by Tom Schreck
“What do we do about it?”
“We? Don’t tell me you’re getting back in the private-eye business.” Kelley rolled his eyes.
“Uh …” I didn’t know how to say what was on my mind.
“Oh geez …”
“I just feel like someone has to look out for Howard. Everyone’s against him.”
“It’s tough to get people on your side when you have his history.”
“Yeah but—”
“Duff, he brutally murdered four kids.”
“Thirty years ago. Doesn’t a guy ever get to live that down?”
“Not in my book.”
“Maybe in mine. Maybe what was going on inside him was so painful that his choices were narrowed.”
“Now you’re starting to sound like those assholes you work with.”
“It’s different. I know everyone’s responsible for what they do, but couldn’t it be the case that for some people, doing the right thing is just really, really fuckin’ hard?” I took a sip of the Schlitz.
“Allow for that and you got chaos in society,” Kelley said.
“I’m just talking about one guy—not all of society.”
“Look, Duff, I’m not a real complicated guy and I don’t do a complicated job. I bust guys who break the law.” Kelley took a pull of his Coors Light. “The bigger issue is you getting involved. Last time you did, it wreaked havoc, people died … shit, you almost died. Everything came out okay, but it almost didn’t. Use your head and let the cops handle this one,” he said.
We sat quietly for a second and I knew he was right. It wasn’t my job, it wasn’t my role to defend the universe or even to come to Howard’s rescue. I was overinvolved already and I had enough going on in my life that I didn’t need to play Robin Hood.
“You’re right. I need to back off,” I said.
“Promise me, you’ll stay away from the hero stuff,” Kelley said.
“Yeah, it doesn’t feel quite right but it makes sense. No more ‘Duffy for Hire.’”
“AJ, let me buy Duffy’s next Schlitz.”
Kelley didn’t buy my drinks very often.
14
I continued to train for my bout with Perryman. It wasn’t the real intense training you do to get in shape, it was the type of training you do to stay sharp and keep your engine tuned. It’s hard for people to understand, but more isn’t better when it comes to training. Probably the biggest problem you see with fighters is overtraining—that is, they do too much. Guys will try to work out their anxiety by pushing themselves extra hard, and come fight night they’ve left all their energy back in the gym. I’ve been around long enough to know not to do that.
My new spiky-haired promoter called Smitty and let him know that my bout was going on a card featured at the Altamont Fair. The fair is a big county to-do up the Thruway near Albany, and it drew a couple hundred thousand people every year for a week in August. I don’t know how he pulled it off, but he had a five-card show scheduled for the weekend and fairgoers would only have to pay an extra ten bucks on top of their fair admission to get in to the fights.
Big-time promoters could make things happen and make things happen quickly. The notoriety the Garden fight gave me was going to be short-lived, so he had to exploit it quickly. I didn’t mind; I was used to taking short-notice fights, and besides, Jerry Perryman was guaranteed to be as mediocre as it got. The Crawford newspaper, the Union Star, even did a profile of me and explained how the fight was a lead-in to the NABU title fight.
Newspaper stories covering my fights were few and far between. I almost never fought close to Crawford, and most of the time they never covered it. Now I was a human interest story because of my counselor job and my overnight success as a prizefighter. Never mind that the overnight success took fourteen years.
Meanwhile, Al was still making me nuts with all his running around the trailer. It had gotten to be an every-morning thing, maybe because Billy seemed to show up uninvited almost every morning to demonstrate a new way he could fall on his head. Al didn’t like the unannounced visits, so even when Billy didn’t come he’d bark and run around to ward off anyone who might show up. The bruises and welts on my shins from when Al would duck for cover just ahead of my grasp were piling up like the notches on a cowboy’s gun.
I called my old friend Jamal for some canine guidance. Jamal was a fighter who had hung up his gloves after a lackluster pro career and he also was in the Nation of Islam. That’s where he met Walanda, a client of mine who was murdered a while back. She was Al’s original master after he flunked out of the Nation’s bomb-sniffing canine program. It wasn’t that Al couldn’t sniff explosives—in fact, he was very good at it and even helped me uncover a terrorist aiming to drop a dirty bomb on Yankee Stadium last year. The problem with Al was that he was always shitting and pissing on everything and that didn’t go over too well with the bow-tied and righteous brothers.
I wanted Jamal’s recommendations for calming Al down. I got him on his cell.
“Hey Duff—I’m surprised you even talk to little people like me now that you’ve hit the big time,” Jamal said.
“Oh, I’m big all right,” I said.
“White guy with an Irish name—shit, you got it made as long as you keep winnin’. Who they got for you?”
“Some guy named Perryman from Arkansas.”
“Boy, they takin’ care of you, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess—hey, what do I do to get my short-legged Muslim brother to settle down? He’s making me nuts.”
“Shittin’ and pissin’, huh?”
“Actually, I’ve kind of gotten used to that. It’s the crazy running all around the house.”
“Take him tracking. Have him follow someone around or just take a walk without him and leave a hunk of food at the end of your walk. He loves to find where people went.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“No, it’s what hounds are supposed to do.”
“So pretty much get lost and have him find me?”
“Duff, people been tellin’ you to get lost for years, haven’t they?”
“Yeah—I’ve never done it though.”
“No, Duff, no you haven’t.”
I thanked Jamal and figured, what the hell. I got Al’s leash, flopped his fat ass up on my Eldorado’s passenger seat, and drove him over to TC’s house. TC lived in a cushy suburb of Crawford known as Londonville, which bordered the industrial section, just a couple of miles from AJ’s. On the way over, Al started to whine because I was listening to the sports radio station. I know that whine and it was Al’s way of saying he wanted to hear Elvis sing “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” He was crazy about the tune and there was no use fighting it. If I didn’t throw in the Blue Hawaii eight-track, the whining would get unbearable.
Elvis just got past the “Wise men say…” part when Al settled in, let out a big sigh, and relaxed.
We got to TC’s house and his car wasn’t there, so I figured he wasn’t home, which was actually what I was hoping. I didn’t knock on the door, I just had Al sniff the lawn chair by the garage that TC sits in on those rare occasions that he’s home and not at AJ’s. Al started to sniff all over the chair like it was covered in sardines and then he looked up.
“Go find!” I said, just like Jamal told me to.
Al bolted along TC’s front lawn, nose to the ground like an anteater addicted to cocaine. He continued along the street, pausing at telephone poles and street signs to sniff their bases. Occasionally, he would pause and then run around in a circle like he was creating a whirlpool of scent for his nose. Then, he’d be back on the trail, working his ass off to the point that I had trouble holding on to him. He was definitely into smelling where TC went and he just wouldn’t let it go.
He was almost on a dead run for a ha
lf an hour and we covered the distance to AJ’s in no time. We were coming up on AJ’s when he abruptly stopped, squatted, and let go. Nature was taking its course, and Al finished up by proudly kicking gravel over his trophy before sprinting off for TC. In about ten minutes we were at AJ’s front door.
I opened the door up and Al bounded through with such vigor that I lost the hold on his leash. He darted for TC, who was saying something about the fact that when ducks quacked it didn’t echo, and Al went airborne and caught TC right in the nuts. The B&B left his hands and covered his shirt while Al started to lick his prey’s face.
“Ughhhhh! … Duffy—I’m going to get dog-related AIDS … ,” TC said.
“There’s our favorite basket hound,” Rocco said. Al was pushing his ample nose into TC’s face, licking and nibbling on TC’s ears.
“Dog likes B&B,” Jerry Number One said.
“Rocco—he’s a basset hound. We’ve been over this,” I said.
“That’s right, he’s French,” Jerry Number Two said.
“He’s a frog dog?” Rocco said.
“I didn’t think he could swim. Where do they put the tanks?” Jerry Number One said.
“What the hell are you talking about?” TC said, wiping slobbered B&B from his cheek.
“Frog dog—like, you know, like in the Navy. Don’t they use underwater bassoon hounds to sniff out explosives?” Jerry Number One asked.
“He can’t swim. Basset hounds have the densest bones of all dog breeds and they sink,” I said, having watched Animal Planet.
“Shitty frog dogs then, huh?” Jerry Number One said.
“You sure it’s not the weight from the tanks?” Jerry Number Two said.
It was a little early for me to sit and pound a few Schlitzes, so I bid the guys a quick early afternoon farewell and walked Al home. Just as Jamal promised, he was remarkably more subdued. Maybe it was the tracking or maybe it was simply the exertion, but it didn’t matter to me. If it would mellow Al out, I’d take him for synchronized swimming lessons—with or without the tanks.
When we got back to the Blue there was a message from Smitty. Apparently, Jerry Perryman’s license had been suspended and they had to get me a new opponent. The new guy was named Rufus Strife from Oklahoma and his record was even worse than Perryman’s. Like me, Strife was a short-notice guy who would get paid more than Perryman because he was taking the fight on even shorter notice. None of it mattered to me; I knew the guy was coming in to be a stiff.
15
For the first time in my professional boxing career, I was excited about possibilities. Don’t get me wrong, I loved to fight and I got off on the thrill of it, but I never really allowed myself to believe that it was going someplace. This new opportunity wasn’t necessarily for a starring role in the game, but it meant being someone rather than just an opponent.
It’s a weird business. I felt like I stepped on the right Monopoly square, and I have to admit I liked what was happening. I’ve always played the guy who was being sent in for cannon fodder, and now they were finding me a setup. I didn’t feel bad over that—Strife would get his paycheck and go home just like I’ve done lots of times.
I couldn’t remember being in better shape. I wasn’t fooling myself, I knew the NABU was not a real championship, but even marginal titles meant more fights, more TV, and more money. I had been a pro for eight years and getting to wear a championship belt, even a goofy one, was a big deal to me.
The promoter loved the response I got at the Garden from the Irish. In boxing you can become a folk hero if a nationality gets behind you. He was talking about plans for Chicago, Milwaukee, Boston, and even Belfast or Warsaw down the road, maybe not as a headliner but as a co-feature or added attraction that would get the crowd going. It sure beat fighting in front of disinterested crowds who had no idea who you were and cared even less. Irish and Polish fans came out for their countrymen because of their nationalistic pride and because of the fact that the beer was pretty cheap at the fights. That was cool with me.
So it was pretty clear: win this fifth fight and get a chance to fight for a belt. Win the belt and every fight means a bit more money. The fight with Strife at the fair was going to be broadcast on the Gotham Cable Network, which featured weekly TV fights that weren’t what you’d call “world class.” Honestly, a fight card where Duffy Dombrowski is the feature attraction is not exactly world class—not yet anyway.
Fight night came and I was walking on clouds. There were several thousand fans from the area and for the first time ever, Crawford was seeing me as their guy. It felt a little weird but I loved it and it charged me up. I got to the fair a couple of hours before my bout during one of the early prelims and found our makeshift dressing rooms were in the cinder-block building in the center of the fairgrounds.
Smitty wrapped my hands in his usual deliberate fashion, all the while reciting his mantra of fundamentals. They were the same pre-fight things he’s said for the last fourteen years to me and to everyone else he’s trained. It’s not that he’s not creative or doesn’t know the game inside and out—he definitely does. He believes down to his bones that boxing is a matter of doing the right things over and over, every training session, every round and every fight. He, of course, was right.
Strife had the dressing room right next to mine and, unlike a lot of fighters before fights, he was quiet. I saw him briefly at the weigh-in and the pre-fight physicals, and let’s just say, he was less than imposing. Simply put, he was fat, slow moving, and he looked disinterested. These weren’t the characteristics of a champion, which was okay by me. If ol’ Rufus wanted to get a payday and go home, that was going to be just fine.
While the preliminaries were going on on the Gotham Network, announcers came into my dressing room to get some comments they could air during our introductions. It was the usual TV shit—actually, who am I kidding? I’ve been on TV a couple of times but never as a feature fighter, so this was hardly usual for me. What was usual were the idiotic questions about my strategy, what the fight meant, et cetera, et cetera. My strategy was to hit the other guy more than he hit me, and the fight meant a chance to make some cash. Of course I didn’t say that, but that was the real deal. The commentator was a guy named Bobby Briggs who had held the middleweight title for a month or so in the ’70s. He was a fighter and a decent guy.
“Duffy, can you tell us what this fight means to you?” Briggs asked.
“It means a chance at a belt but more importantly it means a chance to show my hometown who I am and what I can do,” I said.
“Do you have a game plan to handle Strife?”
“Well, he won’t have to find me—I plan to be right in front of him, pressing the action.”
“Thanks, Duffy. Good luck.” Briggs finished up with me and spoke with the camera guys about some technical stuff before moving on. They left me and I presumed they went over to talk to Rufus, who was still silent in his room. He didn’t even bring a cornerman, instead he was going to use a local guy and pay him fifty bucks from his purse. That wasn’t unheard of, but it was pretty sad even by boxing standards.
Smitty started to have me loosen up with some pad work. Before fights he spent most of the time drilling the recoil again and again to burn it into my mind even more just before I went in the ring. The goal was to get me to break a light sweat before I went in the ring and it was a good strategy. Guys who went in cold and dry often got caught with a punch they weren’t expecting.
Smitty had me take a break and I heard Briggs outside the door arguing with some producer type wearing a head set.
“I don’t care what you say,” Briggs said. “It ain’t right and I ain’t using it.”
“C’mon, Bobby it makes great stuff,” Headset said.
“The fuckin’ guy’s mom dies two days ago and he takes the fight for funeral expenses and you think that’s cool?
Fuck you.” Briggs said.
The headset guy walked away with his arms up in the air for maximum dramatic effect. I walked over to Briggs against Smitty’s protest.
“Kid, get your head where it belongs,” Smitty said.
“Hang on,” I said.
I walked up the hallway to find Briggs. I called to him to slow down.
“Hey, Bobby,” I said.
“Yeah, Duff?”
“That shit about Strife’s mom—is that true?”
“Kid,” Briggs said. “It’s not your concern. Go warm up,” he said.
“But—”
“Look, Duff, I got to get to the ring.”
He walked away and I stood there, not sure what to think. I turned just in time for Strife to leave his dressing room to make his ring walk. Handwritten on his terrycloth robe was “For Momma.”
Smitty scolded me back to the dressing room and told me to get my head into the fight. I tried and got ready to walk out to the ring. I felt sick to my stomach, but it wasn’t the usual pre-fight jitters—this was different. I walked out to the strains of Elvis’s opening, the 2001: A Space Odyssey theme, and tried to get ready. The crowd cheered my entrance and I heard them, but it was like I was removed from it at the same time. Something wasn’t right.
In the ring, Strife’s robe was off and it was clear he wasn’t in any kind of shape at all. His gut hung over his trunks and he had “Laney RIP” written on his beltline. The sickness in my stomach grew. The ref brought us together for instructions and Strife looked to the ceiling. Tears trickled down his cheeks, and we touched gloves and went back to our corners. As he turned he said, “Momma, for you.”
I almost threw up.
In the corner, Smitty put my mouthpiece in and told me to concentrate. The bell rang for the start of the fight, and I came out of the corner doing my best to be instinctive. Rufus was fat and didn’t move well. I hit him with the first jab I threw and his knees actually wobbled a bit.
