by Chad Dundas
Tonight, though, would be different. Fritz had called another dinner in the dining hall, this time so they could all put their best faces on for the reporters. They would eat and laugh and then Pepper would stay with her in the cabin. All one big happy family. The newspapermen would travel with them on the train to New York, Fritz said, and added with special emphasis that he hoped Taft would take the time to show them what kind of man he really was.
They would all grin and slap each other on the back and pretend everything was aces. They all had their marching orders to make Taft look like as dangerous an opponent for Stanislaw Lesko as possible, even though the truth was Taft would not win. It was as dishonest as anything Moira had done for Boyd Markham’s traveling carnival. In one form or another she had been a swindler her entire life, but this scheme bothered her more than most. It stunk of desperation, the smell hanging on Taft and Fritz and even Pepper. It made her feel caught up in a whirlpool of things beyond her control. It had been that way for months and now she told herself it couldn’t go on forever. She wouldn’t allow it.
An hour later she put on her coat and wandered up the path to the garage, where she slipped through the open doorway and stood in the shadows against a back wall. On the mat, Taft was locked up with the big mustachioed foreigner called Lundin. They were both huffing and puffing, but it was clear even to her that Lundin was letting Taft push him around a bit. The reporters were there, hardly watching. They stood close to Pepper at the side of the mat, chuckling and scribbling the things he said in their notebooks.
“Van Dean,” said a reporter with rectangular glasses perched on the tip of his nose. “What do you think the Negro’s chances really are against Lesko?”
“Of killing him?” Pepper said. “I’d say about fifty-fifty.”
The reporters laughed and glanced at each other out of the corners of their eyes. He had always been good at the talking part of it. He stood with his arms folded, lip pooching with tobacco, and Moira felt a tingle of pride knowing he was still a star to them. Quickly she swallowed it down, and just as she did, he looked over and saw her. His smiled flickered for a moment, and he shot her a sly wink.
“You can’t be serious,” a second reporter said. He had liver spots running around the crown of his head.
“Serious as smallpox,” Pepper said. “Soon as we get to New York, I’m putting a big bet down on Taft. Any man that wants to turn a good buck will do the same.”
The reporters shifted on their feet. The youngest, who was also the fattest, said: “Three years in the sneezer is a long time. Do you worry about ring rust?”
“I might,” Pepper said, “if we had a tougher opponent. But Hackenschmidt is retired and Frank Gotch is dead.”
The reporters laughed again. “Which part of Lesko’s game do you think will give your man the most trouble?” asked the fourth.
“Slow-footedness,” Pepper said. “Up here we’re used to a slightly more challenging tempo. I suppose it might take Taft a few minutes to adjust to Lesko’s snail’s pace.”
“What do you think of the champion’s insistence on a single fall?” the first reporter asked. “He says he wants to spend as little time in the ring with the Negro as possible.”
“It tells me he knows he’ll be lucky to best Garfield Taft once,” Pepper said, “let alone two out of three.”
The reporters nodded in unison and scribbled on their pads. Out on the mat, Taft picked Lundin’s ankle, and the big European toppled over in a heap. The noise momentarily distracted the men, and Moira could tell Pepper wanted to use the break to slip away to her. A reporter, though, caught his arm and whispered a question, hoping to get something exclusive. Before Pepper could free himself from having to answer, she walked back out into the weather.
That night she put on one of the dresses Fritz had bought her on their first day in camp and went up the hill. Eleanor had the dining room looking bright and clean, with a great roaring fire giving everything a cozy glow. Pepper and Taft had not yet arrived. To one side of the room, within easy reach of the bar setup, the reporters had Fritz surrounded. He was telling them fish tales, a grin plastered across his fleshy face. Every few minutes a burst of laughter floated up from the crowd. James Eddy was hovering at the edges of the circle, his handkerchief clutched in one hand. Each time she saw him, Moira expected Eddy to walk over to her and confront her about taking the papers from his room. Now, though, she saw nothing in his eyes, no suspicion or malice, just boredom as he watched Eleanor get things arranged. Taft’s training partners were there, too, huddled at one end of the table, their own whiskey bottle set out between them like a hitching post.
Moira didn’t see Carol Jean until she was clutching her elbow and taking up a post on the wall next to her. “I hate these things,” Carol Jean said. “They drive me to drink.”
“They drive everyone to drink from the looks at it,” Moira said.
The men’s voices were already too loud for the hour. Fritz’s forehead was shining red and when he laughed—brow up, eyes pinched shut—it sounded like a lion roaring. A couple of the reporters were also sweaty and loose inside their jackets. She was about to ask Carol Jean where Mr. Taft was when she saw him gliding into the room picture-perfect in a windowpane suit and unadventurous dark tie. He showed off his brilliant smile when he noticed the two women standing together, and she had to admit he looked the part. Taft’s chest was as wide and flat as a suit of armor and he moved with easy confidence, as though acutely aware of how small he made them all look. As he came over to them, she picked up a slack expression in his face.
Carol Jean fit her arm in his. “Garfield,” she said. “You remember Mrs. Van Dean.”
Moira was about to say of course they remembered each other when Taft reached out and took her hand, blinking a bit more than necessary: “I sure do,” he said, giving her wrist a peck. “How do you do?”
As she took her hand back he nodded as if waiting for her to take the lead. It had been a couple weeks since she’d spoken to him. His eyes were deep and empty, his pupils crazy black holes, one of them a little bit larger than the other. A muscle twitched in his jaw and he touched his face with the tips of his fingers. She realized he had no idea who she was.
“Tell Mrs. Van Dean how well training has been going,” Carol Jean said, “and what a wonderful job her husband, Mr. Van Dean, has been doing getting you prepared.”
“Absolutely,” Taft said. “It’s going famously.” The two of them wavering on their feet, moving together as dance partners.
“I’m sorry,” Moira said. “I suddenly feel driven to drink.”
She was pouring herself a stiff one when Fritz pressed his bulk against her. He’d wormed free of the reporters and made his way over without her noticing. “Where is he?” he hissed, trying to keep his voice down and failing at it. She glanced over at the throng of reporters, but they were distracted now by the giant bison head mounted on the opposite wall. One of them was dragging a chair over in an effort to climb up and pet the beast’s mane.
“Not a clue,” she said. “I haven’t been keeping tabs recently.”
“Find him,” Fritz said. “I’m drowning here.”
Moira scowled. “Send one of your lapdogs,” she said. “They seem at loose ends.”
The wrestlers had joined in the examination of the buffalo just as the youngest reporter climbed up on the chair. Reaching up to feel the animal’s bulbous snout, he lost his balance and fell into their arms. Two of the wrestlers cradled him as easily as if he were a baby, swinging him back onto his feet, red-faced and laughing. Fritz leaned even closer to her.
“You’re his wife, for Christ’s sake,” he said. “Go get him and bring him up here to do his goddamn job.”
Moira pulled a quick curtsy. “Well, Freddy, since you put it so politely.”
She had gotten to the foyer when she heard a great crash and turned back to see
the bison head rolling haphazardly on the floor, the reporters and wrestlers scattering away like ants in the rain.
Pepper was sitting on the edge of the wrestling mat, staring out the open doors, steadily adding to a great lake of tobacco spit between his feet. When he heard her footsteps he turned and grinned, grits of it speckling his teeth.
“My estranged wife,” he announced, too loudly.
“Dear God,” she said, stepping over the pool and sitting down next to him. “Tell me you’re not already as drunk as the rest.”
“I’m not drunk at all,” he said. “But I’m looking forward to it.”
“I just had the strangest encounter with Mr. Taft,” she said. “He acted like he didn’t know me at all.”
She recounted it for him and he squinted at her. “He hasn’t had a lot to say to me since I told him about the fix,” he said. “He’s angry. I guess we better get up there.”
“In a minute,” she said.
For weeks now she’d wanted to tell him about Eddy’s letter and the real estate papers, which she’d stashed in one of the high cabinets in the cabin. There was no saying what he’d do with the information, though, once he had it. She worried he would be angry, that he would say something to Fritz or Eddy. She didn’t want to add to the confusion or his trouble, so instead she said his name, and when he looked at her, she kissed him on the mouth.
“What’s that for?” he said.
“Just so you remember that I’m on your side,” she said.
Suspicion crept over his face. “I hope you’re not planning something foolish,” he said.
She sighed. “Unfortunately, my dear, I’m all out of tricks. Now, we have to get you to that party before Fritz comes down here and skins us both alive.”
They sat around the big table smoking as the hired girl brought out dessert. Somehow dinner had been a success. They had eaten cream of celery soup, asparagus with crumbles of blue cheese, venison with chunky brown gravy and Yorkshire pudding. Fritz and Pepper did well to keep the conversation moving as they ate, and even Taft managed a quick line or two when the reporters asked him questions. When he appeared stuck, Pepper would jump in, making cracks about Strangler Lesko until even the most skeptical writers were smiling and laughing along.
“I suppose there was a time when Lesko was genuinely tough,” Pepper said as Eleanor put a trembling bowl of custard on the table in front of him, “but too many nights on silk sheets and room service breakfasts in the penthouse will make any man soft.”
“You expect Lesko to be soft?” one of the reporters said, putting the question to Taft.
Taft had a spoonful of custard frozen in the air in front of him. He looked surprised by the question, suddenly confused. “Soft as an old piece of fruit,” Pepper said.
“Gar lived in a penthouse for a time,” Carol Jean said. “At the Zachary Hotel in Cincinnati.”
Carol Jean’s conversation strategy for the entire evening had been to bring any discussion back to Taft’s glory days, using whatever details she had at hand. A few of the reporters were obviously taken with her, or at least with the green sequined dress that hugged her bust and the sapphire necklace that made her eyes sparkle like she had a secret to tell. Now, though, they appeared to be getting tired of her.
“How interesting,” one of the reporters said. “The two of you lived there together?”
Carol Jean reddened. “Of course not,” she said, “but it was an awfully grand place. Remember, honey?”
Taft nodded slightly. Carol Jean reached over and plucked his napkin from where he’d wadded it on the table and used it to dab a smear of custard from the corner of his lips. She did this without caring who saw, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“When you lived in the penthouse at the Zachary,” she said again. “You remember that.”
“Certainly,” Taft said, sounding not all the way sure. “Those were good old times.”
Moira saw the confusion in his face again as he set his spoon down, straightening it a bit to make sure it sat perfectly with everything else. He looked back at the reporters with deep, sorry eyes. A few of them were staring more intently at him now, sensing something was wrong. Carol Jean flashed a melodramatic smile, all teeth and lipstick, and put a hand across Taft’s forearm.
“I remember the Zach from my time on the road,” Pepper said. “Can’t say I ever saw the penthouse, though. We smaller fellows don’t need so much room to stretch our legs.”
Taft looked at him like he’d just come into the room, and then glanced back to the sportswriters as if looking for a friendly face.
“You fellows,” he said. “What brings you to our camp in the dead of winter?”
The reporters didn’t know what to say to that.
“They’re here to write their stories about you,” Fritz said. “Before we depart.”
Taft blinked at him. Sure, his look seemed to say, of course. All the sportswriters were sitting very still, like they were afraid the slightest movement, any reaching for a notepad, might prompt someone to shoo them away.
“I’m afraid Mr. Taft may have had quite a lot to drink,” Carol Jean said, getting to her feet and trying to take him by the elbow. “We should bid you men good night.”
“Wait a minute,” one of the reporters said, though he seemed to have no idea how to follow it up. He looked at the others for help, but they were all just as confused. Fritz and Pepper got up and Moira pushed her chair back. Only Taft remained seated. He’d started eating his custard again, and Fritz came around the table to whisper a few words into his ear.
“You’re right,” Taft said. “I will feel better in the morning.”
He stood, nodding to the sportswriters and to Pepper and to Moira. “Gentlemen and lady,” he said. “I look forward to picking this up again tomorrow.”
As they began to make their way out of the room, one of the sportswriters said, “What’s going on here?” Nobody answered him.
Carol Jean and Taft huddled together, both of them tall and beautiful despite their feebleness. They could have been a young couple out for an evening stroll if not for Taft’s cautious, delicate steps. Carol Jean had one hand in the small of his back and they got about halfway to the door before Taft stumbled and fell. The slow-moving, face-first fall of the unconscious. The kind that looks nothing like the movies. His shoulder toppled a tray of half-empty drinks from the side table. It flipped into the air and broken glass exploded across the floor a second before the weight of his body shook the whole room as it hit.
The spasms stopped by the time Pepper and Fritz got Taft to his room, but a white froth had crusted on his lips and he was mumbling things they couldn’t make out. His eyes were open as they wrestled him out of his clothes and into the bed, but he didn’t seem to understand what was happening to him. Carol Jean went to the dresser and leaned against it, hugging her arms to her chest as they got him situated. Fritz straightened him out in bed the best he could and Pepper was trying to use a towel to clean his face when Taft suddenly grabbed him by the wrist.
“I know you,” he said. “What’s your name?” There was a spooky insistence in his voice that made Pepper step back.
“I know you, too, sweetheart,” he said, trying for a half grin. “I’m Pepper. You’re Taft. Rest now; you’ll feel better in the morning.”
“He’ll be fine,” Fritz told Carol Jean. “The world always looks brighter after a good night’s sleep.”
Pepper thought she might slap him, but instead she buried her face in his shoulder and began to cry. Fritz gave Pepper a scared, helpless look before he wrapped one arm around her and patted her on the back. Pepper left them and went back down to the dining room, where he had to stay up for another hour drinking with the reporters just to make sure they all calmed down. After a few minutes Fritz rejoined them, explaining that Taft had been running a fever the last
few days and that he and Pepper hadn’t said anything about it because they didn’t want word to get back to Lesko’s camp. He implored the sportswriters not to write anything about it in their stories, and in the end peeled off crisp fifty-dollar bills for each of them to keep them quiet. After they’d seen the last reporter safely off to bed, Pepper poured himself another drink and sat across from Fritz in the sunken lounge area of his upstairs office. “Tell me you didn’t know about this,” he said in what felt like his worst stage whisper.
“One more week,” Fritz said. “That’s all we need.”
“Tell me you didn’t know.”
“Know what?” he said. “That Taft is sick? How could I have known? I’m a promoter, not a doctor. You want me to go around checking everyone’s pulse, making them turn their head and cough before I agree to work with them?”
“That man’s losing his mind,” Pepper said. “I have a hard time believing you could be around him for so long without seeing it. So, what? You kept it from me? Did you keep it from O’Shea and Stettler just the same way? Because I imagine they won’t be too pleased when they find out.”
Fritz straightened his tie. “We did well to sell it to the reporters,” he said. “If you don’t think you’re up for the same when we get to New York, you can back out now and we’ll see how far you get without your cut.”
“All that business about Taft’s wife,” Pepper said. “Needing to get them out of Chicago. That was all bullshit, wasn’t it? You needed to hide him away, all right, but it was because you didn’t want anyone knowing how bad off he really was. You couldn’t take the chance your little partners would discover that this whole training camp was just a street corner shell game.”