A Good American by Alex George Page B

surprising agility. McCready would just need to land one square punch for the fight to be over. But as each round ended without a meaningful blow being landed, the Butcher Boy and his followers began to get restless. Spurred on by the crowd, McCready continued to attack Kliever, but his fists scythed through the air, chasing shadows. As his opponent stepped in close, Kliever began to pick off telling blows as McCready left his upper body undefended. Round after round, Kliever’s punches were beginning to make themselves felt. The sustained ferocity of his initial offensive had exhausted the Butcher Boy. The crowd watched in sullen dejection as Kliever began to assert his superiority. In the seventeenth round his right fist caught McCready on the cheek, an inch below the eye, and opened a jagged wound. Blood began to pour down the young man’s face and onto his chest. His left eye soon swelled into a gruesome blue-black envelope of mottled flesh. Dazed by the pain, the Butcher Boy began to bellow a forlorn lament like a stricken bull. His cries echoed across the field as he charged blindly at Kliever. The crowd watched in silence as Kliever’s fists exacted their due. McCready staggered around the ring, blinded by his own blood. In between rounds his seconds pleaded with him to give up, but he refused, rising unsteadily to take more punishment. After ninety minutes of fighting, Kliever had begun to knock his opponent down at will, but on each occasion the Butcher Boy hauled himself back to his feet, refusing to concede defeat in front of his home crowd. Many in the audience, though, had seen enough. Men began to leave the field, shaking their heads.
    Finally the Butcher Boy’s seconds gave up talking to their man. Instead they moved around the ring and begged Kliever to finish the fight quickly. Kliever’s face remained expressionless. The following round, he swiftly sidestepped McCready’s next lumbering charge and caught the young man in a headlock. Then, with a succession of slow, deliberate blows, Kliever calmly pulverized his opponent’s undefended face into a ghoulish hollow of crushed bone and decimated cartilage. Finally he released his grip and the body of the Butcher Boy fell to the grass. The referee did not need to conduct a formal count. He climbed into the ring and raised the arm of the victor into the air. It was only when Frederick saw the dark blood glistening on Kliever’s knuckles that he remembered that he had won his bet.
    O n the journey back to Beatrice, Kliever explained how the system worked.
    “I travel all over the state, and sometimes beyond,” he said. “The fights are arranged by local bookmakers. The trick is to put forward a local man and talk up his prospects. People always want the next champion to be from their hometown. Once the whole place is chattering about his chances, the bookies can offer short odds on his winning, but they’ll still have enough takers to make it worth their while.”
    “Then you turn up,” said Frederick.
    Kliever nodded. “They find a better fighter from out of town, someone that nobody knows. They offer long odds on him, so nobody is tempted to back him. When the local hero loses, they make a fortune.”
    “But
you
bet on yourself.”
    Kliever nodded. “Sometimes they offer to pay me a flat fee, but I prefer it this way. They give me generous odds. They can afford to.”
    The two men were silent for a while.
    “I was scared,” admitted Frederick.
    “By the fight?”
    “And the crowd.”
    “Oh, they’re harmless enough. Men like to watch other men fight, that’s all.”
    They stopped again in Jefferson City to redeem Jette’s medal. That night, while his wife slept, Frederick returned it to its hiding place at the back of the chest of drawers. Then he added a fat roll of banknotes to the jar that lay hidden beneath the bedroom floorboard.
    Frederick began to accompany Kliever to all his fights. Each time he bet larger amounts, taking whatever