Blood Game (12 page)

Stoddard slid the white envelope from his pocket. He dropped it on the chair. “I like to give referees a little bonus. Before the fight.”

Macatee stared down at the envelope. He leaned over and picked it up. He hefted it, estimating the number of bills inside. He handed it back unopened to Stoddard. “I don't believe in bonuses, Mr. Stoddard. Especially before a fight.”

A minute later, after stuffing the envelope back inside his pocket, Stoddard was gone.

He went over to one of the thirty different beer tents. He knew it was the last place he should go.

He had a sausage sandwich and two mugs of beer. He figured that the food would help offset any damage the beer would do.

He hated it out here. It was too hot, the sunlight almost a bleached white, and too dusty. The dust smudged his clothes and got in his eyes and even down his throat.

He was eager now to get it over with.

He would go in and not even hesitate. He would shoot Guild right in the leg. When Guild was trying to recover, he would grab the money and flee. He would vanish into the crowd. That was the reason Stoddard had hired him. He was no good as a gunnie, but he was very good at vanishing.

So that not even Victor Sovich could find him.

He stood in the beer tent, hearing the first of the preliminary bouts announced.

A few more hours, he figured. A few more goddamned hours.

* * *

“I'm sorry I got so pissy.”

“It's fine, son. We all get pissy.”

“I know you're only trying to help.”

“It isn't my business, and I shouldn't put my nose in it.”

“It's just I wish you knew him better before you passed judgment on him.”

“Maybe you're right. Maybe he's a wonderful man.” “You're being sarcastic, aren't you, Leo?”

“No, son, I'm not. Maybe he's a wonderful man and it's just my blind spot.”

“He took right over as soon as my mother left.”

Guild smiled at him. “He couldn't ask for a better son. You know that?”

Just then the crowd shouted and whistled and began stomping their feet.

“The prelim must have started,” Stephen Stoddard said.

Guild picked up the rifle from where it stood next to the chair he was sitting in. He laid it across his lap. “Should be some more money coming our way pretty soon.”

“I really am sorry I got so pissy, Leo. I hope you understand.”

“Oh, I understand, son. I understand fine.”

Stephen Stoddard grinned. “Maybe when this is all over, the three of us will go out and have some drinks. Would you go along if we asked you?”

“Sure.”

Stephen Stoddard sat back and shook his head. “I've got a feeling you're good for him, Leo. He seems to act a little better when you're around.”

“That's me,” Leo Guild laughed. “A good influence on everybody I meet.”

He rolled himself a smoke and checked out the rifle again.

They started rubbing Rooney with liniment half an hour before schedule. He was tightening up, and the bald, lanky man John T. Stoddard had appointed as Rooney's trainer could see why.

Rooney was obviously afraid he was going to die, and probably with good reason. Rooney, from everything Simpson, the trainer, could see, was no longer much of a fighter.

Oh, there had undoubtedly been a time when Rooney had been respected enough giving and taking in the ring, but he had probably always been one of those men who look more ferocious than they really are. Harold Simpson had been watching Rooney work out the past three days. If he were Rooney, he'd be afraid, too.

The liniment smelled of alcohol and another sharp odor. In the tiny dressing room the odor was overpowering.

“You probably should talk.”

“Huh?” Rooney said, glancing up from his reverie.

“Talk. It would probably be good for you. You're real tight.”

“I was remembering this fishing hole in Arkansas.”

“Nice, huh?”

“Biggest snappers a man ever saw. And the water so blue and cold in the morning with steam coming up off the lake.”

“Sounds pretty.”

“Real pretty. Real pretty.”

“You remember what I told you about his right hand. The son of a bitch comes up from nowhere.”

But Rooney wasn't listening. “Then when it got hot you could lay back on the shore and look at the clouds. I never had it so peaceful before or since.” Rooney was still back there fishing in Arkansas.

“You got to keep moving, first to your left, then to your right. It's your best chance, Rooney.” He wanted to say your
only
chance, but he knew how that would sound.

“Sometimes I'd stay there right through the night,” Rooney went on. “I'd get me a fire going by the shore, and I'd clean the snapper and put it in a pan and cook it right there. It was beautiful, the way the fire glowed in the darkness. Downright beautiful.”

“You keep moving and his punches won't land clean. And if his punches don't land clean, he's going to get frustrated. And if he gets frustrated, you got a chance of hitting him back, Rooney.”

Rooney turned his ebony torso toward Simpson. “You ain't been listening to me, have you?”

“You ain't been listening to me, either, Rooney.”

“I was telling you about this fishing spot in Arkansas.”

“And I was telling you about how to get out of that ring alive.” Simpson said this with such vehemence that Rooney had no choice but to forget about Arkansas and face the situation at hand.

“I need to go fifteen rounds anyways,” Rooney said. “I need the money bad, Simpson.”

“He could hurt you a lot in fifteen rounds.”

“Not if I keep moving like you said.”

Simpson thought of the thick, ponderous body he'd seen working out yesterday. At some point in the past five years or so, Rooney had been hurt. The arms didn't come up quite right, the legs were always wobbly, and sometimes, for no reason, he'd start to shake.

Fifteen rounds could kill him for sure.

“You ever want to go with me?”

“Where, Rooney?”

“Back to Arkansas. That's where I'm going when this is all over.”

“You are, huh?”

“Yes, I am. I'm getting me a pole and some elderberry wine and some good cigars, and I'm going to do nothing but fish for a month and watch the steam come up off the lake every morning.”

“It sounds like it's going to be swell.”

“It is. You wait and see.”

Simpson had the impression that Rooney was gone again, was refusing to face the battle at hand by slipping into dreamy dialogue about fishing holes in Arkansas.

But suddenly Simpson knew better.

When he looked down at Rooney, he saw him starting to cry. “I'm scared, Harold. I'm scared.”

Simpson put a white hand on the black shoulder. “It'll be all right, Rooney. You wait and see.”

But Simpson knew better. Simpson was scared, too.

“This'll probably be the last big box,” the guard said as he put the strongbox on the desk next to the other two strongboxes.

John T. Stoddard took the cigar from his mouth and nodded. Guild watched Stoddard as he obviously resisted the impulse to start running his hands through all the greenbacks.

Stephen Stoddard, standing next to his father, said, “Dad and Victor are certainly going to be on easy street after this one.”

Guild said, “If this is the last big strongbox, why don't I take it all to the bank right now instead of letting it sit here the rest of the afternoon?”

John T. Stoddard turned and looked at him. “The agreement was that you'd guard the money, Mr. Guild.”

“The agreement was,” Guild said, “that I'd make sure your money was safe. It'd be a lot safer in a bank vault than here.”

“You've got a rifle, don't you?”

“You know I do. You're looking at it.”

“Then my money should be safe.”

“The banker said we could bring it in anytime up till three o'clock. That gives us forty-five minutes. If we put the strongboxes on a buckboard, we could make it.”

John T. Stoddard put the cigar back in his mouth and shook his head. “You ever do a job without offering your own opinion?”

“I'm not arguing with you. I'm just making a point.”

“Well, you've made your point. Now I'm making my point. I want you to stay here with the money the rest of the afternoon while Stephen and I make sure everything's going all right in the grandstand.”

“But Dad, I told Leo I'd stay with him.”

“I want you to help me out, Stephen.” John T. Stoddard seemed to make a point of being casual. But, watching him carefully, Guild saw that his eyes had begun to flicker anxiously. “Unless you've got a contrary opinion like our friend Guild here.”

“I just thought I'd kind of help him out.”

“I want you to help me out, Stephen. Do you understand that? I want you to help me out, and I don't want any more goddamn back talk about it.”

Stoddard's attempt at casualness was now gone.

The office crackled with his anger.

Stephen went over and sat on the edge of the desk. He put his head down and said, “Yes, sir.”

But his father wasn't done yet. “I'm getting good and sick of having to tell you everything. You know that?”

Stephen was shrinking into himself. “Yes, sir.”

John T. Stoddard obviously needed to unload his formidable temper. He went over by the strongbox and slammed his fist on the desk. He whirled suddenly and jabbed his finger in Stephen's face. “The next time I tell you to do something, I want you to do it, and no back talk.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now you stand up and precede me out of this office”

“Yes, sir.”

Guild couldn't watch any longer.

Stephen would never be free of his father. Never.

Stephen glanced over at Guild. He looked ashamed of himself and ashamed of his father. He put his head down and walked out the door.

When the kid was gone, Guild said, “I think you finally got to him, Stoddard.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning that I think you finally broke him.”

“Did I ask your opinion?”

Guild stood up. He wanted to smash in Stoddard's face. “You want to keep him a little boy, don't you?”

Stoddard thumped the pocket watch in his vest. “In a few more hours, Mr. Guild, it is going to be my pleasure to pay you off and get you out of my life forever.”

“I wish you'd do the same favor for your son.”

“You just take good care of my money.”

Guild said, “Something's going on, isn't it?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“There's a reason you're not letting me take this money to the bank, isn't there?”

“Are you calling me a liar?”

“No, Stoddard, I'm calling you a lot worse than that.”

But Stoddard was already on his way out the door. “You'll be all finished in a couple hours, Mr. Guild. In the meantime, you just take care of the money.”

After Stoddard slammed the door, Guild went over and locked it. Next he propped a chair under the doorknob so nobody could force his way in.

Finally he went over and sat directly in front of the door, his .44 in his lap.

He wasn't sure what John T. Stoddard was up to yet, but he now knew for sure that he hadn't hired Guild simply as a guard.

He had hired Guild as some sort of patsy.

“I told her how you are about seeing women right before a fight.”

“It's all right,” Victor Sovich said to Kane, his pudgy trainer. She stood in the doorway after Kane left. She looked crisp in her white dress, and beautiful. In her right hand was a suitcase.

Sovich smiled as she walked into the dressing room. “You did it, huh?”

“My mother is not happy.”

“She'll survive.”

“She says you'll get tired of me and throw me away. Or do something worse.”

“You know how mothers are.”

She came over and stood by the table he sat on. He had been rubbed down. He smelled harsh. The gloves had been put on his hands. “You seem so calm.”

“I am calm.”

“You don't ever get afraid?”

“What's to be afraid of?”

“Do you suppose you'll ever marry me?”

“I thought we were talking about boxing?”

“Is my mother right, Victor? Are you that kind of man?”

He brought her to him and put his face into her soft breasts. “I'm not exactly forcing you to go with me at gunpoint.”

“Do you want me to go with you?”

“What did I tell you about the next time you asked me that? I said I wouldn't tell you anymore.”

“Are you ashamed to tell me your feelings?”

He laughed. “No. But I am tired of repeating myself.”

If he wouldn't repeat himself, she would repeat himself for him. “You told me you wanted me to go with you.”

“If I said it, I must have meant it.”

“You told me that I was beautiful and that you have never felt this way about any woman.”

“I'm pretty good with the words, aren't I?”

“You said that if everything went all right that perhaps someday we would be married.”

“Oh, I did, did I?”

“Yes.”

“And how much did I have to drink?” He smiled and brought her tender body to his again.

“It was very hard saying good-bye to my children.”

“I'll bet.”

“They cried so hard I could hear them three blocks away.”

“They'll get over it. You know how kids are.”

“You don't care about them, do you?”

Just then his trainer knocked again. He held up a bottle. “This'll be your last drink before the fight.”

He was happy for the chance not to get into the mess about her children. He held out his thick arm. “I could use some water.”