Dreadful Summit

by Stanley Ellin

  Suppose he started to put up a fight before I got a chance to tell him what it was all about? I would have to plug him in the belly then, so he could hang on a little while and I could tell him. Then I would put in the finisher.

  The big clock on the wall said ten o’clock, because the last preliminary was over and the main bout was ready to go on. That meant they were putting it on the radio too, and maybe Flanagan was sitting there and listening. He was a bug on fights, and if he got my father to bed all right he would sit in the parlor and listen. But what if my father got worried and they started looking for me? They would know easy where I was because the tickets were gone. The best thing would be if the fight was over right away and I could get going.

  Only what worried me was finding Al Judge down there. There was no fighting in the ring, only a lot of guys walking around and talking, and plenty of light. Once the fight started, it would be even harder to find him, and it was plenty tough enough now without my glasses.

  I started looking at one corner of the ring and I looked all around the four sides trying to count heads, but I could hardly make anything out. Then I saw the man next to me was looking through a little pair of field glasses, not big ones like Mr Reardon had for the races but little ones, and I figured I would ask for a lend of them. When I started to ask, I saw it was the redheaded man I sold my ticket to.

  That shows how dumb you can be sometimes when you’re all hot and bothered. I mean, he was using my other ticket so of course he would be sitting next to me, and I hadn’t even thought about it until I saw him there.

  He had his hat on his lap and he was looking through the glasses very busy, and his hair was about the way I figured it, short with a little wave in it and very red. When I started asking for the glasses he took them down, then he took a good look at me and grabbed my hand and shook it. His hand was very soft and smooth but he had a good grip. He said, ‘Well, I’m glad to see you. I saw that guy grab you right after I got inside the door, and I was wondering if I got you into any kind of mess. What was it all about?’

  I said, ‘He was sore because I sold my ticket. He said I wasn’t supposed to.’ I was almost starting to spill what I figured out about the guy maybe being a chiseller and not even a cop, but I stopped myself. It wasn’t anybody’s business anyhow, so I only said, ‘Could I take a look through your glasses?’

  He gave me the glasses and while I was winding that screw on them so I could see clear he said, ‘You did me a big favour. I’ve been looking forward to this fight, but I came down on a late train and by the time I got here there wasn’t a ticket to be had. It looks like Abruzzo is a national hero.’

  I said, ‘He’s a good fighter all right,’ but I didn’t like him to bother me while I was monkeying around with the glasses. Then all of a sudden I was looking right at Al Judge and it was like catching a pail of cold water on my belly. Before I even thought, I jumped right back in my seat so he wouldn’t see me. Then I remembered I was looking through the glasses and he couldn’t see me at all. I was scared for a minute I wouldn’t find him again, but it was easy now that I knew where he was.

  He was sitting with a little typewriter in front of him and he was half turned around to say something to the man by the bell. His overcoat was off, but the big white scarf hung loose around his neck, and over the back of the chair was the cane. It was Al Judge all right, and I had him pinned down. He couldn’t walk fast with his bad leg, I figured, and before he could get up from the chair I would be downstairs and right behind him.

  Then the redheaded man said, ‘What’s so interesting?’ and started to reach for the glasses, and I gave them back before he could see where I was pointing them.

  I said, ‘I saw my friend down there,’ and he said, ‘Hell, the way you jumped I thought it was some good-looking babe taking her clothes off.’

  Then he stuck his hand out again and said, ‘The name is Cooper. Dr Lloyd Cooper. What’s yours?’ and I shook his hand and said, ‘George LaMain.’

  I was sorry right away. If there was going to be any trouble about what I did to Al Judge, it would be that much easier to put the finger on me. I mean, somebody knowing my name was bad and I started to sweat about it. Then I got an idea and I said, ‘I got a bet on with my friend, and if you’re a doctor maybe you can settle it. I bet that a doctor has to keep everything a secret like a priest. Is that true?’

  He thought it was a big joke. He laughed and said, ‘Not my kind of doctor. I’m a Ph. D.’

  ‘What kind is that?’

  ‘That’s the kind that knows a lot about nothing. I’m a college instructor. Teach at Troy College upstate. Even so, I think you win the bet about doctors and secrets.’

  I didn’t win any bet, because if he wasn’t a real doctor I shouldn’t have said my name, but I was wondering if he wasn’t lying about it. We have a doctor comes in the bar now and then and we have to call him mister because if the guys hear he’s a doctor they start to bother him about what they have, and he doesn’t like that. I figured maybe Dr Cooper didn’t want me to ask him stuff about being sick and doctors, and that’s why he said he was only a college professor. He didn’t look like a college professor either. I mean he was young and pretty sharp, and they’re all kind of old, I figured. I took a quick look at him, but he saw me and said, ‘What’s the matter? Something worrying you?’

  I said, ‘What do you teach?’

  ‘Oh, that. I’m preparing a load of foreign correspondents for shipment to the big city. I’m in the English department. Specialize in journalism.’

  When he said that, the first thing I thought was crazy. I knew it but I couldn’t stop it buzzing through my head. I thought, Al Judge knew everything about me and this guy was a friend of his he got to tail me, and I was a sure goner. Almost before I knew it, I turned a little sideways on the seat and got my hand on the gun. Then I knew it was crazy, it was too much of a long shot, and I started to breathe all right again. But even if it was a long shot, I had to make sure. I read plenty books and stuff where you find out what happens to guys who get careless. So I kept my hand on the gun and I said, ‘Do you know Al Judge?’ I watched his face while I said it.

  ‘You mean the Press sports editor?’

  ‘Yes. Do you know him?’

  ‘Christ almighty, he was the first man I worked for when I got out of journalism school! And if there was ever a better excuse for getting out of newspaper work, I never found it.’

  He wasn’t lying. I was watching his face, and he meant it. Then he said, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have talked like that. Is he a friend of yours?’

  I said, ‘No,’ and then I sat up straight and let go of the gun because there was a lot of excitement downstairs with everybody yelling and some guys whistling and Rocks Abruzzo came into the ring, and right after that Joe Shotfield came in the other side.

  After Dr Cooper was done looking through the glasses, I looked through them and I could see both of them very clear. But mostly I wanted to look at Al Judge, and when I got the glasses on him he was banging away at the typewriter and the scarf was flapping around right by his hands and it didn’t seem to bother him. After I gave the glasses back, I could see that white scarf no matter where I looked. It was always in the corner of my eye, and I felt good about that.

  I thought the fight would start right away now, but it didn’t. There was still a lot of walking around and talking in the ring, and then a man got in the middle and he made some fighters come up and wave their hands at everybody.

  All this time Rocks Abruzzo was sitting there, and there were a couple of men talking to him and one of them pointed to Joe Shotfield and Rocks Abruzzo shook his head. Joe Shotfield was tall and kind of skinny and he was holding on to the ropes and jumping up and down. I could see all that even without the glasses.

  But it took a long time and I could feel my hands getting colder and colder while I was watching and keeping that white scarf in the corner of my eye. The gun hurt me too. The way I was sitting my pants were pul
led tight, and something on the gun was sticking into my leg. I was afraid to move around and fix it because of the way Dr Cooper was leaning over.

  Then all of a sudden Dr Cooper said, ‘Why are you so interested in Al Judge anyhow?’

  I said the first thing that came to me. ‘I want him to get me a job.’

  ‘On the Press? For Christ’s sake, that’s where the gag started about the guy telling his kids he played piano in a whore house because he didn’t want them to know he worked there.’

  ‘I don’t care. I want to work on a newspaper and maybe he can help me.’

  ‘Why Al Judge?’

  ‘He’s a big shot. I want to talk to him about it.’ An idea was really cooking in my head now and I said, ‘Do you know where he goes after the fights?’

  ‘That wouldn’t help you any. You just go to the personnel office of the Press, and tell them what you want. They’ll make sure you don’t get it.’

  ‘I have to talk to him about it.’

  He shook his head and started to say something but I couldn’t hear him. The bell had gone off and everybody was yelling because the fight started. And right off Rocks Abruzzo came out and started smacking Joe Shotfield around. He hit him with everything and then they got tangled up together and the referee ran over and pulled them apart and it started all over again. But what bothered me was when they started fighting the lights all went out except over the ring, and it was hard to see that white scarf. I couldn’t see it out of the corner of my eye at all. I had to keep looking straight at it, and that’s how I knew when the rounds were over. Because then the lights went on and it was easy to see.

  Then there was a real riot and I had to look because Rocks Abruzzo got in a good one, the one everybody wanted to see, only I didn’t see it, and Joe Shotfield was down and he must have been hurt bad. He couldn’t even get up when it was all over. They had to carry him to his corner.

  Then I felt with my foot my father’s good hat was on the floor, and I picked it up and saw it was dirty all over. I was scared about that and what he would say, and I started to dust it off. Then I remembered the scarf.

  I looked down quick and it wasn’t there any more. I was so mad that I grabbed the glasses right out of Dr Cooper’s hand, and he looked like I was nuts. But no matter how I looked around with them, I couldn’t find that scarf. The typewriter was gone, the cane was gone too, and I knew for sure Al Judge would get away from me if I didn’t do something quick to find him.

  Then I remembered Dr Cooper might know where he went to so I grabbed his arm. I said, ‘Look, it’s important. Where does Al Judge go after the fights? I mean, is there any place special? I have to know because he went away already and I have to find him.’

  ‘About that job?’

  ‘Yes. I have to get that job. I just have to.’

  I was starting to get up, but he pulled me back so I was sitting down again. He said, ‘Is it Al Judge you were looking at through the glasses?’

  ‘I had to know where he was so I could talk to him. Does he go back to the paper now?’

  ‘You ought to polish up your lying, George. First it was your friend; then it was Al Judge. And all you want to do is ask for a job. You don’t expect me to believe all that stuff, do you?’

  I said, ‘Honest to God.’

  ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I’ll tell you what’s bothering you. You were working for the Press, and Judge had you fired off your job, and now you want to square it somehow, don’t you?’

  The way I tried to pull my arm loose was a giveaway, but I couldn’t help it. All I wanted to do was get away from there and do it quick, but he held my arm so tight I was afraid it would start trouble where everybody would look. Dr Cooper said, ‘He’s done that to a hundred guys, and the smart ones forget it and shop around for another job. When you tangle with him you’re looking for trouble. I once saw him whack a copy boy over the head with his cane for looking at him cross-eyed. What did you expect to do? Beat him up?’

  The finger was on me good now. Whatever I did, Dr Cooper would figure out who it was, and he even knew my name. The only thing to do was get him somewhere and give it to him and that would fix it up. But what about all the people who saw me with Dr Cooper, and maybe if my picture was in the papers they would put the finger on me for that.

  All I wanted to do was kill Al Judge and kill him quick. I didn’t want to kill Dr Cooper, because that would be murder and not like killing Al Judge. I wasn’t even sore at Dr Cooper, only a little because he was getting everything balled up.

  Then it hit me I could get Dr Cooper to help me, and I could do the job so good I would be all right. I would only know that when I did the job, and if it didn’t turn out right, there would be time to get Dr Cooper too.

  I said, ‘That’s what happened. What you said.’

  ‘What exactly?’

  ‘I was a copy boy and Al Judge didn’t like me so he had me fired. Now my whole family is broke.’

  ‘I know how you feel. I felt that way myself ten years ago. But it’s smarter to forget it.’

  ‘I don’t care. I want to give him what’s coming to him.’

  We were looking at each other and Dr Cooper was moving his lips in and out over his teeth like he was thinking hard. He said, ‘If there was ever anybody who needed a good shellacking, it’s Al Judge. But you’re not the guy to do it.’

  ‘I’ll take my chances.’

  ‘You mean that no matter what I say, you’re bound to do it sooner or later.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  There was a fight on in the ring, but we didn’t watch it. We were watching each other. Dr Cooper rubbed his hand around his chin. ‘I’d like to be there when it happens. And I could find twenty other guys in half an hour who’d back you up.’

  ‘I don’t want anybody around.’

  He looked at me worried. ‘You don’t expect to use brass knuckles or a roll of nickels or something like that, do you?’

  ‘No. But I don’t want anybody around.’ He didn’t understand if he was around when it happened I would have to get him too. And I didn’t want to do that.

  He shook his head and laughed. ‘George, I think you’re crazy, but you’re a man after my own heart. As a matter of fact, if you can do the job in style, I know three guys in the racket who’ll give you jobs tomorrow.’

  I said, ‘Then where is he now?’

  ‘If things haven’t changed in ten years, he’s probably over at Tuffy’s, hoisting a couple. You’ll never get him alone there, but you can tail him when he goes out until you get him where you want him.’

  He said it so much like my thoughts that it sounded like an echo coming back to me. I said, ‘Where would he go after Tuffy’s?’

  ‘Well, his story is in, but he might want to do a column on the fight. That means he’d head back to the Press.’

  ‘Does he go home after that?’ I wanted to ask was he married or maybe living with some people, so I would know how everything stood, but I was afraid it wouldn’t sound right.

  Dr Cooper said, ‘Hell, nothing may be the way I told it. The best bet is to start at Tuffy’s and tag along.’

  ‘Where’s Tuffy’s?’

  He said, ‘Right across the street, from the Garden,’ and then, when I started to push my way out, he grabbed his coat and hat and came right after me. He said, ‘I hope you don’t mind my going part of the way, George. You’re making an old dream of mine come true, and I owe you a drink for that.’

  I wished he hadn’t done that. Because the more he followed me, the more he was getting into trouble, and he was so nice it was crazy to think about killing him. I mean, he was a professor and all that, but he cursed like anybody else, and he was being friendly like Flanagan was sometime.

  And here he was getting more and more into trouble, and I couldn’t even tell him about it. Because the big thing was to kill Al Judge, and that might spoil it.

  Chapter Nine

  I KNEW about the guy who ran Tuffy’s. His name w
as Tuffy Walsh, and ten, twenty years ago he was one of the best fighters around. He was only a little guy but he had plenty of heart and he wasn’t afraid of anybody. He even had a fight with the heavyweight champ and he would have licked him but he didn’t have enough weight. I knew all this because only a couple of months back there was a big piece in the Press about him, and all the old-timers in my father’s bar started to argue about it.

  The piece said that Tuffy Walsh was all fed up with fighting and drinking and stuff like that and he was writing poetry. It must have been good poetry too, because they were making a book out of it and there was even one of the poems in the Press. It told how things looked in the Wintertime when there was snow all over the ground, and it sounded all right to me. A lot of guys think poetry is dumb, but I don’t. There’s a couple of poems in Rudyard Kipling that are all right, and once I tried to write one but it didn’t come out good. So I knew Tuffy Walsh was plenty smart if he could write good poems like the one in the Press.

  But some of the guys started laughing and said Tuffy Walsh must be punchy from all the fights he had, and that got old Mr Reardon and Flanagan all hot. Mr Reardon started telling about the fights Tuffy Walsh had and who he licked, and Flanagan said all the Irish were full of music and poetry and it was nothing to be ashamed of. Then one of the guys said all the Irish were full of — and there would have been a fight only my father broke it up. But Flanagan went into the toilet with the True Story magazine and wouldn’t come out for an hour.

  When I was standing outside Tuffy’s with Dr Cooper I didn’t think about that. The thing on my mind was if I walked into Tuffy’s and Al Judge saw me and remembered me, there would be trouble. I didn’t know what kind of trouble, just trouble. Because if he made some kind of crack or did something I didn’t like, I might pull out the gun in front of everybody and give it to him right there.

  Dr Cooper was half way in the door but I was still outside. He turned around and said, ‘What’s the matter? Losing your nerve?’