than ever. Mr. Martinez shouted, «Hey, you boys …»
But Jimmy couldn’t hear him. He and Paul were locked in mortal combat: Zorro and his enemy.
«You’re too close! Stop!» Mr. Martinez raced toward them.
Jimmy hacked at Paul’s blade and then lunged. He saw his foil hit his friend’s chest, bend almost double, then snap in half. Horrified, he felt himself falling off-balance against Paul, the broken end of his foil still in his outstretched hand. Like watching a slow-motion film, he saw the jagged end of the blade enter Paul’s body just under the right armpit.
The two boys collided and went down in a tangled heap. Paul was clutching at his right side, and Jimmy could see his grimace of pain even through the fencing mask.
Mr. Martinez yanked Paul’s mask off, and he and Jimmy gently unbuttoned the high-necked fencing jacket and eased it off Paul’s shoulders. Everyone else was standing around them in a tight, silent knot.
«Doesn’t look very bad,» Mr. Martinez said, examining the gash under Paul’s arm. It was bleeding slightly. «Donna, go over to my fencing bag and get the first aid kit.»
«I,» Paul’s voice was shaky. «I taste blood in my mouth.»
«Oh no,» Donna gasped.
«Punctured lung,» somebody whispered. Mr. Martinez’ jaw muscles tensed. «Help me lift him… gently,» he said to Jimmy. «We’ve got to rush him to the hospital.»
Dazed, scared, wordless, Jimmy took one of Paul’s shoulders. Mr. Martinez took the other and a couple of other boys lifted Paul’s legs. As gently as they could they hurried him out of the gym and down the musty-smelling hallway. The whole class followed.
They went through the Y lobby, where they startled a couple of old men playing chess, and out into the street. It was getting dark. A chilly wind was blowing. Jimmy felt nothing; he was numb.
They carried Paul down the shabby street, past a restaurant with grease-streaked windows, an empty store, an abandoned church, a group of tired people waiting for a bus. One of the kids sprinted out into the street ahead of them and held up his arms to stop the traffic. Jimmy barely noticed the cars and buses and trucks growling in the city’s end-of-the-day traffic snarl.
A tough-looking gang of kids and young men stood on the street corner and watched them as they hurried past. Jimmy saw that the next building was the hospital; gray cement walls and a faded old sign lit by a single bare bulb: outpatient clinic—cashier—emergency.
They hustled Paul right past the startled receptionist, through a half-filled waiting room, and through a double swinging door into the emergency treatment area. There was an empty white-sheeted table on their right, and they laid Paul down.
A frowning nurse bustled up to them, but before she could say anything, Mr. Martinez puffed, «Punctured lung accident.»
Her mouth clicked shut. She said, «I’ll get an intern. You go to the waiting room, all of you.»
They clumped into the waiting room, suddenly filling it to overflowing. Donna took Jimmy by the arm and sat him in one of the creaking plastic chairs, next to a fat woman who scowled at the gang of silent, scared kids. Mr. Martinez went over to the receptionist, who pulled out a long, blue-paper form and started asking him questions.
Suddenly Jimmy wanted to cry. He held back the tears, just barely. But he sank his head into his hands.
«My best buddy,» he heard himself say, his voice sounding all choked up. «I stabbed him.»
«It wasn’t your fault,» Donna said gently.
«Maybe he’ll die …»
«You didn’t do it on purpose. It was an accident.»