Holy man

CVCKY IKAINbK

IS LOOKING FOR A FIGHTER,

A MESSIAH,

WHO WILL TAKE HIM TO THE

PROMISED LAND

Thirty years and no champ, but the bell still keeps ringing in the dream I have every morning. It wakes me at 5:30, and I get up groggy and holding my head. You got to have the right boy to make a champion. But if you catch a break and get a kid who's a champion outside the ring same as inside, when you got what I call a holy man, one who will sacrifice himself, then what you got is happy work and you ain't tired all the time.

Then Ernie Pescetti came along. I watched him come up as an ama­teur. Good-looking boy, Ernie, strong, and white. His daddy's still a stone­mason back in Albany. Ernie is one of those light-skinned north Italian boys, straw-blond hair and blue eyes. He gets hit, or he slides along the ropes with his back, his skin turns red and streaky. Brothers in the gym saw that and started calling him Peachy, Peachy Pescetti. Ernie liked the name Peachy, specially when he put the brothers on their ass.

Ernie turned pro and for a while did all right because he's a big banger. But the trouble is, he got no class. You never saw a stronger fighter at 147, but every punch is a hard punch, and you always know what's coming. Just the same, he won his first 15 fights, 11 by KO. People were talking about him, watching him come along, and I said good for him. Except nobody in his corner had bothered to tell him that the guys in the other corner get better the more you move up in class. And that he best have more to his game than just moving in behind that big wide left hook of his.

Seemed for a while like things was going dead right, but then the worst thing that can happen to a L.A. fighter happened to Ernie. It ain't booze, or that shit, or the ladies. The worst thing in Los Angeles is Hol­lywood. All of a sudden Ernie's hanging with the Italian Hollywood touph

guys, movie heroes who act like fighters and fight like actors. This actor Vinnie Vincenzo gets Ernie some little TV walk-ons and a movie bit part as a washed-up pug who cries.

They show him off at parties, some bitch wants to touch the slick skin around his eyes. Everybody's a fight fan all of a sud­den, everybody's telling Ernie he's better than any of the old-time Italian fighters. Better than Graziano, better than Basilio, imagine. Ernie's dick is hard. Next thing, he's sticking that shit up his nose and driving a silver BMW with the top down.

Word in the gym is that he's into booze more than he's into that shit, that starting at five in the afternoon he's doing double peppered shooters of ice-cold 100-proof Stolichnaya. He's dancing and screwing and sweating all night, sleeping till noon, thinks he don't need roadwork, thinks he's King Kong. Old-time fighters, some of them, could stay in shape by fight­ing every week or so. Today's guys don't fight half what the old guys did. But they fight faster, they throw more punches. So conditioning today is even more important than before.

Ernie lost three of his next four fights, the last two by KO. Worse

than KO, the last one. He turned his back to his opponent, which is to quit, which means he's gone dog, and now the ref has to stop it automatic.

Once Ernie found out it ain't no fun when the rabbit's got the gun, he saw he wasn't as good as he thought he was. He didn't want to fight no more—it's a com­mon thing. The Italians don't take his calls no more. And now the bank comes for the car. He's hurting for money, but the only guys who want to fight him are ones who are 30 and 2 and looking for a stepping-stone or a tune-up fight for a title shot. Forget shooters of Stolich-naya, now Ernie's stumbling around on half-pints of supermarket vodka.

After that, I didn't think about Ernie. Besides, fighters change from week to week. It's us trainers who are always the same. But every so often I hear some-

thing. Somebody says Ernie's begging at off-ramps, somebody else says he's a street drunk wearing one shoe and got puke down the front of him. Stories keep getting worse about Ernie, and then somebody says that he's in some high-ticket rehab center in Palm Springs. For two years, nobody hears nothing. Then one day, I see Ernie sticking his nose in the gym. He's all cleaned up, nice clothes, polite. To his credit, word was that he's going to AA and he's got a job driving a delivery truck.

Then this tomato starts showing up with Ernie, and I noticed her watching me work with my fighters. One day he introduced her to me, his sister Sophia, a looker, a broad you'd call refined, wears Frenchy-type clothes. They asked me to have dinner with them, that they want to talk. She says to pick the place, so I say the Pantry, on Ninth and Fig. It's a joint where they fry steaks on a griddle like in the Depression, and everything's greasy. You get filled up and you stay filled up after a hard day. Sophia had trouble with the tough meat, but she was a trouper and chewed longer. She said her last name was Pescetti-Gottlieb, that she's a teacher married to some kind of a psycho doctor who wants to help her work on Ernie's self-esteem. I ain't impressed by broads with double last names, and this self-esteem business don't blow my doors off. But she ain't uppity, and she looks like money, so my one good ear is open. Finally we get to it.

She says, "What do you think of my brother making a comeback?"

Straight out, I told her not much, told her it'd be a long haul. "He's strong, but he ain't young no more."

"Hey, I'm only 28."

Sophia's the money, so I don't pay him much mind. "See, starting all over at 28 and all blown up like he is, he's a old man in this game. Look at him. What you weigh, 60, 62? His fighting weight was 47."

"I weigh 60."

I told her, "Fighting at his age, if he's already the champ, 28 ain't old. Okay, so he used to hit hard. But with his habits, and with his tit, his chances are in the toilet. Sorry about my language."

"Don't be. I appreciate your candor."

Candor! I'm in love with this broad.

She turns to Ernie. "Is he right or wrong?"

"I been running. I'm all the way down from 178."

I asked him if he was drinking.

"I'm a AA recovering street alcoholic, always will be, okay? Can't have drugs, can't have one drink, not one, or I'm puking on the street again. Come on, I want my name back."

I had to whack him for turning his back. "Why don't you try the movies again?"

Ernie nodded, took my movie shot like he had to take my tit shot. Sophia wasn't sure.

"But you remember Ernie, right?"

"I remember everybody."

"What was wrong with him?"

"He could pitch, but he couldn't catch. And it's best if he don't stand there fighting with his face, specially when you got heart trouble."

"I got heart!" Ernie said, firm. "What I been through, I got heart!"

I told Sophia that talking heart wasn't the same as having heart. Me telling her that didn't make Ernie love me, but what's going on here is who's the horse and who's the jockey. I asked Sophia who's Ernie's manager, and Ernie says she is.

"You get standard 10 percent off the top," he said.

"Ernie, no offense, but 10 percent of nothin' is nothin'. I charge up front for shot fighters."

"I ain't shot!" he said, getting red and peachy-looking.

"You think your sister can handle the deep end of the swamp, the slimy shit at the bottom? That she can make deals that'll move you, you think that? Then you got her. But if you want me, I'm the manager-trainer. I get one third off the top—if there ever is a top."

Sophia said, "I was going to let Ernie have it all after your 10 percent."

Ernie didn't like her telling me that, but I didn't think he'd last, so I told her that the first thing was to find out if he had anything left. I told her I'd charge $200 a week for two hours a day, six days a week. I told her nice-like if that was too much, then she should take Ernie back to Hollywood and start him dancing aerobics at 50 a hour.

Sophia said, "What will you teach him that he doesn't already know?"

"I'll teach him how to fight, that's what," I said. "How to think and move in there. But there's more that you gotta pay."

I explained that boxing is business. To the fight fan, whether they're watching amateurs or pros, it's a sport. But once a fighter goes pro, it's business. That means the money's got to come from someplace. I reminded her that she gets paid for teaching, that her husband gets paid for shrinking.

I said, "So why should a promoter put a shot fighter on the card who won't sell tickets or look good on TV?"

"I ain't shot," Ernie said loud. "Damn it, I ain't."

"Maybe, maybe not. But it costs to find out. I'm telling you now so there's no surprises. You're gonna have to juice the promoters, at least to start." (continued on page 120)

HOLY MAN

(continued from page 90) "Does everybody have to pay?" Soph­ia asked.

"One way or another. Like kickbacks on training expenses. Or you gotta wait forever for a shot and you run outta time, or your boy falls in love and gets a job. Or because somebody in a silk suit decides he's your partner."

"Has that ever happened to you?" "Everything's happened to me."

A couple of weeks go by. I didn't see Ernie, and I forgot all about him. Then Sophia called me, said to meet her for lunch at the Polo Lounge. I showed up in a sweatshirt, like always.

First off, 1 ordered a Pilsner Urquell from the waiter, who sniffs. Later on I ordered chilled mulligatawny soup and cracked Dungeness crab on ice with mustard-mayonnaise sauce. For dessert, I had a ginger souffle. Sophia started looking at me different.

We drew up a simple letter of agree­ment. For the next three years I was to be Ernie's manager and trainer. If some­body big-time comes along and Ernie wants to sell the manager part of the contract, no problem, 1 get a third of the cash for the sale, simple. And I got my $200 a week, like I explained.

Ernie started to work, and I punished him. His outfit's wringing wet, his mouth is dry as a popcorn fart. He's crying for water. I told him that good fighters don't need water, that bad fighters don't deserve water. He stopped crying.

Truth is that I figured I'd pick up a few weeks' work and that Ernie would fold. But he hung, the kid, God bless him, and then damned if I didn't start to

believe. Besides, 1 wanted to see a white fighter make it again, wanted more white boys in the gym, wanted to see white boys get their balls back from Democrats and back from thong-assed bitches who want their boyfriends to be like girls.

I start to think a lot about Ernie, about what's going to work for him.

First off, with damaged goods like Ernie, you got to go at him from a angle. You got to get him to do stuff he doesn't know you got him doing. You do that so he's not worried that doing something new will make people laugh at him, you do it hoping he won't go back to his old habits. Even so, all fighters can't do all things. I got his legs up under him, and 1 got him to keep his hands up, but I couldn't get him to keep his chin down all the time. And I couldn't get him to slide in on his front toe instead of walk­ing in heel-toe, which tends to make you a half beat behind the other guy.

The biggest thing I couldn't get him to do was shift his weight from his front foot back to his rear foot when he threw his left hook. I figured he didn't want to do it. Eighty percent of his KOs had come from doing it his way, even though I proved that shifting his weight made him hit harder, that it took less energy. I knew I wasn't get­ting to him on the hook, but I wanted to have it on record that I tried. The right way not only sets up the right hand, but it gives more protection to the chin.

What I didn't have to worry about was him boozing. He went to AA once he told me how terrified he was of falling off the wagon. He confided in me that his father had told him to stay away, that he didn't have a son. And if he started drinking again, Sophia told him he'd have to walk the walk alone.

He was strong and quicker than I'd remembered. I put him in to spar with a 10-round fighter who I told to go easy on

him. Ernie barely made it through three rounds, but he wouldn't have made it at all if he was dirty. There were still big conditioning problems, but what he could do was hit. and he had good hand-eye reflexes. Maybe he wasn't the fastest with his hands, but timing will beat speed if you know what you're doing.

Ernie's heart still bothered me some, but as long as 1 was getting paid. I could wait and see. Besides, the better the con­dition a fighter's in, the bigger his heart. Once he was running right, and once he had a few wins, he'd be king of the hill again. A good white fighter is a draw. Maybe I could get him the right fights and we could go someplace.

The trick was to make Ernie the best at what he was already good at, power. But the biggest trick of all was to make his opponents think that Ernie would be the same old Ernie—walking in throwing bombs and lunging with his chin stuck out behind that wide hook of his. So once I knew I couldn't fix his hook, I knew I had a problem, right? But once I knew my problem, I knew my answer. Switch him. Not from orthodox to southpaw. Not from banger to boxer. The switch would be from lead slugger to counterpuncher.

It went slick and sweet as unsalted butter. We worked on the footwork first. Ernie walking in same as always. But instead of getting off first, I had him wait a split second before unloading—that or I'd have him fake a shot. That forces the other guy to run, or to go first...and at that point Ernie would know that one of only two things can happen. Either a left hand is coming, or a right. I taught Ernie to block and counter. To catch the shot and counter. To slip and counter. I taught him to shoot combinations from inside, showed him he could do damage no matter where his shots landed.

That's the key. Hurt the man. Make him back up, make him fight on his heels. Go to his kidneys, make him know his piss'U be red in the bowl. Damage the eyeballs, make the white a pool of blood. Separate his ribs, cause spasm to the liver. Cripple the joints where the arms and the shoul­ders come together. Break him down. Take his heart and squeeze it. That's the game we play. That's how awful it is. But sur­viving that, and winning, that's what gives you the kick. It's called getting respect.

To get Ernie sharp, I put it on him a little at a time, had him catch my punches on his arms, on his gloves, on his shoulders. If the other guy throws a right to the body, you catch it with your left elbow and counter with a left—a hook, a uppercut or a jab. The same on the other side. It works because the other guy is open when he punches, just like you. The difference is that you're not trying to stay away, you're staying close, and he can't counter

as good as you can. because you're so close you can suck on his tittie.

Or I'd have Ernie slip to his left under a right hand and drive his own right into the gut, come back to the head with a hook, because the other guy's got his hands down at his waist from the body shot. Think about it. Some bitch slaps your face. What happens first? Your hand goes straight to the sting. It's after that when you rap her back, right? Except if Ernie catches you flush, you ain't dealing with a slap. It's all logical, only you got to be good or you're the guy looking for the place to go to sleep.

We went from footwork to the punch mitts and to the big bag, where he learned to grab his balance in a wink off a pivot and to drill up-and-down combinations of five and six punches. Now his dick was hard again. What he liked about working this way was that it put him in position to always bang with power. Was it pretty, like Ali? Not if you didn't know' what you were looking at. But to the old-time fight guys, it was like watching Charley Burley again, who you couldn't hit from three paces with a handful of rice. Joe Louis was maybe the best counterpuncher of all, those short little shots of his broke hearts and bones. And in the '70s, there was Albert Davila at 115 pounds, who put a kid in the grave.

People in the gym began to shy away from Ernie once they saw what he could do. Usually you don't have to pay for sparring in the gym unless you're get­ting ready for a big fight and you're getting training money. The other guys will help you, you help them. But some of the time I had to pay for work. Forty dollars for four rounds, maybe more. I did it because Ernie's not getting any younger. Sophia understood. There would also be fighters who wanted to try Ernie out, so we obliged. He'd make them miss, and he'd make them pay. His pride came back, and he didn't need to go to AA so much.

Sophia called me often to tell me how happy she was with the way things were going. She always thanked me, always asked me if I needed anything.

"I need a champion."

The next stage was to test him under the lights, dump fight noise on him. I got the Commission to let us start off at six rounds instead of at 10 because of Ernie's long layoff. They'd heard how hard he was working and said okay. I began with club fights in Bakersfield and Santa Maria, Indio, down in Pedro. I paid the promoters under the table to put Ernie

on the card, and same way had to pay the opponents' purse as well.

The first fight's pure panic. Ernie's so afraid he's going to lose the fight that he left three rounds in the dressing room from nerves. 1 always carry in my medi­cine kit a flat sterling-silver half-pint flask that I bought in Madrid. I fill it with Hen-nessy X.O and sometimes give a snort mixed with orange juice to a scared kid for his nerves. I knew better with Ernie.

In the ring, he forgot everything and reverted to his old style. It didn't sur­prise me, that's what the lights and the noise'll do to you. We were winning rounds the hard way, when in the fourth round Ernie's legs go and he's staggering tired. We got lucky when the other guy butted us. Ernie's cut was so deep above his eyebrow that he couldn't see from the blood. I could have stopped the flow, but I played a hunch and on purpose I let it bleed. In the fifth, blood everywhere, they stopped the fight in the first minute and gave it to Ernie because he was ahead on points. So that's a good cornerman for you. If I'd stopped the blood, the other guy would have stopped Ernie.

Back in the dressing room, Ernie slumped over while I took care of the cut. I soaked two towels in ice water and wrapped one on his head, one across

his chest and shoulders. He didn't even flinch when they hit him. It was 20 min­utes before Ernie was on his feet again. It was a tough fight with a bad stink to the win. But scared as he was to start, Ernie didn't go dog on me, and we did what we went there to do. We won.

The cut meant 45 days before we could fight again. That was good. It gave me time to work on Ernie's mind some more.

His next fight was six rounds again, and then I moved him up to eight. Then I tried him at 10 rounds against a solid Mexican opponent. KO win in five.

Every time, he'd get so spooked before a fight that he'd piss himself in the ring. I had to spill water on the can­vas so nobody'd know, had to keep him in black shorts so nobody'd see. Don't misunderstand. All fighters are spooky before a fight, even the ones who go to sleep on you in the dressing room. It's a natural thing. So I'd tell him that he wasn't scared at all. that it was just his system putting itself in high gear. I told him how fighting bulls shit and piss dur­ing a bullfight and how they'd still tear ass. That made Ernie laugh.

"Yeah, like a raging bull, that's me, like Jake I.aMolla."

The story worked every time. Now that he was back lighting 10-round fights again, he won six in a row, all with good fighters, four by KO. Ernie was counter­ing like a champion from bell to bell. Now my dick was hard.

Ernie took out a couple more opponents. He worked his way inside behind his jab just like in the gym, waited for the guys to commit, and then he took them out with body shots. Busted the ribs of one boy. Hit the other in the heart. Boy went still, arms and legs went all shaky like he's electrocuted, and then he pitches face-first onto the canvas.

"Peachy! Peachy! Peachy!"

There was no more us paying out the money. Hadn't done that since after the firsi eight fights. The purses coming in were not thai big. They never are. unless they come from big-time title fights on pay-per-view. Even some title fights are for short money. I was hustling to make another good fight for Ernie, but the problem was that nobody wanted him.

We hung around almost six months, no fight. Thai's no good for a fighter, specially one Ernie's age. When we were offered a shot at the NABO belt, I took it.

It was for short money with Abdul Kashad Mohammed, a Black Muslim boy out of Chicago. NABO's a second-level title the WBO runs to generate excite­ment with the fans, a stepping-stone fight for a real title. I had always stayed away from Abdul because he's got a bad mouth on him. But winning the NABO would set us in line for ihe WBO title. WBO ain't like WBC or WBA or even the IBE, but if you're a knockout puncher

like Ernie, it gives you leverage towards a unification bout.

The deal was the fight's in L.A. That's our hometown, and we figure to get lucky with the judges if it goes to a decision. Money's only 8,000, and Ernie don't like that, but I explain if we don't take the fight, they could move us down in the rankings. "And we ain't getting any younger."

Abdul shot his mouth oil at the weigh-in. He acted like he was going to throw a punch at Ernie, and Ernie stepped back. Abdul and all the other blacks were slap­ping, touching hands, the usual.

I told Ernie, "You gotta get respect, son. You don't, these fucks'll run a train on you."

"Peachy! Peachy!" screeched Abdul through the loudspeaker. "Peachy be a punk name!"

Ernie stepped forward, talked like he was black into the microphone. "Abdool-dool, he a fool-fool!"

Now the whites were laughing. Abdul started forward and so did Ernie. Com­mission guys got between them. I was feeling better.

When we got to the arena, right away I smelled something was off. We went down the sleep ramp into the belly of the old Eorum and were clearing with security when I noticed that all the black guards were smiling and looking at us sideways. Just after we swung into the long, narrow corridor leading to the dressing rooms, we saw blood-red gang shit scrawled across the pale-blue walls:

DAGO PIC; DIE DIE DIE.

On the dressing-room door was a photo of some dead white man, part of his face blown away. Ernie went stiff, tried to back away. I shoved him through the door.

He was greener than I'd ever seen him. In the two hours we had to wait, he threw up twice. I couldn't give him the Hennessy, so I got a can of Pepsi, which lifted him a little. He couldn't stand still or sit still. I had to get somebody to hold him down so I could wrap his hands. Piss was all over the place.

The fight went offon time. On the trip to the ring, there was a trail of water behind us. Sooner or later, everybody loses, so I figured this was it. I took losing as part of the game. It's how you lose that counts.

Abdul was quicker than anyone Ernie'd fought and jumped all over him the first round. Ernie was shook, reverted to his old style. His head was sticking up like a cabbage. I was yelling at him to bob and weave, when Abdul caught him with an overhand right that knocked him down and broke his nose. Blood is running like coffee from a spout. A bloody nose and a broken nose ain't the same. I worked on it in the corner. Coagulant stopped it for a minute, but once you break that bone up in there, most of the time there's no way to stop the blood unless you pack it, and in a light there ain't no packing.

Second round's the same. Abdul jabs to the broken beak, and Ernie's eyes fill with water from the sting. The jagged bone is slicing the meat up there inside, and the nose starts squirting again. Blood's down all over Ernie's belly and smeared across his face. As long as I can stop it between rounds, the ref's not going to stop a title fight. So forget blood. But Ernie can't forget it, keeps wiping at it, and Abdul keeps whacking him. For the first time since I been with him, Ernie just backs away.

Three chiseling rounds, and we're dead meat. Even the Italians are booing. 1 hit him with a ice-cold towel on his back, stick ice cubes down his balls. I got swabs up both holes of his nose. It's illegal, but I swab adrenaline inside his mouth to try to jack some life into him. He stays slumped in the corner. His eyes are wide as a rab­bit's. There goes my Kewpie doll.

Ernie whined, "When he hits me I can't see, for Chrissakes! It's like somebody's throwing boiling water in my face."

I say, "Keep your hands up, he won't hit you. Get inside and bang like you're sup­posed. This guy ain't nothin' but mouth."

"Bullshit, he ain't nothin'! I can't breathe, and I can't fuckin' see!"

I'm thinking. Punk, mm' you know what the guys you been whipping on all this time been feeling. "Breathe deep for me, Ernie. But through your mouth, not your nose, so your face don't blow up on us. Here, take some water." I tried to grease him.

"Fuck water and fuck grease. I can't fight like this. Stop the fight."

"Ernie, look, all you gotta do is get inside and work."

"Fuck you, man. Throw in the towel. Stop the fight or I will!"

He says fuck me} Me, who's been changing his fucking diapers? I take out my scissors and I stick one blade up each of his nostrils. I squeezed the scissors so

they pinched on the nose gristle there above his upper lip. He tried to pull back, but the ring ropes in the corner held his head in place.

1 talked to the boy colder than a cheated-on wife. "You go out there and fight like you know how, mothafucker! You fight, or 1 cut you up to your eye­brows and I pull your nose back over the lop a you iuckin' head!"

Ernie'd thought he was afraid of Abdul, but once he saw the picture I painted for him. he sat straight up on the ring stool. At the bell, he shot out of the corner. In 56 seconds he broke Abdul's jaw and knocked the prick into the front-row seats.

In the dressing room after the fight when we were alone, Ernie closed the door. He shook my hand.

"1 know what you did for me out there. I'll never forget it, Pops." He hugged me to him. "Man, 1 owe you forever."

"Part of my job."

Ernie never pissed his pants again.

"I got to ask you," he said. "Would you have done what you said?"

I shrugged. "Try me again."

Getting so many KOs, Ernie's in all the papers and on TV. They interviewed him about his comeback from jail and booze, made him like a lily. Everybody's proud of him, they're talking role model. All the attention gave Ernie confidence he needed outside the ring.

Me? I keep on punching.

Vinnie Vincenzo and his boys showed up in the gym, talking Italian like they're in Palermo. Vincenzo's making faces like he knows what Ernie's doing in the ring, but I know it's his act.

A movie star is a big thing in a gym, and everybody started sucking up. But it wasn't no big thing between Ernie and Vincenzo. They shook hands, a little kiss on the

cheek, that dago bullshit. Vincenzo signed some autographs, posed for some snap­shots, took oil with his dead-eyed ginzos.

Right after that. Ernie hooked up sieady with a redheaded German girl out of Han­nover, Inge, a scholarship track athlete running the 880 for UCLA. She had blue Mongol eyes and was so clean and shiny you needed sunglasses to look at her. Her legs made your heart do the cha-cha.

I cornered her when Ernie was in the showers one day. "Is he drinking? Tell me the truth. Even if it's a little wine."

"No," she said, and her eyes danced for me. "And 1 would know."

Ernie had three more fights. Blew the opponents away, two KOs out of three. Newspaper and TV guys are matching him against the champ, making him the favorite because of his power. We get rated number two and four by three different sanctioning bodies. A German kid, VV'illyboy Wachter, KO'd some .Afri­cans and was right on our tail. But by then I figured we could beat anybody behind us or ahead of us, and I slept every night with the VVBO champion in my dreams.

The champ is Ugo Lagalla out of Naples, a slick European stand-up boxer who liked to move. In between us and him, the sanctioning body let Lagalla have another payday fight with the number nine guy. and Lagalla won from his bicycle.

Then it was our turn. But there was a problem. The fight was to be in Germany, and the purse was for only $35,000. We had to sign a contract to fight a second fight for the same Ger­man promoter, in Germany, if we beat Lagalla. The opponent would be Wil-lyboy Wachter. That's not a problem, but Ernie's bitching about money again. Besides, once we're over there, we learn that the German government will automatic take 30 percent income tax off the top. That's SI0.500, or only $24,500 to split between me and Ernie. It was a detail the kraut promoter didn't bother to tell me about until we got to Germany, and Ernie already signed the contract. It had never happened in any other country I fought in, so up front I never even thought to ask. Willyboy Wachter was on our undercard against a Dutch nobody. That set him to fight the winner of our fight. The promoter's the guy backing Willy, and his idea was to build up Wachter, make the German public hungry for a German champ. A Pescetti-Wachter fight in Germany would be a money fight, Ernie being an American. But it was my screwup. so I told Ernie I'd only take five grand as my cut. He still ain't happy.

"We win the title, then we got some leverage, Ernie. It's business."

"Business is supposed to mean money, right or wrong?"

"Ernie, when you fight the bear, they pay you to fight the bear. When you fight the bear's sister, they pay you to fight the bear's sister. I.agalla's a cupcake."

"Don't seem right when other guys get so much and I don't. "

Though he don't say it, I can see that Ernie's thinking maybe I did some kind of business on him with the promoter. I'm cleaner than a unblown whistle, but he don't credit me for it. I was about to say screw the fight and walk out, but 1 think about it and decide to hang in until we beat Lagalla. Making a champ, after all, that's the propeller in my ass.

The l.agalla light was to be held in Leipzig, which is Wachter's home­town. It's 80 miles or so south of Ber­lin and close to Poland and Czecho­slovakia. Leipzig had been part of East Germany only a few years before, and you could still see the dead spots left over. But we stayed in a new hotel behind the big post office and about a half mile from the center of the old town.

We'd brought a black sparring pariiii'i1 with us out of Dallas, Dan-yell Harris, and it was clear that the people this far east weren't used to see­ing brothers. It's not that they were hostile, in fact peo­ple would stop us and ask if we were talking English and

then try to practice talking English with us. I'd tell them we was there for the light. That got them excited, and now they ask about W'illyboy. I tell them he's the best, and they'd walk off pumped. We got there 10 days before the fight. We had one room for Danyell, and one lor me and Krnie. See, you got to sleep and eat with your fighter, you got to check his shit and the color of his piss. You got to watch how shiny his eyes's getting and make sure he's not in top shape too long before the fight, or he-gets crazy on you and starts punching walls. You got to squash temptations of broads and food. With Krnie, you got to squash any chance of liquor.

First day we're there, two hookers come prancing up to the room, the kind with that sulky look. Somebody is sending them, and they keep coming back every day. It ain't easy for me to run them oil. especially when I'm alone and Ernie's watching TV down in the lobby with Danyell. I finally sent them to Danyell's room, told them that he was Ernie. That kept them away from Ernie and got Danyell a daily double freebie on whoever is trying to drain us. Then food starts getting delivered to our door. Cakes and fruit pastries. We got 10 days and only five pounds to lose. I gave the food to the housekeepers, bitter-looking old white ladies who started to love me. Somebody is scared

for Lagalla, but the housekeepers was all dancing in the halls.

And every day Ernie is working better with Danyell, always moving in. slipping shots and coming back. People in the gym never seen nothing like it.

As the fight comes close, Italian fight fans start Hying into town. Trains dumped them into the depot in big crowds, and you'd see them in the old quarter. Some of them march and sing and carry red, white and green ban­ners with Lagalla's name and face on them. It was like being in the south of Italy at Easter, and you looked to see

if maybe somebody's carrying a statue of the Virgin with money stuck all over her outfit. Near the crowded square, I thought I saw somebody familiar, but they were gone in a blink and I decided I was wrong.

At dinnertime the day before the fight, the three of us were supposed to go down to eat, when I get a long­distance call from Sophia. She talks with Ernie, and then she wants to talk to me. She keeps talking and Ernie's waving at me he's hungry, so I send him and Danyell to the dining room. Sophia's all proud of her baby brother and says she's been talking to her father. Looks like the old man is soft­ening up about Ernie, and she chokes

up. "Clod bless you both," she says.

1 get to the din­ing room and who's at the table next to Ernie is Vincen/o's goombahs from the gym in L.A. These are the same dead-eyes I thought I recognized in the old-town crowd. They're with three bamalam Frenchy-looking gals out of some fashion magazine. They're all smiles and flirty with Ernie, but I can see they been told by the goom­bahs to stay away from Danyell. They leave when I get there, leave half their mineral water on the table. The gooms don't even give me a nod.

I ask Danyell to leave us alone. "Ernie, what's the deal here?"

".Ain't none. They said they came up from Rome. They were in here look-

ing for rooms when they saw me. 1 didn't remember them."

"I remembered them. You didn't remember them?"

"I never talked to them before, for Chrissakes."

"Ernie, if there's anything you should talk to me about, you should say it now."

"What the hell, ain't nothin' to say."

The weigh-in was held at the Peugeot dealership near stretches of crumbly brick walls and ghosty railroad tracks. TV was there, flashbulbs up the ass. We hit 147 on the button, 66.8 kilos. Lagalla was 66.4 kilos, 146. The weights're announced in

German and Italian and English. The crowd applauded like they're surprised the fighters make weight. They applaud in France same way.

Lagalla's 26 years old and five feet 11 inches tall, to Ernie's five-nine. Ernie by now's almost 31. Lagalla had a slight upper body but powerful legs, which he depends on. He was pretty, like today's movie stars, but his eyes were tired, and he made hardly no eye contact. Like I say, he was a cupcake, but the guineas in his corner were badass old-timers out to win. The fight is for the next day. That night, Inge flew in. All of us had a big meal, with German desserts and ice cream. I want Ernie to gain six, eight pounds. Before we go to sleep, I have Ernie eat again. All day long I have him drinking water, taking potassium.

I woke up early like always. I told Ernie to sleep in. 1 went down for breakfast alone. Danycll slept in late too. Every­thing is nice and smooth. I took a long

walk after I ate, smoked a $18 Monte-cristo and then went back up to the room to check on Ernie. It's nine o'clock by now and time to check his shit. He's half asleep, he says he already done it.

"Let's go eat."

He looks sleepy when we're downstairs and picks at his food. Eat, I tell him.

"I'm getting tired of this German food, man."

"Let's go get some pastry in old town. We'll take a cab." I said, not wanting to walk him before the fight.

Same thing in old town, except he says to excuse him while he goes to the can. I start to go with him, but it's a one-unit stall and people looking at us are going to think the wrong thing.

Ernie was funny with his food later on, and there's dark around his eyes, and there's no shine to them. I weighed him in the hotel kitchen, and he's at 146, a whole pound down.

"It's title-fight nerves."

"Are you drinkin' your water?" "Yeah, yeah."

The fight's at 11 o'clock that night. At five I made him cat. Thick soup and good German bread, and pasta and fish. 1 sat there while he swallowed, had him drink hot tea. I go up with him while he takes a nap, read some more about Leipzig. The promoter came by to check on us. 1 went downstairs and tell him everything is line. He wanted to see F.rnie. but 1 tell him Ernie's sleeping. That gets the promoter happy. 1 was starting to feel good too.

When I go back to the room, it smells sour in there.

"What's the stink?"

"One of the old broads came in to straighten up, and then she puked in the John, fuckin drunk."

"But you're okay, right?"

"In the pink."

The arena was packed, as much to see Willyboy as us for the title. Our light came up right after Willyboy won his, and we had to stand through three national anthems. Before that there's the introduc­tions of some German fighters, and then all of a sudden there's Vinnie Vincenzo up in the ring taking bows. He's got his face on, like he's ready to kick both lighters' ass at the same time, like in the movies. The crowd loves it. Before the fight, Lagalla weighed 154, gained eight pounds. Ernie was at one fuckin' 45. Then he goes to the can again. Now he weighs less. He Hushed before I could see. From the smell 1 can tell it's loose.

I'm thinking he's scared to death, was why he was shitting himself, and now I'm scared he'll go dog on me. By now his dark circles are almost black. But when I look at him close in the eye, he's calmer than I'd ever seen him.

So now I'm the guy with the loose ass.

Danyell helped me in the corner, not that there was that much to do. Ernie went out good in the first round, bobbing, weav­ing, working his way in. Went good to the body, just like the plan, and Lagalla's backing up. Ernie'd catch and counter, slip and bang. He had Lagalla's knees jerking up under his chin. But Lagalla's scoring too, and Ernie's face is turning colors, get­ting peachy. Then Lagalla gets off a shot. Ernie's wobbling across the ring, but we still won the first.

At the end of the second, Ernie goes down Irom a body shot. The bell saves us. In the corner, I jump his ass. "What's this shit?"

"Caught me with a good shot." "Lagalla ain't got a good shot!" About the middle of the third, Ernie flat runs out of gas. His legs're mush, his hands are down, and Lagalla's doing a tarantella on his head. In the corner, I hit Ernie with the wet towel, with ice down his dick, with adrenaline inside his lips

and up his nose, but all he can do is gasp. Only thing ain't happened is he's cut, but Lagalla couldn't cut you with a razor.

Fourth round's ham-'n'-egger time. Ernie's tongue is hanging out, bin he makes it to the bell. In the fifth, the shit happens, and it's a disgrace. Lagalla knocks Ernie out with a chickenshit tap to the liver. It's all in slow motion, like in a silent dream when you're punching some unknown thing and you can't hurt it. Cameras's flashing, everybody's yell­ing. I feel like I got no stomach.

The Italians are singing and danc­ing, and the Germans are raising their fists and hollering for a Willyboy fight. Lagalla and his corner came over to shake hands. Ernie's smiling, trying to lalk guinea. I look across the ring. Three rows back Vincenzo and the gooms are together. Not a smile between them, not even a smirk. Business.

I got to kill somebody.

The postfight party was at Lagalla's hotel. I had no party in me. Ernie didn't care if I went or not, but Inge and Dan-yell drag me along. Loud, lousy music, musicians who look like roadkill. Ernie is dancing with one of the three Frenchy broads, Vincenzo's dancing with another, and Lagalla's with number three. Inge's not happy with what she sees. She taps me to dance.

Inge rubbed it up on me. She said, "I still do not understand how Lagalla could win."

"Lagalla didn't. Ernie lost."

I left her in the middle of the dance floor and got a cab back to the hotel. I tore up our room. I figure it's that shit, or even booze, but I'm a dummy. Hidden deep in Ernie's gear bag is two bottles. Labels's in English. That tells me he brought the bottles from home. A small brown bottle, ipecac. And a green one, like a soda-pop bottle, magnesium citrate. Ipecac is to make him puke. Magnesium citrate, which is like salty 7-Up, is to make him shit quick. Ernie made himself sick to make his dive look real. Hollywood.

I tore some small pieces off the labels. I stuck the bottles back where they were and put the room back the way it was. I cany stuff 1 left in Ernie's room over to Danyell's and pack my bags.

Once a fight's over, promoters want you gone, so our driver picked us up at (5:30 for our eight o'clock flight out of Leipzig. The others had slaved up all night, checked all their luggage and slept most of the way home. We cleared customs in Dallas, and Danyell got off to see his family. Ernie ate like a horse when the stews brought ihe zapped food around, then crapped out again. The Dallas-Los Angeles flight was near empty, and we were able to pull up the armrests in

the middle section of seats and stretch full out. I don't sleep 30 seconds.

As we come in to land at LAX, 1 sat on the outside seat next to Inge, who was in the middle. Ernie was in the window seat, all of us strapped in to land. He was rested and happy, like we was the ones who won the title. I leaned across Inge, I motion to Ernie. He leans in.

"You awake?"

"Yeah, I'm awake, what the hell."

"Then I'm just gonna tell you this once, Ernie, so listen good."

"Yeah?"

"You gonna have to kill me, under­stand?"

Ernie went pale. Inge looked at me like I just jumped out of the plane. I show Ernie pieces of the labels from the medicine bottles.

Ernie lied through his teeth. "I was bloaty from the kraut food, man, and afraid we'd have to call off the fight."

"You don't hear right, Peachy? You got to kill me, or I got to kill you, unerstanl'msay? And your buddy Vinnie can't save you."

Ernie got rabbit eyes again. I told Inge to leave us alone.

Ernie tried to get his balls back. "You don't tell her nothin'."

"No. You don't tell me nothin'."

I nodded at Inge and she went to a seat across the aisle where she can see and hear. I tell Ernie what I know.

He said, "So what? It's my life."

"It was our title. How much did you get? Don't fuckin' lie."

He shrugged. "Seventy-five clear. In Inge-baby's name."

"Does Inge know this?" I looked over at her.

Inge shook her head hard, her face was mad.

"She knows now," Ernie said. He blew a kiss at Inge and reached into the inside pocket of his jacket. He held up a small black book done in morocco leather. He (lashed the plastic bank card inside it.

"Banco Milano-Zurigo, Svizzera. Seventy-five Gs American." He slipped the bank stuff back into his jacket and starts eating peanuts. "Banco Milano-Zurigo, Svizzera... that's Bank of Milan-Zurich, Switzerland. I learned that from Nunzio. Ha."

"Dummy shit-for-brains, why didn't you tell me you wanted to do business? I couldda got us 200,000, maybe three. Both of us wuuldda made money."

"Naw." Ernie talks to me like I'm noth­ing. "See, our contract's almost up, you and me. Vinnie's gonna be my new man­ager, bring in a Italian trainer from New York. Willyboy beats Lagalla, then I beat Willyboy for a couple of million. Then I retire a champ and go into film with Vinnie. Form our own company."

"Ach," said Inge. She headed up the aisle and never looked back.

I said, "Wise guy. what makes you think Vinnie won't dump you again?"

"Ehy, my man Vinnie? We're cut from the same stick."

Everybody was off the plane by now, and the stews were collecting blankets. I stood up and stepped back. I tell Ernie one third of his 75 thou is mine. He stands up, changing colors.

"Bullshit, old man, that money is my blood money."

"Then like I say, you gotta kill me, you scumbag dago piece a shit.'

Ernie did what I knew he'd do. He came with his big wide left hook, his jaw sticking out. I crack him with a quick right-hand lead that snapped his chin back past his shoulder. I come right back with a sweet little light left hook, like a hook's supposed to be. Both shots catch him on the way in before that hook of his ever gets to me. I stand there clean, but he goes airborne into the bulkhead next to the window and slumped unconscious on his knees and face. Spit and blood's drooling from him. My hands is killing me, but I yank the prick back to the aisle by his movie-star hair. I'm about to pound on him some more, when all of a sudden there it is. My way to kill him.

First, I went for that pretty bank book. Next, I pull my kit down from the over­head and take out my silver flask of Hen-nessy. 1 propped Ernie's mouth open with my thumb and tilted his head back. 1 pour the raw cognac in. and it runs down his throat. Now his eyes is open, and he sees me looking at him. and he sees what 1 done to him, and he sees what I helped him do to himself. That's when he starts to howl like a dog, and he keeps on howling as I made my way to the front of the plane.

Inge was waiting at the top of the ramp, her eyes dancing, a curly little smile on that mouth. She tried to link her arm with mine, but I pulled away. Red bush on her or not. 1 told her that I don't want noth­ing what'd been that close to Peachy. She winced like I slapped her with a dead cat.

"Here." I said.

1 handed her the bank book. At first, she didn't understand, but when she saw her name and the numbers inside, she looked at me like I'm Martin Luther. 1 walked her down to Swissair. Last lime I see her, she's buying a ticket for Zurich and tapping her foot.

When I'm at the luggage place, Sophia came over. She don't know what I did to her brother yet. Her hand is out to touch me. But my heart's used up, and I got to back away.

There's no blood in her face. "Papa said Ernie went into the tank, is that right?"

"All the way to the bottom."

She's got the look of the Madonnas on my wall. It's the same face my mother's got most of her life. I want to wipe away Sophia's tears, but she's part of Peachy.

Besides, I'm thinking about that bell ringing at 5:30 every day. And about that hot plate. And I'm thinking about this new boy who come into the gym a cou­ple of weeks ago. From Louisville. This heavyweight.

THE WORST THING THAT

CANHAPPENTOAHGHTER

HAPPENED TO ERNIE...NOT

BOOZE, THAT SHIT, OR THE

LADIES. THE WORST THING

IS HOLLYWOOD.