The Power of One (13 page)

“You done good,” Bokkie said. “It will take the bastard two rounds just to get over his anger.” He then told Hoppie to get some rest, that they'd pick us up at the mess at seven-fifteen to drive to the rugby field, where the ring had been set up. “People are coming from all over the district and from Letsitele and Mica and even as far as Hoedspruit and Tzaneen. I'm telling you, man, there's big money on this fight, those miners like a bet.”

“No worries,” Hoppie said. “See you at quarter past seven.”

We walked the short distance to the railway mess. The sun had not yet set over the Murchison Range and the day baked on, hot as ever. “If it stays hot, then that changes the odds.” Hoppie squinted up into a sky the color of pewter, his hand cupped above his eyebrow. “I think it's going to be a bastard of a night, Peekay. A real Gravelotte night, hot as hell.”

When we got to the mess Hoppie told me his plan. “First we have a shower, then we lie down, but here's the plan, Peekay, every ten minutes you bring me a mug of water. Even if I say ‘no more,' even if I beg you, you still bring me a glass every ten minutes, you understand?”

“Ja,
Hoppie, I understand,” I replied, pleased that I was playing a part in getting him ready. Hoppie took his railway timekeeper from one of the fob pockets of his blue serge waistcoat hanging up behind the door.

“Every ten minutes, you hear! And you make me drink it. Okay, little
boetie?”

“I promise, Hoppie,” I said solemnly as he began to undress for his shower.

The window of Hoppie's room was wide open and a ceiling fan moved slowly above us. Hoppie lay on the bed wearing only an old pair of khaki shorts. I sat on the cool cement floor with my back against the wall, the big railway timekeeper in my hands. In almost no time at all Hoppie's body was wet with perspiration and after a while even the sheet was wet. Every ten minutes I went through to the bathroom and brought him a mug of water. After five mugfuls Hoppie turned to me, still on the bed, resting on his elbow.

“It's an old trick I read about in
Ring
magazine. Joe Louis was fighting Jack Sharkey. Anyway, it was hot as hell, just like tonight. Joe's manager made him drink water all afternoon just like us. To cut a long story short, by the eighth round the fight was still pretty even. Then Sharkey started to run out of steam in the tremendous heat. You see, Peekay, the fight was in the open, just like tonight, and these huge lights were burning down into the ring, the temperature was over one hundred degrees. In a fifteen-round fight a man can lose two pints of water just sweating and if he can't get it back, I'm telling you, man, he is in big trouble. I dunno just how it works, but you can store water up just like a camel sort of, that's what Joe did and he's the heavyweight champion of the world now.”

“What did Mr. Jackhammer mean when he said you were a kaffir lover, Hoppie?”

“Ag,
man, take no notice of that big gorilla, Peekay. He's just trying to put me off my stride for tonight. You see, Joe Louis is a black man. Not a kaffir like our kaffirs, black yes, but not stupid and dirty and ignorant. He is what you call a Negro, that's different, man. He's sort of a white man with a black skin, black on the top, white underneath. But that big gorilla is too stupid to know the difference.”

It was all very complicated, beautiful ladies with skin like honey who were not as good as us and black men who were white men underneath and as good as us. The world sure was a complicated place where people were concerned.

“I've got a nanny just like Joe Louis,” I said to Hoppie as I rose to get his sixth mug of water.

Hoppie laughed. “In that case I'm glad I'm not fighting your nanny tonight, Peekay.”

After a while Hoppie rose from the bed, went to a small dresser, and returned with a mouth organ. For a while we sat there and he played
Boeremusik
on the mouth organ. He was very good, and the tappy country music seemed to cheer him up.

“A mouth organ is a man's best friend, Peekay. You can slip it in your pocket and when you're sad it will make you happy. When you're happy it can make you want to dance. If you have a mouth organ in your pocket you'll never starve for company or a good meal. You should try it, it's a certain cure for loneliness.”

Just then we heard the sound of one piece of steel being hit against another. “Time for your dinner,” Hoppie said, slipping on a pair of shoes without socks and putting on an old shirt.

Dinner at the railway mess was pretty good. I had roast beef and mashed potatoes and beans and tinned peaches and custard. Hoppie had nothing except another glass of water. Other diners crowded around our table and wished Hoppie luck and joked a bit and he introduced me to some of them as the next contender. They all told him they had their money on him and how Jackhammer Smit was weak down below. They almost all said things like “Box him, Hoppie. Stay away from him, wear him out. They say he's carrying a lot of flab, go for the belly, man. You can hit him all night in the head, but his belly is his weakness.” When they had left, Hoppie said they were nice blokes but if he listened to them he'd be a dead man.

“You know why he's called Jackhammer, Peekay?”

“What's a jackhammer, Hoppie?”

“A jackhammer is used in the mines to drill into rock. It weighs one hundred and thirty pounds. Two kaffirs work a jackhammer, one holds the end and the other the middle as they drill into the sides of a mine shaft. I'm telling you, it's blery hard work for two big kaffirs. Well, Smit is called ‘Jackhammer' because if he wants, he can hold a jackhammer in place on his own, pushing against it with his stomach and holding it in both hands. What do you think that would do to his stomach muscles? I'm telling you, hitting that big gorilla in the solar plexus all night would be like fighting a brick wall.”

“I know,” I said excitedly, “you keep it coming all night into the face until you close his eye, then he tries to defend against what he can't see and in goes the left, pow, pow, pow, until the other eye starts to close. Then
whammol”

Hoppie rose from the table and looked down at me in surprise. “Where did you hear that?” he exclaimed.

“You told me, Hoppie. It's right, isn't it? That's what you're going to do, isn't it?”

“Shhhhh . . . you'll tell everyone my fight plan, Peekay! My, my, you're the clever one,” he said as I followed him from the dining hall.

“You didn't say what happened to Jack Sharkey.”

“Who?”

“In the heat when Joe Louis fought him and drank all the water?”

“Oh, Joe knocked him out, I forget what round.”

Bokkie and Nels picked us up in a one-ton truck which had
SOUTH AFRICAN RAILWAYS, GRAVELOTTE
painted on the door. Nels and I sat in the back and Hoppie sat in the front with Bokkie. In the back with me was a small suitcase Hoppie had packed with his boxing boots and red pants made of a lovely shiny material and a blue dressing gown. Hoppie was very proud of his gown and he had held it up to show me the “Kid Louis” embroidered in running writing on the back.

“You know the lady in the cafe in Tzaneen, the young one?”

“The pretty one?” I asked, knowing all along whom he meant.

“Ja, she's really pretty, isn't she? Well, she done this with her own hands.”

“Is she your
nooi?
Are you going to marry her, Hoppie?”

“Ag,
man, with the war and all that, who knows?” He had walked over to the dressing table and taken the brown envelope from the top drawer. He tapped the corner of the envelope into the palm of his open hand. “These are my call-up papers. They were waiting for me when we got in today. I have to go and fight in the war, Peekay. A man can't go asking someone to marry him and then go off to the war, it's not fair.”

I was stunned. How could Hoppie be as nice as he was and fight for Adolf Hitler? If he had gotten his call-up papers, that must mean that Adolf Hitler had arrived and Hoppie would join the Judge in the army that was going to march all the
rooineks,
including me, into the sea.

“Has Hitler arrived already?” I asked in a fearful voice.

“No, thank God,” Hoppie said absently. “We're going to have to fight the bastard before he gets here.” He looked up and must have seen the distress on my face. “What's the matter, little
boetier

I told Hoppie about Hitler coming and marching all the
rooineks
right over the Lebombo Mountains into the sea and how happy all the Afrikaners would be because the
rooineks
had killed twenty-six thousand women and children with blackwater fever and dysentery.

Hoppie came over to me, and, kneeling down so that his head was almost the same height as my own, he clasped me to his chest. “You poor little bastard.” He held me tight and safe. Then he took me by the shoulders and held me at arm's length, looking me straight in the eyes. “I'm not going to say the English haven't got a lot to answer for, Peekay, because they have, but that's past history, man. You can't go feeding your hate on the past, it's not natural. Hitler is a bad, bad man and we've got to go and fight him so you can grow up and be welterweight champion of the world. But first we've got to go and fight the big gorilla who called me a kaffir lover. I tell you what, we'll use Jackhammer Smit as a warm-up for that bastard Hitler. Okay by you?”

We had a good laugh and he told me to hurry up and put my tackies on and he'd show me how to tie the laces like a fighter.

The sudden sound of a motor horn outside made Hoppie jump up. He put the dressing gown in the suitcase with his other things. “Let's go, champ, that's Bokkie and Nels.”

“Wait a minute, Hoppie. I nearly forgot my suckers.” I hurriedly retrieved them from my suitcase.

THE
rugby field was on the edge of town, down a dusty road. By the time we arrived I could taste the dust in my mouth. We parked the ute with all the other cars and trucks under a stand of large old blue gums, their palomino trunks shredded with strips of gray bark. In the center of the football field the men from the railway workshop had built a boxing ring that stood about four feet from the ground. The miners, who were responsible for the electrics, had rigged two huge lights on wire that stretched from four poles, each one set into the ground some ten feet from each corner of the ring.

Huge tin shades were fitted over the lights and in the gathering dusk the light spilled down so that it was like daylight in the ring. Hundreds of moths and flying insects spun and danced about the lights, tiny planets orbiting erratically around two brilliant artificial suns. The stands, which were really a series of stepped or tiered benches each about twenty feet long and twelve high, were arranged in a large circle around the ring. It meant everyone had a ringside seat. There looked to be about two thousand men packing the stands, while underneath them, looking through the legs of the seated whites, the Africans stood or crouched, trying to get a view of the ring as best they could.

Bokkie and Nels led us to a large tent, on the side flaps of which was stenciled
PROPERTY OF MURCHINSON CONSOLIDATED MINES LIMITED
. We entered to find Jackhammer Smit, his seconds, and four other men, three of them ordinary size and one of them not much bigger than I. Hoppie whispered that they were the judges and “the dwarf is the referee.” I was fascinated

so by the tiny little man with the large bald head. “He may look silly, man. But take it from me, he knows his onions,” Hoppie confided.

Jackhammer Smit had already changed into black shiny boxing shorts and soft black boxing boots. In the confines of the tent, lit by two hurricane lamps that cast a bluish light, he seemed bigger than ever. As we'd entered he'd turned to talk to one of his seconds. My heart sunk. Hoppie was right, I had seen his stomach muscles as he had turned, they looked like plaited rope, and his shoulders seemed to loom over the smaller men.

“This is one big sonofabitch, Peekay,” Hoppie said. “Moses was still blubbing in the bullrushes the last time he weighed in as a light heavy.” He clipped open his small suitcase and, taking off his shorts and shirt, he quickly slipped on a jockstrap. He looked tough, tightly put together, good knotting around the shoulders and tapered to the waist, his legs slight but strong. He slipped on his shiny red shorts and sat down on the grass of the tent floor to put on his socks and boxing boots.

Jackhammer Smit now stood in the opposite corner of the tent facing us, with the light behind him. He looked black and dark and huge, and he kept banging his right fist into the palm of his left hand. It was like a metronome, a solid, regular smacking sound that seemed to fill the tent.

The referee, who came only halfway up Jackhammer Smit's legs, called the two boxers together. I wondered if all dwarfs had such deep voices. He asked them if they wanted to glove up in the tent or in the ring.

“In the ring,” Hoppie said quickly.

“What's blery wrong with right here, man?” Jackhammer shot back.

“It's all part of the show, brother,” Hoppie said with a grin. “Some of the folk have come a long way.”

“Ja,
man, to see a short fight. Putting on the blery gloves is going to take longer than the fucking fight.”

“Now, boys, take it easy.” The referee pointed to a fairly large cardboard box. “Them's the gloves, ten-ounce Everlasts from Solly Goldman's gym in Jo'burg, specially sent, man,” he said with obvious pride.

Bokkie walked over to the box and took the two pairs of gloves out, and, moving over to Smit's seconds, he offered both sets to them. They each took a pair, examined and kneaded them between their knees before making a choice. The gloves were shiny

black; they caught the light from the hurricane lamp and even empty, they looked full of action.

Bokkie held the gloves out for Hoppie to inspect. “Nice gloves, not too light,” he said softly.

“No worries.” Hoppie put a towel around his neck and then slipped into his dressing gown. Bokkie slung the gloves around Hoppie's neck. “Let's kick the dust,” Hoppie said, moving toward the open tent flap.

Suddenly Jackhammer barked, “What you say, Groenewald, okay by you, winner takes all?”

Hoppie turned slowly to look at the big man. “I wouldn't do that to you, Smit, what would you do for hospital expenses?” He took my hand.

“That kid of yours is gunna be a fucking orphan by the time I'm through with you t'night, you nigger lover,” Jackhammer yelled at Hoppie's departing back.

Hoppie squeezed my hand and laughed softly. “I reckon that was worth at least another two rounds, Peekay.” Pausing in the dark outside the tent, he took me by the shoulders. “Never forget, Peekay, sometimes, very occasionally, you do your best boxing with your mouth.”

A small corridor intersected the stands on either side of the brilliantly lit ring by which the patrons and the fighters entered. It at once became obvious that one semicircle contained only miners and the other only railwaymen, while smiling, excited African faces under the stands peered through gaps between the legs of the whites. I had never been at a large gathering of people before and the tension in the crowd was quite frightening. I held on to Nels's hand tightly as he took me to the top tier of a stand and handed me over into the care of Big Hettie.

Big Hettie seemed to be the only lady at the fight. She was the cook at the railway mess, and Hoppie had introduced us earlier at dinner. Big Hettie had given me a second helping of peaches with custard and Hoppie had said that I had better eat it even if I was full because Big Hettie was a genuine heavyweight who could take on two drunken railwaymen with one arm behind her back.

Big Hettie patted the place beside her. “Come sit here, Peekay. You and me is in this together. If that big baboon hurts Kid Louis we'll go in and finish off the big bugger ourselves,” she said, rocking with laughter.

Hoppie was seated on a small stool in the corner of the ring with Bokkie standing over him bandaging his hands. When Jackhammer Smit entered, he didn't look up. Jackhammer paused in the middle of the ring and cocked two fingers in Hoppie's direction, much to the delight of the miners, who were cheering him like mad.

“Ho, ho, ho, have we got a fight on our hands!” Big Hettie said gleefully. Then she rose from her seat and in a voice that carried right over the ring she yelled, “I'll give you two fingers, you big baboon, right up the arse!”

It was almost totally dark. The sound of a woman's voice was unexpected, and for a split second the stands were hushed and then both sides convulsed with laughter.

Big Hettie sat down again, and, reaching into a large basket at her side, she brought out a half jack of brandy. She popped the cork from the slim, flat bottle and took a long swig, grimacing as she withdrew it from her lips as though it was really nasty
mootie.
“That will fix the big ape,” she said, thumping the cork back into the half jack with the flat of her hand.

The fighters had both been gloved up, and while Hoppie remained seated on the tiny stool, Jackhammer Smit continued to stand, looking big and hard as a mountain. While my faith and my love were invested in my beloved friend, I'd been around long enough to know the realities of big versus small. Big, it seemed to me, always finished on top, and my heart was filled with fear for my newfound friend.

“My God! Look at that Sparrow Fart!” Big Hettie exclaimed, pointing to the tiny referee. “How the devil is he going to keep them men apart?”

“Hoppie says he knows his onions, Mevrou Hettie,” I ventured.

Jackhammer Smit began to shuffle around the ring, throwing imaginary punches. He seemed to be increasing in size by the minute, while Hoppie, seated on his stool, looked like a small frog crouched in the corner of the ring. Nels was putting Vaseline over Hoppie's eyebrows while Bokkie seemed to be giving him some last-minute instructions.

The tiny referee said something and the seconds left the ring and the fighters moved to the center. The crowd grew suddenly still. Standing between the two men with his head thrown right back, the referee looked up at them and said something. They both nodded and touched gloves lightly and then turned and walked back to their corners. The crowd began to cheer like

mad. The referee held his hands up, turning slowly in a circle to hush the crowd, his head only just showing above the top rope of the ring. Soon a three-quarter moon, on the wane, would rise over the Murchison Range, though as yet the night was matte black with only a sharp square of brilliant light etching out the ring with the three men in it. It was as though the two fighters and the dwarf stood alone, watched by an audience of a million stars.

The referee addressed the stilled crowd, his surprisingly deep voice carrying easily to where we sat.
“Dames en here
, tonight we are witnessing the great biblical drama of David and Goliath.” He paused for his words to take effect.

“Weeping Jesus! Sparrow Fart's going to give us a Bible lesson,” Big Hettie hissed at no one in particular. She took a quick swig from the half jack as the referee continued.

“Will history repeat itself? Will David once again defeat Goliath?” The railwaymen went wild and the miners hissed and booed. The referee held his hands up for silence. “Or will Goliath have his revenge?” The miners cheered like mad and this time it was the railwaymen who booed and hissed.

The little man held up his hands again, and the audience calmed down.

“Introducing, in the blue corner, weighing two hundred and five pounds and hailing from Murchison Consolidated Mines, the ex-light-heavyweight champion of the Northern Transvaal, Jackhammer Smit. Twenty-two fights, eleven knockouts, eleven losses on points, a fighter with an even-steven record in the ring. Ladies and gentlemen, put your hands together for Jackhammer Smit!” The miners cheered and whistled.

“What's eleven losses on points mean, Mevrou Hettie?” I asked urgently.

“It means he's a pug, a one-punch Johnny, a slugger,” she said, taking another swig and wiping the top of the bottle with the palm of her hand. “It means he's no boxer.”

The referee turned to indicate Hoppie, who raised his hands to acknowledge the crowd. “In the red corner, weighing one hundred and forty-five pounds, from Gravelotte, Kid Louis of the South African Railways, Northern Transvaal welterweight champion and the recent losing contender for the Transvaal title; fifteen fights, fourteen wins, eight knockouts, one loss.” He cleared his throat before continuing. “Let me remind you that the fighter he narrowly lost to on points in Pretoria went on to

win the South African title in Cape Town.” He raised his voice slightly. “Let's hear it for the one and only Kid Louis!” It was our turn to cheer until the referee orchestrated us back to silence. Hoppie had once again calmly seated himself on the tiny stool, while Jackhammer Smit was snorting and throwing punches at an imaginary opponent soon to become Hoppie.

“This is a fifteen-round contest. May the best man win.” The referee had already assumed the authority of the fight and he didn't look small anymore. It was clear the crowd accepted him. He moved to the edge of the ring where the light spilled sufficiently to show three men seated at a small table. “Ready, judges?” They nodded and he turned to the two fighters. “At the sound of the bell come out fighting, gentlemen.”

Out of the darkness the bell sounded for round one.

Hoppie jumped from the stool as Nels pulled it out of the ring and Jackhammer Smit stormed toward him. In the oppressive heat the air was as still as a dead man's breath and the big boxer's torso was already glistening with sweat. I had earlier unwrapped my first sucker, as usual licking the clear cellophane clean. It was the yellow one the beautiful Indian lady with the diamond in her tooth had given me, and the wrapper had tasted vaguely of pineapple, only even sweeter than a real pineapple.

Hoppie danced around the big man and Jackhammer Smit let go two left jabs and a right uppercut, all of which missed Hoppie by a mile. He followed with a straight left which Hoppie caught neatly in his glove as he was going away. Hoppie feinted to the right as Jackhammer tried to catch him with two left jabs, then he stepped in under the last jab and peppered Jackhammer's face with a two-handed attack. Two lefts, then two stabbing rights to the head. The blows were lightning fast, and Hoppie had moved out of reach by the time Jackhammer Smit could bring his gloves back into position in front of his face. Hoppie continued to backpedal most of the time, making Smit chase him around the ring. Occasionally he darted in with a flurry of blows to the head and then danced out of range again. Jackhammer came doggedly after him, trying to get set for a big punch, but Hoppie was content to land a quick left and a right and then move quickly out of harm's way. The first round saw him land a dozen good punches, most of them just above Jackhammer's left eye, while the big man only managed a long straight left that caught Hoppie on the shoulder as the welterweight was moving away.

It was clear that Jackhammer Smit was having trouble with the southpaw and was showing his frustration. The bell went for the end of the first round, and the fighters returned to their corners. This time, like Hoppie, Jackhammer sat down, breathing heavily. He drank deeply, straight from a bottle of water one of his seconds held up to his mouth. The other second sponged him, dried him, and smeared Vaseline above his left eye.