Watching the Climbers on the Mountain (13 page)

Laurie Hill had not arrived when Crofts and Gil Sturgiss and the station owner got there. Waterhouse wouldn't let Ward Rankin and Alistair in the dressing room so they stood by the open flap and looked on silently. Men came and went with messages and requests for Waterhouse; earnest and subdued, they shot quick glances in at the boxers while they talked. Waterhouse bent his head and listened to them and flicked his moustache with the tips of his fingers and sent them on their way. The voices of children on the rides came in regular crescendos through the canvas walls and a faulty loudspeaker relayed country and western music.

Crofts worked at the hard knot that bound the boxing shoes together. The shoes were wrinkled and old and smelled of storage, of feet, and of sweat so ingrained it was no longer offensive. He felt intense about these shoes, as though they were already more intimately his than the riding boots he had just put aside. The knot resisted him but he worked at it until it began to yield. He had an urgent desire to have the long shoes securely laced on his feet. The task took his full concentration.

With the shoes on he felt better, not quite so panic-stricken. He tested the feel of them, flexing his ankles and enjoying the soft grip of the old leather and the pliant sole. He noticed that Gil and
his
opponent were chatting amiably, comparing gear. He had to prepare a mouthguard. Waterhouse picked one out of the bag for him and ripped the plastic cover off. ‘Here. Remember to keep your mouth shut so your teeth don't cut through your lip. Put it in the bowl,' he said, indicating the hot water that would soften the guard so that Crofts could mould it to his gums.

Laurie Hill arrived. He greeted one or two of the other men and tossed down a bag with a fighter plane badge sewn on it. The stockman felt the queasiness stir in his stomach and he concentrated on preparing his mouthguard.

Waterhouse closed the flap to the annexe, shutting out the small crowd of onlookers, and he called for the attention of the fighters. There were to be seven bouts, he said, and even though one of the contestants hadn't turned up yet he would run the draw now nevertheless. He placed pieces of paper on which the contestants' names were written in Gil's sombrero and offered it to the Aborigine who was to fight Gil. When the draw had been made the stockman and Laurie Hill were to fight the sixth bout and Gil and his opponent the second. The contestant who had failed to turn up was drawn for the first bout, and after some discussion it was agreed that Gil and Allen Lloyd, the Aboriginal boy, would go first instead.

So it was settled.

After a few last-minute adjustments, the boxers filed out silently behind Waterhouse, each carrying their gloves, a towel and their mouthguard. He led them to the big tent and they climbed into the ring where the referee was waiting for them. They stood in a line while they were introduced. The packed crowd was ready for them and cheered and booed in about equal measure as each name was called out. Waterhouse had prepared a speech and persisted with it until the derision and chiacking drowned him out and he was forced to hand the proceedings over to the referee, who immediately announced the first bout and cleared the ring of everyone but Gil and Lloyd.

While the preliminaries were being attended to, the stockman retreated with the rest of the fighters to the wide aisle that ran between the annexe and the ring. The station owner, backed up uncertainly by Alistair, acted as Gil's second. Allen Lloyd had two black men helping him. He looked no match for Gil. He was skinny, a few centimetres shorter and appeared far too cheerful to ever muster enough aggression to hit anyone. The referee called them together for a few words and made them touch gloves.

Things went quiet in the tent and all attention was now on the two men in the ring. The instant the bell was hit there was a murmur from the crowd and Gil moved out to meet Lloyd, starting to throw punches as fast and as hard as he could the second he was within range. But his opponent didn't wait to be hit; he leaped and pranced and ducked and darted around the ring, keeping just out of reach of Gil's fast-moving gloves, and every now and then he jabbed the air with his left and swerved his head as if he were trying out something for later.

Gil kept after him, crowding him as hard as he could and trying to trap him in a corner against the ropes. But Lloyd was too quick. Once he cocked his right glove as Gil went past him off-balance, and he looked towards the crowd as much as to say: see, I could hit him behind the ear but I won't do it.

Gil didn't intend to lose this fight and after a minute or more of fruitless chasing around he stopped in the middle of the ring, his gloves hanging by his sides, and he shouted, ‘Come here and fight me!' The crowd yelled with delight and Lloyd obediently sprang forward to just within range, only to weave aside at the last second as a driving left whistled past his head. And he was off again, here there and everywhere and no stopping him.

By the two-minute mark Gil was looking flustered and out of breath. He stopped every so often and yelled at Lloyd and then turned and shook his head at the crowd.

It was when Gil was turning back to the fight from one of these off-guard moments that Lloyd threw his first punch. Gil's attitude was more or less: well why don't you just hit me and be done with it? And that's what Lloyd did. He snapped a left to Gil's stomach. The glove made a smart slap as it hit the flesh, and then he followed this nicely timed punch with a lightning left and right combination to the head before Gil could get his guard up. Smack! Smack! went Lloyd's gloves, one each side, rocking Gil first one way then the other. And as Gil straightened up, Lloyd let one rip. Bang! point-blank to the chin.

The crowd went frantic. Lloyd whipped round and signalled to them: see, that's how it's done! Still grinning as if it were all a huge joke. Gil's brothers sat silently with their arms folded while the crowd yelled and screamed for Gil to thrash the coon.

There were quite a few Aborigines in the audience. They weren't saying much but they were having a good time. Ward Rankin kept shouting: ‘Stop chasing him, Gil! Make him come to you.' But there was so much noise that it was unlikely Gil heard him.

Gil took the punches without backing away, but it was clear they hurt him. As he bounded after his elusive opponent the little Aborigine resumed his dancing evasions, spiking and jabbing the air with rapid staccato combinations that bewildered the eye and signalled his next move. Those seated close to the ring could hear him shouting Zap! Bang! Wham! each time he let fly with one of these ghost punches.

The bell for the end of the first round found Gil almost throwing himself through the ropes in his desperation to land something on Lloyd. He had not hit him yet. He walked back to his corner and sat down on the stool that Ward thrust out for him.

‘It's fucking hopeless!' he said, his chest heaving and the sweat dripping off his face. ‘I can't catch him.'

Ward sponged him and offered him a drink. Holding his shorts away from his body so he could get his air cleanly, he urged Gil: ‘Make him come to you!”

‘I can't catch him!' Gil repeated as if he had heard but had not understood.

‘If you chase him he will beat you!' the station owner growled.

But Gil must have understood something, because instead of rushing out for the second round he walked deliberately to the centre of the ring and waited for Lloyd to come to him.

The crowd booed and hissed and Lloyd pranced around Gil just within reach, forcing him to keep turning in a tight circle. Then, Crack! He hit him cleanly on the side of the head. Gil stumbled and held out his arms to regain his balance. Lloyd stepped in close, delivering a rapid combination of short punches to his body, then stepped away. Gil went after him, lunging forward, desperate to catch him. But this time Lloyd stood his ground and he lifted slightly on the balls of his feet, his body poised and still, and he waited until it was almost too late, then he let loose a five, six, seven punch combination that had Gil popping up and down on the spot.

Gil yelled and thrust himself forward through the hail of punches, his arms flailing, and he grabbed Lloyd round the neck and dragged him into a clinch, wrestling him against the ropes.

The referee stepped in and separated them, pausing to speak to Gil before signalling them to get on with it. The blood was streaming from Gil's nose and he stood there half blinded by sweat and frustration. Lloyd danced up to him and hit him again—one, two, three left-handers to the head, followed by a perfectly timed right that sat Gil neatly on the canvas. He stayed there to the count of five as if he hadn't realised he was down. Then he scrambled up and headed unsteadily after Lloyd again. But the fight was over. The station owner decided Lloyd had had enough fun for one day and tossed in the towel.

As soon as Gil realised what had happened he grabbed Lloyd's arm and raised it in the air, walking him round the ring and proclaiming him the winner. ‘Hit him now, Gil,' someone shouted, and the crowd clapped and cheered and yelled their appreciation. Despite defeat Gil Sturgiss looked delighted.

Waiting in the crowded aisle between the dressing annexe and the ring, the stockman could not get a clear view of the fights. One round followed another, one bout another, and he lost count of them. People crowded in from outside, the tent grew hotter, and each time he lifted his gaze from the trampled grass he met Laurie Hill's eyes. He could not help lowering his gaze or looking away from the older man's stare.

The stockman felt as if he'd stood for hours in the noisy tent, pushed and shoved by excited men trying to see the fights over each other's heads, clutching his gloves and his guard and his towel while the sweat dripped steadily from his body and the queasy feeling in his stomach turned to nausea.

He lowered his eyes, then closed them, as the noise and the movement washed around him and he swallowed the thick saliva in the back of his throat . . . He was a child, holding hands with his father, walking along a dark street somewhere in London. The street was black and the bitumen shone from a recent shower of rain. His father's ungloved hand was warm and large and comforting and they were going along together almost with one heartbeat. It was some sort of dock or warehouse area, and ahead of them, maybe a hundred metres away, the lights of a pub on a corner shone onto the pavement and onto the buses and cars going by. There were people there. But here where they were walking, taking this short-cut, it was deserted and in darkness. Then they heard a terrible cry and they stopped, their hearts hammering. There was a man on his knees in a raised loading recess. He was surrounded by four other men who stood over him. The group waited for his father and him to pass, but for that instant they were all still, gazing across that space at each other, the man's pale face looking out from between the dark legs, the cry just emptied from his mouth.

He inhaled a strong stink of cheap cigar smoke and Gil said, ‘Come on, Robert! You're
on
, mate!'

The stockman looked along the aisle towards the ring. Laurie Hill was standing next to the referee, and his father was standing behind him, bent forward, waiting. The black and white faces of the crowd were all turned expectantly towards the aisle. Ward Rankin and Alistair were waiting there too, outside the corner of the ring, watching him.

The nausea in his stomach contracted into a single sharp stab and then it was gone and Crofts went towards them. The cold metallic taste of the man's fear had reached them from the loading recess and had followed his father and him as they hurried away towards the lights, not looking back, hands clasped tightly, and not speaking of it.

Had he said: ‘Help him, Dad?' Or had he only thought it? He could not remember. The referee was talking to them. Laurie Hill's face was close, his eyes boring into him, still attempting intimidation. Crofts did not look down. And now his father was nowhere and he was here, Springtown, in the middle of nowhere. He smiled. What had the referee been saying?

Gil was leaning at him across the corner post and yelling something, waving his cigar—Crofts wondered how Gil had managed to get dressed again so quickly. The bell clanged and he turned and went out to meet Laurie Hill. As he turned he met Ward Rankin's unguarded gaze for a fleeting second. It was as if they already inhabited different dimensions. The station owner's hands were locked onto the ropes and his expression was one of grim intensity.

And Laurie Hill's soft body was close to him and he saw the first punch coming, his head ducked away to the left and his right arm went up in a reflex action, catching the blow and sweeping it aside. Too late, he saw Hill's right following through and knew he would not be able to avoid it, but he began a correction that would absorb some of the force by the time it smashed into his face.

Hill drove his arm and shoulder and his back forward and launched his body in a committed follow-through. He went right over the top of the stockman and mowed him down, his right glove smashing into Crofts' cheekbone with a sound that was echoed by the crowd as they drew in their breath.

The shock of the heavy blow drove his head back on his neck and went down his spine and right into his knee joints and Crofts felt the dull thump of the canvas hitting his back, his head bouncing off it; and he was still rolling away from Hill's onslaught, dissipating the force of the blow out through his body and transferring it to the floor of the ring, Shockwaves riding back into him like a wash of ripples in a tank. He calmly watched Hill's black boxing shoes going past his face an inch away and he noticed the minute detail in the roughened texture of their soles, as if they had been scratched with a piece of broken glass; and he reasoned that it would have been done to improve their grip.

The stockman came to rest on his face.

On the point of levering himself up by his gloves he felt an open hand placed firmly against the small of his back, pushing him down, and the impassive voice of the referee close to his ear said, ‘You must stay down to the count of eight, Robert.' And the voice began to count against the roaring and yelling of the crowd, who were afraid the fight might be over already.