Strictly For Cash (3 page)

"Listen, Henry," Brant said to him, "let's have a fight. I want to see how good this guy is. Don't pull your punches and keep after him."

The Negro grunted.

"And that goes for you, too, Farrar," Brant went on. "Well, if you're ready. Okay? Then come out fighting and make a meal of it." He touched the bell.

Waller came forward like a gigantic crab, his head hunched down into his heavy shoulders. We moved around the ring, feeling each other out. I got in a couple of quick jabs and swayed away from a vicious looping right he threw at me. I managed to pin him with another left. None of my punches had any steam in them. I wanted to test my timing. I knew it wasn't sharp. Every now and then Waller caught me with a dig that hurt. He kept shuffling away from me, making me come to him, and countering every time I landed on him. Suddenly he stopped in his tracks and let fly a right that landed high up on the side of my head. I was rolling by the time it landed, but it was a good solid punch, and it shook me.

As he rushed in I let go a left: the first punch I'd thrown with any steam in it. He went back as if he had run into a brick wall. I could see the surprise on his face.

We moved around. He was more cautious now. That left had startled him. I got in two jabs and collected a dig in the body that made me grunt.

I was now having trouble with my breathing. You've got to be in strict training to take the heavy bangs I was taking and not worry about them. If I was going to keep out of trouble I'd have to stop him, and stop him quick.

He saw my wind was going and began to pile on the pressure. He was a difficult target to hit, and for the moment all I could do was to jab away at his face and head and hope for an opening. I smothered most of the punches he was throwing, but some of them landed and they hurt. I was glad when the bell went and I could flop on the stool and take a breather.

Brant sponged the blood from my nose, his fat face thoughtful.

"You've been out of training too long," he said. "You're not timing your punches right. Better take it easy in the next round. Box him this time and keep away from him."

I didn't say anything. I had my own ideas what to do. I'd have to finish him in this round or I wasn't going to last.

Waller hadn't bothered to sit down. He lolled against the ropes, looking bored.

"Okay?" Brant asked as he reached for the gong-string.

"Yeah," I said, and came out slowly.

Waller moved in, set to nail me. He slung a left. I shifted so it slid over my shoulder and hit him three rimes to the body. I heard him gasp as he went into a clinch. His weight sagged on me. I tried to shove him off, but I couldn't do it. He hung on desperately, and didn't pay any attention to Brant's yells to break. He was hurt and worried. We wrestled around, and finally I got clear of his hugging arms. I caught him with a right upper-cut as we broke. Snarling, he fought back, and for a second or so we slung lefts and rights at each other. He was flustered now. I was timing them better, and they were sinking into him. A left prepared the way. His guard dropped, and I whipped over the right hook. It caught him flush on the jaw and down he went. I moved away, wiping the blood from my nose and breathing heavily. I wasn't worried. He wasn't going to get up in a hurry.

Brant climbed into the ring, beaming from ear to ear. Together we dragged Waller to his corner and propped him up on his stool. We were working on him when a voice  said, "I like this boy. Where did you find him, Brant?"

Brant started as if someone had goosed him with a red-hot poker.

Three men had appeared from nowhere and were standing near the ring. The one who had spoken was short and square-shouldered. His face was as uncompromising as a hatchet and as thin, and his black eyes were deep-set, still and glittering. He had on a bottle-green linen suit, a white slouch hat, and his pencil-lined moustache looked starkly black against his olive skin.

The other two were the kind of muscle-men you can see in a Hollywood movie any day of the week. Two Wops, pale imitations of their boss, tough, dangerous, and more at home with a gun or a knife than with their fists.

I didn't like the look of any of them.

"Hello, Mr. Petelli," Brant said, his grin fixed and his eyes scared. "I didn't see you come in."

Petelli let his eyes slide over me. I had a feeling there wasn't a muscle, mole or freckle missed in that one searching glance.

"Where did you find him?"

"He's the guy who bust MacCready's jaw," Brant said, and nervously took out his handkerchief and mopped his face.

"I heard about that. Is it your idea to match this boy against the Kid?"

"I was coming to see you about it, Mr. Petelli. But first I wanted to find out how he shaped."

"The nigger seems to think he shapes all right," Petelli said with a thin smile.

"He's a little out of training ..." Brant began, but Petelli cut him short.

"Come down to my office in an hour. We'll go into it." He looked at me. "What do you call yourself?"

"The name's Farrar," I said curtly, and ducked under the ropes.

"You look a good boy to me," Petelli said. "I can give you some fights. Have you signed with Brant?"

"I haven't signed with anyone," I said, "and I'm not signing with anyone. This is strictly my one and only appearance."

"You'd better come down with Brant, and we'll talk this over," Petelli said. "I can give you a fight a month."

"I'm not interested," I said, and walked across the gym to the changing booths in a sudden silence you could hang your hat on.

I got back to Roche's Cafe in time to see Josh Bates driving his six-wheel truck along the water-front towards the Miami highway. I watched him go with mixed feelings. I had a sneaking idea I should have been on that truck.

Roche was polishing an urn when I walked in.

"So you changed your mind," he said. "Josh waited around for you. What happened?"

"Sorry, Tom. I got hung up." I told him of Brant's offer. "With a car and five hundred bucks I'll be set. It means hanging around for four days, but when I go I'll move on my own steam."

I went on to tell him about Petelli.

"You want to keep an eye on that baby," Roche said. "He's got a bad reputation."

"I can believe it, and I intend to keep out of his way. I've got to do a little training. There's not much time, but I figure I can get into some sort of shape before Saturday."

"You'll stay with us, Johnny. Don't argue. We'll be glad to have you."

I didn't argue. I was glad to be with them.

Later, Solly Brant came into the cafe. He slumped down at a corner table as if he had completed a ten-mile run.

I went over and joined him.

"Well, it's all fixed," he said heavily. "It took all my time to convince Petelli this was your last fight. I think you're making a mistake, Farrar. Petelli could make you a sack of dough."

"I'm not interested."

"That's what I told him, and I finally convinced him, but you've still time to change your mind."

"I'm not changing it."

Brant shifted uneasily.

"It'll make a difference."

"How's that?"

"Well, look, if this is going to be your last fight, you can't expect Petelli to take much interest in you, can you?"

"I don't want him to. The less I have to do with him the better I'll like it."

"But he's got his money on the Kid, so the Kid's got to win."

"Well, all right, if the Kid's all that good, he probably will win."

"He's got to win," Brant said huskily. "It's orders."

I stared at him.

"Are you trying to tell me you've arranged for me to take a dive?"

"That's it. Petelli's giving you a big build-up. The betting will switch, and he's spreading his dough on the Kid. My instructions are for you to take a dive in the third."

"I told you: I've never taken a dive, and I don't intend to take one now."

Brant mopped his face with a none-too-clean handkerchief.

"Look, Farrar, you're getting five hundred bucks and a car out of this. For the love of Mike don't make it difficult."

"If the Kid can't win by beating me, then it's his funeral. I'm not taking a dive!"

"You haven't any choice," Brant said, beginning to sweat. "When Petelli says a thing it sticks."

"You're up to your neck in trouble. I'm not kidding. Petelli's poison. There was a boy who lost him a lot of money a couple of years back, not doing what he was told. They laid for him and smashed his hands so he never fought again. They bashed his knuckles with a steel rod until they were pulp, and that's what'll happen to you if you don't do what he tells you."

"They'll have to catch me first."

"They'll catch you. The other boy thought he was smart. He ducked out of town, but they caught up with him. It took them six months to find him, but they found him. He was picked up with a cracked skull and broken mitts, and he's never been any good since."

"You don't scare me," I said, getting angry. "This is going to be a straight fight or I quit!"

"Use your head, Farrar," Brant pleaded. "If Petelli says you take a dive, then goddamn it, you'll take a dive. Ask anyone. Ask Roche. You just don't fool with Petelli. What he says goes."

"Not with me, it doesn't." I stood up. "This is my last fight, and I'm not getting mixed up in a dive. Tell Petelli that from me."

"You tell him," Brant said hurriedly. "It's your baby now."

"Oh, no, it isn't. You fixed this: you unfix it. I'm going over to the gym to loosen up."

He must have rushed around to Petelli the moment I had left the cafe, for I was just getting warmed up in the gym under Waller's supervision when Petelli's two muscle-men came in.

Later I was to learn their names were Pepi and Benno. Pepi was a slick-looking Wop, wearing a pencil-lined moustache like his boss, while Benno was fat and blue-chinned and vicious.

They marched in like they owned the place, and Waller froze at the sight of them. All right, I admit it, there was something about those two that made my flesh creep.

"Come on," Pepi said, jerking his thumb at me, "get your clothes on. The boss wants you."

"I'm busy," I said. "He'll find me here if he wants me that badly."

I heard Waller catch his breath. He was looking at me as if he thought I was crazy.

He was a head shorter than I was, and I didn't want to hit him, but hit he was going to be if he didn't change his tone.

"Get out of here!" I said. "Both of you, before I toss you out."

"Toss us out," Benno said, and a blue-nosed automatic jumped into his hand. "You heard us the first time. Get your clothes on or you'll stop a slug with your belly!"

His still glittering eyes warned me he wasn't bluffing.

Without moving his lips, Waller mumbled, "Don't be a fool, Farrar. Go with them. I know these two."

Pepi smiled.

"Wise guy. Sure he knows us. He knows Benno's been mixed up in three shooting accidents already this year. Better not make a fourth."

I got dressed while they stood around and watched me, then we went down the alley to where a big Cadillac was parked. Benno kept the gun in his hand. There was a cop standing on the edge of the kerb right by the car. He looked at Benno, looked at the gun, then hurriedly walked away. That told me faster than anything that had yet happened just what kind of a jam I was in. I got into the car and sat beside Pepi who drove. Benno sat at the back and breathed down my neck. It took less than a minute to reach the Ocean Hotel. We went in by a side entrance and rode up in a gilt-painted elevator. Neither Benno nor Pepi said anything, but Benno kept the gun pointing at me. We walked down a long corridor to a polished mahogany door marked Private
. Pepi ta
pped, turned the handle and walked in.

The room was small, oak-panelled, and fitted up like an office.

A blonde sat pounding a typewriter, and chewing gum. She glanced up, gave me a swift, indifferent stare, seemed to think nothing of the gun in Benno's hand, and jerked her blonde head to the door behind her.

"Go on in," she said to Pepi. "He's waiting."

Pepi scratched on the door panel with his finger-nails, opened the door and glanced in. Then he stood aside. 

I walked past him into one of those vast rooms you rarely see outside a movie set. The enormous expanse of bottle-green carpet was thick enough to cut with a lawn-mower. A couple of dozen lounging chairs, two big chesterfields, a number of lamp standards and an odd table or two scarcely dented the space they were supposed to fill. Around the walls hung gilt-framed mirrors that caught my reflection as I moved forward, and reminded me how shabby I looked.

At a desk, big enough to play ping-pong on, sat Petelli. He was smoking a cigar, and the white slouch hat he had worn when he had come to the gym still rested at the back of his head. He waited, sitting forward, his elbows on the desk, until I was within a yard of him, then he stopped me by pointing his cigar at me.

"I'll do the talking; you do the listening," he said, his voice curt and cold. "You're a good fighter, Farrar, and I could have used you, but Brant tells me you want to stay out of the game. Right?"

"Yeah," I said.

"The Kid is a good boy, too, but I don't think he's got the punch you carry. Well, if I can't have you, I'll have to make do with him. This will be his first fight as far north as Pelotta. It wouldn't look good for him to get licked, so he's got to win. I've ten grand spread on the fight, and I don't intend to lose it. I told Brant you're to take a dive in the third round. Now I'm telling you. Brant says you don't like the idea. Well, that's your own private grief, not mine. You've had your chance to come in with me and you've passed it up," He paused to tap ash on the carpet. "This happens to be my town. I run it, see? What I say goes. I have an organization that takes care of guys who don't do what I tell them. We'll take care of you, too, if we have to. From now on you'll be watched. You're not to leave town. On Saturday night you'll fight the Kid and you'll put up a convincing show. In the third round the Kid'll catch you, and you'll go down and stay down. Those are my orders, and you'll obey them. If you don't you'll be wiped out. I mean that. I don't intend to lose ten grand because some bum fighter is too proud to take a dive. Double-cross me and it's the last double-cross you pull. And don't bother about police protection. The police do what I tell them. Now you know the set-up, you can please yourself what you do. I'm not arguing about it. I'm telling you. Take a dive in the third or a slug in the back. Now get out!"