“So does the Champ, Shirley.”
She made a face. “He keeps telling me I’ve hitched my wagon to the right star. I hate him when he says that.”
“Don’t have any fights with him before the go, Shirley.”
She drew herself up. “Don’t talk nonsense, Lew. I’m Keno’s sister. I know about fighters.”
“Sorry, honey.”
Maybe you caught it on TV last night. Or maybe you were there. You saw the end of the story. The way Junior came out and got on the bicycle. You heard how they booed him. The referee kept motioning for Junior to come on in and fight. You saw the number of times the Champ stopped and motioned to Junior to come on in and trade punches. Junior stayed out of the corners and kept moving fast, along the ropes. The Champ couldn’t corner him.
A lot of people switched to another band on their sets. So they missed the seventh. Junior came out and he was still on his bicycle. Not one solid blow had been struck in the fight. And then after twenty seconds of running, Junior reversed. He took the Champ’s right around the back of his neck and dropped home the prettiest straight right I have ever seen. It didn’t travel over eight inches. The Champ’s pants bounced off the floor and for once he lost his head and came up too fast. He still had fog in his brain. Junior dropped him on his face with a left and right.
Right then a lot of people learned something about champions. He got his hands under his chest at the count of four. At seven he got a knee under. At nine he came up, pulling that dazed squatty body off the floor through sheer will power. Instinct carried him through the rest of the round, brought him up after the two knockdowns that followed. And each time he came up he seemed a little stronger.
The crowd noise was one continuous high-pitched scream like nothing I ever heard before. It didn’t let up between rounds. And that incredible man came bounding out for the eighth. Maybe Junior thought it was an act.
Junior tried to stand toe to toe with him. He missed twice for every blow he landed. The Champ didn’t miss at all. Junior went down twice. He went down the third time and he was counted out as, with a smeared mask for a face, he was trying to use the ropes to pull himself back up onto legs that wouldn’t hold him.
I had him on the stool when the Champ came over. Junior was just able to keep himself erect on the stool.
The Champ said, panting, “How goes it, kid?”
“It’ll be warm in California for the Christmas vacation,” Junior mumbled.
“What goes with him?” the Champ yelled over the crowd noise.
Junior saw him then. His eyes cleared. “You wouldn’t stay down,” he said accusingly.
“In my business, I can’t afford to. Nice fight, kid.”
We got him back to the dressing room. I cut the tape off his hands while Micky swabbed his face clean with a special tenderness.
The loser’s dressing room is always a funeral. Some of the press boys come around for a little color. “How hard did he hit you, son?”
Micky chased them out. His cigar was out but he was still chomping on it. His voice shook a little as he said, “Nice, kid. A nice battle. Beat some of the kinks out of him, Lew.”
“I’m through,” Junior said dully. “I’m all done.”
“I expected that, kid,” Micky said. “Maybe the next good boy I get will let me bring him along the right way.” Micky walked out.
Junior was almost asleep when Shirley came in. She went to his side and took his hand. He opened his eyes and gave her a startled look. I moved away from the table.
“You’ve got your cues wrong, honey,” he said. His voice was harsh. “I didn’t win. I lost.”
“I watched it, dear.”
He pulled his hand away. “There’s no angle here, honey. I’m through fighting.”
“Angle, angle,” she said. “Can’t you think of anything else? What do you think I am? What do you think most people are? Most people are just like you and just like me. Lonely a lot of the time. Afraid sometimes. Don’t you know that you’ve got... you’ve got to have somebody to love? If you don’t... you’re alone. Always.” Her voice grew uncertain. “Somebody who cares what happens to you.”
She went down onto her knees then on the tile floor and as she is not a tall girl, her forehead came just high enough to rest against the padded edge of the rubbing table. Her shoulders shook, but she did not make a sound.
Junior came up onto one elbow. He reached his hand out and touched her hair. In his eyes was a great wonder.
I shut the door quietly behind me. I could hear the sounds of celebration from the Champ’s room, echoing in the concrete corridor.
The crowd had gone, leaving a litter of gum wrappers, cigarette butts, the smell of smoke and sweat and perfume.
Micky was out by the car. He was leaning against it and he had relit the cigar. It glowed against the night.
We stood for a time in silence, as old friends can.
“He might come along O.K.,” I said.
“Uh?” he said, around the cigar.
“Shirley’s in there. Give him a few months. He’ll fight again.”
Micky thought that over. He took the cigar out of his mouth and spat a flake of tobacco from his lip. “I’d like that,” he said. “I always told you he’s a good boy.”
We got in the car and went back to the hotel.
But that was only last night, and it’s still too early to tell.