Fifty-to-One hcc-104

by Charles Ardai

  As they neared the end of the street they approached a building the likes of which Tricia had never seen outside of classroom filmstrips intended to teach the children of Aberdeen about the dangers of narcotics. The windows were dark with filth, the rain gutters dangled, the paint on the walls was peeling. Patches of scrubby grass grew from cracks in the paving stones out front. There were less leprous buildings on either side, but Tricia knew, somehow, that this was the one they were headed for even before the tarnished brass numerals “361” became visible on the front door.

  “You’re saying artists live here?” Tricia said, and Erin nodded. “Wouldn’t you think they’d keep it looking a little nicer? Being artists, and all?”

  “Have you got a lot to learn,” Erin said.

  The doorbell, when they pressed it, surprised Tricia not at all by being broken. Knocking didn’t yield any better result until finally Erin began hammering the side of her fist against the door and shouted: “Rise and shine, boys! Rise and shine!”

  “Easy, sister,” a man with a mellow voice said, drawing the door away from her descending hand. “We can hear you. We’re not deaf.” He wore a tunic that covered him from neck to knees over faded dungarees and a pair of wooden sandals. His hair, longer than any Tricia had ever seen on a man, was tied back with a leather strap. Between two of his knuckles, a hand-rolled cigarette slowly burned while between the next two extended the narrow wooden shaft of a paintbrush. There were smears of bright red on the tunic that matched the still-wet color on the brush.

  “Hi, there,” Erin said. “Is Rudy around? Or Jim?”

  “Everyone’s in the back,” the man said, “but if you wanted in on the session, you should’ve been here two hours ago.”

  “That’s okay, we’re not here to paint. We’ve just got a couple of questions for the boys.”

  “Questions?”

  “Won’t take but a minute,” Erin said, and pushed past him. He let them go.

  Erin led the way down a dark corridor lined with canvases, squares of painted Masonite and bent-wire sculptures.

  “Did you think his cigarette smelled funny?” Tricia whispered.

  “Hilarious,” Erin said.

  They passed through a kitchen whose sink was home to a stack of dishes crusted with the residue of a month’s meals. The door to the back yard was open and Tricia saw five or six easels set up in a circle around a pair of models, a man straddling a tall bar stool and a woman sprawled backwards at his feet, one arm outstretched in front of her as though to ward off a blow.

  The man in the tunic followed them out, took his place at the yard’s one empty easel, tamped out his cigarette, slipped the butt behind one ear, and resumed painting.

  Tricia followed Erin around the perimeter, glancing at each canvas as they passed. On the first, the man was a cowboy on a rearing horse, the woman a squaw about to be trampled. The next showed an eight-foot-tall metal man shooting bolts from his eyes and a spacewoman in a gold jumpsuit returning fire with her ray gun. The third showed a German soldier in a First World War uniform leaping into a trench; the woman was a resolute doughboy this time, bayonet fixed to spit the Boche when he landed. Each showed the pair from a different angle, of course, depending on where the painter was standing; no editor, art director, or reader would ever know the paintings came from a single sitting. But meanwhile the painters got to split one modeling fee, Tricia supposed.

  Erin stopped, finally, beside a bear of a man in a denim smock, the pocket in the front erupting with a profusion of brushes, palette knives, and other implements. He dabbled the wide fan brush he was using in a jar of water, stuck it in the apron pocket, and said without turning, “Afternoon, Erin. What brings you to the hinterlands?”

  “You know I always like seeing you, Rudy,” Erin said. She looked over his canvas, which showed the woman on a heart-shaped mattress, naked and quite a bit bustier than the model was in life. The man in his picture was at the top of a stepladder, training a movie camera downwards. “Nice work. Is this for Charley?”

  “He wishes,” Rudy said. “I’ll get five times as much for it from Hefner.”

  “Fair enough. Rudy, listen, there’s someone I need to find, a model. I thought you might know where she is. Stella Dane?”

  “Stella Dane,” Rudy said, scratching his chin with a thick and discolored fingernail. “Stella Dane. I remember her—I think. Was she the one I used on The Big Blade? Or was she Death Rides the Rails?”

  Erin pulled out the cover of Death Stalks a Bride. “I don’t know those two, but here’s one Bob Maguire did of her.”

  “Oh, yeah, her. Sure. I painted her two, three times. We had her here for a session like this once. Jim, you remember Stella Dane?” A man across the way looked up, blinked twice, shrugged.

  Tricia crossed to his easel, showed him her copy of the cover.

  “Oh, sure, the tall girl,” Jim said. “With the feet. She had these unusally long feet.”

  “Do you know where we could find her?” Erin said. “It’s important.”

  “No idea,” Jim said. And Rudy nodded.

  “Let me see that,” one of the other painters said, and Tricia brought the cover around to him. “Yeah, right—Stella. Isn’t she the one who was talking the whole time about how she wanted to be in television? How she was really an actress and a singer and I don’t know what-all else. Like maybe one of us would pull a record contract out of his back pocket if she kept talking about it. You remember Norm made her pose with a cigarette in her mouth just to shut her up?”

  A couple of the others nodded.

  “Any idea where she is now?” Tricia said

  “Nope.”

  Tricia looked around the circle, saw heads shaking. Then a small voice said, “Excuse me?” They all looked down. From where she was lying on the ground, propped on one elbow, the squaw/spacewoman/doughboy said, “I think I know where she is.”

  “Keep your mouth closed, honey,” one of the painters said. “I’m working on your face.”

  But Tricia darted over to the woman.

  “Hey,” the painter said, “get out of there, you’re lousing up the pose.”

  “Just one second,” Tricia said. Then, to the model, “Stella Dane, right? This girl?” She showed her the cover.

  “Yeah, that’s her,” the model said. “I saw her just the other day.”

  “Where was this?” Tricia said.

  “At the fights,” she said. “In the basement at the Stars Club.”

  “She was in the audience?” Tricia said.

  “No,” the model said. “She was in the ring.”

  It took them a bit more than an hour to get back to Times Square and from there it was a short walk west to the Stars Club, a squat building in the shadow of the piers. It stood a scant quarter mile south of the Sun and though it was supposed to be independently owned, Tricia knew from the newspaper articles she’d read that Sal Nicolazzo was involved behind the scenes. He hadn’t really gone out of his way to hide the connection—he also had a piece of one of the city’s last remaining ten-cent-a-ticket dance halls, and a year ago he’d renamed it the Moon.

  The doorman stationed outside the front door of the Stars looked like the least likely man in New York to be found wearing a top hat, but a top hat was what he was wearing. Beneath it he sported the crumpled face and cauliflower ears of a boxer who’d taken one too many trips to the mat. His fighting days looked to have ended around the time of Carnera, if not Dempsey, and he glared at anyone entering the building as though nursing a deep resentment that boxing attendance hadn’t come to a halt the day he left the sport.

  The lineup advertised on a card beside the door promoted three afternoon fights, the first already underway, Mick “the Brahmin Brawler” Brody against Jerry “the Jackhammer” Lamar. After that it was Norman “the Mountain” Peakes against Steve Curtis, who had no nickname, apparently, and then the headline bout, featuring former middleweight champ Bobo “the Hawaiian Swede” Olson, fresh out of a shor
t-lived retirement, against Ramy “the Chemist” Farid. Those were the fights in the main arena on the ground floor. In a box at the bottom of the card there was also a mention of an exhibition bout in the basement, pitting a fighter called the Houston Hurricane against one called the Colorado Kid. Those two fighters conspicuously were identified only by their nicknames, not by name and not with photos. According to the girl out in Brooklyn there was a reason for it—the Houston Hurricane was one of the cover models from Death Stalks a Bride, and not the one in overalls.

  “I’m surprised they let women box,” Tricia said.

  “They who? The boxing commissioner doesn’t; the city of New York doesn’t. But a lot of things go on behind closed doors that they don’t allow.”

  Tricia aimed a thumb at the ex-pug, who was letting a well-dressed couple enter. “Looks like an open door to me.”

  “Just try getting past our friend there if he thinks you’re an undercover cop, or an inspector.”

  “And what exactly is he going to think we are?”

  “The two of us?” Erin said, putting one arm around Tricia’s waist. “He’s going to think we’re girls who like watching other girls hit each other.”

  Erin tugged at Tricia to get her moving and whispered, “Put a little sex in it.” The advice was superfluous; it didn’t take guidance on Erin’s part to make Tricia do the things that got heads swiveling. It wasn’t something Tricia turned on and it wasn’t something she could turn off. Cars that would’ve honked angrily at your typical New York jaywalker honked appreciatively instead. Passersby stopped passing, if they were of the male persuasion, and those with female companions were jerked promptly into motion again, departing with an involuntary glance back over one shoulder. The boxer at the door to the Stars Club didn’t budge from his post, but his thick-veined eyes widened as they approached and his massive jaw swung down like a drawbridge.

  “We’re here for the fight,” Erin said.

  The boxer said, slowly, “Upstairs...or down?”

  “What do you think?”

  “I, I...look, I,” the man said, and then started over. “They got a rule here. No ladies allowed unaccompanied, see?”

  “Do we look unaccompanied?” Erin said. “I’m with her. And she’s with me.”

  “But—”

  Erin stepped forward, walked her index and middle fingers gently up the front of his too-tight jacket. “Or you could say we’re both with you. If anyone asks. And no one’s going to ask, will they?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Mister,” Tricia said, “we’re old friends of one of the fighters.”

  “Oh, yeah? Which one?”

  “Stella Dane,” Tricia said. “She and I used to live together. We...shared a room.” It was true, Tricia told herself, only slightly ashamed of the deception. It wasn’t her fault if the man leapt to conclusions.

  Which he seemed to be doing, judging by the blush that reddened his ravaged cheeks. “You and she...”

  “They were very close,” Erin said. “Like family. You’d let a fighter’s wife in, wouldn’t you?”

  “Sure,” the boxer said. “But...”

  “Well,” Erin said, pulling the door beside him open, “then you should let my friend in.”

  The man shoved the door shut again, firmly, wagged an index finger at the two of them. “If anybody asks, I’m gonna say I didn’t see you. You snuck by me. If there’s any trouble, I’m not taking the fall for, for, for a coupla...”

  “A couple of what?” Erin said, hands on hips.

  “You know what,” the boxer grumbled. “I don’t need to say it.”

  “All right, then,” Erin said.

  Inside, a narrow staircase led down and a wide one led up. The wide one was better lit. From upstairs came the sound of feet slapping canvas, of wooden chairs sliding against a concrete floor, of men and women hooting and gasping. And of punches landing. Then a bell rang and you could hear a collective sigh—of relief, of despair, Tricia couldn’t tell.

  “Ladies and gentlemen...” came the amplified voice of a ring announcer. “The winnah and still champeen...Jerry, the Jackhammer...”

  The voice faded as they began picking their way downstairs. Tricia held onto the railing and took care not to trip. She heard Erin’s steps behind her. The basement ceiling was low and the lights hanging from it were all trained on the ring in the center of the room. There was an announcer here, too, and a microphone dangling at the level of his mouth, but the ring was empty otherwise, except for a stool in each corner and a metal pail beside it.

  They made their way around the room, hugging the wall, murmuring apologies to the people they had to step past. The place was packed, all the rows of folding chairs filled and much of the standing room besides.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” the announcer said, and the crowd hushed.

  “You’re about to witness something few have seen.” His words echoed before fading out and he allowed them time to do so. “A battle in the squared circle unlike any you’ll find anywhere else in this fair city. Now, some of you may have heard of fights down Texas way where ladies box like men—Buttrick and Kugler and all that jazz. And you’ve dismissed it as a passing fad. A bit of gulf madness. Like cockroach races, or those wrestling matches where a man goes up against a bear. But anyone who thinks that is mistaken. I’m here to tell you, it’s nothing less than the future of this sweet science of ours.

  “And we have here for you this afternoon two of the finest figures in the field...two fierce young fighters of the feminine fashion...in short, two women who will wow you with a demonstration of the distaff brand of brutal battery! Are you ready, I say are you ready, to meet the contenders?”

  The crowd roared back in the affirmative, and a door opened just a few feet to Tricia’s left. Three figures came out, a woman in a hooded satin robe followed close behind by two stocky cornermen. Stitched on the back of the robe in sequined letters half a foot high were the words HOUSTON HURRICANE. The woman held up her gloved fists as she passed and pushed the hood back. Her shoulder-length black hair was coiled up and pinned to the top of her head and there were some sort of marks on the side of her face—in the second before the three of them moved past, Tricia couldn’t make out what they were. But it was Stella, all right. No question.

  Stella made her way down a cleared path between the rows of chairs and then pulled herself up to the apron and climbed between the ropes. She shrugged the robe off her shoulders and took a few casual practice punches at an invisible opponent. Somewhere in the crowd someone whistled loudly. Stella had on gray trunks and black canvas shoes with white laces up the front and white athletic socks; on top she was wearing a tight sleeveless jersey with her substantial bosom strapped down beneath it. In place of the placid expression Tricia was used to seeing from her when she was lounging around in her pajamas, Stella wore a steely, determined stare, and the narrow muscles of her arms stood out as she flexed them.

  “Can you believe it,” Tricia whispered to Erin, but turning, she saw that Erin was no longer standing beside her. She felt a tug on her shirt from behind her.

  “Come on,” Erin said, pulling her out into the aisle toward the still-open door.

  “We can’t go in there,” Tricia whispered.

  “Sure we can. We’re like family.” They ducked inside and took a hard right just as another robed and hooded fighter marched by, a trainer and a cutman trailing in her wake. The back of her robe said THE COLORADO KID. She was past before they could get a look at her face.

  “What are we doing?” Tricia said.

  “You’re following me.” Erin led her down the backstage corridor, peeking in open doorways as they went, hurrying past one small office in which a radio was broadcasting the sixth inning of a ballgame out at Yankee Stadium.

  At the end of the hall was a door labeled FIGHTERS ONLY. Erin turned the knob and went in.

  There were two tables, one on either side of the room, each with a wide mirror against t
he wall surrounded by a border of bare light bulbs. A bank of lockers—four up, four down—stood on the far wall between the tables and a small older man with a tattoo of an anchor on his forearm stood before the lockers, a push-broom in one hand and a dustpan in the other. He’d swept together a small pile of cigarette butts on the floor and had a new one in the making between his lips.

  “Hey,” he said, looking up with the myopic stare of a man who needed glasses but was too embarrassed or stubborn to get them. “Who let you back here? This ain’t Grand Central Station.”

  “Damn,” Erin said, “and here’s us looking for the train to Poughkeepsie. What’s the matter, squinty? You don’t recognize one of the greatest female fighters of our time?”

  “Who? Her?”

  “Yeah, her,” Erin said. “This is Barbara Buttrick, the Mighty Atom of the Ring. Just flew in from Texas.”

  The guy walked up to them, gave Tricia a quick up-and-down glance. “Her?” he said again.

  “She could punch you into next Tuesday,” Erin said. “Want to show him, honey?”

  “That’s all right,” Tricia mumbled. “Wouldn’t want any sort of trouble.”

  “I thought Buttrick was a Brit. You don’t sound like a Brit.”

  “She’s tired,” Erin said. “It was a long trip.”

  He narrowed his eyes, peered closely at Tricia. “She looks awful young.”

  “They all do in her family,” Erin said. “Now, you want to leave us alone so she can change? Or were you hoping for a free peep show?”

  He headed for the door, leaving his sweepings where they lay. As he went, he pitched his new butt onto the pile. “Ain’t got much to show, has she?”