Doc - Mary Doria Russell [153]
Bat himself never boxed as a grown man but throughout the 1880s, he would build a reputation as an expert on the Chambers-Queensberry rules. By the end of the decade, he was widely recognized as an honest and reliable referee, called upon to serve in important matches featuring boxing greats like John P. Clow and John L. Sullivan. That experience would eventually land him the best job of his life: covering sports for the New York Sun, where he would indulge his flair for flamboyant storytelling to his heart’s content and his readers’ delight until he died pen in hand, at his desk, a fat old man who’d had a hell of a good time ever since he left the farm.
Of course, his sporting knowledge and repute did not appear all at once, like Athena springing full-grown from the forehead of that divine boxing enthusiast, mighty Zeus. Bat Masterson’s apprenticeship began in Ford County, Kansas. Out past Duck Creek, a little north of Howells.
Wyatt found what he was looking for with no trouble. On a windless night in open land, the roaring of four hundred men can carry.
Astride Dick Naylor, he drew up and surveyed the scene. The ropes were pitched and respected. It cost a dollar to get in. Inside the perimeter, a crowd stood ten deep around the ring. A couple of farmwives were doing a brisk business in coffee and fried pork sandwiches; their husbands rented standing room on wagons for fifty cents. There was even a bartender selling whiskey straight from a barrel, two bits a swig.
“What’s the line?” Wyatt asked a stranger.
“Nine to one, on Rowan, but I put a dollar on Hamner. He’s got sand.”
Bat was easy to pick out in the center of the ring, his fancy clothes giving him visibility and authority amid skinny boys clad in denim and dust. His frock coat and bowler hat had been removed, but the white of his shirtsleeves glowed in the moonlight, and the flare of torches made the gold threads of his brocade waistcoat glitter as he followed the action, eyes intent, concentration complete.
Wyatt had refereed fights up in Deadwood, and he’d done a little boxing himself. He recognized competence when he saw it. Bat was short and getting stout, but he was light on his feet, his rhythm and movement graceful and deft as the boxers shifted and fell back and came on. He showed no partiality, enforcing his rules consistently, his voice cutting through the spectators’ shouts with brisk authority. His timekeeping was faultless.
The bout itself was more wrestling than boxing. The opponents were a lanky young drover and a local German boy. You could see that neither was going to do much more than bloody the other’s nose. Even so, they went close to fifty rounds. When at last they’d grappled and pummeled each other into exhaustion, Bat raised the wrist of the cowboy, who’d stayed on his feet slightly longer than the farm kid. Then Bat helped the local boy up and praised him lavishly, inviting the crowd to cheer for an honorable effort.
Money changed hands with minimal grumbling. Inside the ring, Bat got both combatants to mumble “Good fight” through thick lips, their fists too cut up and swollen to allow a handshake. The crowd dispersed. The gatekeeper counted out the referee’s rake and handed it over. Bat folded a substantial wad of cash into his pocket and walked toward his horse, stopping in his tracks when he caught sight of Wyatt, waiting.
“You got no jurisdiction out here, Wyatt.”
“Didn’t say I did.”
Silence fell. Eyes on the ground, mouth turned downward in thought, Bat tugged at his vest, smoothing the brocade. “Two idiots go at it in a bar,” he proposed suddenly. “They’re disturbing the peace. What do you do?”
Wyatt didn’t bother answering.
“You bash them,” Bat supplied with a shrug. “You don’t argue. You don’t explain. You don’t hesitate. You bash them both, and jail them.” He paused before asking, “What happens after that?”
Indifferent, Wyatt said, “None of my affair.”
“That’s right,” Bat agreed. “That’s right! It’s none of your affair. You broke up the fight. The peace of the