By God, thought ‘Lil’ Arthur. I’m gonna change the world.
Yes sir, Saturday, he was going to fight a heavyweight crown contender, and though it would not be listed as an official fight, and McBride was just in it to pick up some money, he was glad to have the chance to fight a man who might fight for the championship some day.
If he could beat him, even if it didn’t affect McBride’s record, ‘Lil’ Arthur knew he’d have that; he would have beaten a contender for the Heavyweight Championship of the world.
It was a real beginning and a far cry from The Battle Royales he had first participated in. There was a time when he looked upon those degrading events with favor.
He remembered his first Battle Royale. His friend Ernest had talked him into it. Once a month, sometimes more often, white “sporting men” liked to get a bunch of colored boys and men to come down to the club for a free-for-all. Would put nine or ten of them in a ring, sometimes make them strip naked and wear Sambo masks. He’d done that once himself.
While the coloreds fought, the whites would toss money and yell for them to “kill one another.” Sometimes they’d tie two coloreds together by the ankles, let them go at it. Once, ‘Lil’ Arthur saw a fight between two one legged colored boys, hopping about the ring and clubbing each other. Blood flowed thick as molasses on flapjacks. Bones were broken. Muscles torn.
For the whites, it was great fun, watching a couple of coons knock each other about. For them, it was one step below a dog fight. Whites had some feelings for their dogs.
‘Lil’ Arthur found he was good at fighting, and even knocked his friend Ernest out, effectively ending their friendship. He couldn’t help himself. He got in there, got the battling blood up, he would hit whoever came near him.
He started boxing regularly, gained some skill. No more Battle Royales. He got a reputation with the colored boxers, and in time that spread to the whites.
The Sporting Club, out of white contenders for their champion, Forrest Thomas, thought they would put together a novelty match. If it was fun watching two coons hit each other, wouldn’t be more fun to have a trained boxer, a white man, slap a coon about. It would show the superiority of the white race, proved in a match of skill and timing.
They gave ‘Lil’ Arthur twenty-five dollars to mix it up with their man. They even promised him the club’s championship title if he defeated Forrest Thomas.
Right before the fight, ‘Lil’ Arthur said his prayers, then considering he was going to be fighting in front of a bunch of angry, mean-spirited whites, and for the first time, white women— sporting women, but women—who wanted to see a black man knocked to jelly, he took gauze and wrapped his dick. He wrapped it so that it was as thick as a blackjack. He figured he’d give them white folks something to look at. The thing they feared the most. A black as coal stud nigger.
A bad nigger.
Meaner than they were.
And hung better, too.
And when the big event rolled around, he whupped Forrest Thomas like he was a redheaded stepchild; whupped him so bad, they stopped the fight so no one would see a colored man knock a white man out.
Against their wishes, the Sporting Club was forced to hand the championship over to ‘Lil’ Arthur Johnson, and the fact that a colored now held the club’s precious boxing crown was like a chicken bone in the club’s throat. Primarily Beems’s throat, the current president.
Enter McBride.
Beems, on the side, talked a couple of the Sporting Club’s wealthier members into financing a fight. One where a true contender to the heavyweight crown would whip ‘Lil’ Arthur and return the local championship to a white man, even if that white man relinquished the crown when he returned to Chicago, leaving it vacant. In that case, ‘Lil’ Arthur was certain he’d never get another shot at the Sporting Club Championship. They wanted him out, by hook or crook. The idea of a nigger with their championship was revolting.
‘Lil’ Arthur had never seen McBride. Didn’t know how he fought. He’d just heard he was as tough as stone and had balls like a brass monkey. He liked to think he was same way, and he loved his championship, even if it was just a small local one.
It was a true badge of pride, and if you came from the Flats, you didn’t have a chance to have much pride. And now he had a chance. He was even somebody in the Flats. His own people took notice, and the whites took notice, too, by hating him. He could see it in their eyes.
That alone made ‘Lil’ Arthur determined not to give his local title up. It was the only thing that made him something more than just another nigger from the Flats.
He’d fight anyone they put in front of him to keep it.
He’d fight the devil himself.
About the Author
With more than thirty books to his credit, Joe R. Lansdale is the Champion Mojo Storyteller. He’s been called “an immense talent” by
He’s won umpty-ump awards, including sixteen Bram Stoker Awards, the Grand Master Award from the World Horror Convention, a British Fantasy Award, the American Mystery Award, the Horror Critics Award, the Grinzane Cavour Prize for Literature, the “Shot in the Dark” International Crime Writer’s Award, the Golden Lion Award, the
Lansdale lives in Nacogdoches, Texas, with his wife, Karen, writer and editor.
Find him online at www.JoeRLansdale.com.
Also by Joe R. Lansdale
“Hap Collins and Leonard Pine” mysteries
