Cinderella Man (17 page)

“His ribs are mushy,” said the trainer. “I got it on good authority. If you can connect with his right, tap Braddock on the ribs a few times—sharp jabs. He's weak, you can hurt 'em.”

Baer sneered. “I won't need to smack his ribs. I can floor this mug any time I want to—put him on the canvas. What's important is that I give 'em a good show before I kill the guy.”

The trainer frowned, turned off the projector. Maxie's redhead rose and switched on the lights. On a long couch in a corner, the blond yawned, stretched like a lazy cat.

Baer's dressing room was all show business—makeup lights circled the mirror, photos of Baer with various celebrities and movie stars hung on the walls, stood in silver frames on countertops. Mammoth bouquets of bright flowers were strewn about, sent long distance by the cream of the Hollywood establishment. Actors, producers, and directors all loved Maxie, adopted the heavyweight champion as a member of their exclusive “club”—mostly because his arrogant, self-aggrandizing manner mimicked their own.

A knock. The door opened and Ancil Hoffman burst into the room. Baer stood, faced him. “You get it there like I told you?”

“Yeah,” said Ancil.

“You sure!” Baer roared.

“The ambulance is at the back gate, Max,” Ancil cried. “Jeez, calm down. There's a doc there, too. I just checked it myself.”

Max cursed, shook his head. He turned to peer into the mirror.

“That's all I can do for him, then,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Now Braddock's on his own.”

 

Mae Braddock spent the rest of the day at her sister Alice's house. Jay and Howard played in the yard, Rosy drew pictures on the sunny front porch. Alice and Mae drank coffee, shared lunch, and spoke of many things. Both women carefully shied away from any discussion about the real reason for Mae's visit.

But as the shadows lengthened, the conversation lagged. Mae's silence grew longer. She glanced more often at the Art Deco clock on the mantel, as the afternoon waned. When Alice offered her a glass of her favorite wine, Mae declined. Distractedly, she gazed out the window until Alice gave up trying to engage her.

Then, at five o'clock, Mae rose abruptly, pinned on her hat. Wordlessly, she crossed to the front door, where she paused.

“No radio, Alice.”

Mae's sister frowned, nodded.

“I'll be back soon.”

As Mae strode across the lawn, Howard and Jay watched her go, and Rosy looked up from her pencils.

She walked alone for a long time through the deserted streets of Newark. The shadows stretched until they darkened the streets. All was quiet until she came to Father Rorick's church.

Though no regular service was scheduled for this hour, people were streaming through the open doors. Inside, the lights were bright. Mae wondered as she crossed the courtyard if a funeral or even a wedding
was in progress. Then Mae spied Father Rorick at the door and approached him.

“Father?” she asked, puzzled. Peering around him, Mae saw that the church was full to brimming, with people lining up in the aisles as well.

“Hello, Mae,” said Father Rorick.

“I came to pray for Jim.”

“You too?” said the priest. He stepped back, directing her gaze to the church's interior. “So have they.”

Mae blinked, surveyed the full pews, the people in worn clothes praying on their knees in the aisle, and shook her head.

“I don't—” Her voice faded as realization dawned.

“Maybe sometimes people need to see someone do it so they can do it themselves,” said Father Rorick. “They think Jim's fighting for them.”

Mae looked over the crowd again. She saw men from the docks, vagrants from the street, women and children who'd been abandoned—all of them thrown aside by the world, challenged to summon enough fight inside themselves to keep going. They looked up to her husband, Mae realized, all of them. Jim Braddock had become their example…if he could fight and win, maybe they could too…

“Yes,” Mae whispered. “I understand now.”

Mae turned, hurried into the street. As her heels clicked down the sidewalk, she noticed knots of men and women gathering in doorways, outside of shops. Through open windows and doors radios blared. They were all tuned to the same station—the announcer excitedly teasing the title fight about to begin.

The same thing was happening at Quincy's bar, in Sam's butcher shop, at the docks, the rail yards, the
coal shuttles—even the Newark relief office. Anywhere there was a radio, a crowd of hungry, eager people crowded around to listen.

It wasn't only happening in Newark, either. The fight of the century and the fate of the Cinderella Man had become the fodder for national news. From coast to coast, from the Mexican border to Canada—all across the nation, from rusty factory towns to the hot, barren farms of the Dust Bowl, idle fisheries to ramshackle shantytowns—men without jobs, women without hope, tuned in to hear the boxer Damon Runyon dubbed the Cinderella Man fight. They listened and hoped that Jim Braddock would beat the odds that had all but crushed the rest of them.

They prayed that Jim Braddock would win. That he would finally become the prince, the king, the champion—and that this fight would not end their beloved Cinderella Man.

 

The crowd roared, a palpable wall of noise that shook the walls, wafted upward, into the warm night sky.

In his dressing room, Braddock felt the tension. He sat patiently on a wooden bench while Joe Gould taped up his hands. The echoes from the vast stadium rumbled in their chests like the growl of a hungry lion. Joe ripped the tape, tossed the roll onto the bench, slapped his fighter's broad back.

“Who beat John Henry Lewis?”

Jim smiled. Their old game. “That would be me.”

“Who whupped Lasky?”

“As far as I can tell, that would have been me too.”

Joe grinned. “Who—”

A knock interrupted him. Braddock's back was fac
ing the door, but Gould looked up. When it opened, a small, frail, familiar shape swayed like a slender reed in the doorway. Gould's grin widened. Jim noticed his manager's look, swiveled his neck. Mae Braddock's eyes met her husband's.

“I tell you,” Gould said. “That's a bet I shoulda taken.”

“Joe…” Gould looked up. Jim put his finger to his lips. “Shhh.”

Gould rose. “'Scuse me a minute.” He slipped past Mae, out the door, closed it behind him.

For a long minute, no words came. Finally, Mae spoke. “You can't win without me behind you.”

Jim swallowed, spoke. “That's what I keep telling you.”

“Thought it looked like rain, you know. Used what was in the jar.” Mae handed Jim a brown paper bag, bulky and heavy. The paper crinkled as he opened it, stared at a brand new pair of boxing shoes inside.

“Maybe I understand some,” Mae said, eyes shining. “About having to fight.”

Jim rose, caught her up in his powerful arms. They kissed and kissed again. Mae's words flowed in a torrent. “I don't know what I was saying, I'm always behind you Jimmy, with you and inside you and in love with you. So you just…just you remember who you really are.”

“Who's that?”

“You're the Bulldog of Bergen,” she said, smiling through her tears. “The pride of New Jersey. You're everybody's hope and your kids' hero and you're the champion of my heart, James J. Braddock.”

They kissed again. Then, with a devilish grin, Jim
leaned close to his wife's ear. “You better get home. Boxers hang around places like this, and you don't wanna get tangled up with that crowd…Nice girl like you…”

Mae laughed. Her gaze was brave, stoic, despite the fear that still threatened to engulf her.

“See you at home, okay?” she whispered, fighting hard to bite back more tears. “Please, Jimmy…See you at home.”

Jim nodded. “See you at home.”

Madison Square Garden Bowl
Long Island City, New York
June 13, 1935

Jim Braddock closed the dressing-room door, moved through a long, dimly lit corridor to the shadowy stairwell. Someone called his name, the voice reverberating off the slate gray blocks of the concrete walls. A stagehand wished Jim luck, watched his back as Braddock climbed the steps.

Ushers and concession workers gaped at the sight of Jim. He nodded politely, then stepped out into the aisle of the open-air stadium. For a moment, he saw the bruised color of the blue-black night, then a blasting glare blinded him as a spotlight swung to illuminate his walk to the ring.

Around him, the typical buzzing noises of the packed stands instantly became muted, the crowd's hushed whispers a sibilant hiss. Jim couldn't see the throng, but he was bewildered by their strange silence.

Slowly, Jim's vision returned, allowing the shape and form of the Garden Bowl to come into focus. From where he stood, at the top of the dark stadium, the ring seemed miles away, an illuminated postage stamp. The small roped-off square shimmered under the klieg lights like a dazzling diamond set on black velvet in a jeweler's glass case.

Where Jim stood now was as far away from that sparkler as a man could get. These were the cheap seats, paupers' row, hayseed heaven—and they were packed. Beneath the night sky, bodies jammed every row, every seat. But these weren't the usual fight-going folk. They were
Jim's
people, his forlorn fans. They came from Newark, Hoboken, and Weehawken; Woodside, Red Hook, and Crown Heights, wearing their very best shabby finery, heads held high for the first time in recent memory. There were so many of them here, Jim realized, so many. They sat quietly, reverently, like hollow-eyed ghosts, silent, expectant.

“God Almighty.”

Jim knew their expressions—from the streets and docks, the coal house and rail yards. Men hurting for jobs, seeing no chance of a future. Women robbed of
once happy homes. Some looked as if they could stand a good meal, or a stiff drink. Others seemed to have drifted over the East River from Hooverville in rags and tatters. Yet they were here tonight, using precious money they'd begged or earned—cash they should have spent on food or the rent—to buy a little piece of the Cinderella Man's shimmering gem of a dream and take it home.

He'd never seen these people before, yet Jim knew them—from the streets, the basements, the junkyards, from Sam's butcher shop, Andolini's grocery, Quincy's tavern, or a million other places like it, in a thousand other towns. Places where the beaten down congregated in a mutual pact of shared disillusionment. But there was no disappointment tonight. Instead, Jim saw awe, joy, anticipation. Their eyes followed him with wide, hopeful expressions. For the first time in years, they were transfixed by a belief in something bigger than themselves, a conviction that a fight could be won. Jim Braddock was a fairy-tale comeback that would end tonight in this place, happily or not. And they'd come here to be a part of it.

As Jim moved down the aisle, he began one of the strangest walks any boxer had ever taken to the ring. As he passed each row, the people rose to their feet, as if the bleachers were church pews and they were at Mass, standing out of respect for the celebrants' procession. Jim caught the nods, the smiles, the waves. Some reached out to touch his robe, his arm, his hair. After what seemed like an eternity, the eerie silence was broken when someone shouted his name.

Jim Braddock had spent so many years being called a bum, being jeered at, booed, discounted and written
off, he didn't know what to do, really, when at the sound of his name, the pent-up emotions were released in a stadium-quaking explosion of applause.

As he approached the ropes, the cheers persisted, rising into the starry sky. That sound continued its journey across America, carried over the airwaves to radios across the nation, so loud the clamor merged into a sustained barrage of white noise. The voice of the announcer vainly tried to cut through the cacophony, but was forced to pause and wait for the shouts and applause to fade.

 

Back in New Jersey, Alice had been fixing a light supper for her sister's children. The soup was hot, the table set, so she went to the porch to find Jay, Howard, and Rosy and bring them inside.

She noticed immediately that Rose Marie was gone. Her pencils were lined up in a neat row on the porch step; the drawing she'd worked on most of the day was now being blown around the yard like a fallen leaf. There was no sign of Howard or Jay either, yet they'd been playing pink ball in the now darkening streets when she had gone inside to cook.

Alice tamped down her worry and went back inside, searched every room of the house, but the Braddock brood were nowhere to be found. She raced down the stairs to check the basement, loudly calling their names.

“If you're playing hide-and-seek, I want you to know that the game's over now,” she cried.

No answer. Heart racing, Alice ran up two flight of stairs to check the bedrooms. Then she checked under the beds. Still no sign of her niece and nephews.

Alice was about to go outside and scour the neigh
borhood when she heard a muted roar—cheers and applause. The sound was coming from the back hallway. Then she spied the electrical cord running from the socket to the closet, and the empty table where her Edison radio usually rested.

She pulled open the door. Jay and Howard were huddled around the radio, which they'd dragged into the closet. Rosy was there, too, her eyes defiant. Ford Bond's familiar voice boomed out of the wooden box. Alice, hands on hips, wore a disapproving face. The boys' eyes were desperate.

No words were exchanged. At the sound of a bell, Ford Bond's distinctive voice announced the entrance of Jim Braddock. Realizing then that her cause was lost, Alice surrendered. Making room on the floor, she sat outside the open closet door and listened to the play-by-play along with the children.

 

“This is Ford Bond, live from the flats of Astoria and Long Island City,” he screamed into his microphone. “I don't know if you can hear me out there. I can't hear myself. Madison Square Garden is on its feet and the noise is deafening!”

Braddock, still stunned by the response, was suddenly flanked by dozens of photographers, vultures circling carrion. Bulbs flashed, incomprehensible questions were shouted, adding to the general chaos around him.

Ford Bond clutched his microphone like an umbrella handle in a hailstorm, shouting into it at the top of his lungs. “We saw people lining up to buy tickets tonight…People who looked as if they were spending their last dollar. But they're here now, and thirty-five thousand strong. Listen to them!”

The announcer held up the microphone to capture the noise of the caterwauling mob. Jim Braddock climbed over the ropes, scanned the audience. As soon as his feet touched the canvas, the noise intensified, buffeting him like a gale-force wind.

Behind the back row, Max Baer emerged from the same doorway that Braddock had passed through. Ignored, he listened to the approving crowd, jealousy darkening his handsome features. His eyes fixed on Braddock inside the ring, basking in the applause. Baer's manager, Ancil Hoffman, and two corner men appeared at Baer's side. The boxer tapped Ernie Goins, one of his two corner men, with his glove, and then moved down the aisle, flanked by his entourage.

As the audience became aware of Baer's presence, a wave of respectful silence rolled down the stadium bleachers in a muted waterfall that matched his feral strut. Max felt the public's dread and savored it like fine wine. By the time he climbed into the ring, his chiseled features were a smirking mask, his every move, every gesture an arrogant challenge.

With both fighters inside the ring, the managers and corner men behind the ropes, photographers and members of the sporting press hurried to their ringside table. Typewriters were already clacking as Sporty Lewis, in his wrinkled seersucker suit, squeezed between the bodies of his packed-in colleagues and sank into his chair. He tossed his sweat-stained hat onto the typewriter in front of him, nodded to the cub reporter assigned to the seat beside his.

“All ready, kid?” Lewis yelled over the noise.

“Yeah, but for what?” the young reporter replied.

Sporty winked. “You never been to a funeral?”

Max Baer trotted around the ring like a stallion, accepting the boos, insults, and catcalls tossed his way as if they were an ovation. Gould, who'd slipped unnoticed into Braddock's corner, called Jim over. Alone in the center of the ring, Baer soon grew tired of his own antics and the crowd's scorn and moved into his corner too.

A moment of tense drama followed as the men in both fighters' camps awaited the arrival of the all-important third man. The ongoing dispute over the referee continued right up to the wire. Nothing had been resolved at Jimmy Johnston's last-minute powwow that morning. Gould and Braddock still nixed Dempsey; and Hoffman and Baer rejected Arthur Donovan. Adding to the mess was General Phelan, chairman of the boxing commission, who insisted that the referee be licensed in New York State. At the moment, as the fight was about to begin, neither Baer nor Braddock knew who the referee would be.

A gray-haired man built like a fireplug appeared at the ropes and climbed into the ring.

“That's Johnny McAvoy, from Brooklyn,” Gould informed Braddock, relief evident in his voice.

“Yeah, I recognize him,” said Doc Robb, Braddock's cutman. Ray, Braddock's other corner man, agreed. “Me too.”

Gould's cherubic face beamed. “Lucky break for us. We'll get a square deal from Johnny. He's on the up-and-up. A real straight shooter. I tell ya' Jimmy, with McAvoy as ref, and Kelly and Lynch for judges, it's a great night for the Irish.”

Baer's corner seemed complacent with the choice. Ancil shrugged, Ernie Goins nodded his approval.
Baer didn't know McAvoy from Adam, but he wasn't Arthur Donovan, so Max was fine with the commission's selection.

The referee spoke with the boxing officials for a few moments. Then, leaning over the ropes, he addressed Charley Lynch and George Kelly, the title fight judges. Finally McAvoy adjusted his bow tie and moved to the center of the ring. Hands on hips, he summoned the boxers and their corner men.

“I want a clean fight,” McAvoy said in a whiskey voice. “When I say break, I want you to step back, 'cause I won't say it twice. And remember”—McAvoy's eyes caught Braddock's—“protect yourself at all times.”

McAvoy stepped away from the huddle. “Shake.”

Braddock and Baer touched gloves. Max flashed white, straight, movie-star teeth. Braddock's expression stayed neutral. Before they broke and returned to their respective corners, Ernie dangled a gold watch in front of Jim's face.

“One minute to midnight, Cinderella!”

Gould lunged at the man, caught himself, then waved the punk back to his own corner. “You ain't worth it, ya little turd,” he muttered, climbing out of the ring.

Braddock stripped off his robe to reveal a scrapper's body, lean and sculpted with a rock-hard chest and thighs clad in blue trunks with a green shamrock emblazoned on the right leg. On the other side, the Californian was down to his black trunks, his powerful, bronzed muscles rippling under the glare of the stadium's man-made daylight.

Ancil spoke intensely to Baer, who kept waving his manager off with a grimace of annoyed impatience that said he'd heard it all before and was sick of it already. Jim leaned into the ropes, closed his eyes. He seemed relaxed, calm, almost as if he were praying.

“Keep your hands up, Jimmy,” said Gould.

Jim nodded.

At ringside, Ford Bond was nearly whispering into his microphone. “Jim Braddock's rise from the soup lines to number-one heavyweight contender has truly been miraculous. Now, never in all my years, have I seen the arena so quiet.”

Then the clang of the bell crashed through the silence to mark the start of the fight.

ROUND 1

Braddock leaped out of his corner, lean and determined, a lunging predator. Before Baer even made it to the center of the ring, Jim was on him, a light tap with his left followed by a stiff right to Baer's body.

Braddock's tactic—to catch the champ completely by surprise with an aggressive, well-directed attack—was the same one Baer himself had used in his first round with the German Max Schmeling in the title fight back in 1933. Braddock knew this because he'd watched the film. Yet Baer seemed unprepared for the assault, and shaken by Braddock's unexpected intensity.

The Cinderella Man's no-fear ferocity lifted the audience out of their seats.

But Baer recovered quickly and came back at Braddock with a short uppercut that missed Jim's chin by
less than an inch. Braddock stepped away, circled Baer until he spied an opening in the champ's defenses, then closed on him again.

This time Baer was ready, delivering a left hook that smashed Jim's ribs and set his teeth grinding against the mouthpiece. Jimmy swallowed the punch and spit it back in the form of a twisting hook—right into Baer's side.

Spun by the blow, Baer dropped his fists, leaving himself wide open for a combination. Braddock let him have a long, stinging right to the face. Baer grunted, sneered. Braddock let fly with another right, then a left, and a final terrific right that bounced off the champ's iron jaw.

Max grunted, clinched with Braddock in a sweaty embrace. Baer blinked then grinned through the mouth guard. “Now, now,” he said, a parent chiding a naughty child. Before Braddock could reply, McAvoy barked, made them break. Braddock danced away, his footwork dazzling, and then he charged again.

Jim's three early rights, all of them robust, had stunned Max Baer, as much by their authority and control as their power. For the first time, Baer realized that Braddock had the kick of a mule in his arm. But the champion refused to show any discomfort to the audience. He began to clown instead. As he easily blocked several jabs, using his powerful right to swat them aside, he laughed and pranced. But Jim relentlessly pressed his advance and they clinched again.