One-Eyed Jacks
Page 21
Except for the kid from the Telly who was waiting in the dressing room when Tommy went in to shower. The kid was after the grizzled sportsbeat look, cigar clenched beneath a peach-fuzz mustache, dark fedora and rumpled suit. Andy Hardy trying for Wallace Beery.
“So whatdya think, Champ?” he started.
“My name ain’t Champ,” Tommy said. “What do I think about what?”
Tommy began to strip the damp shirt away as the kid came closer. T-Bone walked in, carrying gloves and a towel.
“Excuse me,” the snotty kid said to T-Bone. “Can you give me a minute with the Champ here? I’m trying to do an interview.”
T-Bone glanced over at Tommy, who stood up and took the kid by the arm and shoved him into the shower. Tommy turned the cold water on and held the squirming kid there for half a minute, then hauled him to the dressing room door and pushed him outside. The nickel cigar was still wet in the kid’s mouth.
“That some interview,” T-Bone said.
Tommy went in to shower. When he came out he dressed and sat on a bench while he waited for T-Bone to finish in the shower. There was hot water today, and T-Bone stayed under the spray a while, soaking it in. Tommy could hear him singing in the stall. Presently he came out, towelled off and began to dress.
“How you feeling, Thomas?”
Tommy stood up. “Right now I feel good. Tomorrow morning I’ll be stiff as a new hair brush.”
“Right back at it, that’s the thing.”
“Yeah. But I don’t think anybody’s gonna say I overtrained for this one, Bones.”
When they left the room, the kid was still there, sitting in a puddle on a bench outside the door. Beside him his notebook was running ink like blood from a wound.
“You feel like answering some questions now?” the kid asked.
“This youngster got some mule in him,” T-Bone said.
Tommy reached down and picked the kid’s fedora from the bench and held it by the brim as it drained water. Then he set it down again.
“One question,” he said.
“All right,” the kid said and he got to his feet. “You said you were through. Why are you fighting Nick Wilson?”
“Well,” Tommy said slowly. “I’m a fighter. That’s what I do.”
“But why did you change your mind?”
“That’s two questions,” Tommy said and he went out the door.
The persistent kid would have followed him even then if not for the hand on his wet shoulder.
“Don’t ask him nothin’ else,” T-Bone said softly. “Just let him be.”
He caught up with Tommy down the block and they walked back to the hotel. Tommy had notions of going for a beer, but T-Bone nixed the idea.
“Got six days to do three months’ work,” he said. “That mean no beer and no Irish for you, Thomas. That old barleycorn a thief, be stealing what you get in the gym. You listen to me now, Thomas, I ain’t foolin’.”
“I hear you, mother.”
Up in the room T-Bone lay on the bed while Tommy stood by the window, looking down to the street below. Lying there, T-Bone went over what he’d learned sparring with Wilson.
“Got no left hand to speak of,” he said aloud. “Couldn’t jab his way out of a church supper.”
Tommy put his fingertips on his temples and imagined what it was like there, under the skin. From the outside everything was fine. Like a car engine about to throw a valve; everything ran along all right one moment and then the next...
“He fair to middlin’ quick for a man his size,” T-Bone was saying. “But clumsy like a day-old calf, and ’ceptible to the uppercut, mighty ’ceptible to that.”
“Okay, Bones.”
“And he foul you, if he get the chance. Like to hook low comin’ off the break.”
Tommy crossed over to sit on the other bed. “Let’s just let it go for now.”
T-Bone looked over as Tommy stretched out the length of the bed and looked at the ceiling.
“Tell about them trout again, Thomas. Reckon a body could get used to eating trout, if it had a chance.”
“Another week or so and we’ll be home, Bones. Then I’ll take you out and show you.”
“Yep,” T-Bone said. “We damn near there already.”
While Lee was setting her nerve to go see Mel Dunston, he sent a message through her landlady that he wanted to see her. Whether that was a good sign or bad she couldn’t decide. She let him wait a couple hours and then walked down to the Parrot. Mel was sitting at his desk in his office, behind an adding machine from the last century and a framed picture of two dark-haired toddlers, a boy and a girl.
“I didn’t know you had kids, Mel,” Lee said.
“My cousin’s children,” Mel said.
They rent you the picture, Mel? Lee reined it in — no smart comments today — and moved to sit opposite Dunston. Mel smiled at her, the kind of smile people saved for bellhops and cabbies.
“Are you happy here, Lee?”
“Sure.”
Mel moved a sheaf of papers from one side of the desk to the other.
“Well, we’re happy to have you here.”
Well, golly gee, she thought. But she kept quiet. Mel moved the same stack of papers back across the desk.
“I was wondering if you’d like to stay on,” he said then.
“What happened to whatshername — Tempest Teapot?”
“Miss Torrence will be staying on the coast for a while. She got a job on a variety show. Singing and dancing, you know. A lucky break.”
“Oh, yeah.”
Mel smiled again. “So I am in the fortunate position to offer you a job here long term.”
“Well,” Lee said and she waited.
“Uh... how do you feel about that?”
“I’m honoured,” Lee told him and she had to look away. “The money, though, Mel. I just can’t make it on a hundred a week.”
“I’ve thought about that,” Mel said. “And I’ve decided to give you a raise. One hundred and ten dollars a week, Lee.”
“Two hundred,” she said, and Mel got so red she thought he’d suffered a heart attack. She hoped to hell he wouldn’t need mouth-to-mouth; he’d have a tough time finding a volunteer in present company.
“That’s impossible,” he managed to say.
“Two hundred a week,” she said again.
Mel made to move the papers again, then let it go. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “Do you think I’m a wealthy man?”
“As a matter of fact I do,” she said. “But I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll sign a year’s contract for one-fifty a week, what about that?”
Mel’s colour got better so quick she thought he’d been leeched. He even managed a smile. He’d expected a tougher negotiation from this woman. But not only had she dropped fifty dollars in thirty seconds, she’d offered to sign for a year. If he could get her down to one-twenty-five, he’d be dancing on the ceiling.
“But I need five thousand in advance,” Lee threw in, and Mel got apoplectic again.
“What?” he shouted.
“I’m in a bind, I need some money,” Lee told him. “What I’m offering you is a good deal. If you’re an intelligent businessman, you’ll take advantage of it.”
“Five thousand,” Mel said, like he never knew such a number existed.
“That’s the deal.”
“Get out of here, young lady.”
“Better think about it, Mel. Get that adding machine to work.”
“I want you out of here.”
Lee got to her feet.
“You’ll pay out more than that over the year anyway,” she told him. “And you won’t have Lee Charles. Recording Artist, the sign out front says. Now I’m not Greta Garbo, Mel, but we both know the reason your cash register is going ka-ching. You think people are packing this place every night just to get a glimpse of your sweaty face? Not fucking likely. You know why they’re here, don’t you, Mel? You can give me your answer tonight.”
She walked home, stopping at the Greek deli for a chicken sandwich and an RC cola. Elegant dinner for one. Two blocks from the rooming house, it began to rain and she ran the last distance, getting soaked anyway, hurrying drenched up the stairs and down the hall to her room, stepping inside to find the heavyweight boxer Tommy Cochrane lying on her bed. The blinds were pulled, and he was lying there in the near dark, smiling at her, at her wet clothes and her crumbling bag of dinner and her earnest expression.
She set her package down and came over to sit on him, her skirt pulled up and her bare legs across his stomach.
“Hey, you’re all wet.”
“Never bothered you before,” she said. “How’d you get in here?”
“I’m a shadow, I come and go as I please.”
“Oh, yeah?”
Tommy smiled. “I stood at the corner and watched until your landlady went to the market.”
“Some shadow,” Lee said. He made an attempt to grab her, but she rolled off him, then feinted and tagged him lightly on the jaw with a small left hand.
“Breaking and entering,” she said seriously. “Violating a lady’s boudoir, you’re in a lot of trouble, mick.”
“I’m gonna throw myself on the mercy of the court.”
She stood up and began to undress. “Well, you’re lucky,” she said. “The court is feeling very merciful today.”
And they made love, remaining in bed for more than an hour, in a room so warm and humid from the storm outside that they soon were both as wet as Lee had been when she walked through the door. She was on top of him, her hands gripping the headboard, his on her waist, her ribcage, her breasts. Neither said a word — after Dunston, Lee was sick of talking anyway. When finally she came, she collapsed over him, falling against his chest, her hair covering him like water from a falls.
After a time Tommy rolled her gently to her side and kissed her on the forehead. Eyes closed, she smiled and put her hand to his cheek.
“You need a shave, mick,” she said. “You always need a shave.”
“Any bum can get a shave,” he said. “What I need I got.”
“What’d ya do today?”
“Worked out.”
She opened her eyes and pulled back a little. “You’re really going to fight.”
“Yeah.”
She pulled her hair back with one hand and turned onto her stomach. She propped her elbows beneath her. “I know about the aneurysm,” she said.
Tommy looked at her in the faint light. “He shouldn’t have told you.
“Maybe not. But he did. What’re you fighting for — the money?”
“The farm. You know that.”
“Is that the reason though? What about Wilson and Bones?”
“I never liked what he did to Bones,” Tommy admitted. “But that part of Wilson will catch up to him sooner or later, it doesn’t have to be me. I never set out to right all the wrongs in the world, Lee.”
She glanced at him and then got out of bed to retrieve the sandwich and the cola from the dresser. They split the sandwich in bed and drank the warm pop.
“If you had the money,” Lee said with her mouth full, “you wouldn’t fight?”
“If I had wings, I’d fly to the moon.”
“Listen to me,” she demanded. “If I could give you the money, would you forget about fighting?”
“You don’t have the money.”
“If I did.”
“You don’t.”
“Goddamn you!” she shouted and she spilled the cola on the sheets. “Three days ago you asked me to go to the farm with you. If I can get the money, will you say no to Mac Brady?”
Tommy could see she was scared. It didn’t help much, on top of everything else.
“I don’t want to fight, Lee. But there’s no other way. Either I do this and get the farm or I hit the hobo road, end up in the old palooka’s home, telling stories about things that never happened.”
“Maybe there’s another way,” she said. “The only thing is — I wouldn’t be able to come to the farm right off. I’d have to stay in the city awhile.”
Tommy got out of bed and began to get dressed. “I got to get back to the Jasper. Mac’s coming with the cash and the contract, today or tomorrow.”
“Don’t sign it, Tommy. Wait a day or two.”
“You better get dressed, you’ll be late for work.”
“Jesus Christ,” she said. “Aren’t you scared?”
“I’ve been scared before,” he said. “I always got over it.”
He buttoned his shirt and, shoes in hand, he tiptoed out into the hall and down the back stairs.
TWENTY-THREE
Tony Broad stood stonily at the bar, sipping the same bourbon he’d acquired thirty minutes ago and keeping a dull eye on Mel Dunston, who was sitting at a table by the stage, worrying the pages of a ledger and biting his bottom lip like it was a piece of chewing gum. At Tony’s elbow Billy Callahan was drinking rye and drumming his fingers on the bar top. Tony Broad was walking a wire with Callahan, buying him enough booze to keep his nerve going, but not so much that he would foul up.
Because tonight was the night.
Shortly Mel came to the bar and asked his bartender for a glass of buttermilk, a quart of which was kept in the cooler for the fickle nature of Mel’s stomach.
“That’s a hell of a drink,” Tony said.
Mel didn’t know Tony Broad from Adam. “For my stomach,” he said vaguely.
“Having problems with the tummy, Mel?”
The older man shook his head darkly. “My problem,” he said, “is with Lee Charles.”
Tony played ignorant. “The singer?”
“Singer?” Mel snorted. “A robber is more like it.” And he took his yellow milk into his office.
Tony called for another drink for himself and one for Callahan. “Now what the hell is that all about?”
“Who knows?” Callahan said. “Lee Charles is gonna be the least of his worries tonight.”
“Keep your mouth to yourself,” Tony told him.
When Mac Brady strode into the bar five minutes later, Tony waved him over and bought him a drink.
“You owe me that,” Mac said. “I sprung for your steam the other day.”
“I forgot to pay?” Tony asked. “Goddamn, 1 guess I did.”
But Mac had no time for nickel and dime today. “You guys seen Bert Tigers around? I’m supposed to meet him here.”
“The guy from the gym?” Tony asked. “Haven’t seen him.”
“Well, he’s supposed to be running an errand for me.” Mac took some papers from his pocket and put them on the bar. “I’m busier than a one-armed switchboard operator with the crabs. I got this contract for Tommy Cochrane and I got a meeting in half an hour at the Royal York.”
“What kind of meeting?”
“I’m looking into this new show at the Belair Theatre. It’s a hell of a thing. It’s like Shakespeare, but with strippers, you know. I’m looking for backers, if you’re interested.”
“Maybe I’ll sleep on it,” Tony said.
The front door opened and Mac turned impatiently. Lee Charles walked in, looking cool and determined. She went past the bar and into Mel Dunston’s office.
“Where in the hell is that Bert?” Mac wondered. Then he looked at Tony Broad. “I hear Miss Charles is not real happy about Tommy taking this fight. I think she’d queer the deal if she could.”
“How could she do that?”
“She can’t,” Mac said. He took a short drink. “I got the contract and I got the cash. All I need is a signature, and Tommy’s mine.” He made to drink again, but didn’t. “Where’s that goddamn Bert?”
Tony glanced to Callahan, who was standing dumbly with his Canadi
an Club, mouth open and mind in neutral.
“You listening to this?”
“What?” Callahan asked.
Morons, Tony thought. The world is overrun with fucking morons.
When Bert Tigers finally showed, he was followed so closely by Herm Bell that Tony thought for a moment the two were together, an unlikely pair. But Herm, spotting the brain trust assembled at the bar, sat at a table across the room and ordered beer.
Bert took a tongue-lashing from Mac, then ordered a rum and coke. He sucked at the Bacardi like a man dying of thirst. A boozer for sure, Tony thought.
“I have to get to the Royal York,” Mac told Bert. He pushed the papers on the bar over, then took a thick envelope from his pocket and tucked it forcefully into Bert’s inside jacket pocket. “Tommys at the Jasper. Get his goddamn signature on the contract before you give him the envelope.”
Bert made to look in the envelope.
“Leave it,” Mac said. “You just have to make the delivery. And get the signature. You follow?”
“Sure.”
Then Mac was gone, off to do Shakespeare with strippers. Tony Broad couldn’t believe what was happening. In a minute he was beside Bert Tigers, buying him another Bacardi. Bert folded the contract and put it in his pocket and took the free drink.
“What do you figure in the fight?” Tony was asking. Coming on dumb, like Bert Tigers was some expert.
“The kid kills him,” Bert said. “Early.”
“That’s my thinking too,” Tony said.
They had a couple more drinks and Tony Broad talked it up, about the fight and about what a wonderful trainer Bert was, and then Bert had to use the can. When he was gone, Tony turned and showed his teeth to Callahan.
“Forget Dunston,” he said. “You know what we got here?”
Callahan had no idea what they had there.
“We got two birds. You ever kill two birds with one stone, Billy my boy?”
“I never killed any birds.”
Tony laughed. “Well, tonight you’re gonna learn how.”
When Lee came out of Dunston’s office, she avoided the sludge at the bar and, spotting Herm Bell, went over and sat down. She ordered gin and tonic. Her face was closed and angry.