The next morning I felt the hand on my shoulder. I felt it and then I felt it again, this time shaking me, and then, finally, I made out a figure bending over me and I knew where I was.
“Frank?”
“Yes? Jay?”
“No. It’s Eddie.”
“Oh. I thought you were Jay.”
“Doc wants you.”
“Who?”
“Doc?”
“Yes, sure. Doc? What’s the matter with him? Is he all right?”
Eddie was gone, the door open and the light from the hall coming in. I got up and got into my slippers and put on my robe. Doc was standing in the doorway of Eddie’s and Jay’s room, with his blue flannel robe on over his pajamas, and he looked terrible. His hair was uncombed and he needed a shave and his eyes were baggy and his face was almost as white as his hair and he looked a hundred years old.
“You all right?” I said to him. “What’s the matter?”
“It’s Jay,” he said. “Come in here.”
“What’s the matter with him?”
“He’s what?”
The overhead light was on in the room, bright, and I looked at Jay’s bed against the wall and he was lying there with the khaki Army blanket up to his chin, the white sheet folded down over the edge of the blanket. Just his face was showing, the eyes closed, the head on the pillow, all of it, Jay and the bed, in that corner against the wall.
“He’s dead?” I said. “How do you know he’s dead?”
“He’s dead,” Doc said.
“But why is he dead? How could he be dead?”
“A heart attack,” Doc said. “A heart attack, I guess.”
“A heart attack? Did he have a bad heart?”
“Sure. Two years ago he had an attack.”
“I didn’t know that. Nobody ever told me.”
Doc was sitting on the straight-backed chair near the table with Jay’s tape and bandages and bottles on it. Eddie was sitting on the edge of his bed, his robe over his pajamas, staring at the floor, and they said nothing.
“I never knew that,” I said. “What do you want me to do?”
“He told me the doctor said he should take it easy,” Doc said. “I told him to listen to the doctor. I always brought another man into the corner to do all the carrying. Maybe he shouldn’t even have been here?”
“Where else would he be? This would have happened wherever he was.”
“Eddie woke me. He said: ‘You better get up. There’s something the matter with Jay.’”
“I didn’t know what it was,” Eddie said. “The alarm clock went off and Jay always gets up. He didn’t get up and I got up and shut it off, and I tried to wake him up. How did I know he was dead?”
“C’mon, men!” Penna said. “Hit the road!”
He was standing in the doorway in his road clothes. He could see that something was wrong, and he came into the room.
“Jay’s dead,” Eddie said.
“What?”
The others were in the hallway now, crowded in the doorway and looking in—Barnum and Memphis and Booker Boyd and DeCorso and Cardone—all of them heavy in their road clothes.
“Jay’s dead,” Penna said to them. “Eddie said Jay’s dead.”
“He’s what?” Barnum, in the beret, said.
They followed him into the room, then, cautiously. They seemed almost to fill the room and they looked at Jay. I looked at him again, too, at the form under the khaki blanket and at the head on the pillow, bald, with that bashed, broken nose and that gnarled left ear. Now that I knew he was dead, he seemed a yellowing, curious figure out of a wax museum. He was so still. Move, Jay, I was thinking. All you have to do is move.
“What happened to him?” DeCorso said.
“He had a heart attack,” I said.
“Why don’t we all get out of here?” Memphis said.
“Yes,” Doc said.
“You goin’ on the road?” Penna said to Eddie.
“No.”
“Yes, you are,” Doc said.
“I don’t want to go. I don’t feel like it.”
“You’re going,” Doc said. “You had yesterday off.”
“That’s right,” I said. “Doc’s right. You’re in training here, and the sooner you get back into it, the better.”
“But I’m not even dressed.”
“We’ll wait,” Barnum, in the doorway, said. “We’ll wait downstairs.”
“Sure,” Penna said. “We’ll wait for you.”
They left and Eddie got out of his robe and pajamas and dressed slowly. When he went out, Doc closed the door and sat down again.
“Well,” I said, “what do you want me to do?”
“I don’t know. What do we do?”
“Is there any family? Did Jay have any relatives?”
“No. He had a sister, married, but she died a couple of years ago. There’s her husband—if he’s still alive—but he’s old and wouldn’t give a damn.”
“Where did Jay live?”
“He’s got a room on West Ninety-third Street. I’ll have to take care of that, too.”
“Forget it for now. I suppose we should get Girot. I suppose he knows an undertaker in this town.”
“What time is it?”
“That clock says five of seven.”
“We kept Girot up until one o’clock. He’ll like this.”
“He doesn’t like anything. Katie will be in the kitchen by now. I’ll tell her.”
“I’ll get dressed,” Doc said.
When I told Girot’s wife she threw up her hands and sat down and kept slapping her hands onto her lap and shaking her head. I got her to go and wake Girot, in the cottage where they slept, beyond the south end of the parking space, and I went upstairs and dressed quickly and went into Doc’s room. He was just finishing dressing when Girot came up the stairs.
“Do you mean he’s dead?” he said. “This is terrible. Where is he?”
“In his bed,” Doc said. “Go see for yourself.”
Girot went across the hall and, in a moment, came out, closing the door behind him and shaking his head.
“This is terrible,” he said. “Why did this have to happen here?”
“Do you know an undertaker in town?” I said.
“There’s only one.”
“One’s enough,” Doc said. “Call him, will you?”
“I’ll call him,” Girot said. “This is terrible.”
Doc and I went down to the kitchen and Girot’s wife commiserated with Doc and poured us coffee. We carried it out into the dining room and sat at a table by a window on the lake side with the new sunlight flooding the white tablecloth. When we finished the coffee, Girot’s wife came out and refilled the cups, and finally we heard the fighters come back and we went out into the lobby.
“Go up and use my room,” Doc said to Eddie. “Cool out in my room.”
“All right,” Eddie said, and he followed the others into the sitting room and we could hear them going up the stairs.
“I’ll go up with him,” I said.
Doc went to the kitchen to get the cup of hot tea for Eddie, and I followed Eddie into the room and closed the door. There was a wicker armchair with a cretonne-covered cushion in it by the window, and Eddie, sweating, sat down in it.
“How was the road?” I said.
“All right.”
“Here. Use Doc’s towel.”
“Thanks.”
“Look. I know how you feel about Jay, but you have to forget it. It may sound unfeeling, but the only important thing is the fight. You don’t want to blow the fight.”
“I’m not gonna blow the fight, but Jay was a nice little guy. Why did it have to be Jay?”
“Who knows?”
“He was with me for all my fights. From the time Doc took me, Jay was with me for every fight except one or two out of town the first couple of years.”
“I know.”
“How did I know he was dead? I was shaking him and saying: ‘Jay, come on and get up.’ I didn’t know he was dead.”
“Of course not.”
Doc came in with the tea and gave it to Eddie. Then he went across the hall and came back with Eddie’s robe and shower clogs and another towel.
“After you’ve had your shower I’ll get your clothes,” he said to Eddie.
We heard feet on the stairs and Girot came up with a man in a blue serge suit. He was short and fairly stout and looked about sixty. He had a round, pink face that was expressionless, and his hair, gray now, was plastered back in a pompadour with a straight part right down the middle.
“This is Mr. Edwards,” Girot said. “The undertaker. This is Mr. Doc Carroll and Eddie Brown and Mr. Hughes.”
“May I extend my sympathy?” Mr. Edwards said.
“Thanks,” Doc said.
“Tell me,” Mr. Edwards said to Girot, “where is the deceased now?”
“Across the hall,” Doc said. “It’s that room right there.”
“I understand. Would you, uh, prefer to talk here or shall we go somewhere else?”
“If you’re going across the hall we’ll talk there,” Doc said. “Eddie doesn’t have to be a part of this.”
“I understand. Fine.”
“Will you come with us, Frank?”
“If you want.”
We left Eddie, and Girot went back downstairs and Doc led the way into the room. Mr. Edwards walked over to the bed and looked down at Jay and then turned back to us.
“As I understand it, there was no physician in attendance at the time of death?”
“That’s right,” Doc said. “He must have died in his sleep. Eddie—my fighter—found him just like that. He had heart trouble.”
“Well, I shall need a certificate of death. Is there a doctor here who was treating him?”
“Up here? No.”
“Then I’ll call the coroner.”
“Why the coroner?”
“Well, that’s the law. It’s just a matter of procedure. In the absence of a physician the coroner must certify to the death.”
“So call him.”
“I’ll do that. Have you informed the surviving relatives?”
“There are none. I’ll handle everything.”
“Oh. Well, have you had a chance to think about the funeral and interment? Where it will be?”
“I don’t know,” Doc said. “This thing just happened.”
“I suppose he should be buried in New York,” I said.
“I suppose so,” Doc said. “In Woodlawn, I guess. How do I go about getting him in there?”
“I judge Mr. Jay owned no plot?” Mr. Edwards said.
“No.”
“Well, I can arrange that for you. Will there be a church service?”
“No. He didn’t go to church. Can’t we use Cooke’s or one of those funeral parlors somewhere around midtown?”
“Certainly. I’ll make my call now and then go back to my office—I have a burial later today—but I’ll be back. I’ll see to everything.”
“Thanks,” Doc said.
“I suggest that this room be locked. I imagine the coroner will want to see everything as it is.”
“Whatever you say,” Doc said.
“But he wants to get Eddie Brown’s clothes out of here,” I said.
“Clothes?”
“Yes. He ran on the road this morning. He’s probably getting out of those clothes now. After he’s had his shower he wants to put on other clothes—slacks and a shirt and sweater. They’re probably right there in the closet.”
“He couldn’t wait? It probably won’t be long.”
“Wait?” Doc said. “Wait for what? What difference does it make?”
“Well, it would be better to leave everything.”
“Look,” I said. “I’ll pick out the clothes right now, while you’re here. Then we’ll all go out together and close the door.”
“There aren’t any keys for these doors anyway,” Doc said.
That seemed to convince him, so I went over to the closet and opened it. I saw some of the things Eddie had been wearing, and I took a pair of slacks and a plaid shirt and a light-blue sweater and shoes with socks stuffed into them. There were a pair of shorts and a T-shirt on a hook, and I took them, too.
“That’s all,” I said, showing Mr. Edwards.
“All right,” he said. “You understand that I just want to avoid any complications later.”
We all walked out and Doc shut the door. Mr. Edwards went downstairs, after telling us again that he would handle everything, and Doc and I went into his room and I put the clothes down on the bed.
“Is it all right?” Eddie said.
“What’s this about the coroner and everything being left where it was?” Doc said to me.
“I don’t know. It’s standard operational procedure, I suppose.”
“The law. Always the law. The politicians and the lawyers haunt a guy right to his grave. Can’t they ever leave him alone?”
After Eddie had had his shower and dressed we went down to the dining room. The others were finishing breakfast, and we sat by one of the windows again. Eddie passed up his cereal but had a couple of soft-boiled eggs, and Doc and I had coffee and toast.
“Anyway,” I said, “the weather is nice. It’s beautiful out.”
“Yeah,” Doc said.
“What are we going to do?” Eddie said.
“I’ll have to go into the city,” Doc said. “Is there a bus this afternoon or tonight?”
“If you could drive,” Eddie said, “you could take my car.”
“Go in tomorrow morning,” I said. “You won’t have the funeral until Thursday. Tomorrow’s Wednesday. I’d drive you, but for the purposes of this thing I’m supposed to be doing here I should stay with Eddie.”
“I want you with him anyway. Funeral. Can you get out of having a funeral?”
“Sure. You can call it private.”
“Private. It’ll be private enough, even when it’s public.”
“Mr. Edwards is here again,” Girot said, walking over to us.
Mr. Edwards was waiting in the lobby with the coroner. He introduced the coroner as Doctor Bernardi. The doctor seemed to be in his early thirties, stern-faced and black-haired, wearing a dark gray suit and carrying a black medical bag and a black brief case.
“You want to go upstairs?” Doc said.
“I’ve already seen the body,” the doctor said. “There are some questions to be answered, so I’d like to find a place to sit down.”
“You go upstairs,” Doc said to Eddie. “Go to my room.”
“I’ll go with him,” I said.
“I’d rather have you here,” Doc said. “Eddie’ll be all right.”
We went back into the dining room with the doctor and Mr. Edwards following us. We sat down at one end of the long table that had been cleared of the breakfast dishes, and the doctor took a printed form out of his brief case and placed it on the table and took out a fountain pen.
“To begin with, the name of the deceased?”
“Johnny Jay,” Doc said.
“He’ll want his legal name,” I said.
“Yes, his legal name.”
“That’s right,” Doc said. “Joseph Giorno. G-i-o-r-n-o.”
“He had an alias?”
“Not an alias,” Doc said.
“Well, what was it, if it wasn’t an alias?”
“It was his fighting name.”
“He was a fighter?”
“Years ago.”
“Was he a good fighter? Well known?”
“Does that have to go down there, too? Do you mean to tell me you’ve got a line on that form for that?”
“I’m merely asking.”
“What else do you want to know?”
“Not that I know of.”
The doctor filled in a couple of lines on his own.
“Was he married?”
“No.”
“Ever?”
“No.”
“Date of birth?”
“July 14th, sixty-three years ago. Figure it out.”
The doctor took a piece of blank paper out of his brief case and did the subtraction on that. Then he marked the date on the form.
“Place of birth? Do you know that?”
“Brooklyn.”
“Father’s name?”
“Tony. Anthony, or Antonio. Whatever you want to make it.”
“Mother’s maiden name?”
“God, I don’t know.”
“As I understand, there are no relatives who would know?”
“Correct.”
“Usual occupation?”
“Prize-fight trainer.”
“Kind of business or industry?”
“What? Prize fighting. Boxing. Make it boxing.”
“Is there a difference?”
“Yes. As long as we’re being so legal, prize fighting is outlawed. It’s boxing. Boxing is legalized.”
“Was the deceased ever in the U.S. armed forces?”
“Yes. In the Navy.”
“When?”
“World War One.”
“Now, as to cause of death.”
“A heart attack.”
“That’s merely your supposition.”
“Well, what else would it be?”
“It might be any number of things. We don’t know.”
“What do you mean?”
“It could have been a cerebral hemorrhage, a ruptured aneurysm, an intestinal hemorrhage. It could have been many things.”
“He had heart trouble.”
“As a matter of fact, Mr. Carroll, we don’t know but that it might have been foul play.”
“Foul play? Are you kidding?”
“No. Until I’ve got evidence to the contrary this man might have been poisoned for all I know. He might have died by strangulation. He might have been struck a blow on the head. There is no evidence of that at the moment, but it may be a fact.”
“Did you ever hear anything like this?” Doc said to me.
“That’s why I’m going to perform an autopsy.”
“An autopsy? You mean you’re going to cut the poor guy open?”
“You can be sure, Mr. Carroll, that it doesn’t make any difference to him.”
“It does to me.”
“I’m sorry, but that’s my ruling. It’s the law.”
“How long will this take?” I said.
“I’ll do it this afternoon. Mr. Edwards will remove the body to his funeral home.”
“How long will it take?”
“Oh, an hour and a half. I’ll call with my finding, if all goes well.”
“If all goes well?” Doc said. “What does that mean?”
“All right,” I said. “It’s all right, Doc.”
“It is like hell,” Doc said.
The doctor put his papers back in his brief case and we walked out into the lobby. Doc was talking with Mr. Edwards about the cemetery plot and the doctor motioned to me and I followed him out onto the porch.
“You understand the necessity for this, don’t you?” he said.
“After all, you recognize the circumstances. The cause of death has to be established. Besides, this Mr. Giorno, or Jay, was in the boxing business. Right?”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“Are you in the business?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so, but you’re familiar with the business. You’ve read about it.”
“About what?”
“What sort of business it is, the types that are in it. How do I know who this man was, or what went on here?”
“All right, doctor. You’ll call us later?”
“I’m not particularly keen about this myself. Performing an autopsy is no novelty to me. I was going to play golf this afternoon, the first time this season.”
“I know. We were going to have some gangsters up for tea.”
“What?”
“Call us when you’re ready.”
“Listen, we have a fellow in this town who used to be a fighter. You should see him.”
“Why?”
“A drunk. A no-good.”
“Is he the only drunk in this town?”
“No, but he’s one of them. That’s what it did for him.”
When I went back into the lobby Doc was still standing there, and Mr. Edwards was coming out of one of the phone booths.
“I’ve just called my son,” he said. “He’ll be right over and we’ll take the body. I’d like to go up now with you gentlemen and check anything that’s on the body. I mean any jewelry or whatever.”
We went up to the room, and Mr. Edwards pulled the covers off Jay. I merely glanced at what he was doing, and looked at Doc, who was looking around the room.
“Nothing on the body,” Mr. Edwards said. “Except, of course, the pajamas.”
“All right,” Doc said.
“My son will be here shortly.”
“Wait a minute,” Doc said. “There’s a ring. Jay had a ring.”
“There’s no ring here,” Mr. Edwards said. “There’s no ring on either hand.”
Doc and I walked over and we looked at both hands. There was no ring.
“There should be a ring,” Doc said. “A ring with a ruby in it. He wore it on his left hand.”
“It isn’t here.”
“I gave it to him myself, about twenty years ago, on his birthday. He was born in July, and that’s the birthstone.”
“Maybe he took it off,” Mr. Edwards said.
“He never took it off. Since I gave it to him he never took it off.”
“You’ll probably find it here somewhere,” Mr. Edwards said.
“Maybe Eddie took it off,” I said.
“No,” Doc said. “Why would he take it off? He wouldn’t think of that.”
I heard the front door slam. Then we could hear someone coming up the stairs.
“That’s my son, probably,” Mr. Edwards said.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said to Doc. “We’ll look for the ring later.”
We passed the young man carrying a stretcher in the hallway, and went into Doc’s room. Eddie was lying on the bed, looking at the ceiling.
“Everything all right?” he said.
“Yes,” Doc said. “Did you see anything of Jay’s ring?”
“His ring?”
“Yes. It’s not on him.”
“It’s got to be. He never took it off.”
“Some SOB took it,” Doc said. “Can you imagine that?”
“You’re not sure,” I said. “When they leave we’ll look around the room and through Jay’s stuff. It may be there.”
“But I never saw him take it off, ever,” Eddie said.
When we heard them go out and slowly down the stairs, Doc and I went back into the room. We looked all over the room and in the bureau drawers and the table drawer and in the pockets of Jay’s clothes.
“Some SOB took it,” Doc said. “Can you imagine a thing like that?”
“Who would take it?”
“Anybody. Who knows? This is some business.”
“Well, not anybody. Who would steal a ring off a dead body? Not Girot or his wife. That’s two out of the way.”
“I don’t know.”
“Suppose we say nothing about it?”
“I don’t care. I need a drink.”
We went back to Doc’s room, and Doc told Eddie to keep quiet about the ring. We sat with Eddie for a few minutes, and then Penna came in with the morning papers and Doc and I went down and got Girot from behind the desk in the lobby. I think that desk gave Girot the same sense of security that the Maginot line once gave the French, but it was just as false, and we went into the bar.
“Make us doubles,” Doc said to Girot, “and that’ll be all. Then you can get back to your work.”
“All right.”
“I feel lousy,” Doc said.
“I do, too. After what we had last night we’d feel lousy under the best of circumstances.”
“To Jay,” Doc said, when Girot had left.
“To Jay.”
“Jay and I went through a lot together. Over forty years.”
“I know, and now I’m feeling a little ashamed.”
“Of myself.”
“Why? What’s the matter?”
“Oh, about Jay. Jay was a nice little guy. I liked him, but I used to think how he weighed on everybody. Now I’m ashamed.”
“God how he liked to talk.”
“I probably shouldn’t say this now, but I used to wonder sometimes how you put up with it.”
“You want to know how?”
“Yes.”
“You ever look at that busted nose? That beat-up ear?”
“Yes.”
“I put them there.”
“You?”
“Certainly. Jay was my first fighter.”
“I know that.”
“I learned on Jay. I was a punk kid, managing him. I put that busted nose there. I put that beat-up ear there. I was learning—on Jay. Many a time Jay used to get on my nerves, too, but I’d look at that nose and that ear, and I’d say to myself: ‘You’re with me. As long as you live, you’re with me.’”
“I should have figured that out for myself.”
“It’s something, talking about it now. ‘As long as you live.’ That’s the way it worked out.”
“Yes. Suddenly today was the day.”
“I should have been arrested, the fights I put him in. Some of those great old-timers they use to write about—those grand old managers—what they did to me when I had Jay. He might have been a good fighter.”
“Really?”
“Not a great one, but a good one. A lot better than he was. I was real brave with Jay. I put him into wars. I’ll tell you one thing. When he was finished, I was finished being a brave manager. I outgrew that with one fighter. Jay.”
“I’ll tell you another thing. Every fighter I’ve had since Jay was a better fighter because of Jay, because of what I learned on Jay. Every one of them, and that goes for the Pro, too, and I told every one of them. Jay never knew it, but I told them. I told the Pro. He was very fond of Jay.”
“I know. He used to go along with him the same as you did.”
“A lot of guys at Stillman’s probably wondered why I kept Jay. He talked too much. He got excited in the corner. I could have got ten better trainers. I didn’t need a trainer. I do that. I needed a pickup guy for the towels and the pail and to give a rubdown.”
“I know.”
“I thought a lot about Jay in the last few years. You ever ride along in a train, or drive along, and see one of those junk yards packed with old cars, rusting, one on top of the other?”
“Yes.”
“I used to see those old car bodies and think of Jay. Every one of those old wrecks has a piece of every new car on the road. They learned on those old ones the way I learned on Jay. As long as I lived there could never be any junk heap for Jay. You know something else?”
“What?”
“Don’t get me wrong. This was no charity. Jay did what he was supposed to do, and he was loyal. He was the most loyal guy in the world.”
“I know.”
“Right after he had that first heart attack, a couple of years ago, I asked him about it and he says: ‘The doctor says I should take it easy. I shouldn’t get excited.’ Do you think I could keep him out of the corner?”
“No.”
“About ten days later we’re in Boston. Eddie got a bad decision—dreadful. He had the other guy almost out at the end, and where’s Jay? Jumping up and down and screaming at the referee, ten days after the doctor warned him to take it easy.”
“I believe that.”
“A loyal little guy. He had nothing. You know what was a big thing with him?”
“No.”
“Christmas cards. He sent Christmas cards to everybody.”
“I know. He always sent me one.”
“Half of the people never sent any back to him.”
“I never did. You make me ashamed again.”
“It makes no difference. He got some. He used to hang them on a string in his room. There was an old, bricked-up fireplace there, and he’d hang the cards on a string over the fireplace. He’d keep them there all year, until the next Christmas when the new ones came. Then he’d save the old ones in boxes under his bed. Over thirty years or more he had boxes full of them. That was his Christmas. I’ll have to clean them out now.”
“Let it go until after the fight.”
“I will. I’ll have to. He had nothing. That’s why, one birthday, I gave him that ring. I thought he was going to cry. Nobody ever gave him anything. Who the hell would take that ring?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who would do it? Figure it out.”
“Well, if you want to go into it, you’ve got the fighters and old Barnum. One of them must have gone back into the room while we were in your room.”
“Not Barnum.”
“No.”
“Penna?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“That wise-guy type wouldn’t do it.”
“He’s just the type.”
“No, Doc. He’s out in the open. Practical jokes and kidding, yes. Not taking a ring off a body. How about DeCorso? I don’t know much about him.”
“Vince? Listen, he’s so glad that I gave him a few weeks’ work he wouldn’t take the chance. I know him.”
“Not Memphis.”
“No. Of course not.”
“Booker Boyd?”
“I don’t know.”
“A possibility, but my candidate is Cardone.”
“Cardone? Why Cardone?”
“Well, I know Charley Keener, and the way he keeps his fighters, Doc. Cardone’s probably got nothing in his pockets right now—except, possibly, the ring—and when he’s in Jersey I bet Keener gives him a ten a week. He has all his fighters eat with him, you know, so he can watch them.”
“It’s possible.”
“Certainly. Cardone’s got those two dames, or they’ve got him.”
“Ah, he doesn’t need dough for them. You can be sure they pick up everything. Maybe they’re even paying him, for all I know.”
“Nevertheless, picture the kid. He’s got some pride. He’d like to be able to make one show, have some dough.”
“That ring is worth a couple of hundred.”
“I recall seeing it on Jay, now that it’s come up. Does Keener know about those dames?”
“I don’t know. My suspect is still Penna, in spite of what you say.”
“You may be right, but I doubt it. Too open. Not knowing anything about Booker Boyd, mine is Cardone.”
“We’ll never see that ring again.”
“I believe you’re right.”
We saw Barnum come through the door, looking for someone, and then he saw us at the bar and walked over.
“Sure, Barnum.”
“You goin’ to New York?”
“Yes. Tonight or tomorrow morning.”
“I’m sorry about Jay, and I’ll take care of Eddie while you’re gone. I mean I’ll handle him in the gym, and don’t worry about it while you’re gone.”
“Thanks, Barnum. Thanks. I’ll bring somebody out with me. Freddie Thomas, if I can get him. I’ll get somebody. I appreciate it, Barnum.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m glad to do it, because Eddie’s gonna win this fight.”
“Sure he is.”
“I know. I know the other boy. I know him since he start. He ain’t the fighter people think he is. He got dog in him, but he don’t show it to them yet. Eddie, he’ll make him show it.”
“He will, for sure.”
“Nobody fought that other boy right yet. I been watchin’ Eddie in the gym, and the way he’s boxin’ in the gym is the way he’s gonna lick him. You got that other boy just right.”
“I know.”
“You back him up, he can’t fight you. The way Eddie counters and punches to the body he’s gonna make it easy. I know the other boy and I been watchin’ Eddie. What Eddie knows and the way he punches he’s too much for him, sure.”
“Thanks, Barnum.”
“The people in our business, they don’t know. They may think Eddie gets lucky, but I know you for years, Doc. You got the good one now, and he ain’t gonna miss.”
“Fine, Barnum.”
“I’ll take care of him. It’s a pleasure.”
Eddie went into the gym that afternoon stony-faced, and Doc worked him harder than he had worked since we had come into camp. No one kidded around, and it seemed to me that they all were working harder and that there was an air of resentment over it all. Charley Keener said a few words to Doc about Jay and let it go at that, and Eddie and Memphis were boxing the last round, with Doc and me standing together on the apron, when Girot tapped me on the leg and I climbed down.
“Doctor Bernardi is on the telephone.”
“I’ll take it.”
I went out into the lobby and into the booth and shut the door and identified myself.
“Oh yes, Mr. Hughes,” he said. “I’m ascribing cause of death to coronary thrombosis with infarction—”
“Wait a minute. I’m trying to write this down. Did you say infraction?”
“No. Infarction. I-n-f-a-r-c-t-i-o-n. That’s an obstruction. With infarction due to arteriosclerotic heart disease. Have you got that?”
“In other words, he died of a heart attack.”
“To all appearances.”
“Wait a minute. What do you mean, to all appearances? You performed an autopsy, didn’t you?”
“Yes. Of course.”
“Then appearances have nothing to do with it. You were going on appearances before. This is your professional finding, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
I hung up and, when I got back to the gym, Doc had Eddie banging at the big bag. Doc was standing with his arms folded across his chest, watching.
“That coroner just called.”
“He did? What did he say?”
“Jay died of a heart attack.”
“Surprised?”
“Hardly. I don’t really think that that doctor was, either.”
“Political SOB. He’d like to have made a big thing out of it, wouldn’t he? He might even have gotten his picture in the paper.”
Doc took the 9:25 bus to New York that night. Eddie and I walked up the driveway to see him off, and then Eddie went into the kitchen and had a glass of warm milk and went to bed in Doc’s room. In my own room I lay awake in the darkness for a long while, seeing Jay. He wanted to be sure I’d put him in the story. Then I remembered Jay’s fat friend Stanley, and I felt sorry for Stanley, too.