Second Intention (5 page)

It was absolutely bloody perfect. Toby thought he
’d got the timing sussed and brought his blade across to close off the line, thinking it would pick me up on the way in, but it was
too early.
He had brought his hand straight into line with my point, which hammered into his little finger bringing up one light. One light for me.

It was such a good hit, a
textbook
hit, that it drew sharp intakes of breath from all who saw it. Toby clearly wasn’t pleased, however. It had made him look very poor.

‘
For the left, two. Two three.’ Alex looked down the piste at Toby, who, if his body language was anything to go by, was not happy about it. ‘On guard. Are you ready? Fence.’

Maybe it was the pressure of the situation that did it, but I let my
concentration slip. It was only a piddling little first round pool fight, but, thanks to my stupid comment a week earlier, it was now a high-stakes grudge match. On any other day I would have wiped the floor with a little squirt like Toby, but with him only two hits from victory, and with Sue watching, I tightened up. As he came in I should have hung back, but tried to stop hit him and got the timing wrong.

Double hit.

Damn.

‘
Halt.’ I could feel the sense of relief in Alex’s voice as he could tell the fight was drawing to a close. ‘Double hit. Four three to the right.’

I turned back to the on guard line. No - this wasn
’t happening. I could still do it, but couldn’t afford to make any mistakes.

As I faced Toby I could tell he couldn
’t wait to get on with it. This, to him, was probably one of the high spots of his fencing career.

‘
On guard. Are you ready? Fence.’

He came straight forward and made a direct lunge low towards my leading foot. It
’s an all-or-nothing move. You either get the hit or you get picked off trying to do it. Normally I would have just extended my arm to stop hit him on the shoulder or the mask, but at that moment I was being too guarded, and tried to get him with a low-line parry first.

I met his blade alright, and even got my riposte onto his chest, but had underestimated the speed with which he got his point back in line and hit me on the thigh.

We both snapped around to look at the lights on the box.

‘
Halt. Double hit,’ called out Alex, way too loud for my liking. It seemed as though everybody in the hall was going to hear this one. ‘For the right, five. Five four. Victory to Toby Rutherford.’

Well, you
’d think Toby had just won the World Championships or something. He ripped his mask off, which went clattering away down the piste behind him and leaped in the air, punching two fists up in a victory salute, his epee flailing around on the body wire.

I calmly pulled off my mask and tucked it under my sword arm, and stepped forward to shake his hand, hoping that my disgust at what I had just allowed to happen didn
’t show too much. He kept me waiting for a moment, though, bouncing around and snarling at anybody who happened to be watching. When he finally did come forward he took my hand and tried to give it a bone crusher grip, but it didn’t really work, so he had to content himself with turning to one of his cronies and shouting ‘Who da man? Who da man?’

If I had been an observer on the outside of this spectacle, it would doubtless have been highly entertaining. There was this red faced, ginger haired buffoon noisily strutting about over having won a pool fight by one hit, and it all looked pretty comical. But from where I was, I couldn
’t see the funny side at all.

Sighing, I plodded back over to my bag and dropped my mask and epee down. Sue handed me a towel and my water bottle, but said nothing. It would have been pointless to try and console me with any words of wisdom. We both knew the real situation - I had lost two good hits because of an intermittent fault with my epee, then tightened up when I could see the fight slipping away from me. We both knew I
should
have won, but that didn’t really count for anything. I
hadn’t
won, and nothing could change that now.

I turned and looked back down the piste towards Toby, and saw something strange about his posture. He was looking at me, the inevitable smirk on his face, but was stood with his head tilted to one side, and had two fingers laid across his wrist, as though taking somebody
’s pulse.

Yeah, I got the message.

Clinically dead?
he was saying.

*                  *                  *                  *

We went and got a coffee after the first round had ended. We had a little while before they posted the rankings for the direct elimination, and I wanted to get my feet back on the ground. Sue was being deliberately chatty, and talking about anything and everything except what had just happened. It hadn’t been helped by my losing to Prime in the last fight, again by five hits to four. His parry-riposting had been too good for me, and I think I was also a little shaken by my bout with Toby. Whatever, I wasn’t fencing my best, and would have to do something about it.

It was at this point that Sean strolled over, a wry smile on his face. He had been sitting across on the other side of the sports centre cafeteria, chatting with Steve Domek and inevitably talking through the highs and lows of their pools, but had obviously decided that now was the time to get the inside story on the shock of the morning.

‘So what happened then?’ he said, cheerfully. ‘Tell me he didn’t just outfence you.’

‘
Intermittent fault with my weapon. Two hits down, then doubles.’ I was trying to sound like it was just one of those things, although I was feeling far from philosophical about it.

‘
Ah, that’s bad news. You know he’s never going to let anybody hear the end of this one, don’t you?’

Yeah, thanks Sean, I thought to myself. Try making me feel bad about it. I murmured an affirmative.

‘Anyhow,’ he went on. ‘Apparently the lists are up, and you’re not doing too bad.’

‘
Good.’ It was all I could think of to say. ‘How about you?’

‘
Oh, I’m just grand,’ he was clearly pleased with it. ‘Five up and none down. It’ll do me nicely.’

Yes, well might he be pleased. Five straight victories would put him into the DE with a nice high seeding, and a string of fairly easy opponents, at least to start with.

I wished him well, we drained our cups and wandered down to see the listings.

A modern fencing tournament is organised in a very specific way, to try and make sure that all the best fencers don
’t get knocked out early on. You start the event with an opening round in which all the competitors are put into pools, usually of six fencers, with all the competitors spread around according to their national rankings. You fight everybody else in your pool, and the results (the “pool sheets”) are then handed in to the organisers who then use a clever computer system to rank every fencer in the tournament according to their performance in that opening round. People with five straight victories are ranked at the top, followed by those with four, three, two and so on. To order the people who have the same number of victories they use a system called the indicator, where the number of hits a fencer receives is subtracted from the number of hits they scored, and this gives a number, either positive or negative, which allows all the fencers to be ranked from highest to lowest.

After the pools you then go on to the knockout stage, which is known as the direct elimination or DE. The opponents you get in the DE are determined by your ranking, so the top seed will meet the bottom seed, the second seed will meet the second from bottom, and so on. The better you do in the pools, therefore, the further you are likely to get in the tournament.

Unlike pool bouts, which only go to five, DE fights are always fought up to fifteen hits, spread over three periods of three minutes each, with a one minute gap in between. Whoever gets to fifteen first, or is leading at full time, wins and goes through to the next round. With each round, half of the fencers still in the competition are eliminated: sixty-four, thirty- two, sixteen, eight, four, right down to the two who meet in the final.

It
’s a good way to run it, although you do occasionally get upsets when somebody has a nightmare in the opening round and goes through to the DE underseeded.

When they
’ve done the rankings they print them off and stick them up on the wall somewhere, usually in the corridor outside the main hall, and you always get a huge press of fencers crowding around the list to see how they’ve got on. A few minutes after this they put up the tableau, which is a diagram showing who is fencing who in the DE, so you can see all the people you are likely to have to fence on your way to the final, assuming you get that far. That morning it all made for interesting reading.

The crush had died down a bit by the time Sue and I had made it down from the cafeteria, and we could both clearly see how I had done. As expected, the top of the list was dominated by the usual names, some of the best epee swordsmen in the country having, as expected, taken a clean sweep of five straight wins. After that came those with four victories which, on this occasion, included Toby
Rutherford. He had done well for himself, his four wins and healthy indicator giving him a seeding of 11
th
overall, which meant his first round fight was going to be the number 54 seed, who was a relative novice. This was good for Toby, as it looked very likely that he was going to make it through to the last 32 with ease.

My three victories, with a fairly healthy indicator, had put me into the DE seeded 22
nd
overall, and I was going to be up against the number 43 seed, a gobby bloke from the RAF called Hartson who I had known for a few years. He was fast enough but never really did much with it, and I knew I could beat him.

What I was most pleased about, though, was what happened in the
second
round of the DE. If it all went according to the seeding, I would be crossing swords with Toby again in the last 32.

I turned to Sue and smiled.

‘Now it gets interesting,’ I said.

Five

My first DE fight, against Hartson, was just a formality really. He wasn
’t on form, and I most definitely was, having been well and truly woken up in my defeat by Toby. I took him to pieces, and breezed through 15-4, the few hits he managed to rack up having come from doubles.

As soon as I
’d finished I got my tracksuit on, dumped my epees, and we strolled over to watch Toby finishing off his bout, from a discreet distance of course. Although he won fairly easily I did notice that there were one or two instinctive moves he was making, which could prove useful to know about if I could find a way to exploit them. Each time his opponent stepped forward he was lifting his sword hand, and every time he tried a second intention move he prefaced it with a little flicker of the fingers on his left hand.

Learning to
“read” an opponent is one of the things which marks the good swordsmen from the mediocre, and I always make a point of trying to watch the next guy I’m up against, if I can. Toby was displaying habits which I would certainly try and work on.

Their bout finished, and he turned away looking smarmy. We probably had a few minutes before we were due to meet, so I decided to go and get some more water down my throat. Sue strolled over to watch Sean making mincemeat of some poor kid from one of the minor public schools, and reported back that he was looking really fired up. It didn
’t really bother me that much. He and I were in different halves of the tableau, which meant the only way we would have to cross swords together was if we both made it to the final, which would have been nice, but highly unlikely.

Eventually the time came when the fights for the places in the last 32 were called. Toby and I were going to be the first bout on piste seventeen, across on the far side of the hall, and as I looked across I was relieved to see that we had a president  waiting for us who knew what he was doing. Oliver Heazel is one of the best presidents you
’ll find at provincial open tournaments, and I knew he wasn’t going to take any nonsense from the likes of Toby.

As we strolled over, hauling all my kit along, Oliver saw us and gave an encouraging smile.

‘Alright, Richard?’ He extended his hand and I gave it a shake. ‘I see you’ve lined up a good one for me.’

He had obviously heard about the business with Toby earlier on. I nodded and gave him a wry smile. He knew how the bout
should
have gone.

‘
And the lovely Susan,’ he went on, taking her hand and giving it the gentlest of kisses, a move which would look cheesy from most men but which he somehow seemed to get away with. ‘You’re looking as beautiful as ever.’

‘
You’re not looking so bad yourself,’ she replied, with a smile.

Everybody seems to get on with Oliver, and it
’s hard not to get drawn by his charm. Everybody except Toby, that is, who arrived with a look of disdain on his face. Still, there was nothing he could do about it, since Oliver’s reputation for being scrupulously fair in his presiding meant that there was absolutely no point in protesting his officiating this fight.

I wired myself up and presented my weapon to Oliver for testing. The rules for epee are very clear: the spring loaded tip must have 750 grams of force and there needs to be at least half a millimetre of travel left in the tip when it is compressed before it sets off the box. To check this, presidents have a feeler gauge to check the travel and a tubular weight, weighing exactly 750 grams, which the epee must lift when held vertically, point upwards. Weapons should always be tested for DE bouts, though quite often people don
’t bother until the final stages. Oliver was the sort of president who would never cut corners on something like that.

Mine passed, as I expected, since I always prepare all my weapons
meticulously the day before a competition to ensure they are perfectly legal, but I could see from the uncertain look on Toby’s face that he hadn’t been expecting this, not yet at least.

He wired up and Oliver did his test, bringing up a buzz and a green light for both weight
and
travel. Toby gave a snort and turned to fetch his second epee from his end of the piste as Oliver calmly took a yellow card from his blazer pocket and held it up.

So, a yellow card warning before we had even begun. A second offence and Toby would get a red card, automatically gifting a point to me. Hardly the start anybody would wish for, although he didn
’t seem that bothered. Clearly he felt this fight was a foregone conclusion, having already beaten me once that day.

His spare passed, fortunately for him, and we tested the guards and took to our on guard lines.

It’s funny, but I felt completely different to earlier in the day. When I fought Toby in the pool I had been anxious, tight if you like, but now I felt relaxed and totally in control. Upsets can happen more easily when you are only fencing to five hits, but in a fifteen hitter real class tends to show through. Besides,
I
knew that the faulty weapon was really to blame for me losing two good hits earlier, and that wasn’t going to happen here. No, I was the one in control now. This was my fight.

We saluted each other, then Oliver.

‘On guard,’ said Oliver. ‘Are you ready? Play.’

The moment he said it Toby came forward, his point extending threateningly towards my upper arm. It was an aggressive move, intended to steal some ground and try and draw some sort of reaction. His whole body language made it clear that he wanted to rack up the first point of the bout.

I stepped back as he did so, not wanting to commit to a parry or counter attack at this stage, but just trying to get a feel for his timing and distance.

He came forward again, this time with two steps, and his point looked to be spearing straight for my shoulder. I could easily have tried to pick up his blade with a circular parry, but noticed the flicker of his left hand as he came in.
It’s a feint,
I realised. A second intention move. He’s trying to draw my parry so he can disengage and dip under my blade to make the hit.

I simply held my point in line as he came at me, and he very obligingly planted his forearm straight onto it. It was one of the most effortless hits I have ever had to make, and it clearly looked like it to everybody watching.

One light.
My
light.

‘
Halt,’ called out Oliver. ‘For the right, one. One nil.’

We made our way back to our on guard lines, Toby quietly muttering a profanity within his mask.

‘On guard. Are you ready? Play.’

This time it was my turn to go on the offensive. I had already managed to exploit one of his weaknesses, the movement of his left hand when making a feint, and now I wanted to see if the second would work.

I took two steps forward, angling my point towards his mask, and, as expected, he lifted his hand. It was all the opening I needed, and I dipped the point down to hit him under his wrist. One light. My light again.

‘
Halt. For the right, two. Two nil.’

Toby clearly wasn
’t impressed. We had been fencing for a total of about fifteen seconds and I was already two hits up. Worse than that, I had done it with very little effort, and to the people watching he was looking out of his depth. He cursed again, and stepped back to his on guard line, angrily swishing his blade about.

I took the next three hits as well, with textbook attacks where my timing and distance were absolutely perfect. It was amazing, feeling so relaxed and in control. I just did the right thing without even having to think about it.

Toby, on the other hand, was doing the complete opposite. He was getting really angry now, since this wasn’t how the fight, in his mind at least, was supposed to go. He shouted, he stamped, and he walloped the blade of his epee down onto the piste with a loud smack.

Oliver said nothing, but again drew the yellow card from the pocket of his jacket and held it up in Toby
’s direction.

Toby ripped his mask off with a look of disbelief, the redness of his face suggesting that he was about to seriously blow a fuse. He looked as though he was going to protest, even though such blatant equipment abuse was automatically cardable, but Oliver nipped it in the bud.

‘Want me to make it a red one?’ he asked quietly, his eyebrows raised.

The threat of the red card seemed to get through to Toby, in spite of his fury. He knew he couldn
’t afford to be giving any more points away, and he sloped back to his on guard line.

I had just taken four hits in a row by attacking, and felt it was time for a change of tactic. You can
’t just assume that because something’s worked well up until then that it would keep working, since your opponent will probably start to read your game and can easily begin to pull back, so I decided to play it defensively for a bit.

It proved exactly the right thing to do. Toby had been expecting me to attack, but now that I was just bouncing around and wasting time, he knew he had to
bring the fight to me. If I was leading at full time I would win, and with a five hit lead that was very likely. The onus was now on
him
to advance the bout.

He was so wound up, so tight in the shoulder as he lunged, that it was really easy to pick him up as he came in and make a straightforward riposte to his chest, taking my lead to six hits. I got a little sloppy after that though, and he managed to pull off a couple of singles, followed by two doubles, before I got myself back in the zone. At 8-4 I got a single light from a counterattack as he came in, and, I must confess, I did feel I
’d been lucky to get it.

Toby, too, had a feeling something wasn
’t right, and stepped towards Oliver with the weapon held up, requesting that the president test it. Oliver’s check revealed that the epee was, indeed, failing to produce a light, and annulled my hit.

It was disappointing to have my hit disallowed, sure enough, but what
happened next more than made up for it.

As Toby walked back to his end of the piste he remembered that he didn
’t have a spare epee within reach: he had only brought two over with him, and one of them had already failed the weight and gauge test, so he couldn’t use that. With an authority borne of years of getting whatever he wanted he called across to one of the little crowd who now had gathered to watch, a young lad from his own club who had just been eliminated in the previous round.

‘
Epee,’ he demanded, holding out his hand and snapping his fingers. Not so much as a please or thank you.

The boy rummaged in his bag, clearly knowing better than to argue, and pulled out a right handed pistol grip epee, exactly the type that most of us use. He handed it over to Toby without a word, and glumly watched him wire up and step forward to test it on my guard. He then strode back to the on guard line while a bemused Oliver watched.

‘Er … if you don’t mind, Toby?’ Oliver was holding out the test weight and feeler gauge. Toby came forward again, scowling, and presented the new epee for testing. When it failed I honestly thought I was going to wet myself laughing. I turned away and took a few steps towards Sue, since Toby was about to go ballistic and I wanted to be able to shield her from the blast if necessary.

As Oliver held up his red card and announced that the score was now 9-4 to me I felt, rather than heard, the explosion from the other end of the piste.

‘Get me one that works for Christ’s sake!’ he bellowed at the poor lad, hurling his epee back at the bag. If he’d spoken to me like that I would have just turned and walked away, leaving him to sort out his own problems, but the boy, ever mindful of what life would be like back at the club if he didn’t help, mutely did as he was told.

When we finally got under way again it was clear to everybody that the fight was mine. Toby was so out of it, so full of rage and so lacking in control, that it was now a foregone conclusion. The harder he tried, the easier it was for me to hit him, wherever and however I wanted. This was no longer fencing, it was surgery.

As my fifteenth and final hit landed squarely on his forearm he tore off his mask and kicked it away, swearing, a move which could have got him carded again except that there was now no point as the bout was over.

I saluted, removed my mask, and waited with my left arm extended so he could shake hands, but he was having none of it. He just unhooked himself from the spool and began stomping back to where he had left his bag on the far side of the hall.

‘Toby!’ I shouted after him. If he was going to be so unsportsmanlike as to refuse to shake hands with me and Oliver, I was determined that everybody should see it. See him for the brat that he was.

He spun around and glared at me.

‘Don’t think this is over, Teasdale!’ he spat, with a venom which was scary, as it was so unexpected. I’ve never seen anybody react like that after losing at fencing, and being on the receiving end was unsettling to say the least.

He turned and walked away, leavi
ng us all in stunned silence.

*                  *                  *                  *