The Harder They Fall (28 page)

Fernando was ready in a couple of minutes, but Pepe must have been in there at least half an hour. When he finally appeared, he looked like one of those ads the tailors always show you when you are selecting a style that never comes out looking on you as it did in the picture.

‘Now where shall we go, boys?’ Pepe said, with an empty, festive smile.

‘Depends what you’re looking for,’ I said. ‘Music, celebrities, girls?’

‘Who’s interested in music and celebrities, eh, Fernando?’ Fernando smiled heavily. Pepe produced a gold cigarette
case, filled with Players, and selected one gracefully. ‘Don’t worry, my friend,’ he said to Fernando, winking at me happily, ‘I will swear to your wife you spent every night at the training camp.’

Pepe tipped his way to ringside tables, ordered the waiters to keep the wine flowing and fell verbosely in love with each successive blonde who came on to dance, sing, or smile across her cigarette tray. It was apparent that he was to have a happy and costly Broadway debut. Early in the morning at the Copa, he was saying, ‘The one second from this end – who looks like a little golden kitten – do you suppose she would like to come up to the apartment for a nightcap?’

‘Look, Pepe,’ I said – he had already offered me a large guest house all to myself whenever I came down to Santa Maria – ‘that little tramp takes a hinge at your layout in the Towers, and you’re in trouble.’

‘But she is so beautiful. For her I would not mind a little trouble …’

When the party broke up, the garbage collectors who herald the dawn in New York were banging and scraping the cans on the sidewalk as if in protest against the more fortunate citizenry with cleaner jobs at more convenient hours. On the corner of Eighth Avenue I bought the morning papers from an old woman with a shawl around her head. Automatically, I turned to the sports sections as I walked back to the hotel.

The
News
had given the de Santos story a nice play. ‘Argentine Scion Arrives to Cheer Former Employee, Toro Molina. Brings $50,000 to Wager on Ex-Barrel-Maker of
Famous De Santos Vineyard.’

And further down, I read, ‘Toro Molina faces the acid test of his spectacular career this Friday night when the undefeated giant gets a chance to try his celebrated
mazo
punch on the formidable ex-champion, Gus Lennert.’

I recognised my own words, words I had written so many times they began to assume the weight of truth. On the bottom of the same page was a large cigarette ad in which a recently crowned middleweight champion was advising his fans to smoke a well-known brand because it was the only cigarette that didn’t affect his endurance. I thought of all the people involved in this pious lie: The fighter, the copywriter, the advertising and cigarette executives, the newspaper publishers and finally the great mass of readers themselves who acquiesce and make a lie, for all practical purposes, as easy to live by as truth.

How could I be blamed for pushing my product, the Giant of the Andes? Who was I to crusade for integrity? I was just trying to live in the world with a minimum amount of friction and pain. If this town was so stupidly credulous as to fill the Garden to see a harmless oaf maul a burnt-out ex-champion, who was I to turn them away at the door? What if I did know better? What if I even saw the fight game for what it was, a genuinely manly art, dragged down through the sewers of human greed? What could I do about it?

But whom was I arguing with? Who said I had to do anything about it? I was looking up toward the sixth floor of Beth’s apartment-hotel. What was I doing a dozen blocks away from my own joint off Times Square? Her light was on. At five o’clock in the morning, her light was on. Now I
realised why my mind wasn’t letting me rest. This wasn’t a Hamlet soliloquy; it was my running argument with Beth. I peered through the locked glass doors into the hallway. The dreary shapeless figure of a middle-aged woman was scrubbing the floor. I had seen her there for years on my way to and from Beth’s apartment.

I kept looking in at the scrub-woman while trying to make up my mind. How would Beth receive me? Would she see this as an act of determination daring enough to sweep away her resistance? Or would it seem to be just another alcoholic performance by a restless drunk who wandered through the grey canyons of the city’s dawn in pursuit of a will o’ the wisp – his decency?

Her window was a small rectangle casting its yellow shaft into the drab morning. There shines my conscience, I thought, one small compartment in this great edifice of darkness. And as I watched it, in a kind of hateful reverence, it suddenly went out. Down the empty street came a bony milk-horse calop-calopping wearily on the echoing pavement. His day had begun again. Back in harness with his blinders on. In that instant I remembered that I had to be out at the camp by nine o’clock to meet some out-
of-town
sports writers who were coming in to interview Toro.

I shaved, showered, tossed a couple of coffees down and called the Waldorf to see if the Argentine delegation was going out with me. Fernando answered the phone. Pepe had just gone to bed. He had left a call for four that afternoon. But Fernando wanted to go with me. He thought it would be a good idea if Toro, in his interview, said something about the growing importance of the national sports movement in Argentina. So for one hour on that bumpy local, with an off-key version of the Anvil Chorus pounding in my head, I had to hear about the growing enthusiasm for
Argentinidad
. Our Giant of the Andes was only supposed to be a national hero. But this self-appointed ambassador from south of the Amazon seemed determined to make him a hero of nationalism as well.

Toro was sitting on the porch listening to his radio and idly drawing faces in the margin of a newspaper. Training
was over except for some light exercises in the afternoon and there wasn’t much for him to do.

‘Why you leave last night?’ he said. ‘Lots of people come and ask questions. I do not know what to say.’

I had never seen him in such a mood. The strain was beginning to tell. This was the first fight for which Danny and Doc had really put the pressure on, and the daily grind building up to the nervous tension of the
tapering-off
period had twisted even Toro’s stolid intestines into the usual pre-fight knot.

Even with the reporters, to whom he usually showed a peasant amiability, he was irritable and uncommunicative.

‘It’s a good sign,’ Doc observed. ‘He’s in the best shape he’s been so far. Down to two-sixty-eight. It’s the first time he’s had an edge. Danny has really been working the hell out of him. Trained him like he would for an old-time fight. Had him chopping wood, climbing trees and hopping fences besides his regular work.’

‘I’d like to see the big bum make a good showing,’ I said. ‘Those boys in the press row who can’t be had will really be gunning for him.’

‘If you ask me, Danny’s done miracles with him,’ Doc said. ‘At least this time he oughta look like a pro. He’s finally got him punching a little bit and he’s moving around a little better, getting off his heels.’

After lunch Toro was supposed to lie down, but he told Doc he couldn’t sleep. He was too nervous about the fight. He said he wanted to take a drive in his car. Danny, edgy with the terrible effort at sobriety he always made when he was taking his work seriously, jumped Toro irritably.

‘Don’t try to kid your Uncle Danny. I haven’t let you out in three weeks, so now you want to run over and get Ruby to take care of you.’

Toro’s face tightened with anger. ‘You say that, I keel you, you son-of-beetch …’

‘Tell you what I’ll do,’ I stepped in. ‘Maybe the ride’ll do Toro good. So I’ll go along with him. Okay?’

They both agreed. Fernando was ready to come along, but for some reason Toro didn’t want him. Even in Spanish he could never find the words to express his suspicion of his aggressively patriotic countryman. For Toro, phrases like ‘the power and glory of Argentina’ had no meaning, no matter how many flowery adjectives were used to establish him as a symbol of
Argentinidad
. To him Argentina was the village of Santa Maria.

‘Please,’ Toro said, when we were on the open road, ‘I go to see the Señora.’

‘Toro, I am your friend. What goes with you and the Señora?’

‘I want to see her,’ Toro pouted. ‘I see her today.’

‘Maybe I can help you. But you’ve got to tell me more about it. I’ll guard your secret like a confession. I promise.’

‘I have already confess to the sin of
adulterio
,’ Toro said. ‘But I cannot stop. I am in love with the Señora. I want the Señora for my wife. I want to bring her home to Santa Maria to live with me in the big house I build on the hill.’

‘But, Toro,
estas loco
,’ I said. ‘
Completamente
loco
. Don’t you realise she’s married? Have you forgotten Nick, of all people?’

‘It is not real marriage,’ Toro insisted. ‘She has tell me
whole business. It is not real marriage before the Church. It is only civil marriage.’

‘But what makes you think the Señora wants to go with you? Has she told you? Has she promised you?’

‘She says only maybe, it is possible,’ he admitted. ‘But she says she is in love with me, only with me. I will take her back to Santa Maria. And Mama will teach her how to cook the dishes I like. And we will be very rich with the money I make in the ring.’

‘That’s great,’ I said. ‘That’s the end of the movie, all right. Only you left out one little detail. Nick. What are you going to do about Nick?’

‘The Señora is very intelligent. The Señora will find a way to tell him what has happen.’

What could you do with a dope like that except clam up and enjoy the scenery?

Toro told Benny to drive to Green Acres. ‘Dat okay?’ Benny asked me. Maybe it was just nasty curiosity on my part, masquerading as high purpose, but I let him go.

When no one answered the front door, we went around to the back and let ourselves in through the screen porch. There was no one in sight, so I followed Toro up the stairs. He seemed to know where he was going. At the end of the second-floor hall was Ruby’s suite – she and Nick had separate apartments – an upstairs sitting room decorated completely in white. At the far end of the room, facing us, was a white piano. A man was sitting on the bench at the piano, but he wasn’t playing. He had his back turned to it and his head was thrown back as if he were a mute going through the emotions of singing grand opera. We didn’t see
Ruby at all until we were halfway into the room. From where we stood, her head had been hidden by the top of the piano.

When he noticed us, the man jumped up and I saw it was Jackie Ryan, Jock Mahoney’s kid nephew. ‘Get outa here! Get the hell outa here,’ he was yelling. Ruby’s voice, shriller than I had ever heard it, screamed. Even quicker than I could, Toro seemed to grasp what had been going on.

‘¡Puta!’
he shouted.
‘¡Estás una puta, una puta!’

He made a frenzied, awkward lunge for her, but Ryan who barely came to his shoulder, rushed forward and drove his fist into Toro’s stomach. The punch caught Toro by surprise and sent him reeling backward. Then he lowered his head, amazingly like a fighting bull, and started to charge.

‘Get out, get out,’ I ordered Ryan.

‘Yes, for God’s sake, all of you,’ Ruby screeched. ‘You too, Jackie.’

‘Okay, okay, I’m going,’ Ryan said and swaggered out with an air of casualness.

‘Come on, Toro. We better go, too,’ I said. But he didn’t hear me.

The first wave of Toro’s fury was spent now. He turned to Ruby unbelievingly.
‘Puta,
’ he said. ‘Why you do this? Why you do this bad thing? And all the time you tell me Toro is the only one …’

‘You lummox,’ Ruby shouted. ‘You filthy, sneaking lummox.’

Her lips were unusually red in her pale, frightened face. But as she stood there in her silk lounging pyjamas, her superb, unimaginative self-control began flowing back into her.

‘Why you do this bad thing to Toro?’ he persisted. ‘Why?
¿Por qué?’

‘None of your business,’ Ruby said. ‘None of your goddam business. Just because I let you come up here a few times, you think you own me. All you men try to own me.’

‘But all the time we talk about Santa Maria. Maybe you go with me, you say.’

Ruby looked at him without pity. ‘I had to tell you something, you baboon. Do you think I’d leave all this for a lousy little hole in Argentina? Spend my life with a dopey tenth-rate bum!’

Toro stared in bewilderment. ‘Toro no bum. Toro fighter. All the time win. Best fighter Nick has in whole life.’

Ruby laughed. She had to get back at him. After what had happened she had to do something to put him in his place.

‘Listen, you slob,’ she said slowly. ‘You couldn’t beat Eddie here if it wasn’t fixed. Every fight you had in this country was fixed. All those bums you’re so proud of beating, they were paid to take a dive, every one of them.’

‘Dive?’ Toro said, frowning. ‘I not understand. Explain me what you mean, dive?’

‘You poor sap,’ Ruby said. ‘Those guys you beat were letting you win – didn’t you know that? – letting you win.’

Toro’s large eyes half closed in pain. ‘No!’ he roared. ‘No! No! I no believe. I no believe.’

‘Ask Eddie,’ Ruby said. ‘He ought to know.’

Toro turned to me desperately.
‘Dígame,
Eddie,’ he begged.
‘La verdad. Solamente la verdad. Dígame.’

Having to stand there and swing that body blow to his
simple pride suddenly seemed to compound my crime. But there was no room to weasel out. ‘It’s true,’ I said. ‘Your fights were fixed. They were all fixed, Toro.’

Toro ran his hand slowly over his face as if his head held a terrible aching. Looking at him, you had the crazy impression that the whole front of his face had been beaten in.

He turned and rushed out. Downstairs, he charged out through the screen door, ran around the house and started wildly down the street. I jumped into the car and told Benny to follow him. We let him go for almost four blocks. He was beginning to run out of gas. He lacked the athlete’s coordination to run easily on his toes. Gradually he slowed down to an awkward workhorse trot. We parked the car about fifty yards ahead of him, and as he came abreast we tried to herd him into the back seat.

‘Go ’way, go ’way, you make me look like fool,’ he shouted.

‘G’wan, get in dere,’ Benny said. He pushed Toro toward the car. He had nothing but contempt for him. The exertion had sapped Toro’s power to resist. Wearily he submitted and climbed into the back seat.

All the way out to the camp, Toro sat huddled in the corner, staring down at his massive hands.

‘Listen, for Christ sake,’ I said. ‘We were only trying to help you. Trying to get you that dough you wanted.’

There was no response from Toro, no indication that he had heard me.

This wasn’t in the script. Toro wasn’t supposed to have any sensibilities, any capacity for humiliation, for pride
or indignation. He was merely the product: the soap, the coffee, the cigarette.

‘Honest, Toro, we weren’t trying to make a fool out of you. We just wanted to make sure you got the right start. It happens all the time.’

But Toro wouldn’t hear me. He just sat sullenly in the corner, his eyes turned inward in shame.

When we reached the camp, Danny and Doc were sitting out on the steps with George and some of the boys.

‘Hello, big fella,’ George said. ‘Have a nice ride?’

Toro stood on the landing, dwarfing all of us. Looking up at this inept and angry giant, his inarticulate wrath was terrible to see.

‘You think you make joke of Toro, huh?’ he accused us all. ‘You make big fool of Toro?’ He went on into the house.

‘What’s eating him?’ Danny wanted to know.

‘Ruby just gave it to him straight about how he beat all those fellas,’ I said.

‘Serves him right for nosing around the Duchess,’ Doc said. ‘It serves him right.’

‘Maybe we shoulda told him,’ Danny reflected. ‘It stinks bad enough without smelling it up with more lies.’

‘Aah, you guys sound like a lot of old women,’ Vince said. ‘He’ll be all right. I’ll go in and slip him another five hundred. That’s the best kind of medicine.’

But a few minutes later, when Vince returned, his fat neck was reddened with anger. ‘He says he don’t want the dough. The jerk. And six months ago his ass was hangin’ out. How d’ya figure a slob like that?’

When it was time for supper Benny went up to call Toro, but he wouldn’t come down. Then George took a crack at it because he was closer to Toro than the others, but he came back alone too. So I went up to see what I could do. Toro was standing in front of his window, staring out into the gathering darkness.

‘Toro, you better eat something,’ I said.

‘I stay here,’ Toro said.

‘Come on, snap out of it. We’ve got a beautiful steak waiting. Just the way you like it.’

Toro shook his head. ‘I no eat with you. You make joke of Toro.’

Then he turned around and confronted me. ‘This fight with Lennert? This fix too?’

‘No,’ I lied. ‘This one is on the level. So if you beat Lennert, you have nothing to be ashamed of.’

I was sorry to have to keep on with it, but I was in so deep there was no way out of this circle of lies. We were in a tight spot. The mood he was in now, he was liable to do anything in that Lennert fight. If he thought the fight was in the bag, he might even spill it to the Commission and that would be the end of the Lennert and Stein gravy. We could even wind up before a grand jury. I wish I could have had a choice, but there I was. I had to make him believe this fight was on the level.

Toro drove his enormous right first into the open palm of his other hand. ‘I win this fight,’ he threatened. ‘I show you Toro no joke. You no have to fix for Toro. This time you no laugh behind me.’

‘Okay, okay,’ I said. ‘Now come on down and get yourself some steak.’