Blood Game (4 page)

He paid his bill and splurged on a fifty-cent cigar and went out to walk the streets. He could hear the vaudeville show over at the opera house, the harmonies of the popular ballads melancholy and irresistible.

He tried a whorehouse, but just standing downstairs in the vestibule convinced him. Whores couldn't help him tonight.

He did the second-best thing. He started at one end of a long city block and drank his way, beer-and-shot, beer-and-shot, to the other end of the block. There were nine saloons on that block. Nine of them.

In the morning when he awakened in the hotel, he found a plain white envelope on the stand next to the bed. The envelope depressed him. Not knowing where it had come from or what it contained reminded him that he'd been pretty bad last night. He did not drink liquor that often or that much, but when he did, and did so indulgently, the hangover always brought on memories of the little girl he'd shot and killed. Now he saw her six-year-old face and her patched gingham dress as she moved from the shadows of her cabin. By then it had been too late. He had already fired.

He looked at the way the dust motes glinted gold in the sunlight. He stared out the window at the hard blue sky until the little girl's face vanished. His bladder was full and his mouth was dry. His head pounded. Jesus, was he stupid.

He had just returned from the bathroom down the hall ten minutes later when the knock came.

He was dressed and already packing. He wanted to get out of this town. He had come here to try to earn some money, but instead he'd only met Stoddard and been beaten for his troubles. His bones still ached from the beating, but the hangover ached more.

He opened the door on the fifth knock. He jerked it open with some aggravation. He was not good at hangovers and tended to take them out on other people.

“You found the envelope, Mr. Guild?” Stephen Stoddard asked.

“How the hell did it get here?”

“I had the clerk bring it up last night.”

“What is it?”

“You mean you haven't looked inside?”

“I'm too goddamned hung over for games, kid. What's in the envelope?”

“A hundred and fifty dollars.”

“For what?”

“My father's money needs protection.”

“You want to know what I think of your father, kid?”

“I'm willing to make it two hundred, Mr. Guild. For two days' work.”

Even dehydrated and somewhat shaky, Guild thought the idea of two hundred dollars for two days' work sounded good.

“I need some breakfast,” Guild said.

“They serve a very fine one here. I ate here yesterday. Toast and scrambled eggs and ham.”

Guild smiled. “You sound like an ad in the newspaper.” His stomach made noises. He'd done a lot of drinking last night but not enough eating. He went back, leaving Stephen Stoddard in the doorway, picked up the envelope, and said, “Let's go get some breakfast.”

* * *

“I finally had to grab the shotgun and put it right to his face. I've seen Victor pretty mad before, but nothing like last night. Not even close, Mr. Guild.”

“Will you do me a favor?”

“What?”

“Stop calling me Mr. Guild.”

“Oh. Sure.”

“Leo will do fine.”

For the next few minutes Guild went back to his eggs over easy and his American fries and his two thick slices of ham.

Stephen Stoddard knew enough to just let him eat.

As he sipped his coffee, Guild said, “You really think Victor wanted to kill him?”

“Yes, he did.”

“He just barged into your hotel room?”

“Just barged in.”

“And ran over to your father and started hitting him?”

“Yes. And that's when I grabbed the rifle.” He shook his head. “I put it right up against his cheek. I would have killed him, too, the way he was beating Dad.”

Guild frowned and looked around the restaurant. It was beautifully decorated with flocked red wallpaper and gathered white drapes and mahogany appointments. Sunlight came in golden and warm through the front windows. Fancy men in three-piece suits sat talking to each other with great amounts of self-confidence. Women in big picture hats spoke more quietly.

“I believe Victor,” Guild said, looking back at Stephen Stoddard.

“About what?”

“About your father cheating him.”

Stephen Stoddard dropped his eyes. “My father doesn't cheat people.”

“Sure he does, kid, and you know it.” Guild realized how harsh he sounded. “I'm sorry I had to say that, but in case I decide to take your two hundred dollars I want you to know where I stand.”

“I don't suppose it's important that you respect Dad, as long as you protect him.”

Guild grinned. “I couldn't protect myself from Victor yesterday. What makes you think I can protect your father?”

“You'd kill Victor if he tried anything. I know you would. The sheriff told my dad all about you.”

Whenever people said that to Guild, he wondered if they knew about the little girl. There were a lot of lies told about Guild in and out of the territory. Most of them had started over the death of the little girl.

Guild said, in a softer tone, “Why do you stay with him, kid? The way he treats you and all.”

“You don't know anything about him.” For the first time Stephen Stoddard sounded angry. For the first time Guild felt a little respect for the kid.

“Such as what?”

“Such as how he had to raise me after my mother ran off with a drummer ten years ago. Or how he was raised in the worst white slum in New York. Or how he was taken prisoner in the war and tortured by three Confederates.

Guild sighed. You could make a case for anybody. You could even make a case for Guild, a man who'd killed a six-year-old girl.

“I guess I was getting a little pompous there,” Guild said.

Stephen Stoddard calmed down. “He really is a decent man. After all is said and done, I mean.”

“He shouldn't have sent me over to Victor's.”

“He really thought Victor would take the money and come back.”

Guild asked him a question he'd been curious about since yesterday. “If Victor's so hot on the idea your father is cheating him, why doesn't he go to some other boxing promoter?”

In the strong sunlight, Stephen Stoddard blushed. “I'm not sure.”

“You're lying, kid. Your father's got something on him, doesn't he?”

“Please don't ask me any more about that, Mr. Guild.”

Guild stared down at the envelope between them. He could live four or five months on the money in there.

He told himself he had no right to judge John T. Stoddard. He couldn't figure out if he was just saying that to allow himself to take the money. As for Victor—Victor didn't scare him anymore. The kid was right. If Guild signed on, he'd be prepared to shoot the boxer. That was the only way he could be sure he'd survive the two days.

“So you're not going to tell me what your father's got on him?”

“No,” Stephen Stoddard said softly. “No, I'm not.”

At sight of Victor Sovich, Guild drew his .44 and aimed it directly at the boxer's middle. This was an hour after finishing breakfast with Stephen Stoddard.

Sovich, dressed in the type of black suit and white shirt and red-lined cape you would expect to see on an opera baritone, walked into the boxing camp smiling.

Guild, John T. Stoddard, and Stephen Stoddard all stood staring at him.

“You'd better tell Guild here that guns don't always frighten me,” Sovich said, strolling up.

It was hot in the alley, just as it had been yesterday afternoon, though thunderheads had begun massing in the flat blue midwest-em sky and there was a promise of a brief respite from the heat.

The two Mexican boys were in the rope ring again. They would precede Sovich and the black man. Guild just hoped the skinnier of the boys somehow learned to box between now and tomorrow afternoon.

A small group of reporters stood in the wide mouth of the alley, to the left of the livery stable, where you could smell heat and iron and smoke, talking to a small, prim group of churchwomen who were here to protest fisticuffs in general and any fight with Victor Sovich in particular.

“I wish I could turn you loose on them,” John T. Stoddard said, nodding to the women.

“I wouldn't do it,” Guild said. “I agree with them, remember?”

By now Sovich was directly in front of them.

Guild glanced up, sensing Stephen Stoddard's eyes on him. The kid could obviously sense what Guild was thinking.

Here was Sovich coming back to a partnership in which he was constantly cheated. Yesterday he had burned Stoddard's money. He had been through with the relationship. His presence here today could only mean that Stoddard had telephoned or sent a note—reminding Sovich that if money hadn't wooed him back, then maybe a certain memory would.

Guild wondered what Sovich had done.

John T. Stoddard said, “Victor, I don't expect any trouble between us. I've agreed to give you half the purse tomorrow. But I want Guild here to make sure that everything runs smoothly. I want tomorrow to be a good day for us.”

“You just keep Guild out of my way,” Sovich said, glaring at Guild.

“He'll be with me, Victor. That's the whole point of having him. But he won't bother you unless he needs to. Right, Guild?”

Guild felt as if he were stepping into the middle of an argument between two ten-year-olds.

“He'd better be damn good with that gun,” Sovich said, “for his own sake.”

“We'll have those boys take a rest,” John T. Stoddard said, “and you can get in there and work out with Barney. I hope you didn't hit the bottle too hard last night.”

“It wasn't the bottle,” Sovich grinned. “It was the woman. Those goddamn hips of hers never stop.”

Unlikely as it seemed, John T. Stoddard slid his arm around Sovich's bear shoulders, and together they walked back to the two rooms in the livery stable used for dressing.

Halfway there, however, John T. turned around and nodded his head at Guild.

He wanted him to come along.

Given Sovich's power and temperament, that was probably a good idea.

John T. Stoddard hadn't been exaggerating. There was every possibility that Victor Sovich was the best fighter in the country.

His sparring partner, Barney, was a rangy man with red hair and small but astonishingly quick fists. Even Sovich had occasional trouble with the other man's speed.

But for the most part Sovich, dressed in black pants and black boots, had no trouble at all pounding Barney, dressed in black pants and red boots; no trouble at all.

The body blows were almost as impressive as the head shots, something you rarely saw. Twice Sovich hit Barney so hard in the ribs that he lifted the man off the canvas. He hit him so hard in the kidneys that he drove him to his knees.

After twenty minutes, both men were sleek and rancid with sweat.

The reporters had deserted the churchwomen and come over for a look at Sovich.

“Listen to how those goddamn punches sound when they land,” said one reporter in a derby and checkered suit. “They sound like he's throwing bricks.”

They fought for another twenty minutes until Barney's bleeding got bad, especially from the nose. He started choking on his own blood, and John T. Stoddard stepped in and said, “Why don't you quit now, Barney? We're going to need you again tomorrow.”

For all his sweat, for all the redness in his face, Victor Sovich did not seem tired at all. Indeed, he seemed refreshed in some unimaginable way, as if punishing the other man so severely had made him younger, stronger, sharper.

When he stepped between the ropes, he looked up at Guild and said, “Remember yesterday afternoon, Guild? Remember how it felt?” He smiled. “Next time, you're going to look like Barney when I get through with you.”

Guild hadn't realized until just now, looking at the boxer, what was really wrong with him.

Victor Sovich was insane.

Driving cattle, riding shotgun, serving as lawman, tracking bounty, Guild came across them occasionally, insane men. They weren't the laughing, sneering people he saw in melodramas. Usually it was just something in their eyes, some rage or grief that was frightening when he finally recognized it.

There was no grief in Sovich's dark eyes. Just rage.

He walked past Guild, back to the dressing room.

John T. Stoddard came up and stood next to Guild. “You stick right by me, you understand, Guild?”

“I understand.”

“I hope you realize that the son of a bitch wants to kill us both.”

Guild nodded. “Yeah, that's sort of what I was thinking.”

John T. Stoddard shook his head. “I was going to take him along to see the colored man, but the hell with him. You and I will go.”

From inside the livery you could hear Sovich yelling at one of the trainers. He really was crazy.

The town had a colored section adjacent to the mixed-race section. The buildings all seemed to lean at impossible angles, as if ready to collapse. You could smell cooking and heat and filth. A white policeman in a fancy blue uniform and a kepi-style hat walked up and down the street with a murderous-looking nightstick in his hand. Ragged children ran after him, trying to be nice. He wasn't nice back. He was just fat and Irish-looking and mean. The people here stared at Guild and John T. Stoddard with white, forlorn eyes out of black, forlorn faces.

Rooney was the name of the colored fighter. Unlike Sovich he did not have a training camp. He worked outside against another Negro in tufty grass behind a bar where an ancient Jamaican man played a squeeze box. There were maybe thirty black men in a circle around the two fighters. Some of them wore the bright clothes of the bayou they originally came from. Most wore the drab rags of stoop laborers. Most of them were drunk. The sparring served to take their minds off their problems. They sounded as if they had only one real concern in this world, and that was how good Rooney looked.