‘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 boetie?’
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 black water 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.
SIX
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 grey bark. In the centre 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 which 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 stencilled Property of Murchison 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 me. Hoppie whispered that they were the judges and that, ‘the dwarf is the referee’. I was fascinated 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 which 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 sank, 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 jock strap. 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 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 only came 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 blerrie 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 blerrie 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 towards 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 while the other only railway men, 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 onto Nels’ 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 railway men 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. 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
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 was invested in my beloved
