by Holly Bush
Then the place erupted in a deafening noise, and Alexander was pulled to his feet by virtue of how smashed he was against the men to his right and left. The whistles from the men behind him were deafening and he was sweating from the heat of the bodies and the depth of the crowd. But he found himself clapping and shouting just the same as the men around him as James Thompson made his way from an opposite door to the ring, bending down to slip through the ropes several men held up for him to enter.
Thompson was a fierce-looking competitor, and Alexander was thankful he was not the one to be meeting him in a ring. He was bare chested, wearing only a pair of close-fitting pants with a red sash holding them at his waist and tight leather flat-soled boots. He was muscular and thick chested. His hair was slicked back, and his skin shone, glistening in the light of the room.
“Thompson rubs hisself up with kitchen grease,” the man to Alex’s left was shouting to a man sitting a few rows ahead. “Make the punches slide off his skin, they say.”
“Is that allowed in this here match?” the man shouted back.
“Red Chambliss makes the rules be whatever he can and still get the fighters to come fight. If the grease makes the punches slide, then the bout is longer and Red makes more money,” another man said. “He’s always in favor of that!”
The crowd went completely silent in the next moment as a fat bald man in a bright orange jacket stepped into the ring. The bald man shouted and turned slowly so every ear could hear.
“This here’s a fight to the finish, whether it’s two rounds or twenty. I’d like it to be twenty,” he shouted to the laughing crowd. “Once a man is down, the othern can’t hit or kick him. Corky Hallman is our official and will count the ten seconds off for a knockout if a man is on the ground. He’ll be watching for low blows and any cheating. Chambliss fights don’t have any use for cheaters!”
The crowd erupted in screams, and Chambliss motioned for them to quiet down. “Padino here works at the cloth mill and recently had his right hand burned pretty bad. He’s asked to wear wraps around the knuckles and palms of that hand. Thompson has agreed to allow him to do so and will wear them himself.”
While Chambliss spoke, encouraging those who hadn’t placed a bet to do so, Hallman had both fighters at his side, talking to each and examining the hands that were wrapped. Thompson and Padino were staring at each other, and Alexander recognized the intense gaze and complete stillness of Thompson, as if the man were concentrating all his energies into the calm look he wore for his opponent.
The fighters went to opposite corners. Several men huddled around Padino, mimicking punches and defenses as he watched and nodded. Thompson stood quietly beside a tall, thin man in rolled-up shirtsleeves, a vest, and a flat cap. They did not speak at all. Thompson rolled his head once and came flying to the middle of the ring on the sound of a bell ringing. His fists flew in a combination starting with a right hand to his opponent’s jaw followed by an undercut from his left. Padino’s head bounced back, forward, and then to the side. Thompson leaned close for three bruising punches to Padino’s middle. The crowd erupted in deafening cheers.
Padino staggered back a step and shook his head but moved back toward Thompson with purpose and struck with his left fist. Thompson easily blocked the punch with his right arm and clobbered Padino from the left, sending him reeling around in a circle. Thompson waited, bouncing on his toes, his clenched fists near his chin. The crowd was chanting Thompson’s name.
“He’s the best, our James,” the man beside Alexander shouted. “Even if this Padino lands a fist, Thompson can take a beating. I’ve seen him take punch after punch and still stay on his feet. He went twenty-two rounds once.”
“He’s the champ all right,” another said.
But just as Alexander focused again on the bout, Padino landed a solid punch to Thompson’s chin. His head snapped back, and even from Alex’s perspective he could see it was a brutal blow, sending Thompson back against the ropes. Before Thompson could get his hands in front of his face, Padino swung again, a great roundhouse punch, causing blood to shoot four feet from Thompson’s mouth and sending him to his knees. The tall, thin man from Thompson’s corner was screaming at Hallman, although Alexander couldn’t hear what he said. He was gesturing wildly to Padino’s fists. Thompson pulled himself up, spitting blood and shaking his head, then dropping his hands to his sides and focusing on Padino. He roared his intent from a mouth filled with blood-covered teeth, and the crowd went wild.
Thompson flew at Padino, his fists flying faster than Alexander could follow, and Padino was soon on his heels, covering his face. Thompson backed off one step, waiting for an opening to pummel his opponent again, and Padino took a wild swing. Alexander didn’t know if Thompson’s reactions were slowed because he was tired or if he couldn’t see or if he just had not recovered from Padino’s punches, but he didn’t step away or cover his face in time, and Padino landed a closed fist on Thompson’s throat. Thompson dropped to his knees, both hands on his neck.
“Unfair!” the man beside Alexander shouted. “You can’t hit a man in the throat!”
Others were shouting and gesturing, and the two men who’d thrown the drunk out the door were suddenly in the ring, pushing back spectators from climbing over or under the ropes. The place was moments from a full-fledged riot when a young boy hurled himself past the two men to kneel on the floor beside Thompson. He could barely believe his eyes when the boy’s hat fell from his head and long auburn hair tumbled down. Elspeth Thompson! Dear God!
Alexander couldn’t get past the men on his left or right without many of them filing out of their seats. He took a glance back to where the other person had stood with Elspeth and knew it was Kirsty, now elbowing her way toward the ring. And then he noticed the two men behind Kirsty, their eyes focused on her. One of them had been in Schmitt’s office that day, and he and the other man were pushing others aside to follow her. Schmitt was having them followed!
Alexander shoved men aside and climbed over and around them to their shouts of annoyance. He pushed his way through the mob and slipped into the ring, where the tall, thin man was defending himself against the three men from Padino’s corner.
“He’s got weights in his wraps, Hallman,” the man shouted and threw a punch at one of the men. Alexander put his back to the tall man’s and swung and connected with the soft stomach of one of Padino’s handlers.
“Miss Thompson!” he shouted. “Miss Thompson!”
She looked up with startled recognition. “Mr. Pendergast! Whatever are you doing here? You’ll be hurt!”
“How is your brother?” Alexander asked as a punch landed on his shoulder and he threw a solid one back.
The tall, thin man shouted over his shoulder as he held another man flush against him, his arm around the man’s neck. “What are your sisters doing here, James? And who are you?” he shouted at Alexander.
“A friend of the Misses Thompson. How are we going to get them all out of here?” he shouted back.
“James! James! Can you walk?”
“He’s nodding yes,” Kirsty shouted.
“You take James. I’ll take his sisters. I should be able to nearly carry them both. Elspeth! Get James on his feet! I’m MacAvoy.”
“Pendergast,” Alexander said.
MacAvoy grabbed a coat lying on the floor, threw it over Thompson’s shoulders, and wrapped a long arm around each of the Thompson sisters. “Make way! Make way!” he shouted. “James Thompson’s coming through!”
Alexander got Thompson’s arm around his shoulders and put his arm around the man’s waist. There was still blood dripping on his chest, and his nose didn’t seem to be the right place. He was holding his neck and gasping for breath.
“Come on! We’ve got to stay close to your sisters,” Alexander shouted. “Can you walk?”
Thompson nodded and leaned heavily on Alex’s shoulder. He pushed and shoved and pulled the weakened man toward the door, close behind MacAvoy and the Thompson
sisters. They burst through the door into the cool night air.
“Where are we going?” Alexander asked.
“Why are those two men following us?” Kirsty said, glancing over her shoulder.
“We’re going home. James needs to be in his own bed,” Elspeth said.
MacAvoy took Thompson from Alexander’s arms and dragged him to a wagon. They pushed and pulled and shoved until he was lying on his back in the bed of the conveyance.
“Get in, girls,” MacAvoy said.
“No. We’re going to split up. Take James on a roundabout route until you know that no one is following you. Mr. Pendergast and Kirsty and I are going to take to the alley in case they follow us. Hurry! I can see one pointing at us!” Elspeth grabbed her sister’s hand. She looked at Alexander. “Hurry. You’re with us!”
“Why are they following us, Elspeth?” Kirsty said as they rounded a carriage house and plunged into the darkness of an alley where the streetlamps didn’t reach.
“I don’t know,” Elspeth answered in a breathy voice. “Wait. Stop here. I think I can hear them. Yes. They’re coming.”
“Follow me,” Kirsty said.
“I can’t see a foot in front of my face,” Pendergast said.
“Take my hand. I’ve got Kirsty’s,” she whispered.
The three of them crept through an open gate and crouched behind a low wall. Alexander was near the end of the wall and watched as the lantern one of the men held swung by. They could hear their low conversation. “They must have ducked in somewheres. In this gloom, we’ll never find them.”
“Shut up and follow me,” the other voice said.
“Come,” Pendergast whispered. “We’re going back the way we came.”
“Good idea,” Kirsty said. “We can go one more street over and up that alley. Then we can cut through Mrs. Mingo’s yard to our own kitchen entrance.”
The three of them crept back into the alleyway to the entrance where it met the street, and they were once again visible in the streetlamps.
“There they are!” they heard from behind.
“Go!” Pendergast shouted to them as he turned back to their pursuers. “Go! Run!”
Elspeth grabbed Kirsty’s hand and ran down the street toward the alley behind Mrs. Mingo’s, but she stopped when she heard gravel crunching under feet, shouted curses, and a dog barking in the distance.
“We can’t leave him,” she said, looking up at Kirsty’s filthy face and disheveled hair. “Go. I can’t leave him. He may need my help.”
Kirsty shook her head and hurried to a pile of trash near the entrance of the alley. She picked up a board and handed it to Elspeth, then picked up one of her own. “Come on!”
Elspeth turned on her heel and ran, skidding to a stop when she saw that Alexander was being held by both arms by one man while the other man punched him relentlessly in the stomach and face. The air in her nostrils was suddenly cold, and the sounds of the night were muted. She would kill him, this behemoth swinging massive arms and fists, connecting with bone and muscle.
She ran at him and swung the plank, connecting solidly with the side of the man’s head. Her momentum carried her to the ground, and she landed hard on her side. She looked up as the man turned, enraged, and bent toward her, holding his ear in one hand and reaching for her with the other.
“You bitch!” he said.
“Stay away from my sister,” Kirsty screamed as she raised the board and brought it crashing down on the back of the man’s head.
The man stumbled and dropped on top of Elspeth. She wriggled and pushed while Kirsty pulled and dragged him off of her. She sat up in time to see Alexander escape the other man’s hold. Alexander landed a hard punch to the man’s chin, and he dropped to his knees. Before she could say anything, he was leaning over her, pulling her to her feet. He held her by the shoulders, blood dripping from his nose and lip, his eye already beginning to close as he searched her face.
“You must do what I tell you to do!” he sputtered.
“Who are you to tell me—”
“I was to keep you and your sister safe. You could have been home by now!”
“I couldn’t leave you,” Elspeth said as she realized she’d begun crying. “He was hitting you, and you couldn’t fight back.”
He put his hands on her cheeks, cold and dirty against her skin. She put her hands over his and looked up at him, searching his face. It seemed as though the two of them were locked in their own world, without noise or sisters or brothers or strangers. Just Elspeth and Alexander, talking softly or not at all, and telling each other unsaid things.
“I was letting them beat me so you had enough time to make your escape,” he whispered and touched his forehead to hers. “They would have tired of hitting me, or I would have had a chance to get away, but not before I knew that you were near safety.”
“I didn’t know,” Elspeth said.
“Perhaps we should get home now before one of these men wakes up or Muireall sends for the police,” Kirsty said from behind them, breaking into their quiet world.
“Yes.” Alexander looked at the men on the ground and took her hand in his. “Hurry now before they’re able to give chase.”
They ran down the alley, past the carriage house, to the kitchen door at the Thompson residence. Lights were blazing on every floor. There would be no quiet entrance for any of them.
“Here they are,” Payden shouted when Elspeth opened the door.
Muireall came running and pulled her sisters into her arms. “Oh my dear Lord, I was so worried when MacAvoy told me you were at the fight!”
“Where is James?” Elspeth asked as she shrugged out of her coat. “How is he?”
“What is he doing here?” Muireall said when she saw Alexander.
“He saved us when some men were chasing us, Muireall,” Elspeth said. “You must say nothing unkind to him. I won’t permit it.”
Muireall glared at her. “What were you doing at that fight anyway?”
“It’s my fault,” Kirsty said and lifted her chin. “I wanted to see James fight, and Elspeth saw me as I was leaving. She followed me to keep me safe. Don’t blame her. I’m to blame.”
“Can we discuss this tomorrow? Mr. Pendergast needs attention, and I want to see James,” Elspeth said.
Muireall stared at her, and Elspeth could feel herself shrinking inward, questioning everything she did or felt, which was often the way it was under Muireall’s scrutiny. But she forced herself to look back at her sister and not look away. Muireall turned and went to the stairs.
“Come,” she said over her shoulder. “We’ve got James in his bed. Bring Mr. Pendergast. Aunt Murdoch is stitching James’s face. She’ll stitch Mr. Pendergast too, if he has anything that needs it. I want to know about these men chasing you, but we’ll discuss it later.”
Kirsty followed Muireall. Elspeth turned to Alexander and held out her hand.
He shook his head and stared into her eyes. “I’ll make my way home. My housekeeper has some experience tending cuts.”
“Come with me.”
“Your sister doesn’t want me here.”
Elspeth stepped close to him. “But I do,” she whispered. “You saved us. Come, let me tend to you.”
Chapter 9
Alexander let himself be led to an upstairs bedroom. He should have insisted on leaving when he first arrived, having gotten the Thompson sisters home safely, but now he was light-headed and short of breath. He would never be able to make it to his home on his own, and truth be told, he was enjoying Elspeth’s attention. He would have kissed her when he pulled her into his arms from where she lay on the ground if his lip wasn’t already swollen and bleeding. It was enough for now, he supposed, that she swayed into his arms, bringing her body flush against his and her face close enough that he could feel her breath on his cheeks when she whispered.
Elspeth led him to the bed, and he gingerly lowered himself down.
“Ah,” he said as he sank into the s
oft mattress and the smell of lilacs drifted up to his nose. He could lay back and sleep for a week, he thought as his eyes closed.
“And what happened to this one?” he heard from the doorway.
“Mrs. Murdoch, I’d stand if I could, but I don’t think I can,” he said and opened his eyes a sliver. Her white apron was streaked with blood, and the older sister was behind her, Muireall, the one he’d not met until a few minutes ago.
MacAvoy stuck his head above both women in the doorway. “Don’t get too comfortable, Pendergast. James wants to see you before Aunt Murdoch gets her hands on you.”
“He can talk to him later,” Elspeth said.
MacAvoy shook his head. “No, lass. He needs to talk to him now. I’ll help him. It’s only across the hall.”
MacAvoy wedged himself past the women and pulled Alexander up by the arm. “There you go, Pendergast.”
Alexander winced and let himself be led out the door, past the disapproving eyes of the women of the house, across the hall. MacAvoy rapped his knuckles on the closed door and turned the knob.
“Here he is, James. Looking a little ragged.”
Alexander walked to the bed, surveying James Thompson as he was stretched out on top of the covers, wearing only a loose-fitting pair of pants, tied at the waist with a drawstring. His neck was wrapped, and his mouth was a mass of cuts, swollen and still bleeding, with several small, neat stitches at the corner. Thompson had a rag in his hand and tapped his lip gently with it, eyeing the blood on it as he pulled it from his face with a shaking hand.
“Get closer, Pendergast. He can only whisper, and he’s not even to do that much,” MacAvoy said and turned his head to the door. “Out with you then, Muireall. This is manly talk. Shoo.”
“What happened at the fight? Did Padino have something in his hands?” Alexander asked.
