The Sergeant slipped the glasses into the left hip-pocket of his breeches. He cupped his hands about his mouth and sent out a roar. “MacKay!”
The group lost their woodenness. MacKay jumped to his feet and turned, looking upward across the clearing to the hut. The Sergeant waved an arm. “Here!” he called. He sat delicately, and delicately slid from the roof and dropped to the ground. MacKay arrived in haste.
“Up there!” said the Sergeant. “Keep a look-out. Yell if you see anything.” He thrust the glasses into the man’s hand and bent. “Up!” he said. “Right away.” MacKay scrambled up on to his shoulders and thence to the roof.
The Sergeant ran through the trees toward the edge of the clearing, where now the men had closed in until they made a solid block, giving, in that place, the strange impression of a crowd. Abelson, his rage fanned by that sudden loosening of control, stooped suddenly and wound the fingers of his left hand in the shirt breast of the limp, lying figure. He pulled, and with the pull the upper half of Sanders body rose. But the man was still unconscious; his head lolled, the eyes closed, the left side of the jaw showing already the beginnings of puffiness and the dark, angry flush of congested blood.
“Yeh —!” said Abelson between his teeth. He went on pulling. “Yeh faking —!” He bent to meet the rising body, and his right arm drew back. “Get up, yeh —!” he said. “Get up an” fight! Or I’ll…”
From behind the heavy hand of Cook fell upon his naked shoulder; a hard, square, blunt-fingered hand whose palm callouses rasped against the shoulder’s soft flesh; a hand with red hair on its back like a paw. It wrenched him round, this hand, to face its owner. With a choking snarl he let Sanders fall and sprang back a foot, then forward. His left fist drove towards Cook’s stomach… the red paws and great mahogany forearms dropped to guard… the Jew’s right came home against the square chin of that square face with a sound deeper, louder, than it had against the jaw of Sanders.
The watchers drew in their breath. Cook did not move. He shook his head a moment, turned away, and began to pull at his shirt, bending a little to get it over his shoulders.
The Sergeant was upon them. He looked at them a moment without speaking, his eyes going swiftly from face to face. He nodded towards Sanders on the ground. “He all right?” he said.
Morelli knelt beside the huddled body. As he peered into the face, greyly pale beneath its tan save for the jaw’s livid patch, the eyelids flickered.
“O.K.,” he said.
“Put him in the shade. Over there.” The Sergeant pointed. “Chuck some water on his head.”
Morelli dragged the limpness away, its boots trailing and raising little spurts of dust.
The Sergeant looked at Abelson. The smouldering eyes, now with little red flicks in their darkness, met his defiantly.
“You,” asked the Sergeant, “and Cook?” He turned. “Cook!” he called.
Cook put the last neat fold to his khaki shirt, which he now set down upon the top of his helmet, lying by MacKay’s biscuitladen haversack. He came heavily forward, tightening his belt.
“Ar?” he said.
The Sergeant sent his eyes from one to the other of the two: Abelson, slightly over middle height, with a body whose poise and grace and contours were delight to the eyes and whose skin, against the deep red-brown of neck and forearms, black-brown of the face and the blue-black of the brows and bullet-head, shone startingly white; Cook, an inch the lower, square, solid, unbeautiful, with great muscles in gnarled and awkward-seeming lumps, with a thatch of reddish hair coating chest and breasts and half the stomach, with tattooings in crude but faded colours all about his arms and neck and beneath the red-brown thatch.
The Sergeant spoke. “Weight?” he said.
“Eleven-two!” growled Abelson.
Cook scratched his head.
“Twelve or thereabouts?” said the Sergeant. “Little more, p’r’aps.”
“Ar,” Cook nodded.
The Sergeant thrust his hands deep into his breeches pockets. He stood between them, swaying gently back and forth, heel and toe. He said:
“Now listen. Abelson, you’ve no business to go cuttin’ loose. ’F it happens again, I’ll put you under close arrest. Get me? I mean that; whatever our position is. Now, you two want to fight. You can, this time. It’ll clear the air. But you’re either going to fight as I say, or not at all. Get that? … Right… This do’s goin’ to be under Queensberry rules… Know ’em, Abelson?”
The Jew shook his head savagely.
“They’re the rules,” the Sergeant said, “that the Marquess of Queensberry made for the old pugs. Listen! … There ’re rounds; but not by time. Wrestlin’ throws are allowed. Rounds end when one of the men’s down. One minute intervals… You can have ten of those.” He glanced up at the sky. “Sun’s not near high yet. ’F you start now you won’t get the tap by bein’ in the buff… Ten rounds, see? Or a K.O… Under these rules you’re out if you can’t come up, after your going down’s made the end of the round, at the end of the minute’s rest… One knee, or more of you, on the ground is down and therefore the end of a round … Got that, both of you?”
“Ar,” said Cook.
The Jew began to speak angrily. “What the hell…” he began.
The Sergeant cut him short. “Quiet! As I say, or not at all. ’Member that… What d’you think I am, Abelson? … I know you… one of the best of the young middles… I’m having Queensberry’s to make it a scrap an’ not a procession… Your ancestors didn’t mind ’em… What about Mendoza? He was half your size and a lunger… He fought this way… and worse… with men twice the size of Cook…”
“All right!” Abelson grumbled. “On’y let’s cut this out and get busy…”
The Sergeant took his hands from his pockets. He stepped back. “Right,” he said. “There’s no ring for you. And not enough of us to make one. Keep in the middle here ’s much ’s you can. Hale, you look after Abelson. Morelli, you after Cook. I’m timekeeper… for the intervals… and ref. Stand back, Hale and Morelli…” They stood back, eagerly. “You two get away from each other…
“Right? … Get to it…” He jumped back a pace…
Under the tree to which Morelli had dragged him, Sanders slowly struggled up until he sat. His eyes were fogged; they gazed mistily about him. He was shaken with a fit of vomiting.
XI
The two stood facing each other, perhaps ten feet apart. The clearing was flooded with the light of the newly-risen sun, which pierced now horizontally through the fringing trees. In this pure blaze, so different from the blinding glare to come, their bodies, stripped to the waist, shone and glistened, with the sweat which broke out upon a man with every movement even at this the day’s coolest hour, like the sleek and shining fur of two white seals.
Cook was square and upright, his right foot a little advanced, his fists together, the forearms at right angles with the biceps and parallel to the ground; he looked immensely thick and solid and permanent… entirely without fear or excitement.
Abelson by contrast was a nobleman’s sword faced with the bludgeon of a giant sans-culotte… He stood upon the balls of his feet, erect and edgeways, his legs well apart. He presented to his enemy the very least possible target. His left arm slid in and out, slightly, with a lithe, sure flicker; his right was still, slanting down, from fist to elbow, across his body. His face was tucked down behind that white left shoulder, so that only his eyes showed above it, dark and malignant and watchful. His stance was, in essence, that of the old-time stylists; but with the great difference that it was not taut and rigid. His every movement was flowing and effortless and swift as a cat; he could… would, probably… change this style for another so often and so quickly as suited his purpose.
He drew closer, imperceptibly, breaking this way and that with light, dancing, economical steps seemingly unhindered by the heavy service boots upon his feet. Cook was motionless… only his blue eyes, bright under the shaggy, down-drawn red brows
, shifted their gaze to follow the dark ones peering over that protecting shoulder…
Abelson feinted with his body to the right; then as suddenly to the left… Cook’s double guard shifted sympathetically… There was a sudden flurry of movement and the sound of two blows, so close together as to be almost one sound… Cook shook his massive head and snorted twice: Abelson danced back out of reach, his full red lips twisted into a sneering smile. Beneath Cook’s left eye a slow trickle of blood started; a dull dark flush spread itself over his right ear.
The Jew was away for only the barest second. In he came again. Cook let fly a right… a surprisingly swift blow for so seemingly slow a man. Abelson did not check his advance; his knees bent, very slightly, and the great fist brushed light over his hair… Then he was in; his fists beat a tattoo upon the ribs and stomach… He danced out again…
Hale, standing with Morelli, pursed his lips in a soundless whistle. “’E may be a bleedin’ Buckle, but ’e can scrap! Eh, Morey? Pore ole Matlow!”
Morelli shrugged. “Maybe. Wish Cookie would hit ’im, just once!”
The twisted, sneering smile was wide upon the Jew’s face. He came close, not dancing now, and stood. He had, apparently, no guard. Cook struck, with left and right. Again the blows were surprisingly quick… But not quick enough. Abelson ducked the first, with a graceful, inward-sliding movement of the upper part of his body. He deflected the second with a gliding push of his left arm… He was close in now… He drove in four incredibly rapid, shattering six-inch punches, all just over the heart… He ducked out again, snapped erect and got home, one immediately following the other, a right cross, over Cook’s shoulder, to the jaw, and, as this punch swung its target round, a flashing left upper-cut which brought quick blood from Cook’s lower lip.
“Oh — it!” whispered Hale. “’Taint a scrap at all… A bleedin’ slaugher-’ouse do!”
Morelli dismally nodded.
The fight went on… always Abelson attacked, never in the same way but ever achieving the same result. Cook, despite the bruise beneath his left eye, the swollen ear, the cut lip, seemed untroubled. His position was unchanged, his breathing unhurried, his eyes serenely watchful.
“But ’e must feel them,” Hale said beneath his breath. “’Emust! They ain’t no slap-an’-tickles, believe me!”
Then, in a flash the unexpected… Abelson darted in on another of his raids… Cook, instead of standing his ground dropped his head and his hands, and rushed forward to meet the attack. A hard left, meant for his face, cracked harmless on his poll… and then his great, knotted arms were round the Jew, about his arms and body…
“Whee!” said Morelli. “That’s the stuff, Cookie! Good old Queensberry!”
“Blime!” breathed Hale. “Looka there!”
The great arms were squeezing, squeezing… The Jew’s dark face had lost its smile; it wore now a startled look… the look of a man who has put his foot upon a non-existent step. His mouth was a round O, his eyes two more… The grip inexorably tightened, and he grunted with the pain of the constriction…
“Looka there, I tell yer!” Hale danced on one foot in his excitement.
For Cook was straightening his crouching body… The Jew’s feet were off the ground… an inch… two inches… a clear half foot. Cook was now nearly erect … He suddenly stiffened, twisted, thrust a column of a leg forward and outward… Abelson, helpless, was caught in the small of his back by the top of that thigh and fell, sprawling heavily.
He lay a moment, the breath beaten out of him, his head and body shaken by the force of his fall. Cook turned and walked away: Morelli, hastening to meet him, set down the half-full canvas bucket which he carried and dropped upon one knee; on the other Cook sat, placid and bulky.
Abelson, the surprise in his face giving way before rage, scrambled to his feet. He seemed about to hurl himself across the intervening yards at the seated Cook, now splashing water over his head and face.
“End o’ the round!” The Sergeant stepped forward. “Three-quarters of a minute left, Abelson. Better rest… Hale ’ll look after you.” He kept his eyes upon the second hand of his watch.
Hale came, bucket in hand, his face empty of expression. Abelson waved him away. He would not rest: he would have no ministration. The dull red flecks had returned to the dark eyes. He paced, impatient, up and down, muttering beneath his breath. The white, gleaming skin of his body was white and gleaming no longer; grey, thick dust befouled it. His breathing came deep and hard and loud… The sweat ran down his breasts and down his back, carving channels of white through the clinging thick filth.
“Time!” called the Sergeant.
With a spring more feline yet than any of his always feline movements, Abelson leapt. Cook was barely on his feet in time to meet the onslaught… He steadied himself and crouched and wrapped his arms about his head, bending to meet the storm.
The Jew, though rage held him, was yet too excellent a boxer to lose altogether his judgment. He did not rain blows, after his first leads, on that bent head and guarding arms. He stepped back; he crouched himself, so low that it almost seemed as if his knees must scrape the ground. He waited…
Cook, peering through these crossed arms, began to straighten himself… Abelson, still crouching, came on like a whirlwind… He drove blows at the body, short, twisting, driving punches… He was close… he stayed close, while he hammered… Cook, grunting under this rain, straightened fully. He flung out his arms, hands open, clutching… The Jew slid from under them as water through the tines of a fork… Cook pursued… He swung a right, a blow which then, had it landed, would have ended this fight.
But it did not land. Swiftly, neatly, with an insolent ease, the Jew side-stepped. Cook blundered past him, carried on by the force of his own punch. He got, as he shot past, almost falling, a smashing downward left, which landed behind his right ear… He fell, heavily, forward on to his face… Abelson stood over him, his right arm drawn back, his left flickering in and out, in and out, tentative, feeling … Cook stirred… He began to raise himself, slowly, upon his arms. The Jew’s right arm drew farther back…
The Sergeant jumped forward. He put a heavy hand upon Abelson’s shoulder and pulled him back. He said:
“End o’ the round… Remember what I told you… Stand right back… Right away from him… There’s a minute now!”
Sullenly the Jew dropped his hands and turned slowly away. Hale came to him. “Water?” he said. “Wanter knee?”
“—yer knee!” Abelson snatched at the bucket, set it down and scooped water from it with his hands. He bathed his face and neck. “What sort o’ scrap’s this?” he said. “Fancy — rules! ’Tain’t fightin’ at all…”
Hale was silent. From the corner of his eye he watched Cook, helped by Morelli, get stiffly to his feet, his face covered with dust which now had caked black upon blood and sweat. He sat heavy on Morelli’s knee and rubbed and dabbed at this filth with the handkerchief Morelli had soaked in the bucket. His movements were slow and listless. His eyes bent themselves blankly on the ground.
Abelson paced feverishly about. His lips moved unceasingly in thick and silent cursing. The dust of his fall still clung to his back and powdered gray the cropped black of his hair…
“Time!” called the Sergeant.
Again Abelson leapt. But this time he had not so far to go. Incredibly, Cook, too, at that call of the Sergeant’s, had waked to sudden furious life. His head down, bull-like, he rushed. And, bull-like, his speed was unexpected and astonishing.
They met with a thud. Abelson, for once thrown off his guard by sheer surprise, met this unexpectedness with a light left lead. Cook, snorting, took the blow in his stride… Once more the great arms clamped themselves round the arms and trunk of his opponent.
“That’s the stuff!” Morelli shouted. “Atta Matlow!”
“Quiet!” said the Sergeant.
It seemed, at first, that there was to be a repetition of that throw which had brought an end
to the first round … It was clear that Abelson thought this. He strained, contorting his face with the effort, to keep his feet upon the ground… Suddenly he was released… He stood alone…
For one fatal second, this miracle filled him with amazement… He stood, arms hanging at his sides, eyes staring incredulous…
Cook had stepped back half a pace… His right fist, the punch travelling upward from his hip, took the Jew just beneath the curving juncture of the breast-bone… The blow resounded. It was a ringing, hollow report, that clapped on the watchers’ ears… Instinctively they drew in their breath with little hisses…
At that terrific blow, paralyzing the nerve-centre called the solar-plexus, the Jew crumpled. All the blood left his face, which shone suddenly ash-grey. His mouth fell open, the lower jaw sagging grotesquely. His knees, slowly, gave beneath him. He began to topple forward, crumpling as he fell…
Cook shifted his stance a little… He measured his distance with a careful eye… As the Jew was falling, he hit him again… His left fist landed, with another ringing, heavy report, just below the right ear, over the carotid…
The direction of Abelson’s falling changed. Instead of crumling forwards, he was straightened again… as if a spring within him had been released… and fell, still straight, crashing heavily upon his left shoulder… He rolled over and lay still as the sand itself, face downwards. A small dust cloud raised itself above him.
The Sergeant flicked open his watch. He called: “Hale! Try an’ bring him round! Do y’r damndest… He’s got a minute…”
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