At sight of Victor Sovich, Guild drew his .44 and aimed it directly at the boxer’s middle. This was an hour after finishing breakfast with Stephen Stoddard.
Sovich, dressed in the type of black suit and white shirt and red-lined cape you would expect to see on an opera baritone, walked into the boxing camp smiling.
Guild, John T. Stoddard, and Stephen Stoddard all stood staring at him.
“You’d better tell Guild here that guns don’t always frighten me,” Sovich said, strolling up.
It was hot in the alley, just as it had been yesterday afternoon, though thunderheads had begun massing in the flat blue midwest-em sky and there was a promise of a brief respite from the heat.
The two Mexican boys were in the rope ring again. They would precede Sovich and the black man. Guild just hoped the skinnier of the boys somehow learned to box between now and tomorrow afternoon.
A small group of reporters stood in the wide mouth of the alley, to the left of the livery stable, where you could smell heat and iron and smoke, talking to a small, prim group of churchwomen who were here to protest fisticuffs in general and any fight with Victor Sovich in particular.
“I wish I could turn you loose on them,” John T. Stoddard said, nodding to the women.
“I wouldn’t do it,” Guild said. “I agree with them, remember?”
By now Sovich was directly in front of them.
Guild glanced up, sensing Stephen Stoddard’s eyes on him. The kid could obviously sense what Guild was thinking.
Here was Sovich coming back to a partnership in which he was constantly cheated. Yesterday he had burned Stoddard’s money. He had been through with the relationship. His presence here today could only mean that Stoddard had telephoned or sent a note—reminding Sovich that if money hadn’t wooed him back, then maybe a certain memory would.
Guild wondered what Sovich had done.
John T. Stoddard said, “Victor, I don’t expect any trouble between us. I’ve agreed to give you half the purse tomorrow. But I want Guild here to make sure that everything runs smoothly. I want tomorrow to be a good day for us.”
“You just keep Guild out of my way,” Sovich said, glaring at Guild.
“He’ll be with me, Victor. That’s the whole point of having him. But he won’t bother you unless he needs to. Right, Guild?”
Guild felt as if he were stepping into the middle of an argument between two ten-year-olds.
“He’d better be damn good with that gun,” Sovich said, “for his own sake.”
“We’ll have those boys take a rest,” John T. Stoddard said, “and you can get in there and work out with Barney. I hope you didn’t hit the bottle too hard last night.”
“It wasn’t the bottle,” Sovich grinned. “It was the woman. Those goddamn hips of hers never stop.”
Unlikely as it seemed, John T. Stoddard slid his arm around Sovich’s bear shoulders, and together they walked back to the two rooms in the livery stable used for dressing.
Halfway there, however, John T. turned around and nodded his head at Guild.
He wanted him to come along.
Given Sovich’s power and temperament, that was probably a good idea.
John T. Stoddard hadn’t been exaggerating. There was every possibility that Victor Sovich was the best fighter in the country.
His sparring partner, Barney, was a rangy man with red hair and small but astonishingly quick fists. Even Sovich had occasional trouble with the other man’s speed.
But for the most part Sovich, dressed in black pants and black boots, had no trouble at all pounding Barney, dressed in black pants and red boots; no trouble at all.
The body blows were almost as impressive as the head shots, something you rarely saw. Twice Sovich hit Barney so hard in the ribs that he lifted the man off the canvas. He hit him so hard in the kidneys that he drove him to his knees.
After twenty minutes, both men were sleek and rancid with sweat.
The reporters had deserted the churchwomen and come over for a look at Sovich.
“Listen to how those goddamn punches sound when they land,” said one reporter in a derby and checkered suit. “They sound like he’s throwing bricks.”
They fought for another twenty minutes until Barney’s bleeding got bad, especially from the nose. He started choking on his own blood, and John T. Stoddard stepped in and said, “Why don’t you quit now, Barney? We’re going to need you again tomorrow.”
For all his sweat, for all the redness in his face, Victor Sovich did not seem tired at all. Indeed, he seemed refreshed in some unimaginable way, as if punishing the other man so severely had made him younger, stronger, sharper.
When he stepped between the ropes, he looked up at Guild and said, “Remember yesterday afternoon, Guild? Remember how it felt?” He smiled. “Next time, you’re going to look like Barney when I get through with you.”
Guild hadn’t realized until just now, looking at the boxer, what was really wrong with him.
Victor Sovich was insane.
Driving cattle, riding shotgun, serving as lawman, tracking bounty, Guild came across them occasionally, insane men. They weren’t the laughing, sneering people he saw in melodramas. Usually it was just something in their eyes, some rage or grief that was frightening when he finally recognized it.
There was no grief in Sovich’s dark eyes. Just rage.
He walked past Guild, back to the dressing room.
John T. Stoddard came up and stood next to Guild. “You stick right by me, you understand, Guild?”
“I understand.”
“I hope you realize that the son of a bitch wants to kill us both.”
Guild nodded. “Yeah, that’s sort of what I was thinking.”
John T. Stoddard shook his head. “I was going to take him along to see the colored man, but the hell with him. You and I will go.”
From inside the livery you could hear Sovich yelling at one of the trainers. He really was crazy.