charlie jingle walked into the long room with the long table and long commissioners' faces in it. he went to a chair at the head of the table, and sat down, a small man in loose, seedy clothing looking rather lost in a high-backed chair with a regal crest carved in the wood.
"you," asked one of the commissioners, "are charles jingle?"
charlie nodded his head, a small nod from a small man sitting in a big man's chair.
"you are aware of course ..." began the commissioner, but charlie jingle waved his fingers and cut him off.
"sure, sure, let's can the bunko and get down to cases."
"you have been summoned here ..." began the same commissioner, and charlie jingle waved his fingers again.
"but i ain't gonna anyway," said charlie jingle. the commissioners stirred, cleared their throats, slid their bottoms with unease on their chairs.
"you understand," said the commissioner, "that your license may be revoked if you insist on being uncooperative?"
"sure," said charlie jingle. "i understand."
a bulky man, who had been standing at a window with his back to the seated members of the commission while they talked with charlie, turned to face them. a man with a heavy, grey face that had no humor in it. charlie jingle watched him slowly cross to the table and recognized him as commissioner jergen, head of the fight commission.
"jingle," said the man in a dry voice, "i'm going to make an example of you if you don't come across. i'm going to smear your name from coast to coast. i'm going to blackball you so hard you won't get a job anyplace, at anything! get the message?"
charlie jingle got up from his chair and walked to the door. "this the way out?" he asked.
"hold on!" roared commissioner jergen, and charlie jingle stopped with his hand on the knob, looking back with polite inquisitiveness at him.
"you goddam people think you can pull quick deals on the public and on the fight commission. i'm here to prove you can't!"
charlie jingle laughed.
"you're here to make a big noise, and scare all the scrawny citizens into a confession, jergen. don't kid me!"
"i suppose you've got too many contacts to be frightened?"
"contacts? no, i don't have a single damn contact. all i got is my two hands, and you already told me i ain't gonna be able to make a livin' with them, so why should i stick around here anymore?"
commissioner jergen pulled a chair forward.
"siddown, charlie. let's talk like reasonable men," he said. charlie jingle searched his face for a lie or a trick. finding none, he went back to the table and sat down.
the commissioner waited a moment, and then said earnestly:
"listen, jingle. seventy years ago this country outlawed prize-fighting. it was barbarous, they said. men shouldn't fight men. men shouldn't capitalize on other men as if they were animals. okay. they changed it. now we got the pug-factories. but we also have the same thing that went on before. we have the grifters and the shysters and the fixers operating at full tilt all over the place. there's a few honest guys in the game. i hear you're one of them. all we want is to nail the crooks! we want to bust the fix syndicate wide open, get me? now, if you love the game the way i hear you do—not for the money, but for the smell and the excitement—why won't you help us bust them wide?"
charlie jingle shook his head.
"you got it wrong, jergen. i know about the fixers. but i never consorted with them. if i did, i could've retired a rich man a long time ago."
"then how about that saturday night fiasco at the golum auditorium? you call that a straight fight?"
charlie jingle shrugged his shoulders.
"all i know is i sent my boy in there. he's a tank, okay. he's up against the newest fighting machine invented. okay. he drops him. i'm as much surprised as you. all the odds read against me. i got a rebuilt tank in the ring. but he flattens one of the flashiest pugs in the business. sure, i admit, it looks suspicious. fifteen minutes after the upset, one of the biggest fixers in the game walks into my boy's dressing-room ... but don't forget, i'm the best trainer in the business. i take a chunk of worn out fighting machine and make it over into something that buys me bread and coffee. so maybe i create a freak. how do i know? maybe i twisted a wire wrong, and my tank's the toughest thing punching."
"you're trying to tell me that fight was on the level, is that it?"
"so far as i'm concerned, it's level. so far as you're concerned...." charlie jingle shrugged.
"how is it you happened to have your boy handy when the other fighter couldn't go on?" asked the commissioner.
"i got my stable a block away from the arena. when i heard about kid congo getting smashed up in an auto accident, i called the arena. before the fight, i had twelve cents in my pocket, a dime of which i used to call the arena. they told me 'sure, bring him down quick, charlie'. so there i was...."
"so they put your tank in against the contender. just like that?"
jingle snapped his fingers.
"like that."
"and harry belok had nothing to do with the upset?"
"ask harry belok."
"why did he come to see you when the fight was over?"
charlie jingle laughed.
"he come to pay me off...."
the commissioner looked at a sheet of paper on the table in front of him.
"nineteen thousand seven hundred and thirty two dollars worth of pay-off?"
charlie jingle nodded.
"and thirteen cents. you got the thirteen cents down?"
"i've got the thirteen cents down. but how come he pays off so much money to somebody's completely broke, charlie-boy?"
"easy," said charlie jingle. "the tank's end of the purse is four hundred bucks, win or lose. before the fight, i bet the tank's end against harry, at house odds. you figure it up, and see if it don't figure out to the penny."
charlie watched one of the commissioners scribble quick numbers on a piece of blank paper. in a moment the man looked up, and handed the sheet across to commissioner jergen. jergen looked at it quickly and grunted.
"okay?" asked charlie jingle.
"okay," growled jergen.
"when we fight the champ, i'll send a couple tickets around free. see ya'...." charlie jingle went out.
