Blood Game (11 page)

Stephen walked to the door. “I'm going to go get some lemonade. You want a glass?”

“That would be fine.”

“Big glass or small glass?”

“Big glass.”

“I know you're just trying to help.”

“I don't seem to be doing a very good job.”

“He isn't as bad as you claim.”

“Maybe not.”

“He's my father. He raised me.”

“I know.”

Stephen said, “I'm going to stay with him till he dies, Leo, and that's the way things are.” He spoke with a quiet determination that was all the more convincing for its lack of bluster.

He nodded and left.

Her four-year-old son said, “You will go far away?”

“Not far away.”

“You will go with Victor?”

“Yes.”

“I don't like Victor.”

“I know.”

“Maria, she is scared.”

“I know she is scared.”

“And I'm scared, too.”

“I will not go far away, and I will return often.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

They stood in the center of the living room. The place looked better than it had in months. Victor had given her money to fix the place up. There was a new yellow spread for the couch, and two of the windows were fixed with new panes of glass. Where there had been a picture of the Virgin there was now a photograph of Victor. He had asked for it to be this way. Teresa had brooded about this for several days. Something about the Virgin made Victor uncomfortable. When she'd asked him what, he'd said, “It makes you look like a cheap Mexican. All these religious things on the walls.” But of course Victor made her uncomfortable about many things. He had struck her several times with exceeding force, and sometimes when his teeth nibbled on her during lovemaking he seemed to take undue pleasure from the pain he inflicted.

Now her mother appeared in the doorway.

Her son ran to the older woman and hugged his grandma's thigh. He began sobbing immediately. “She is going to go, Grandma. She is going to go.”

“You be a good boy and go play outside,” the grandmother said softly. She knelt down to wipe away the boy's tears. She kissed him tenderly on the cheek and then patted him on the bottom and sent him on his way outside.

In the doorway the boy looked back at his mother.

Teresa raised her hand and waved good-bye.

The boy stood staring at her as if it would be the last time he ever saw her.

“Go play,” his grandmother said.

The boy vanished.

The grandmother was scarcely five feet tall. She had skin the color of coffee and eyes the color of a midnight sky. She wore a loose-fitting white dress and sandals. She came over and sat on the couch, careful not to wrinkle the new yellow spread when she sat down.

“I do not want you to go,” she said.

“I have already told him I will.”

“It does not matter, Teresa, what you told him.”

“He is expecting me.”

“Your children are expecting you.”

“They love you. They will be happy you are around them.”

“Can you imagine what the priest will say?”

“He will say nothing to me.”

“Oh?”

“Victor does not believe in priests. He does not want me to see the priest.”

“It's terrible what you do.”

“It's not. I will lose my looks in a few years. Then I will have only regrets.”

“I have had three daughters.”

“Yes.”

“And I should be thankful.”

“Thankful, yes. For our good health.”

“And for one other thing, too.”

“What?”

There was craft and malice in the old woman's gaze. “Only one of them turned out to be a whore.”

Teresa flushed. “You do not understand.”

“You think I was not young once, Teresa, as you are young—and beautiful, as you are beautiful?”

“It is different in the modem world, Mama.”

“He made you take down the picture of the Virgin?” “Yes.”

“And he does not want you to see a priest?”

“No, he does not want me to see a priest.”

“And he wants you to leave your children?”

Teresa said nothing. She did not want to be called a whore again.

“Does this not tell you about the man, Teresa? About what is in this man's heart?”

“He's a good man.”

“In bed he may be good. No other place.”

“We will be back often.”

“You don't really believe that. I can see the lie in your face, Teresa.” She wrung her brown hands. “You are so stupid.”

“He loves me.”

The old woman scoffed. “He puts gaudy dresses on your back. He makes you promises. He puts his seed in you. These things are not love.”

“He said we will live in a fine house in St. Louis.”

“You are forgetting your cousin Donna.”

At mention of the name, Teresa lowered her head. “He is not like the man Donna was with.”

“Oh, no? And what makes him different, Teresa? What makes him different?”

“Victor is a man of honor.”

“So was her man until he got tired of her. And do you remember what he did then?”

“Please. You know how I hate to talk about it.”

“He threw fire in her face so that she would be in agony and no other man would ever want her. He could not even give her the rest of her life, a chance to live well without him. He would not even do this much for her. So he burned her.”

“Please.”

“Do you know how she lives today?”

“I know.”

“She lives in the cellar of her parents' basement because she looks so horrible that no one can stand to set eyes on her.”

“He is not like this.”

“Oh, no. He is a most honorable man. He makes you take down the picture of the Virgin, and he persuades you to leave your children.”

She got up and walked across the room to where Teresa sat in a chair. She slapped her very hard across the side of the face.

Teresa began sobbing.

“Because he puts his seed in you does not mean he loves you, Teresa.”

The old woman shook her head sadly, then went out the door and down the steps to play with her grandchildren in the sunlight.

The referee was a man named Macatee. Stoddard had requested a man named Simek but Simek was sick with gout.

Stoddard knew nothing about Macatee, whose first name was George, and this made him nervous. He stood inside Macatee's dressing room, watching a bluebottle fly perch at an angle on the windowsill.

Outside the open window four women in crisp summer dresses carried placards back and forth. Obviously they knew this was where Macatee was getting ready. They wanted him to understand their seriousness.

Stoddard tried a nervous smile. “You can't escape them these days. They're in every town with more than one hundred people.”

“Oh, they're all right.”

“They are?”

“Sure. They just don't like to see people get hurt. Nothing wrong with that, is there?”

Stoddard continued to smile. “I like to see men get hurt. When men get hurt, I have a good payday. So do you.”

Macatee had been shining his black boots with a coarse-bristled brush. The room they were in was smaller than many closets. There was a chair, a bureau with a mirror, and a spittoon.

As they passed by the window this time, the ladies leaned in toward Macatee. One of them, a redhead in an emerald-green picture hat, waved.

Macatee waved back.

“You know her?” Stoddard said.

Macatee, a tense little man with freckles on a white bald head, nodded and said, “I should. She's my wife.”

“You have a wife who protests boxing?”

“It's her right. Just as it's my right to referee.”

“Oh, I'm glad I came over here, Mr. Macatee. To see you, I mean.”

“You are?”

“I certainly am. Do you know how many people are going to be here today?”

“How many?”

“The estimate is four thousand now.”

Macatee whistled. He took a cigar from his shirt pocket, ran a lucifer along the front of the bureau. “Four thousand. That's the biggest sporting event this town has ever seen.”

“That's one of my concerns.”

“What is?”

“That the event lives up to the billing.”

Macatee looked at him with eyes as green as his wife's hat. “What are you trying to say, Mr. Stoddard?”

“They tell me you're a good referee.”

“I try to be.”

“But I wouldn't want you to be too good.”

Macatee blew heavy cigar smoke in Stoddard's direction. The blue-tailed fly was noisy in the corner. “Wish I had a swatter,” Macatee said. “That goddamn thing's driving me crazy.”

“You ever hear of the Sorgenson fight?”

“Sorgenson?”

“Over in Omaha about four years ago. Hmmm. Four years ago exactly this summer.”

“I think I've heard of it. But what about it?” Macatee went back to shining his boots with the brush. He wore a short-sleeve shirt. He might be a small man, but he had outsize biceps for his size.

“Sorgenson was supposed to knock out his opponent pretty early in the fight. Everybody expected it. But Sorgenson was so good that he put the other fellow to the canvas in the first round.”

Macatee whistled again. He didn't look up from his brushing. “Guess I should pay more attention to this Sorgenson.”

“That isn't the point of the story.”

“Then what is?” He still didn't look up. He seemed fascinated with getting the oxfords to shine perfectly.

“It's what happened after the first round. Sorgenson ran back in the ring at the top of the second and really started hitting the other man. Knocked him down again. Knocked him down so hard that the referee got scared.”

“It can get scary in there.”

“The referee stopped the fight.”

“Oh. I see.”

“Maybe you don't. He stopped the fight and a riot started.”

“A riot?”

“It was a hot day, just like today. There was a huge crowd, just like this one. One man was predicted to win, just as Victor is supposed to win today. But the crowd still wanted a match. They didn't want to see it end too soon. They rioted. They took over the town and made it impossible for decent people to be anywhere near them for the night.”

For the first time Macatee stopped his brushing. He raised his very green eyes to Stoddard. “You don't want to see this stopped today?”

“Not too soon.”

“What if the colored boy gets hurt real bad?”

“He knows what he's getting into.”

Macatee studied Stoddard's face for a long minute. “That story wasn't true, was it, Mr. Stoddard? About Sorgenson?”

“It was meant to illustrate a point.”

“But it's not true.”

“Not strictly speaking.”

“Meaning there was no Sorgenson?”

“No.”

“And no Omaha fight?”

“Not exactly.”

“And no riot?”

“No, no riot.”

Macatee had inhaled on his cigar. He was still studying Stoddard. “You're worried I'm going to lose you money, aren't you?”

“Yes, Mr. Macatee, I am. Especially now that I know your wife is carrying a placard.”

Macatee picked up the shoe brush once again. He returned to his polishing. “I'm not going to let him get killed.”

“Meaning what exactly, Mr. Macatee?”

“Meaning I'll stop the fight before it goes too far.”

“Afraid of your wife?”

Macatee tapped his bald head. “Afraid of my conscience. I don't want to be responsible for a man's death. Even if he's colored.”

“Just because a man gets hurt real bad, that doesn't mean he's going to die or anything like it.”

“I know you want a show, Mr. Stoddard, and I intend to help give you a show. Just not at the expense of a man's life.”

“You'll stop the fight, then?”

“When it's appropriate. I'm going to keep watching the colored boy's face close. When he looks like he's had enough, I stop the fight.”

“The colored fellow wants to make some money. Remember, he's getting paid for every round he can get through. He'd sure appreciate all the money he could earn.”

“It's nice you're so concerned for him,” Macatee said. “The colored fellow, I mean.”

“There's no call to get sarcastic.”

“The mayor's office hired me because they don't want the responsibility of a death on their hands. If they hadn't hired me, or someone else with my attitude, Mr. Stoddard, you wouldn't have gotten your permit. A boxer dying may be all in a day's work to you, but not to the mayor's office. You have a fellow die in a ring like that and the state newspaper starts to paint you as an uncivilized place, and once that starts then businesses get real nervous about settling in your town, and pretty soon, before you know it, you've become a little fork in the road again and nothing more.”

“That crowd's going to get awful mad if they don't see a fight.”

“In Houston, I hear a crowd took its money back.”

Stoddard said, “I'm just asking you to be fair, Mr. Macatee.” “How about if his eyes roll back in his head? Is that a fair time to stop the fight, Mr. Stoddard?”

“Eyes rolling back don't always mean anything.”

“How about if he starts strangling on his own blood from his mouth being cut up so bad inside? Is that a fair time to stop the fight, Mr. Stoddard?”

“He takes a little salt water, he'll be fine.”

“Or how about if his arms start twitching because his nervous system has been damaged? Is that a fair time to stop the fight, Mr. Stoddard?”

“He could be just arm-tired.”

Macatee put the shoe brush down and dropped his leg from the chair. He stood up straight, touching a hand to a crick in his back. “I'm sure glad you're not going to be referee, Mr. Stoddard. You know that?”