Lost Art Assignment (12 page)

“I've got another idea,” he said. “It'll make this scam a lot less attractive without involving any cops. Cops ask questions and you and I could be sucked into that. Besides, my plan has a bonus. It'll cost these cheats some money.”

Mornings were never kind to Andreas Skorolos. Even as a fighter he was a night owl, never really able to get into training before noon. After an undistinguished boxing career, he had begun an equally obscure life at ringside, often missing his boxers' roadwork because they began before dawn.

Now, just before sunup, he heard his doorbell. Skorolos hefted himself to his feet, pulling on pants and slipping into shoes before his eyes were fully open. He left on the tee shirt he slept in. Who would visit him at such an hour? Skorolos staggered out of his bedroom, past the little kitchenette at the back, across his narrow living room.

“Who is it?” he asked, already unlocking the door. A burglar wouldn't knock, after all.

“Message for you.”

What the hell was this? He opened the door as much from curiosity as anything else. Morgan stiff armed him back, stepped in and closed the door behind him. Skorolos fell back into his shabby arm chair. Morgan looked into the bedroom on the left, the kitchenette on the right. It was clear that Skorolos was alone. The living room held a battered sofa and a big, aging console television. Floor tiles were cracked in places and the wallpaper was gray from its years in place, just hanging there. Much like Skorolos. Years in the same place. Just hanging there.

“Who the hell are you?” Skorolos shouted.

“Oh, just a man from the New Jersey crime commission,” Morgan answered calmly. “Thought I'd ask you some questions.”

“You…you got to show me some I.D.” He got his feet under himself and leaned forward. Of possible people to fear, government employees were low on his list. They had rules they had to play by. But Morgan stepped forward until he hovered just above the trainer.

“I ain't got to show you shit, scum ball. If I flashed my badge I might be tempted to throw your fat ass in jail.”

“You can't threaten me,” Skorolos said. A low rumble came from his throat and he suddenly lunged forward. All his weight and power went into one right hook into Morgan's stomach. As if he knew it was coming, Morgan slipped the blow easily, grabbed Skorolos' arm and spun him onto the sofa. He landed with a great puff of wind, and all resistance blew out of him right then. Morgan squatted down on his haunches to get on eye level with the man.

“Try that again, and I'll hurt you,” he said, putting just the slightest edge in his voice. “I'm not showing you a thing because I'm under cover. But if you decide to be stupid, I've got this bottle of drugs I got out of your cabinet. It's covered with your fingerprints and I think you might do some time if I hauled you in.”

Now Skorolos was sitting up straight, listening hard. Did he hear a deal here? Why else would this guy be talking instead of putting handcuffs on him? If he paid attention, he might find a way out of this.

“All right, pal, what is it you want?” he asked. “And how did you find me?”

“I got your address at the gym. Now, what do you do with that stuff?” Morgan asked, standing and backing off a step. “Paint it on the fighter's gloves?”

“That's right,” he said. “It doesn't hurt the other guy, not really.”

“No, of course not,” Morgan said. “It just slows him up a bit, maybe puts his balance off for a second. Really, it has about the effect of a good right hook to the jaw. Nobody would know the fight was tampered with. Nobody.”

“Okay, so you know.” he was losing patience. “So what do you want?”

“I want to know if your fighter is in on this?”

“Cevida?” Surprise coated Skorolos' voice. “He'd never go along with anything crooked. Boy's as honest as any I've met. But he'll never get anywhere. He just ain't got the power. He's a good man, just not a good fighter. At least this way, he can have a little bit of a career. A couple of wins, you know? And a few dollars.”

“Very few, I'll bet,” Morgan said. “And he'll have at least one less win than you thought. You're not going to put the drug on his gloves tonight.”

Skorolos' voice dropped to a whine. “No, you don't understand. I can't back out of this. I already been…”

“Already been paid, porky?”

“They give me big money to do this deal,” he said.

“Don't worry, you won't back out,” Morgan said, stepping in again to rest a hand on his shoulder. “You're just not going to do it. Their fighter loses, and they pay off to a lot of lucky, lucky betters.”

“You nuts?” Fear pushed Skorolos to his feet. “They'll kill me.” Morgan walked across the narrow room, and brushed aside the curtain to glance out the front window. He surveyed the street from three flights up.

“Tell me, how much do the bad guys give you to tilt the odds this way?”

Skorolos saw this as the turning point. If he answered he
was committed. If he didn't, he would probably end up in jail. Deciding was easier than he expected.

“I get ten G's.”

“Ten grand?” Morgan struggled to stifle a laugh. “That's your idea of big money? It's not five percent of what they'll clear from this one fight. Tell you what. You don't look too stupid. I'll give you twenty to blow the deal and skip town.”

“Twenty thousand dollars?” He could hardly believe it.

“Right, and all you have to do is do nothing tonight.”

“Wait a minute.” Skorolos retained a certain amount of skepticism. He knew about government budgets. “When do I get the money?”

“Why Andreas, my friend you disappoint me.” Morgan pulled an envelope from his hip pocket. “I'll give you half the money now.” Morgan reached out, offering Skorolos the envelope. He greedily snatched it, and opened it to count its contents. He blinked when he realized that he literally had only half of the money. He held a stack of bills, each displaying half of Benjamin Franklin's portrait.

“There's two hundred of them in there,” Morgan said. “I'll deliver the other half of each of them to you in not much more than twenty-four hours from now. With that much scratch you should be able to get out of Jersey before Cevida's owners figure out what happened. Since they got no respect for you, it will be a while before it occurs to them that you might be the cause of their big loss.”

Skoloros wasn't sure if he'd just been insulted, but he wasn't about to argue with a man offering him this kind of a payday. He was just about to smile when Morgan stepped closer again and clutched his throat with a big right hand.

“Now I know you ain't too bright, but you wouldn't think about double crossing me, would you?”

Skoloros shook his head, feeling hard fingertips dig into
the flesh on either side of his neck.

“And you wouldn't even consider telling anybody else about our little deal, would you?”

Again, Skoloros shook his head, feeling Morgan's eyes bore into his own.

“That's good,” Morgan said. “Because that would really piss me off and then instead of bringing you the other half of those bills when I got back, I'd tear your head off and shit down your neck.”

Then Morgan released the trainer, gave him a light slap on the cheek and backed out of his apartment.

Staring at his handful of cut bills, Skorolos decided mornings were still not kind to him.

Roberto's club threatened to burst with a standing room crowd. Waitresses hustled through the narrow spaces between tables, trying to keep up with the bottomless demand for beer. The crowd babble imitated white noise, like crashing surf or a television set after sign off. The spilled beer smell nearly masked the sweat and the garlic from hoagies and Philly steaks. All other lights, even the neon bar signs, were overpowered by a single glaring hooded bulb hanging from a frayed cord above the raised canvas ring, dead center.

At a rear table, Ross Davis sat with crossed legs in apparent total comfort. A cigarette hung from his right hand, a tall glass filled with a golden brew stood on the table in front of him, and his left arm hung loosely over the back of Felicity's chair.

The chaos hit Felicity's senses like a cattle prod. She hated disorder, especially in the form of shouting, shoving humanity. This time, she minded it less than usual, because it partially concealed her nervousness. She and Morgan planned today's activities in great detail, but she had not seen him since they parted the previous night. Now she couldn't avoid thoughts of the thousand possible combinations of events that could result in things going wrong.

Five minutes before the big fight was to begin, Felicity saw him enter. Deadpanned, still wearing mirrored
sunglasses, Morgan edged his way forward through the crowd. She looked through him. He was a stranger to her now. He would stay in character, and so must she.

When he reached Davis, Morgan crouched to bring him to eye level. Davis expected pretty much what he saw: a strong arm man, cold, deadly, arrogant but prone to follow orders. He waited, saying nothing.

“I'm Johnson.” Morgan shouted in Davis' direction. He was barely heard above the crowd. “J.J. Slash told me to make contact when I got settled in Atlantic City. Guess I'm your backup.”

“Find a corner, but stay in sight,” Davis shouted back. “We'll get together after the fight, outside. Might need you to help collect a few bets.” He gave Morgan one quick smile, which wasn't returned. When Morgan moved off to stand in the nearest corner, Davis hugged Felicity close.

“What a boorish clod,” he yelled to her. “No class, just muscle. Probably carrying a gun. Did you see the way he was glaring down your blouse?”

Felicity stifled a chuckle after that last comment, but luckily the crowd roared, covering her reaction. From somewhere she couldn't see, “Flash” Cevida, the underdog, bounced and danced up to the ring in black trunks. He appeared to float over the ropes. He grinned at the crowd, waving his hands over his head. From all appearances he was feeling like a winner.

Seconds later, another, louder cheer went up. “Big” Bill Bonham, the favorite, stepped into the ring wearing long baggy white trunks. He was glowing with confidence. This opening ritual fascinated Felicity, who had not watched much boxing. From the introductions, beginning with “Ladies and gentlemen”, through the warning to the boxers to fight fair, this pointless, tension building hoopla was
worthy of Atlantic City, even if it did happen on a back street, some blocks distant from the boardwalk.

From his corner vantage point, Morgan sized up the two boxers. Bonham stood an inch taller, with big black arms that glinted under the light, like his scalp. It looked like Cevida had a slightly longer reach. His muscles were longer, smoother. He had that hungry dog look in his eye. Often, in a near even match, the hungrier animal will win. Morgan wondered briefly if the drugged gloves were a true fix, or merely insurance.

A bell rang, and two bodies collided in the ring's center like projectiles fired from cannons. It would be a good match. Cevida depended largely on footwork and tearing jabs. Bonham had that big right hand which jarred opponents every time it landed.

Morgan regarded most fight fans as a bloodthirsty lot, but he admired the courage shown in the ring that night. By the end of round four, Cevida was showing most of it. Bonham covered himself, absorbing flurries of punches on his forearms, and fired at targets of opportunity. It seemed clear by this time, at least to Morgan, that Cevida would not take the fight. He simply didn't have enough power to put his opponent down to stay. Bonham would wait him out. When Cevida was tired, Bonham would take him down.

Halfway through round five, Cevida followed four sharp jabs with a solid right to Bonham's midsection. Bonham, an excellent counter puncher, caught Cevida on the tip of his chin with a sweeping uppercut. The Mexican hit the canvas, rolled and came to his knees. That was the first time Morgan noticed Skorolos in the corner. He was shouting to Cevida to get up, to get back in the fight. When
he regained his feet, the audience shouted their approval. Just before the round ended, Bonham stunned him again. Cevida wasn't quite standing straight when he returned to his corner.

Now Cevida was on a stool, getting water and having a towel waved in his face. Water was poured over him, and he appeared ready to continue. Then the boxer's face fell. Skorolos was telling him something Morgan couldn't hear, but his face told the story. He was telling his fighter to back off, that he couldn't win. Cevida shouted back, waving a fist at the opposite corner, yelling “I can take him, I can take him.” Certainly his trainer had told him that every day for weeks. Maybe he did care about his fighter. And maybe it didn't matter.

The bell sounded again, and both men moved out like they thought this was the end. Morgan could see Cevida was going for broke this round, but he didn't have the strength to finish it. Bonham had waited him out, and now closed in for the kill.

After a minute building his determination, Cevida suddenly exploded in a lightning burst of punches to Bonham's midsection. For the first time, the black man was shaken, pushed back. Was there a chance?

At the end of that burst, Cevida put it all behind a right cross that flipped Bonham's head up. Bonham, the counter puncher, whipped a left hook into Cevida's body that almost put him down. It should have. The follow on right cross put Cevida's nose in the air, then his back on the canvas.

Voices at top volume ravaged Morgan's ears, and bodies leaped up and down in front of him. Someone sloshed beer on his shoes. Despite these distractions, he focused on two pairs of eyes. Ross Davis: rage and hatred. “Flash” Cevida:
shock and disbelief. This young Mexican had more heart than Morgan had seen in years. No one could hear the referee counting, but his hand rose and fell in perfect rhythm. At four, Cevida was on his knees. At seven, one foot was down. He looked up, shaking his head to clear it.