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“Yes!” Sadie chirruped, resetting her fedora at the proper insouciant slant. “On a stack of blueberry
pancakes, and the disciples said they were the best they ever ate! Now pay up!”
12
By the time we got back to Jodie, August 29 had become August 30, but we were both too excited to
sleep. We made love, then came out to the kitchen and ate pie in our underwear.
“Well?” I said. “What do you think?”
“That I never want to go to another prizefight. That was pure bloodlust. And I was up on my feet,
cheering with the rest. For a few seconds—maybe even a full minute—I wanted Case to kill that
dancing all-full-of-himself dandy. Then I couldn’t wait to get back here and jump into bed with you.
That wasn’t about love just now, Jake. That was about burning.”
I said nothing. Sometimes there’s nothing to say.
She reached across the table, plucked a crumb from my chin, and popped it into my mouth. “Tell
me it’s not hate.”
“What’s not?”
“The reason you feel you have to stop this man on your own.” She saw me start to open my mouth
and held up a hand to stop me. “I heard everything you said, all your reasons, but you have to tell me
they are reasons, and not just what I saw in that man Case’s eyes when Tiger hit him in the trunks. I
can love you if you’re a man, and I can love you if you’re a hero—I guess, although for some reason
that seems a lot harder—but I don’t think I can love a vigilante.”
I thought of how Lee looked at his wife when he wasn’t mad at her. I thought about the
conversation I’d overheard when he and his little girl were splashing in the bath. I thought about his
tears outside the bus station, when he’d held Junie and nuzzled beneath her chin before rolling off to
New Orleans.
“It’s not hate,” I said. “What I feel about him is . . .”
I trailed off. She watched me.
“Sorrow for a spoiled life. But you can feel sorry for a good dog that goes rabid, too. That doesn’t
stop you from putting him down.”
She looked me in the eyes. “I want you again. But this time it should be for love, you know? Not
because we just saw two men beat the hell out of each other and our guy won.”
“Okay,” I said. “Okay. That’s good.”
And it was.
13
“Well look here,” said Frank Frati’s daughter when I walked into the pawnshop around noon on that
Friday. “It’s the boxing swami with the New England accent.” She offered me a glittery smile, then
turned her head and shouted, “Da-ad! It’s your Tom Case man!”
Frati came shuffling out. “Hello there, Mr. Amberson,” he said. “Big as life and handsome as Satan
on Saturday night. I bet you’re feeling bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this fine day, aren’t you?”
“Sure,” I said. “Why wouldn’t I? I had a lucky hit.”
“I’m the one who took the hit.” He pulled a brown envelope, a little bigger than standard businesssize,
from the back pocket of his baggy gabardine slacks. “Two grand. Feel free to count it.”