The Devil's Tub

by Edward Hoagland

  The partner naturally had got depressed. Number Four dropped his arms, quit offense and when the guy let loose his all, just wriggled with delight at the massage. And rocked against the ropes to hear them creak, rocked and rocked, began avoiding punches with his body, curling kitten-wise this way or that, sucking in his tummy; arms stayed at his sides. Around the ring like rubber he rocked, limp and lax and scarcely getting hit. One rope’s spring propelled him to the next. Eluded and evaded everything as if it were rehearsed.

  He stopped that business, took a few and let the guy get to him and raised his arms and fought in close. He fought like you would see him on TV against class fighters at their best, who’d have their way to some extent, Four unavoidably being hit and thus sharp-punching at tight targets like the nose and eyes and solar plexus to cut and pain the man and jar his aim; of course he’d hit the jaw whenever he could. This guy wasn’t quite the same, though, this poor kid with features bull’s-eyed in a wad. Number Four drained everything to quarter-strength for him. And on Four’s face that mild, eager, searching look like always when he fought.

  He frauded for the fun of it now, Four, pretended to be hurt and woozy—buckled knees, drooped head. He ‘possumed helpless in the middle of the ring, fumbling for a clinch, woodenly walking into what was thrown, exposing his heart and tummy. But as the partner got engrossed, Four sharp-shot a bunch of aces to eyes and nose—kept quarter-force—and by mistake, it must have been, he clonked the partner’s chin. This put the sags and staggers in the partner’s legs; he braced them wide-apart and quivering. Number Four put out his arms as stiff as railings for the guy to rest on and, when he could stand up by himself, just nuzzled languidly head to head with him and slowly shadow- boxed, leaving his own stomach open-target for encouragement.

  When the guy felt better Number Four spoke Spaniard to him, apparently telling him he’d let his face alone, to cover up his trunk. The partner crossed his arms. Number Four whipped golfing bolo rocket punches down from shoulder height which smashed in on the navel, real divine whirlo bolo punches arching like a scythe which made the paying fans shout. Showoff, yes, but full of zazz. Little Peapod paused in hunting cigar butts to watch. His eyes, instead of being muffled with subservience, were lighted fiercely.

  They wrapped their arms around each other’s shoulders and went to get rubbed down. Both faces gabbled Spanish happily—Four Contender’s mild and eager, the partner’s like a penny put under a train.

  Shuffling, Kelly wrung his wrists and rolled his head around on his neck like a juggled ball. He fiddled with his trunks to sit them higher on his midriff so the legal target would be lessened, and wiggled his feet—the socks were smooth, the laces tight—and closed his eyes, rested vacantly. For a while he was just conscious of his body, how comfortable it felt, not springy like a kid’s, but plenty big and tricky. No, he wouldn’t be hurt, he felt too fine; he was in his prime. Good old boy that never gave him any trouble. He found a private corner behind the rubdown tables and looked across the straightening bending bodies to the whole of the gym. It was a madhouse. In the ring a skinny fighter was taking a beating. Every time he got off something the sound would show he’d hit an arm. Every time the other man chopped in his right there’d be the soft thud of hitting home. The ring shook and squeaked. Spectators clapped. Shadow-boxers stomped the floor. Skip ropes slapped and whispered (when you couldn’t hear them, watching them you thought you could). The skippers thumped their feet. Big bags jerked and shivered up at crazy angles, to the thunder of the little ones. Fighters shuffled in a maze of warm-ups. Several languages were used. The managers goosed and sparred hilariously, pulling ties. “Who?” DeJesus yelled above the uproar; a name was wanted on the phone. “Who? Cufflinks Prince?” He gaped with disbelief and leapt up, spitting like a hot frying pan. He would have thrown his arm except it was attached. “You know that bum’s not allowed in here!” His two poor legs hardly could support his fury. He hawked a real whopper up and let it fly. From the fighting ring, sharp anguished gasps and snorts of heavy labor; the blinks were in the skinny fighter’s eyes, his head was being knocked back and forth with faint flesh-squashing noises as fast as if it were a bag. It shivered like a melon, unattached to him, and flung off hair sweat, tiny tears and spittle drops which could be seen. His head guard looked about to split—it looked as though the lacing of the head guard was lacing on his very head and couldn’t help but split. And still the punches came in succinct thuds. Speed bags reverberated savagely through the gym and underneath their roar were sounds of shaking rings, DeJesus’ fury, managers’ catcalls, whizzing skip ropes, shadow-box gyrations, heavy bags being plastered, plunging calisthenics, until the gym seemed about to fly apart.

  Rudd paced as though his rounds were soon. Kelly asked him, “When do we go in?”

  “Are we boxing? I don’t know, when they tell us.” Rudd pointed at a doe-eyed Negro. “I’ve got him too. He might be first.” He paced alongside Kelly companionably but silently, looking at the floor. Their strides weren’t matched. Rudd seemed to churn along with tremendous energy, slow and channeled. Even walking, his legs hardly stayed under him; they were geared to driving ahead so powerfully. Fighting, if he didn’t come on at you, he’d fall flat. Kelly’d watched him on TV against a classy boxer-puncher tiger who assumed a fancy stance and moved in like the dreadnaught that he thought he was. Rudd, also moving in, had ragged him twice; and all the offense and the class went sick, the tiger dropped them like a stone to cover up and bob down in his lowest crouch. Rudd chased him till he’d knocked him out. His face was scary to anyone who cared about his own: it had a dozen widgets from sewn-up cuts and over parts of it a slick scar-skin had grown in place of welts, a skin so shiny that if he’d been white it would have looked like bone. Under the skin-thick reinforcement buttressing were eyes swollen into Oriental slits, cheeks Indian and huge, brows, nose, chin, each immense—that was what you punched at, features. When Rudd had first puffed up he’d probably looked like China, permanently crying, which made a funny contrast with a smile. But now he’d gone beyond that. He just looked puffed, as with weary sleeplessness, no emotion, only puffed. And his nose, although gigantic as three noses, had been leveled down until it was becoming just another buttress pad across his face. Twenty-two, Rudd was.

  This was no way. Kelly went off by himself again to get into a better frame of mind. He was still in his twenties and younger than plenty of active champs had been. What did he have to worry about? He’d sparred with Tony DeMarco when both of them were kids in Boston, and Tony had ranked Number One behind Basilio for years. Kelly slipped into his fighting stance, arms set loose, hands quite wide. It was a good reliable stance for any general purpose and boosted his spirits because he was proud of it. He really began to feel like fighting. It was a mood to be worked into by walking, by getting grim, thinking what Rudd hoped to do to him and what the rounds could mean if he did well and what specific punches he was going to throw. Soon he was ready to knock the stuffing out of anyone.

  Five minutes later he munched the mouthpiece out of Cracker’s hand and slid his shoes around, looking solemnly down on the people. “To the meat,” Rudd’s trainer was telling Rudd. Kelly smiled and bit his mouthpiece sternly. More than the gloves, the mouthpiece in his teeth made him know that he was going to fight. He crossed himself and circled the ring, dancing and thrusting out his arms. A grave and blank expression settled over his face to cover up the rising heat he felt. He went to a corner and faced away as if Rudd’s name were being announced, ground his feet like crushing bugs, plotted how his arms would go. Twice he glanced at the clock, and ticked the time off in his mind, turned as the bell was about to strike and scrabbled a cross in case he hadn’t done it right before.

  Most anybody would exchange hands at first, a lead for a lead, a cross for a cross, in a study period, but not Rudd. He probably couldn’t lead, he was so crude. Plod and halt, plod and halt was his pattern—halt if he could drag his legs underneath him fast enough. His
gloves pointed at each other by his stomach, making no defense attempt. Kelly jabbed him as Straws had suggested and the reaction was an uppercut one-two, the right hand’s path a mirror of the left’s. Neither got to Kelly; he stepped back. Rudd, ungainly guy, hadn’t any follow-up or plan—jabbing him you might as well have pressed a button which turned out uppercuts and roundhouses and looping overhands; the last two he threw only in excitement. And the side of the glove seemed the same as the punch of the glove to him. He didn’t care. Everything went all out. Everything was spadework for a K.O. He had no subtleties or medium attack.

  Kelly put his hands further from his body than usual and hit Rudd with straight things to keep him off—not that it bothered Rudd so much, but his arms were shorter than Kelly’s. He was the opposite of a counterpuncher, being entirely aggressive, but he acted like one with those automatic uppercut answers to each of Kelly’s jabs. He had a horseshoe in his glove—Kelly’s forearms caught the uppercuts and even there they hurt. Kelly warmed more to the round and stung Rudd with a combination to the head which at least made him lift his arms. The next one he sloughed aside like a snowplow, as elementarily as that. Kelly grinned across his mouthpiece at Rudd’s crudeness. Pretty soon he’d quit this caution and slug naturally, working from the body up. He winged a straight long left to Rudd’s mustache and curved a right which ended on his eye and dug a left hook to his heart. All went through.

  It seemed like he could score at will, because Rudd’s arms were down. What doing? Kelly’s belly almost left him, that’s what! The second uppercut—no aim adjustment made for Kelly’s doubling up—hit Kelly’s chest. The third, immediately after it, from the left hand again, would have rubbered Kelly flat except he stumbled to the side. Instead of his chin it hit his shoulder. He was way down, face gargoyled in pain, clutching his arm across his middle and trying to pry his head in underneath them. He couldn’t have stuck his arms out for a clinch, his belly was too caved; it hurt like a vicious cramp. He quavered backwards as though on ice, groping with his feet. Rudd kept throwing, misses because Kelly had moved, sometimes roundhouses instead of uppercuts, although the arc made was the same. Ponderous, Rudd pushed after Kelly, but Kelly could go faster and gradually recovered, his cockiness not wholly scared away.

  What a funny fighter! Western-movie-type: no punching volume, only force in what he threw. The trainers had accomplished nothing except stretch him out to go ten rounds. All that remained for them to do was give him his feet and a guard and teach him to lead and to hook and to jab and to cross! Kelly would stick him with jabs, and there was a sneak straight right he’d called on in the old days, and his rainbow right brought down from the sky. Power-crazy Rudd with his windmills from ten feet out should be no permanent problem—he didn’t even seem to keep track of where his own hands were, but would sort of discover them before he punched. Ugly, octopussy style. Kelly hung out of Rudd’s range and sent him stuff which had gone soft by the time it landed. But he reached his eyes. After all the receding they’d done and the cartilage surrounding them, still they could be reached, and got their corners cut each feature bout. Kelly’d frame a mouse around both eyes.

  When Kelly came to closer quarters, Rudd began to shove. Strange shoves, the purpose not to set up Kelly for a punch, but to set himself! Kelly was a sack of something to be lifted, and all Rudd thought he needed was the leverage. He’d try to tip him in the right direction with a shoulder jostle and put his head against his neck and place his feet, and then let blast; of course Kelly wouldn’t have it go that far, and Rudd was anything but hard to fool because the fact of Kelly’s being a human, not a sack, came as a surprise. Blocking those uppercuts was murder on the wrists and elbows, though, and once when Kelly grabbed Rudd to tie him up he found he couldn’t hold him—he couldn’t clinch! So what to do, stand and trade blockbusters with the guy, or spar and run and guard his health? He had no choice. That missed Kelly, and that did too, thank God, and Kelly landed one, he thought. But Rudd was happy to take five in order to throw two. Rudd lurched, ape-footed, heaving up his paws. On TV when his man was macaroni on the ropes he’d go into a wild and stamping dance with punches flung exultantly as whoops. Study him, study him, Kelly told himself. He was giving up the possibility of looking very good. Cautiously he held him off. Rudd was familiar with delaying games, but he didn’t make allowances for them, didn’t even get mad. Mad, he couldn’t have swung any harder. “Work, Charlie! Mix, Charlie!” yelled a fan. Kelly backed away, thankful Rudd was slow. He tried again to tie him up. The arms that clung onto Rudd were no stronger than two noodles; into his stomach big bombs burst. He got away sick with pain. To fight a guy he couldn’t neutralize by clinching was terrifying. Hit him and run, hit him and run was the only way to last, and Rudd had learned Kelly’s rhythms now, such as they were, and went after him quicker. Kelly was trapped and hurt twice in the corners right in the belly. He couldn’t punch free. He pulled himself out by a rope one time, wobbling in pain; the next he caught hold of Rudd’s head and tried to bang it on a ring post. Rudd’s trainer shouted angrily.

  They tapped each other on the head and on the fanny at the bell and circled the ring in opposite directions until they came around to where Rudd’s trainer stood. Kelly leaned on the rope, exhaustedly resting. The trainer would have lagged with Rudd, but Rudd wouldn’t let him, made him give Kelly attention. Kelly’s nose, cheeks and forehead were regreased, also his gloves, to protect Rudd (whose hadn’t been). His mouthpiece was rinsed and crammed back in his mouth. His chin strap was yanked insultingly. “Fight him!”

  He hated to leave the ropes, his middle was so tender. The bell alone was a stimulus to Rudd, who started lifting uppercuts immediately. But Kelly flared: the “Fight him” and his trapped imminence of being clobbered. The very ropes were wrapped in cloth a funeral black. He closed with Rudd and slugged, which was his natural fight and not the sharp-shooting boxing. He used long rights and overhands and long left hooks that packed their power at a distance where Rudd’s shorter stuff would not. It was a pleasure to his arms, and sweat flew off Rudd laughably wherever he got hit. He smacked him in the throat and made him gag, then had to move away in front of Rudd’s slow, dragging charge. Moving meant he couldn’t hold his range; either he missed or else Rudd grazed him. Rudd was a machine, with unvarying swings. All of a sudden Kelly shook him with a looping right which flattened the glove and, while the moment lasted, frenziedly swarmed him with close-quarter chops and hooks downstairs to disembowel him.

  What Rudd returned to Kelly drove his stomach to his backbone. It collapsed him. He got more. He didn’t count the punches. His legs would still work, compared to the rest of his body. Palsied, they carried him back, Rudd following and landing. Nothing hit belt-line like the first, but gloves blitzed into his face and chest. At each one Kelly’s whole body shivered uncontrollably. He groped backward, trembly-legged. Rudd followed with the dragging gait. Kelly pushed out his arms to hold him off and fought the shakes and fought to clear his mind. Jab! Jab him! he started to remember, when he felt the ropes against his spine. He jabbed with both hands desperately, but Rudd plunged through and hit him on the lowest rib, hit him on the lungs and hit him on the liver. Kelly couldn’t breathe. He was smothering with pain. His legs went trembling stiff; his head dropped forward. Rudd hit and knocked the mouthpiece out and nearly tore the hinging off the jaw. Kelly put his face into his palms and, half-unconscious, bent between Rudd’s gloves. He couldn’t move or hide or breathe. . . .

  Rudd supported him against the ropes. Kelly clung around his shoulders, clumsy, coming to. With the action of actually helping and raising him, Rudd began slow-motion uppercuts, so as not to stall the round. A little while and Kelly crossed his arms and let Rudd use more force on them and fifteen seconds later was answering with tappings of his own. The middle minute passed in light and dream barragings of each other, perfect punches hard as pats. When Kelly put some bite in his, so did Rudd, and, Kelly having cleared his head, the fight resumed except
Rudd remained outside of Kelly’s jabs.

  Kelly’s mind and reflexes were functioning okay, recovering. The pain had numbed and wasn’t hampering him. But, like a pro, Rudd watched the clock, and like a twenty-two-year-old, he couldn’t bear to goof around the last few seconds. He plowed through Kelly’s jabs and socked. Kelly was a bag of sand for him to lift. Lift him he did with belly punches and, like a sack being slit and emptied, Kelly sank away to shapelessness. The strength slid out of him like so much sand and he clung limply, slobbering on Rudd’s shoulder. Rudd spanked his ass. The people clapped.

  Crackers stripped off Kelly’s stuff and Kelly fixed his eyes on him as if he were a doctor; he wanted to sit down but Crackers wouldn’t let him. Crackers’ face was screwed into the lines he wore when tending battered boys. “We yelled at him when he was lickin’ you so bad, but you know how they never hear. He’s worse, he’s dumb.” Kelly didn’t try to speak. He wanted to lie down. Crackers kept examining him for cuts; he must be red. Finally Crackers shrugged and slipped from under him, so that he couldn’t lean, and patted him and left him with a towel.

  A towel. He focused on the fact of holding it, and touched his midriff gingerly and flinched. His eyes were fuzzed. In arena fights he’d taken maybe two or three beatings like this, when he was much younger. He groaned and was ashamed of groaning. He’d better not sit down; his body troubles would just harden on him. Actually his jaw was the sorest, but nobody minded a sore jaw as much. He walked a little bit. Two rounds in a gym—was it Rudd or was it him? Didn’t matter, this was quits—he’d started coming again mostly to kill time; never again. A trainer and a fighter were arguing. What was there to argue about, how bad your organs were being rearranged? Kelly walked gently, not to let the pains harden.