Champion of the World

by Chad Dundas

  That night in New Vermillion, he had to wrestle half a dozen guys before he found one with any skills. When Pepper saw the ears on the man in the checkered lumberjack shirt and tattered work pants, he knew he had a match on his hands. The man was bigger than Pepper and stripped off his shirt to show a long, jagged scar across his shoulder. When the referee called for the bell he came immediately to center in a decent crouch and Pepper mirrored him. For the first minute all they did was hand fight, stalemating each other with slaps and feints. After another thirty seconds he knew the lumberjack was trying to stall him, hoping for a time-limit draw, trying to get his nickel back so he could brag to his friends in the saloon later. Or maybe he thought Pepper would get tired and give him an opening to attack. As the timekeeper called two minutes gone Pepper tried a double leg shot, but the man sprawled out of it and shoved him away. The crowd oohed and Pepper came up grinning.

  “Nice,” he said, meaning it. “Good.”

  For another minute they circled, with Pepper trying to bait the man into trying an offensive move. Each time he came forward, the lumberjack slipped away from him. He was aware of the big clock crawling past the halfway point of the match and a few cheers floated up from the crowd. The timekeeper called out five minutes, and just for an instant it distracted the lumberjack. He snuck a glance at the clock, and it gave Pepper the opening he needed to step in and trap him in a corner, stomping hard on the man’s foot so he couldn’t get away. The lumberjack’s mouth quivered with pain and surprise as Pepper tied him up with a collar-and-elbow hold and dragged him down to the mat. The man had good balance and almost managed to reverse him, but at the last moment Pepper bucked his hips and leveraged him onto his side. He seized one of his arms in a hammerlock and bent it behind his back. The lumberjack grimaced, a rope of spit caught on his lip, but he refused to roll over and give up the pin.

  “Don’t be a hero,” Pepper said to him. “You’re finished.”

  The lumberjack’s eyes flooded with agony, but he didn’t budge.

  “C’mon,” Pepper said. “We’re done here.”

  He wrenched the arm back further and felt a little tremor go through the man’s body as something popped and came apart in his shoulder. It felt like tearing loose a piece of chicken at the dinner table. The lumberjack groaned and quietly said uncle. Pepper jerked the arm back a little farther and told the man to say it again, loud enough for everyone to hear. He did and Pepper turned him loose, feeling the air drain out of the tent as the lumberjack curled up in the middle of the ring, clutching his arm to his chest. The crowd booed and a few guys made their way toward the exit. Markham saw it and stepped forward to announce for the next ten minutes it was half price to take on Gun Boat Walters in a prizefight. That was enough for a few more towners to come forward and put their money in the jar.

  Gun Boat Walters didn’t like to hit guys in the face if he could help it, so he sent his first two opponents hobbling out of the ring, clutching their sides, their faces green with sickness. The last man was rangy, his chest corded with lean muscle, and he clipped Gun Boat across the eyebrow with a right hand as the referee broke them out of an early clinch. The crowd went crazy, but Gun Boat just stepped back and touched one glove to his forehead to check for blood. Cocky from his one punch, the rangy man sprang forward and put his whole body into a wide, looping hook that Gun Boat ducked easily. He planted his feet and threw a ripping uppercut that sounded like someone swinging a hatchet into a tree when it landed on the rangy man’s jaw. For the next few minutes the only sound in the tent was the man’s snoring as the referee and Gun Boat Walters slapped his face trying to bring him around. Nobody wanted to fight Gun Boat after that.

  “Time for one more,” Markham kept saying. “Time for one more bout if any local boy thinks he has the sand to give either of these mighty fellows a go.”

  The crowd shifted, unsure, until a garbled, drunk voice cut through the hubbub. At first Pepper couldn’t make out the words, but he noticed a tide rising in the people. They began whispering a funny name, one that sounded like a joke.

  “How about Greenchain Charlie?” they said.

  A man standing at the rear of the tent looked up at the sound of his name. Soon he came forward, hesitant, into the light and Pepper saw the one called Greenchain Charlie was a hulking giant of a man. He wore a soiled red work shirt and denim pants. His blond beard was as thick as the hair on top of his head and his brow sloped back above wide bug eyes. Kicking off his untied boots, he stepped up onto the ring apron without using the stairs. Markham recognized the hush that had fallen over the crowd and hopped into the ring to announce that for this one match only the carnival would cover side wagers from all takers, giving two-to-one odds.

  As bets were counted and guaranteed, Pepper leaned back against the turnbuckle, studying the fellow who now stood opposite him. Greenchain Charlie’s clothes were damp and tight on his body, and from across the ring he smelled of dirt and whiskey. His eyes were a hard green, too dull-looking to show any fear. Pepper guessed that the top of his own head would come to the guy’s armpits and hoped like hell he didn’t know how to wrestle.

  When they were set to go, Greenchain Charlie shrugged out of his shirt to show a body as smooth and hairless as a toddler’s. The referee clapped his hands, the clock started winding, and it took a few seconds for either man to decide on a first move. Pepper took the center but misjudged the length of Greenchain Charlie’s arms and immediately the bigger man grabbed him around the shoulders and lifted him off his feet. He might’ve been thrown, but he hooked a foot into the inside of Greenchain Charlie’s knee to block it. The man had to set him down, but as he did he kicked one of Pepper’s ankles out from under him, sending him tumbling to the mat. Greenchain Charlie collapsed on top of him and the crowd hollered with glee. It felt like a five-hundred-pound sack of coal had fallen onto him, and Pepper shifted up onto one hip to avoid being pinned. Burying his head in the big man’s chest, he locked his hands behind Greenchain Charlie’s back and hung on. For a few seconds Greenchain Charlie didn’t seem to know what to do. Frustrated, he threw a couple of pawing punches at Pepper’s ribs and Markham called out: “Easy, boys! Take it easy!”

  After a moment to think about it, Greenchain Charlie reared up off the mat and slammed down, belly-flopping onto the canvas with Pepper underneath him. Once, twice, three times, crushing the air out of his lungs, until he let go. There were still five minutes left on the clock and the crowd moved closer to the ring, clapping in unison to its own beat. Pepper managed to get his knees up to make a little space, but he was still trapped and wasn’t sure how much longer he could avoid a pinfall.

  Throwing his legs up over Greenchain Charlie’s shoulders, Pepper caught him in a jujitsu stranglehold, something he would not have done unless he felt it was absolutely necessary. It was a simple move to avoid if you knew it, but he hoped no one in these hills had seen it before. He pulled down on the man’s head with both arms and squeezed his legs with all the strength he had left.

  Greenchain Charlie knew immediately that he was in trouble, though the crowd hadn’t realized it. Everyone was still clapping and screaming for him even as he began to panic and flail his arms. He got up to his feet, bent awkwardly at the waist with Pepper locked around his neck, and tried to shake himself loose. The effort used up the last of his air and he fell backward onto his ass. For the first time the crowd sensed something was wrong, but before the mob could fully grasp it the big man went limp. Pepper let go of the hold and Greenchain Charlie’s body tumbled over on the mat like a pile of dirty laundry. The referee came forward waving his arms, and Markham hopped up into the ring to stretch the man out in the center of the mat. Markham lifted Greenchain Charlie’s legs to let the blood flow back into his head while Pepper rubbed his neck and shoulders, trying to bring him around.

  “Jesus,” Markham said under his breath. “That was a close one.”

  “Nah,” Pe
pper said. “He never had me.”

  Boos came from the crowd. A couple of locals came up to collect Greenchain Charlie just as he lurched awake with a snort. He looked at them with the wild-eyed stare of a man who had no idea what had just happened. They all climbed slowly out of the ring, moving like some great wounded animal, and Markham stood up to announce the end of the athletic show. The crowd was surly, seeming much drunker now, cussing the performers and the carnival itself as they filtered toward the exits. Pepper ignored them, leaning against the ropes, getting his breath back and going over his body, looking for injuries, pleased with having defeated the big man and relishing the idea that after tonight he would never see this place again.

  The saloon had no windows and no name, but was easy to find in the dark from the buzz of voices and clatter of music spilling out the open doorway into the street. As Pepper and Moira walked down from the circus lot, Markham came out of his trailer and fell in beside them, mouth curling around a hog leg cigar. He had changed out of his ringmaster costume into a canary yellow shirt with a flowery blue ascot. His gold nugget fob chain clattered in the dark as he clapped Pepper on the shoulder.

  “Never a doubt in the world, my boy,” the carnival barker said, making him unsure if he should laugh or deck the fat bastard.

  The men inside the saloon turned to look at them as they came in, veils of smoke swirling around dull faces. They filled the room to overflowing, standing elbow to elbow at the long bar and huddling around a scatter of rough-hewn tables. In a far corner a trio of musicians hacked through a rendition of “Old Black Joe.” The heat was stifling, and as Pepper scanned the crowd, he saw Moira was the only woman.

  The saloon and almost everything in it were built from the same straw-colored wood as the rest of the town. The bar itself was conspicuous for its buttery-brown mahogany, shining at a high gloss and running the length of the room. Whoever built this place was a kind of carnival huckster himself, Pepper thought, having no doubt that once the mill had exhausted its tract, the owner would pack the bar with him and move on to the next boomtown.

  “I take it they don’t spare much thought to the wishes of the federal government in these parts,” Markham said.

  Pepper said, “Get a load of that nude.”

  On the wall behind the bar a naked mermaid lounged across a wide white shore. Her scaled tail curled around her, hair swirling like fire around pink breasts as she watched a clipper ship cutting through the bottle-blue sea. Something about the painting’s point of view wasn’t quite right—the ship a little too big, the mermaid’s face a little too narrow. Like the wood of the bar, the old mural was an obvious import, stained with water spots and smoke. It made Pepper feel dizzy to look at it and for a moment he wondered if he ought to have stayed in the trailer. But tomorrow was an off day while the carnival made the haul north to Seattle, and Moira had insisted they find a card game. He looked around the saloon now and didn’t see one.

  There was space at the end of the bar, and as they stood waiting for the bartender, Pepper felt the towners watching him. The bartender took a long time fiddling with things behind the counter before making his way over. When he finally did he scowled like he might say something about Moira being there, but decided against it.

  They ordered schooners of beer, drained them and ordered seconds before the bartender could make change. “If that’s as big as they get,” Pepper told him, “you better bring reinforcements.”

  The next time the bartender brought them two mugs apiece and a couple of whiskey shots he said were on the house. He poured himself one and showed them how to knock the bottoms of their glasses against the bar before firing them down.

  “Making friends,” Pepper said when the man drifted away.

  “Story of our lives,” Moira said. They sipped their beers and then she asked: “How many guys you beat tonight?”

  He had to think about it. “Fourteen,” he said. “Fifteen.”

  “It seemed like more,” Markham said.

  “Maybe.”

  They’d worked their way into their backup drinks before a group of men surrounded them. Pepper recognized one as the lumberjack with the checkered shirt, the man whose shoulder he’d popped during one of that night’s tougher challenge matches. The man carried the arm in a sling made from a torn bed sheet.

  “Company doctor tells me I’m fired,” he said, a hint of some old country accent in his voice. “Says I might need to go to the city to see a specialist.”

  Moira stepped forward, blocking Pepper with her body, and gave the lumberjacks a friendly grin. “That’s a sad story,” she said. “Can we buy you a drink?”

  “We got drinks,” one of the other lumberjacks said. They were passing around a bottle of homemade liquor, a brownish swill with little black plums floating in it.

  “We owe you men nothing,” Pepper said over her shoulder. “You pay your nickel and take your chances like anyone else.”

  “Legally speaking,” Markham said, “the Markham & Markham Overland Carnival assumes no responsibility for personal injury.”

  The men in the group ignored the carnival barker. “That’s adorable,” one said. “He hides behind a woman.”

  “You hide behind your mob,” Moira said. “Who’s to say which is worse?”

  The lumberjacks looked as though they hadn’t bargained on sass from a lady. It took some of the steam out of them. “You don’t know a thing about us,” one of them said, sounding like he was tired of saying that to people.

  “I know when men come to fight, they don’t stand around talking about it first,” Moira said, “so tell us what you want or leave us be.”

  The man with the checkered shirt rolled his shoulder as if trying to reset his arm in its sling. “That move you used on me,” he said to Pepper. “I wrestled my whole life and never saw a move like that.”

  “That’s probably why it worked on you,” Pepper said. “No shame in that.”

  The lumberjack took his time trying to gauge whether Pepper was mocking him. Then a bloodless grin broke across his face. “We came over to say no hard feelings, is all,” he said, offering an awkward left-handed shake. “We’ll take you up on those drinks, if the offer stands.”

  They ordered up a fresh round of beers. The lumberjacks emptied their schooners and chased them with nips from their bottle, making no effort to hide it from the bartender.

  “Slivovitz,” one of them said to Pepper, passing it over.

  The liquor was syrupy fire in his mouth—a foul plum brandy that made him cough and choke enough that the lumberjacks laughed and slapped him hard on the back. While the men drank, Moira searched through her purse for three small red dice, giving Pepper an innocent shrug when he saw them in her hand. She gave the dice a few rolls across the bar as if she was just passing time and then asked the man with the sling if he was interested in a chance to win his nickel back.

  “I know better than to play with a lady who keeps dice in her handbag,” he said, but offered her the bottle all the same.

  Moira drank and grimaced at the taste. “Here,” she said, sliding the dice across the bar to him. “If you’re worried about loads or tricks you can check them yourself.”

  He scooped the dice in one big fist and shouted for the bartender to bring them another round. “Fair enough,” he said. “What sort of contest did you have in mind?”

  “That depends,” she said. “Have you got five friends?”

  The lumberjack roared with laughter. “Five? Little lady, today was payday. I have a room full of friends.”

  Once he’d gathered a group, she explained the game to them. “Pay attention,” she said, emptying a handful of coins from her purse. “I don’t like repeating myself.”

  Pepper tried to catch her eye, making a slashing motion in front of his throat, but she ignored him. She had each man pick a number between one and six. On every roll of
the three dice they would all bet a dime, she told them. If a man’s number came up she would pay him even money. If someone rolled doubles, the man who’d picked that number would get paid twenty cents. In the event three of a kind came up, well, the lucky fellow holding that number would get paid three to one.

  “What if our number don’t come up?” asked the lumberjack Pepper had wrestled.

  “In that case, you pay the house,” Moira said.

  “What’s the house?” said a dull-looking guy too small for his clothes.

  “I am,” she said, “but the important thing for you boys to remember is that at least one of you wins money on every turn.”

  They agreed that sounded good enough. The first man scooped up the dice and clattered them onto the bar, coming up with one-four-six. Moira nodded approvingly and gave a dime to each of the three men who’d picked those numbers. From the other three, she collected their dimes and added them to her pile of change. The next man rolled three-three-four, so she paid out the two winners—the man who’d picked three pounding his fist on the bar in excitement—and took dimes from the four losers. Two rolls later, the dice turned up all fives, eliciting another hoot of enthusiasm from the men. Moira gave thirty cents to the one who held number five and collected five dimes back from the others.

  “Chuck-a-luck,” Pepper whispered to Markham. “I wonder how long it’ll take them to figure it out.”

  Markham sighed. “From the look of the beasts,” he said, “it could be a while.”

  Around midnight, an old man with a dented star pinned to his work shirt came through to clear out men who had morning shifts. Those that remained organized arm wrestling bouts and chugging contests, and at some point a guy got up on a chair and sang an off-key version of “Dear Old Lady” at the top of his lungs. Pepper could feel the room warm to them, and soon he was slapping backs and borrowing money out of Moira’s winnings to buy drinks for anyone near him. With the clock above the door creeping up on two o’clock, he was making a run to the bar when he found Greenchain Charlie leaning there, watching him with heavy, drunken eyes. When he tried to wedge past him, the big man blocked his way.