11/22/63: A Novel

The Tiger Man, perhaps anxious to get to the steak dinner waiting for him at Sardi’s, rushed in for the kill. Case didn’t try to escape him-his speed had left him behind long ago, perhaps during some tank-town fight in Moline, Illinois, or New Haven, Connecticut-but he was able to cover up… and clinch. He did a lot of that, resting his head on Tiger’s shoulder like a tired tango dancer and pounding his gloves weakly on Tiger’s back. The crowd began to boo. When the bell rang and Case plodded back to his stool with his head down and his gloved fists dangling, they booed louder.

“He stinks, beautiful,” the chubby man remarked.

Sadie looked at me anxiously. “What do you think?”

“I think he made it through the first, anyway.” What I really thought was that someone should stick a fork in Tom Case’s sagging butt, because to me he looked almost done.

The chick in the Jantzen did her thing again, this time holding up a 2. The bell clanged. Once again Tiger bounded and Case plodded. My guy continued to move in close so he could clinch whenever possible, but I noticed he was now managing to deflect the left hook that had devastated him in the first round. Tiger worked on the older fighter’s gut with piston-like shots of his right hand, but there must have been quite a lot of muscle left under that flab, because they didn’t seem to affect Case very much. At one point, Tiger pushed Case back and gestured with both gloves in a come on, come on gesture. The crowd cheered. Case only stared at him, so Tiger moved in. Case immediately clinched. The crowd groaned. The bell rang.

“My granny could give Tiger a better show,” the cigar-smoker grumbled.

“Maybe,” Sadie said, lighting her third cigarette of the fight, “but he’s still on his feet, isn’t he?”

“Not for long, sugar. The next time one of those left hooks gets through, it’s gonna be Case closed.” He chortled.

The third round was more clinching and shuffling, but in the fourth, Case let his guard drop slightly and Tiger hit him with a barrage of lefts and rights to the head that brought the audience to its feet, roaring. Akiva Roth’s girlfriend was with them. Mr. Roth himself retained his seat, but did trouble himself enough to cup his ladyfriend’s ass with a beringed right hand.

Case fell back against the ropes, shooting rights at Tiger, and one of those blows got through. It looked pretty feeble, but I saw sweat fly from the Tiger Man’s hair as he shook his head. There was a bewildered where-did- that -come-from expression on his face. Then he moved in again and went back to work. Blood began oozing from a cut beside Case’s left eye. Before Tiger could increase the damage from a trickle to a gush, the bell rang.

“If you hand over that ten now, beautiful,” the pudgy cigar-smoker said, “you and your boyfriend will be able to beat the traffic.”

“Tell you what,” Sadie said. “I’ll give you one chance to call it off and save yourself forty dollars.”

The pudgy cigar-smoker laughed. “Beautiful and a sensayuma. If that long tall helicopter you’re with treats you bad, sugar, come home with me.”

In Case’s corner, the trainer was working frantically on the bad eye, squeezing something from a tube and mooshing it around with the tips of his fingers. It looked like Crazy Glue to me, except I don’t think that had been invented yet. Then he slapped Case in the chops with a wet towel. The bell rang.

Dick Tiger bored in, jamming with his right and hooking with his left. Case dodged one left hook, and for the first time in the fight, Tiger launched a right uppercut at the older man’s head. Case managed to pull back just enough to keep from taking it full on the jaw, but it connected with his cheek. The force of it distorted his entire face into a horror-house grimace. He staggered back. Tiger came at him. The crowd was up again, bellowing for blood. We rose with them. Sadie’s hands were over her mouth.

Tiger had Case pinned in one of the neutral corners and was hammering him with rights and lefts. I could see Case sagging; I could see the lights in his eyes dimming. One more left hook-or that cannon-shot right-and they would go out.

“PUT IM DOWN!” the chubby cigar-smoker was screaming. “PUT HIM DOWN, DICKY! KNOCK HIS BLOCK OFF!”

Tiger hit him low, below the belt. Probably not on purpose, but the ref stepped in. While he cautioned Tiger about the low blow, I watched Case to see how he would use this temporary respite. I saw something come into his face that I recognized. I had seen Lee wearing the same expression on the day he’d been giving Marina hell about the zipper of her skirt. It had appeared when Marina had come back on him, accusing him of bringing her and the baby to a peegsty and then twirling her finger around her ear in a you’re-crazy gesture.

All at once this had stopped being just a payday to Tom Case.