Delphi Works of Robert E. Howard (Illustrated) (Series Four)

by Robert E. Howard

  “Gents,” yelled the barker, a flashy-dressed young feller with a diamond horse-shoe stick-pin, “the management offers fifty dollars to any man which can stay four rounds with this tiger of the ring! Five minutes ago I made the same offer on the platform outside, and some gent took me up. But now he seems to have got cold feet, and is nowhere to be found. So here and now I again make the original proposition — fifty round, bright iron men to any guy which can stay four rounds with this man-killin’ terror, this fire-breathin’ murderer, this iron-fisted man-mountain, Battling Bingo, the Terror of the Rockies!”

  The crowd whooped, and three or four fellers made a move like they was going to take up the challenge, but I brushed ’em scornfully aside and bellered, “I’ll take that dough, mate!”

  I bounced into the ring, and the barker said, “You realize that the management ain’t responsible for life or limb?”

  “Aw, stow that guff and gimme them gloves,” I roared, ripping off my shirt. “Get ready, champeen. I’m goin’ to knock your crown off!”

  The gong sounded, and we went for each other. They wasn’t no canvas stretched across the back of the ring where Bingo couldst shove me up against to be blackjacked by somebody behind it, so I knowed very well he had a iron knuckle-duster on one of his hands, and, from the way he dangled his right, I knowed that was the hand. So I watched his right, and, when he throwed it, I stepped inside of his swing and banged him on the whiskers with a left and a right hook which tucked him away for the evening.

  The crowd roared in huge approval, and I jerked the wad of greenbacks outa the barker’s hand and started away when he stopped me.

  “Say,” he said, “I reckernize you now. You’re Sailor Costigan. How’d you like to take this tramp’s place? We’ll pay you good wages.”

  “All I got to do is flatten jobbies?” I said, and he said it was. So that’s how I come to start working in Flash Larney’s Gigantic Circus and Animal Show.

  Each night I’d appear in fighting tights before the multitude, and the barker, Joe Beemer, wouldst go through the usual ballyhoo, and then all I had to do was to knock the blocks offa the saps which tried to collect the fifty. I wouldn’t use the knuckle-duster. I wouldn’t of used it even if I’d of needed it, which I didn’t. If I can’t sock a palooka to sleep, fair and above-board, with my own personal knuckles, then they ain’t no use in trying to dint him with a load of iron.

  We worked up and down the West Coast and inland, and it was mostly easy. The men which tried to lick me was practically all alley-fighters — big strong fellers, but they didn’t know nothing. Mostly farmers, blacksmiths, sailors, longshoremen, miners, cowpunchers, bar-room bouncers. All I had to do was to hit ‘em. More’n once I knocked out three or four men in one night.

  I always got action because the crowd was always against me, just like they was against Battling Bingo when I flattened him. A crowd is always against the carnival fighter, whether they know his opponent or not. And when the opponent is some well-known local boy, they nearly have hydrophobia in their excitement.

  You oughta heered the cheers they’d give their home-town pride, and the dirty remarks they’d yell at me. No matter how hard I was fighting, I generally found time to reply to their jeers with choice insults I had picked up all over the seven seas, with the result that the maddened mob wouldst spew forth more raging sluggers to be slaughtered. Some men can’t fight their best when the crowd’s against ‘em, but I always do better, if anything. It makes me mad, and I take it out on my opponent.

  When I wasn’t performing in the ring, I was driving stakes, setting up or taking down tents, and fighting with my circus-mates. Larney’s outfit had the name of being the toughest on the Coast, and it was. The fights I had in the ring wasn’t generally a stitch to them I had on the lot.

  Well, I always makes it a point to be the champeen of whatever outfit I’m with, and I done so in this case. The first day I was with the show I licked three razor-backs, the lion-tamer and a side-show barker, and from then on it was a battle practically every day till them mutts realized I was the best man on the lot.

  Fighting all the time like I was, I got so hard and mean I surprised myself. They wasn’t a ounce of flesh on me that wasn’t like iron, and I believe I could of run ten miles at top speed without giving out. The Dutch weight- lifter figgered to give me a close scrimmage, but he was way too slow. The toughest scrap I had was with a big Japanese acrobat. We fought all over the lot one morning, and everybody postponed the parade for a hour to watch. I was about all in when I finally put the heathen away, but, with my usual recuperative powers, I was able to go on that night as usual, and flatten a farm-hand, a piano-mover and a professional football player.

  Some trouble was had with Mike, which always set in my corner and bit anybody which tried to hit me through the ropes, as often happened when the local boy started reeling. Larney wanted to shave him and tattoo him and put him in a sideshow.

  “The tattooed dog!” said Larney. “That would draw ‘em! A novelty! Can’t you see the crowds flockin’ through the gates for a look at him?”

  “I can see me bustin’ you in the snoot,” I growled. “You let Mike alone.”

  “Well,” said Larney, “we got to make him more presentable. He looks kinda crude and uncultured alongside our trained poodles.”

  So the lion-trainer bathed Mike and combed him and perfumed him, and put on a little fool dog-blanket with straps and gilt buckles, and tied a big bow ribbon on his stump tail. But Mike seen himself in a mirror and tore off all that rigging and bit the lion-tamer.

  Well, they had a old decrepit lion by the name of Oswald which didn’t have no teeth, and Mike got to sleeping in his cage. So they fixed a place where Mike couldst get in and out without Oswald getting out, and made a kind of act out of it.

  Larney advertised Mike as the dog which laid down with the lion, and wouldst have Mike and Oswald in the cage together, and spiel about how ferocious Oswald was, and how unusual it was for a friendship to spring up between such natural enemies. But the reason Mike slept in the cage was that they put more straw in it than they did in the other cages on account of Oswald being old and thin-blooded, and Mike liked a soft bed.

  Larney was afraid Mike would hurt Oswald, but the only critters Mike couldn’t get along with was Amir, a big African leopard which had already kilt three men, and Sultan, the man-eating tiger. They was the meanest critters in the show, and was always trying to get out and claw Mike up. But he wasn’t afeard of ‘em.

  Well, I was having a lot of fun. I thrives in a rough environment like that, though I’ll admit I sometimes got kinda homesick for the Sea Girl and the sea, and wondered what Bill O’Brien and Mushy Hanson and Red O’Donnell was doing. But I got my pride, and I wouldn’t go back after the Old Man had pratically kicked me out to shift for myself.

  Anyway, it was a lot of fun. I’d stand out on the platform in front of the tent with my massive arms folded and a scowl on my battered face, whilst Joe Beemer wouldst cock his derby back on his head and start the ballyhoo.

  He’d whoop and yell and interjuice me to the crowd as “Sailor Costigan, the Massive Man-mauler of the Seven Seas!” And I’d do strong-man stunts — twisting horse-shoes in two and bending coins between my fingers and etc. Then he’d rare back and holler, “Is they any man in this fair city courageous enough to try and stay four rounds with this slashin’ slugger? Take a chance, boys — he’s been drivin’ stakes all day and maybe he’s tired and feeble — heh! heh! heh!”

  Then generally some big ham wouldst jump outa the crowd and roar, “I’ll fight the so-and-so.” And Joe wouldst rub his hands together and say under his breath, “Money, roll in! I need groceries!” And he’d holler, “Right this way, gents! Right through the door to the left. Ten cents admission — one dime! See the battle of the century! Don’t crowd, folks. Don’t crowd.”

  The tent was nearly always packed with raging fans which honed at the top of their voices for their local hope to knock my
iron skull off. However small a tank-town might be, it generally had at least one huge roughneck with a reputation of some kind.

  One time we hit a town in the throes of a rassling carnival. Nobody couldst be found to box with me, but a big Polack came forward claiming to be the rassling champeen of the West — I ain’t never seen a rassler which wasn’t champeen of something — and wanted me to rassle him. Beemer refused, and the crowd hissed, and the rassler said I was yeller.

  I seen red and told him I wasn’t no rassler but I’d give him more’n he could tote home. He figgered I was easy, but he got fooled. I don’t know a lot about scientific rassling, but I know plenty rough-and-tumble, and I was so incredibly hard and tough, and played so rough that I broke his arm and dislocated his shoulder. And after that nobody ast me to rassle.

  It wasn’t long after that when we blowed into a mining town by the name of Ironville, up in the Nevada hills, and from the looks of the populace I figgered I’d have plenty of competition that night. I wasn’t fooled none, neither, believe me.

  Long before we was ready to start the show, a huge crowd of tough-looking mugs in boots and whiskers was congregated around the athaletic tent, which wasn’t showing no interest whatever in the main-top nor the freaks nor the animals.

  Joe hadn’t hardly got started on his ballyhoo when through the crowd come a critter which looked more like a grizzly than a man — a big black- headed feller with shoulders as broad as a door, and arms like a bear’s paw. From the way the crowd all swarmed around him, I figgered he was a man of some importance in Ironville.

  I was right.

  “You don’t need to say no more, pard,” he rumbled in a voice like a bull. “I’ll take a whirl at yore tramp!”

  Joe looked at the black-browed giant, and he kinda got cold feet for the first time in his career.

  “Who are you?” he demanded, uneasily.

  The big feller grinned woIfishly and said, “Who, me? Oh, I’m just a blacksmith around here.” And the crowd all whooped and yelled and laughed like he’d said something very funny.

  “Somethin’s fishy about this, Steve,” whispered Joe to me. “I don’t like the looks of it.”

  About that time the crowd began to hiss and boo, and the big feller said nastily, “Well, what’s the matter — you hombres gettin’ yeller?”

  I seen red. “Get into this tent, you black-muzzled palooka!” I roared. “I’ll show you who’s yeller! Shut up, Joe. Ain’t I always said I barred nobody? What’s the matter with you, anyhow?”

  “I tell you, Steve,” he said, wiping his forehead with his bandanner, “I seen this big punk somewheres, and if he’s a simple blacksmith I’m a Bohemian!”

  “Gahhh!” I snorted disgustfully. “When I get through with him, he’ll look like a carpet. Have I lost you a penny since I joined the show? Naw! Come on!”

  And so saying, I swaggered into the tent and bounded into the ring while the crowd gathered around, packing the place solid, applauding their man and howling insults at me, which I returned with interest, that being a game at which I ain’t no amateur myself.

  Joe started to lead the big feller to the dressing-room which was partitioned off with a curtain in one corner of the tent, but he snorted and began ripping off his clothes then and there, revealing ring togs under ‘em. Ah, thought I, he come here with the intention of going on with me. Some local battler, no doubtless.

  When he clumb into the ring, they was several men with him — one a tall cold-faced man which looked like a high-class gambler, and who they called Brelen, and three or four tough mugs which was to act as seconds. They had the game writ all over their flat noses and tin ears. In fact, it looked to me like the big feller had a right elaborate follering, even if he was a local white hope.

  “Who referee’s?” asked Brelen, the poker-faced gent.

  “Oh, I referee,” said Joe.

  “Not this time you don’t,” said Brelen. “The crowd chooses a referee who’ll give my boy a square deal, see?”

  “It’s against the rules of the management—” began Joe, and the crowd rumbled and began to surge forward. “All right, all right,” said Joe, hurriedly. “It’s okay with me.”

  Brelen grinned kinda thin-like, and turned to the crowd and said, “Well, boys, who do you want to referee?”

  “Honest Jim Donovan!” they roared, and pushed forward a bald-headed old sea-lion which had the crookedest face I ever seen on a human. Joe give him a look and clasped his head and groaned. The crowd was nasty — itching for trouble. Joe was kinda white around the gills, and my handlers was uneasy. I was glad I’d locked Mike up in Oswald’s cage before the show started, being suspicious of the customers. Mike ain’t got much discretion; when the crowd starts throwing things at me, he’s likely to go for ‘em.

  “Gents,” yelled Joe, who, being a natural-born barker, couldn’t keep his mouth shut if he swung for it, “you are now about to witness the battle of the centu-ree, wherein the Fighting Blacksmith of your fair city endeavors to stay four actual rounds with Sailor Costigan, the Terror of the Seven Seas—”

  “Aw, shut up and get out of this ring,” snarled Brelen. “Let the massacre commence!”

  The gong sounded and the Blacksmith come swinging outa his corner. Jerusha, he was a man! He stood six feet one and a quarter and weighed not less than two hundred and ten pounds to my six feet and one ninety. With a broad chest matted with black hair, arms knotted with muscles like full-sized cables, legs like trees, a heavy jutting jaw, a broad fighting face with wicked gray eyes glittering from under thick black brows, and a shock of coarse black hair piled up on top of his low, broad forehead — I wanta tell you I ain’t never seen a more formidable-looking fighter in my life!

  We rushed together like a pair of mad bulls. Bang! In a shower of stars I felt myself flying through the air, and I landed on my shoulders with a jolt that shook the ring. Zowie! I sprawled about, almost petrified with dumfoundment. The crowd was whooping and cheering and laughing like all get- out.

  I glared in wild amazement at the black-headed giant which was standing almost over me, with a nasty grin on his lips. A light dawned.

  “Blacksmith my eye!” I roared, leaping up at him. “They ain’t but one man in the world can hit a lick like that — Bill Cairn!”

  I heard Joe’s despairing howl as I slashed into my foe. Wham! Wham! I was on the resin again before I even got a chance to connect. The yells sounded kinda jumbled this time, and I shook my head violently, cussing fervently as I got my feet under me. Ironville. I oughta knowed — Bill Cairn, which they called the Ironville Blacksmith, the hardest hitter in the game! This was his home town, and this was him!

  Fighting mad, I bounded up, but Cairn was so close to me that he reached me with one of his pile-driving left hooks before I was balanced, and down I went again. Now the yelling was kinda dim and the lights was quaking and rocking. I crouched, taking a count which Honest Jim was reeling off a lot faster than necessary. Bill Cairn! The kayo king of the heavyweights, with thirty or forty knockouts in a row, and never been socked off his feet, himself. He was in line for a crack at the champ — and I was supposed to flatten this grizzly in four rounds!

  I was up at nine, and, ducking a savage drive for the face, I clinched. By golly, it was like tying up a grizzly. But I ain’t no chicken myself. I gripped him in a desperate bear-hug whilst him and the referee cussed and strained, and the crowd begged him to shake me loose and kill me.

  “You side-show rat!” he gritted between his teeth. “Leggo whilst I rip yore head off! How can I show my best stuff with you hangin’ on like a leech?”

  “This is cheap stuff for a headliner like you!” I snarled, red-eyed.

  “Givin’ my home town folks a free show,” he grinned, nastily. “It was just my luck to have a mug like you blow in whilst I was visitin’ back home.”

  Oh, I see the idee all right. It was a big joke with him to knock me off and give his friends a treat — show off before the home-folks! He
was laughing at me and so was all them Ironville lubbers. Well, I thought, grinding my teeth with red rage, they’s many a good man punched hisself into fistic oblivion on my iron jaw.

  I let go of Cairn and throwed my right at his jaw like it was a hammer. He pulled away from it and — bang! It mighta been a left hook to the head. It felt like a handspike. And the next instant, whilst my eyes was still full of stars, I felt another jolt like a concentrated earthquake.

  Purty soon I heered somebody say, “Seven!” and I instinctively clumb up and looked about for my foe. I didn’t locate him, as he was evidently standing behind me, but I did locate a large gloved mauler which crashed under my ear and nearly unjinted my neck. I done a beautiful dive, ploughing my nose vigorously into the resin, whilst the crowd wept with delight, and then I heered a noise like a sleigh-bell and was aware of being dragged to my corner.

  A snifter of ammonia brung me to myself, and I discovered I was propped on my stool and being worked over by my handlers and Joe, who was bleeding from a cut over the temple.

  “How’d you get that?” I asked groggily.

  “One of these eggs hit me with a bottle,” he said. “They claim I jerked the gong too soon. Listen at ‘em! Toughest crowd I ever seen.”

  They sure was. They was rumbling and growling, just seething for a scrap, but stopping now and then to cheer Cairn, which was bowing and smirking in his corner.

  “I knew I’d seen him,” said Joe, “and Ace Brelen, his manager. The lousy chiselers! You ain’t got a chance, Steve—”

  At this moment a rough-whiskered mug stuck his head through the ropes and waved a coil of rope at Joe.

  “We’re on to you, you rat!” he bellered. “None of your side-show tricks, understand? If you try anything dirty, we’ll stretch your neck. And that goes for you, too, you tin-eared gorilla!”

  “So’s your old man!” I roared, kicking out with all my might. My heel crunched solid on his jaw, and he shot back into the first row amongst a tangle of busted seats and cussing customers, from which he emerged bleeding at the mouth and screaming with rage. He was fumbling for a gun in his shirt, but just then the gong sounded and me and Cairn went for each other.