From his shirt pocket he took a receipt and shoved this in Stoddard’s face, too. Guild shoved the barrel of the.44 directly into his face. He tried to climb backward up the couch, but it didn’t work. Guild pushed him out of the way and went straight across the room to the couch where John T. Stephen Stoddard stood in the open doorway. Guild shook his head and went on down the stairs. “You owe it to your kids not to get mixed up with somebody like that. Guild took her by the elbow and walked her to the door with him. On his way out Guild passed the Mexican woman, who had been eavesdropping in the hallway. The sound was loud and harsh in the small, sunny kitchen. “I really think you would shoot me if I gave you half a chance.” Victor Sovich said, “You know something, Guild?” Guild snugged down his Stetson and started for the door. “I’ll go tell Stoddard you burned the money.” But this little speech was all sideshow barker horseshit, and Guild was sick of it and sick of Sovich. After what he’d done to Guild, Guild had no doubt that the man was a genuine killer, nor any doubt even that he took pleasure in the killing. They don’t have to brag because you already believe them, but they brag anyway. But sometimes you meet a man who is truly tough, and he likes to tell you about it, too. They just like to bully people with their words. With most of them it’s bragging, because finally they’re not tough at all. They like to sit over schooners for hours on end and tell you how tough they’ve been and how tough they are and how tough they’re going to be in the future. It really does.”Ī lot of tough guys like to tell you how tough they are. It gives me a certain kind of satisfaction. But when I do kill people, well, I can get away with it legally as long as it’s in a ring. Just a minute ago I said I don’t kill people on purpose, and I don’t. Now, that may sound like a contradiction. “You want to know why I went into boxing instead of banking or something?” “You’re looking at the only boxer in the United States with a high school diploma.” “You expected me to be dumb, didn’t you?” I don’t have much time for niggers, but I don’t kill them on purpose, if that’s what you mean.” He stared at Guild. “I won’t kill him unless it just happens that way. “You think you’ll kill this new colored boy?” “The goddamn church groups went nuts, let me tell you. “Anyway, this boy in Ohio, he went twenty rounds all right, but he was dead before they could get him out of the ring.” He had some more beer.

A part of them wants to see a good clean fight, but another part of diem wants to see somebody die.” He shrugged meaty shoulders. How I’ve killed six boys in the last four years. And they get paid more as the fight goes on.” He smiled. They get paid for every round they stay on their legs. “The colored kids, they don’t try to win. “No, I mean he’ll help me put on a good show. “It is a lot, but he’s going to make a lot. “Tell him I want two thousand or nothing.” When he took the glass away he had a white foam mustache. I started making him pay me my share up front.” He had some beer. That’s why there was always so little to split up at the end. “He’s cheated hell out of me over the years. Guild’s groin sent pain all the way down into his ankles.

I walk off and he sends somebody after me and I beat that somebody up and then he agrees to pay me a certain amount up front before the fight. We go through this in half the towns we’re in.

“Yeah, I burned the money, and I want you to tell John T. “How’d you get hooked up with John T.?” Victor Sovich said. It was warm and cheap, with too much grain. Guild knew there wasn’t anything else to do.

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