at the end of the twenty-eighth, tanker was dragging his feet, hanging on by a thread of will, except of course that there was no will in a fighting machine except the mechanistic desire to be a great fighting-machine.
"he'll nail you this one," said charlie jingle.
"thass what you think," challenged tanker.
"that's what i know. the fans are already going to the windows to collect their bets."
"yeah? they got another guess com—why ain't you collectin'?"
"i gotta stick it out, you know that!"
"you mean to say you really bet on iron man?"
"sure," said charlie jingle, pulling a ticket out of his shirt pocket. "see?"
tanker bent close, scrutinizing the ticket. he looked up into charlie's face, his own blotchy with color.
"five thousand dollars you bet on that bum?"
charlie jingle laughed.
"he don't look like no bum from where i am."
the buzzer sounded, drowning out the string of curses the tanker loosed at him. charlie calmly shoved his equipment out of the ring.
"make it look good right to the end, you hear?"
the bell banged. tanker bell got up slowly, moving in a clumsy waddling gait toward the champion, arms hanging like stiffened lead weights by his sides, head bulled forward, shoulders hunched. he did not spring, did not dance. he shuffled forward, shoulders rocking from side to side.
iron-man pugg saw the stance of the beaten fighting-machine. he knew the dead-locked expression in the face, knew the shuffling, springless walk that indicated that the opponent was cold, was dead on his feet, jammed away inside, locked and frozen. but there was always the suspicion of trickery in him when he saw it.
he danced in lightly, speared the tanker's head with a long series of jabs, chopped away at his mid-section, and then, as if he himself were absolutely cocksure, lowered his guard just a fraction of an inch out of the tanker's reach. nothing happened. the tanker moved toward him, dead on his feet, arms limp. the champion had to blast him back with a murderous right to prevent a head-on, chest-on collision. the tanker staggered back, wobbled, his knees threatened to unflex and buckle, then the built-in instinct to go on picked him up, and he straightened.
iron man could hear, behind and around him, the swelling roar of the crowd. he knew it was for him. he had won. a hard, good fight. he had won. it remained now for him to put the trimmings on the package. artfully he flirted in and around the tanker, jabbing him lightly, ripping powerful right-hand shots to his head, toying with him. the crowd was roaring for blood. they wanted the finish. the champion moved forward, wound up. he started his famous knockout sequence of punches, landing the first and second carefully, playing to his audience so that they could see what was happening and appreciate from the beginning what was about to happen. the champion was enjoying himself. he worked with flash and flourish, and the crowd began to love it.
then tanker bell came alive. the champion was first to see the expression of his face, and a split-second before it happened, he knew he had been tricked. he would forever remember that expression. it was almost human. it was an expression of hatred. of murderous, long-controlled rage, diabolical and lethal.
