The Sweet Science - A. J. Liebling [72]
As I entered the door to the Garden proper, I thought I saw the statue of Joe Gans, the old lightweight champion, smile gratefully. The ticket taker, one of the gruff old retired cops who usually look at me as if I were personally responsible for their hurting feet, said, “Nice weather we’re having, ain’t it?” The program sellers, who ordinarily snarl at you if you can’t find the right change, looked so happy to see me that I handed one of them a twenty-dollar bill, just to test his reaction. He counted out the change like a little gentleman, saying, “Nineteen-seventy-five. Right? I’m sorry I have to give you so many singles, Mister.” At the beer bar, on other occasions so crowded, I could have been served instantly. Unfortunately, I wasn’t thirsty. In the inner lobby, I saw nobody I recognized from the fight mob; no self-respecting character would accept a free ticket that was easy to get. Murray Goodman, the press agent for the I.B.C., entered from the arena, recognized me, and looked as if I had caught him in a humiliating situation. “I gotta be here,” he said. “It’s my job.”
“Is it going to be a hell of a fight?” I asked.
He looked at me suspiciously. “They must think it’ll sell razor blades,” he said.
A sallow bystander said hello, and Mr. Goodman introduced him to me as Hymie Wallman, Zulueta’s manager. Mr. Wallman had been watching the door, and I hoped for his sake that he had not been trying to calculate the gate, because nobody had come in since me. “What percentage are you working on?” I asked, to cheer him up.
“What difference what percentage?” Mr. Wallman inquired bitterly. “You kidding?”
“Hymie isn’t doing so bad,” Mr. Goodman said cheerily. “He gets four thousand for his fighter from television. The other fighter gets four thousand, too. The gate receipts are like a tip.”
“Yeah? Wonderful,” said Mr. Wallman. “You were up at that fight last night?” he asked me. I said I had been, and he said, “If this fight tonight wasn’t on television, it would draw fifty thousand dollars.” Wiping a tear from the corner of my eye, I said good-by.
No sound was audible from the interior, and I supposed that for some reason the preliminaries hadn’t begun on schedule. When I got inside, though, I could see two heavyweights in the ring, belaboring each other in a cathedral hush. It was a private fight. The ushers, who at this point outnumbered the customers, treated me with the courtesy that obtains at the best funeral chapels. One waved me to another, each walking a few steps of the way with me. The usher who accompanied me on the final leg showed me my seat, which was indeed in the center of the second row, on the Fiftieth Street side of the ring. There was one man already seated in the row, and the usher suggested to me politely, “If you went around the other way, you wouldn’t disturb him.” I went around, and found I had the seat next to my fellow patron. It was like the meeting of Robinson Crusoe and Friday. He had been waiting for an audience.
A round ended, and the referee stopped the bout, because one of the men was outclassed. “I could seeyit,” my neighbor said. “It was obvious.” In the next bout, a fat, pink boy from Florida, who must have been the pride of the boxing coach at some Y.M.C.A., was in with a Negro welterweight who was not inclined to be severe. I fancied I could hear the Florida boy counting to himself, “One-two, one-two,” as he hit out nervously. The colored boy would slap him in the belly and push him away. The white boy was off balance constantly, and my expert got the idea that the colored boy was employing some kind of illegal jujitsu on him. “Seeyit?” he would say. “Seeyit? Why don’t they get a referee? It’s so obvious.” The bout went eight rounds, a tribute to the colored boy’s forbearance, and my man was almost tearful with indignation when the judges gave the colored boy the decision.
The next bout brought together two tough young middleweights from Brooklyn. I had heard of one of them, Ray Drake, who once beat Floyd Patterson in the amateurs. After that, Patterson