Scraps of Heaven (11 page)

Josh accompanies him to the front door. Yossel descends the steps weighed down by his bulk. ‘Oil the gate,' he instructs, as he lets himself out. ‘Better still, buy a new one. Or build a brick wall.' He turns to wave before he steps into his car, and all that remains of his brief presence is a tablecloth sprinkled with poppy seeds, and the residue of his final biscuit swimming in the base of a teacup.

Even here, on the verandahs, the thrill can be felt. Shanahan and the Bianchis have their portable radios out. The preliminary bouts are over, the boxers are making their way to the ring, and boxing compere Merv Williams is introducing the main bout. Williams is in full flight. Friday evening at ‘the Stadium' is fight night. ‘Welcome to the house of stoush,' he exclaims. ‘In the red corner, weighing in at nine stone, seven and three-quarter pounds, is George Bracken, Australian lightweight champion. And in the white, at nine stone five and three-quarters, the Italian import, Giordano Campari.'

They sit, two groups of supporters, three verandahs removed, in support of opposite camps. Josh and Miles are for the Aborigine in the red. Old Bianchi and his nephew back their fellow countryman in the white, and Williams, feigning neutrality, is previewing the fight.

Williams is a man of adjectives. He cannot resist stringing them out. ‘Campari is fast, cagey, elusive. And clever,' he says, leaving the listener in no doubt. ‘He has ring brains, speed of punch, a left hook that hurts, and a tricky chopping right. He knows how to take control of a fight. That's why he's the bookies' choice. A five-to-two-on favourite after his impressive showing three weeks ago, in his first Australian fight. He was more than a match for Maxie Carlos. He's not as hard a hitter as Bracken, but he has an advantage in reach and height.'

‘Don't worry,' says Shanahan, as if addressing Williams. ‘Bracken is a heavier puncher. He just needs to tighten his defence.' He mixes Josh a shandy, refills his own glass and sits back on the sofa. There is a conversation going on, an intimacy between the verandah audience and disembodied voices crackling from a radio on an autumn night.

Three verandahs away the Bianchis are getting nervous. Their radio sits on a card table beside a bowl of olives soaked in brine. Their glasses are full to the brim with red wine. ‘Giordano! Giordano! Giordano!' the Bianchis join the pre-fight chant.

The bell for the first round interrupts their shouts. Bracken quickly takes charge. He pins Campari to the ropes with a two-fisted attack. The Italian counters with a flurry of defensive rights. The Bianchis ride each punch.
‘Mena, Mena,'
says Valerio. Hit him. Hit him. Valerio jabs his fist into the palm of his hand. ‘
Buttalo giú .
Knock him down.' Each punch landed by their man incites a cheer, each counter-punch, a groan.

Bracken is on fire. He jolts his opponent in the third round with a right to the head. Campari fends off Bracken's two-fisted rushes with short rights.
‘Dai! Dai!'
urges Valerio. Come on! Come on!
‘Buttalo giú .'

In the sixth the pace quickens. Bracken delivers fierce rips to the body and head. Even here, on the verandah, Josh detects the hunger of the crowd. He knows about eyes that sting with sweat, and the charge of adrenaline, the excitement that builds with each round. He has felt it in Logan's gym. And he knows the sensation of arms tiring, legs stumbling, knows the fury that propels each punch.

In the eighth Bracken opens up a cut over Campari's left eye. The Italian is buckling. Bleeding. The Bianchis have gone quiet. Shanahan is on his feet. He is urging Bracken on. Josh has never seen him so animated. Shanahan stalks the verandah, his eyes fixed on the wireless. The dial is alight. Its innards are babbling. Its graduated plastic bumps bulge in grotesque shapes.

In the ninth Bracken moves in for the kill. He compounds the Italian's injury with a flurry of hard rights. Blood is streaming from beneath Campari's eye.
‘Finiscilo,'
mutters Valerio. ‘Finish him off.' He does not want the humiliation to go on. Referee Reilly separates the boxers, and signals the end of the fight.

‘Bracken wins on a TKO,' screams Williams.

‘What's a TKO?' asks Josh.

‘A technical knockout,' says Shanahan. ‘In plain English it means Campari's getting mauled.'

The despondent Bianchis return inside, but Shanahan listens to the round-by-round analyses, the post-fight reviews. Williams is letting the adjectives fly like beads of sweat off a boxer's face. ‘It is hard to believe that this flashing, resourceful, methodical, fast-punching tradesman was the same, plodding, KO-crazy Bracken who lost to Cavalieri, Campari's fellow Italian import, just two months ago,' he says. ‘The tough Aborigine has turned in the greatest performance of his career. He was far too fast and aggressive for the cunning Italian.'

Williams has got Bracken's trainer, Kid Young, at the mike. ‘I've met him,' Shanahan tells Josh. ‘Logan introduced us. He's been down to the gym. He's a former featherweight champ, and a great trainer. He saw Bracken's talent when he was still a sideshow pug.'

‘I've waited four years for this,' says Young. ‘And I'd almost given up hope of ever seeing that kind of Bracken.'

‘Why the sudden change?' asks Williams.

‘We watched Campari fight Carlos, and adjusted George's training. We concentrated on speed and body punches to slow Campari down. We matched George with speedy sparring partners, and we didn't work him too hard. And it all paid off. He's never been fitter, and he has never had so much zip.'

‘We all could do with a bit of zip,' says Shanahan. ‘And another sip.' He pours Josh a second shandy, and himself yet another glass. ‘Bracken's done it,' he tells him. ‘He's moved from being a fighter to a boxer, from a brawler to a practitioner of the pugilistic arts.' Shanahan pauses, rolls a cigarette, and puts a hand on Josh's shoulder. ‘And you can do it too, if you apply yourself. Even though you're a skinny runt,' he laughs.

‘Young's a great trainer,' Shanahan adds. ‘He knows that you've got to be both aggressive and clever, especially if you're black. I've seen it on the road. They live on the fringes of country towns. They're fair game. They have to grab the crumbs, take whatever comes. That's how Bracken got started. He was once a station hand who used to spar with towels wrapped around his fists. Then he met Jimmy Sharman and joined his boxing troupe. He toured the country, fought in tents. Took on all comers. That's the way it is. It's a dog-eat-dog world.'

Shanahan is agitated. He pauses, puckers his lips, and exhales a smoke ring. It floats over Josh's head. ‘Bracken says he hates boxing and has never liked it, not for a moment. He says he fights because it's his only chance to drag himself out of the muck. That's what Kid Young told me. He knows him well. After all, he got him off the road, and took him into his own house.'

Shanahan draws on the remains of the cigarette. He flicks the dregs off the verandah into the front garden and rolls another. He turns off the radio. Quiet descends on Canning Street and, with it, a late night fog. Inside, Shanahan's wife can be heard pottering around. In the months that Josh has known him, Shanahan has never introduced her, never mentioned her obvious pregnancy. And there have been nights when Josh has awoken to the sounds of argument, voices bickering. Doors slamming. Glass breaking. Perhaps every night is fight night on Canning Street. Perhaps this is the festering secret, the barely concealed fury that seethes behind closed doors.

‘See ya,' says Josh, when he gets up to leave. As he climbs the steps to his front door, Shanahan ambles by.

‘I need air,' he says. ‘I have to take a walk before I turn in. Got a lot to think about. Got to find peace of mind.'

They are both unwilling to re-enter their homes. Josh remains standing by the front door. He recalls Zofia's sullen silence during Yossel's visit, two hours earlier, just before the fight. He does not wish to let go of the night. He conjures the thwack, thwack of fist upon flesh, the odour of fear in Logan's gym. He hooks and uppercuts imaginary foes until, reluctantly, he steps into the passage and vanishes into the dark.

Bloomfield's nights in Curtain Square are numbered. The cold is beginning to bite. He must return almost every evening now to his room in the welfare house. Tonight he detours to the espresso bar on Rathdowne Street. He is enticed by the warmth of its lights. They know him well, these men sitting at tables, bent over their coffees and snacks. They know him well, this shadow of a man who darts in and out of the bar. Who does no one any harm. They glance up when Bloomfield enters, acknowledge his presence with a nod.

‘Buona sera,'
he replies.

He speaks softly, as someone who rarely exercises his voice. Perry Como croons ‘Catch a Falling Star'
.
Bloomfield sits at a window table, beside the jukebox, and looks through the plate glass. He makes out a Zephyr and Morris Minor driving by. He looks back at a group of men mustered by the pinball machine. Valerio is the latest addition to the company, the most recently arrived immigrant to spend weeknights in the bar. He sends the ball scudding from one end of the table-soccer pitch to the other and controls the levers with a deft hand. He mutters
vaffanculo
when he misses, and leaps in triumph when he scores a goal.

Paolo the cafe manager serves donuts, cheese sandwiches, slices of cake. He stands behind the coffee machine, works the black levers, dishtowel tucked into his flannel trousers. The machine hisses. His palms are wet and blistered, his wrists ache. He is a barista, a master of the Gaggia. Espressos, macchiatos, cappucinos and machitos, emerge with speed from his fast moving arms. Paolo deals in caffeine and delivers his heady brew with a steady hand.

Bloomfield's ear is cocked to the music. He plays with Como's lyrics. He mouths them, enunciates each word. Bloomfield is easing himself into yet another language. He is a collector of linguistic fragments. He has lost count of the bits and pieces of languages he has picked up. He likes the sense of protection it gives him to be able to say ‘how are you' in a dozen tongues.

‘Come stai?'
he asks, when Paolo brushes by.

‘Bene,'
Paolo replies.

‘Un cappucino per favore, signore,'
Bloomfield says, timidly.

‘Bravo,'
says Paolo.

Bloomfield smiles like a proud child.

Upstairs the men are playing Red Aces. On the walls, there are posters of cyclists, boxers, soccer champions mid-play. The players scan their cards for an ace of diamonds or hearts. Between hands they are reviewing tonight's fight.

‘Campari was two pounds short,' says one.

‘He should eat more pasta and
bistecca
,' jokes another.

They are forensic scientists at a post-mortem, each with a theory of their own.

‘The Australian boxers are waking up. Less blind punching, more defence. They are copying our style,' argues the dealer.

‘The fight was rigged,' is the common consensus. How could it be otherwise?

Mostly, they are talking of work. This is where schemes are hatched, and where futures are conceived. This is the de facto labour market where newcomers exchange information around tables, intimate and snug. And there is serious money on the card game. Behind the scenes there is a bank. Hard-earned cash is changing hands. Cigarettes perch on the edges of ashtrays. Their butts lengthen into red shadows. Their owners are too engrossed to notice the waste. Or perhaps they like it that way. The idle cigarettes are faithful companions, tranquil witnesses of the game. The players harbour the same wish, to make money, and large amounts of it, quick.

A police officer enters the cafe. Paolo punches a bell on the counter. It resounds upstairs. Within seconds the men have put away the money and cards. When the officer emerges from the stairs he finds them quietly talking. They resume their gambling as soon as he leaves.

Bloomfield stays at the corner table until the last customer departs. He can no longer stave off his return. He leaves as Paolo is sweeping the floors. He walks from Rathdowne to Newry, turns right into Drummond Street and continues four blocks north, to the welfare house. He chants a smattering of Italian as he walks:

‘Un cappucino per favore, signore.'

He accentuates the roll of the r's.

‘Un cappucino per favore, signore.'

He allows each word to rest upon his tongue.

‘Un cappucino per favore, signore.'

He repeats the phrase in a singsong hum. And stops, when he enters the house. He tiptoes over the floorboards. His fellow guests are asleep, he does not wish to disturb them. He wishes to remain a non-presence, to keep out of harm's way.

The bathroom is lit by a single globe. Romek dips his shaving brush into a glass of water and lathers his face. He prides himself on the straight tracks he cuts through the lather. He admires the precision, the way the razor works the skin. He works with the guidance of a small mirror attached by wire over the sink. When the shave is done, he returns the razor and brush to the medicine chest. Its shelves are a mess of bandages, cotton wool, castor oil, hair creams and bottles of iodine, the all-purpose antiseptic for abrasions and cuts.

When the poached eggs are done Romek spreads the yolk on toast. As he eats he inspects the front page of this morning's
Age
: ‘P.M. Sets Australia's First Nuclear Reactor in Operation' reads the headline, Saturday, 19 April, 1958. ‘Nuclear Patrols Threat to Peace' reads another. ‘Moscow Envoys Meet But Top Talks No Closer', states a third.

Romek plays with the words. He singles out key phases that pepper the lead reports and frames them in biro. He scribbles them at random in the newspaper margins as if compiling a shopping list. It is his first step towards creating his daily couplets, his simple English lines. He is astonished at how the words, when reassembled, form approximations of rhymes.