John McEvoy - Blind switch

Angelo sighed as he sat back in the chair behind his battered desk. “That’s the whole package,” he said.

Doyle was puzzled. It seemed too easy. “So what will all that do?”

Angelo, not looking at Doyle, got up and moved to unlock the office door.

“Back when you was an AAU boxer or whatever the fuck you were, you ever fight on a real full stomach?”

Realization swept over Doyle, carried on a wave of very unpleasant memory. “Yes, I did,” Doyle started to respond, but Angelo was already out the door.

Doyle now understood perfectly. He recalled a steamy summer night in the Eagles Club in Rockford, Ill., maybe 1979, his third bout in an AAU tournament.

Doyle had won his first two bouts easily. Having made weight for the next one, a semi-final event that night, Doyle-hungry, dehydrated, and emboldened by his two earlier successes-walked to a bakery near the Eagles Club, where he bought and quickly consumed two quarts of cold milk and a warm cherry pie. Two hours later, a squat Mexican hard case from Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood had buried a left hook slightly below Doyle’s navel, causing him to spew a stream of vomit on the ringside timekeeper’s head.

Doyle shook his head. “I see.”

Doyle didn’t sleep the night prior to what he had begun to think of as The Stiffereeno. Badly in need of someone to talk to about all this, he tried Moe Kellman’s haunts; Moe was not to be found. Doyle then called O’Keefe’s Olde Ale House, in quest of the sympathetic Maureen, only to be informed that his confidante from Cork had quit her waitress job there. For the life of him, Doyle could not remember where he had taken Maureen when he’d driven her home from O’Keefe’s that drunken night.

“I’m not from Immigration,” Doyle had emphasized to O’Keefe, but he had failed to pry loose a phone number or address for Maureen. Unnerved, he paced his apartment floor up to the dawn, then headed for Heartland Downs. “Hell with it, I’ll just get it done,” Doyle said as he drove.

Doyle followed Angelo Zocchi’s instructions to the letter that overcast, humid spring day. At noon, he gave City Sarah her ample, non-raceday sized portion of feed. She finished it right up. Doyle then offered more, which was gratefully received.

“You’re like a damn beagle, you’d eat yourself to death,” Doyle snarled at City Sarah, bitterly regretting that Midlife Bustout had reduced him to talking to horses.

Doyle gave the filly several buckets of water early that afternoon, and she polished off another one right before he put a halter on her prior to leading her over to the paddock for the third race. When he pulled her out of her stall City Sarah appeared more ready for a nap than for a race. She looked at Doyle with as incredulous an expression as horses can manifest.

City Sarah’s race that day was at six furlongs for $25,000 claiming fillies and mares. She got beat more than twenty lengths-as the heavy favorite.

The jockey was furious when he brought City Sarah back to be unsaddled in front of the grandstand, from which cascaded a series of heartfelt boos. In a molten mixture of Spanish and English, he cursed City Sarah, cursed Doyle who had shamefacedly gone onto the track to slip a shank on the halter, and he leveled a hard look at Angelo Zocchi. The jockey was Heartland Downs’ perennial leading rider, a tough little number named Willie Arroyo, whose will to win was legendary among Chicago racetrackers. Listening to Arroyo’s tirade, Doyle was reminded of Genghis Khan, another real short guy who hated to lose.

After dismounting, Arroyo spat on the ground between Angelo Zocchi’s feet.

“Theez goddam ’orse burp-ed , she burp-ed I tell you, ina gate,” Arroyo said angrily. “She cooe ’ardly move!” he continued disgustedly. “Eet was like rideen a goddam water bed, she was slooshing in ’er belly so much.”

Arroyo kicked at the ground, then looked accusingly up at the silent trainer. “Steef! You steefed theez one, An-Hello.”

The jockey slapped his whip against his right boot. With a sudden sweet smile, he looked up at Zocchi.

“Con I ride ’er back next time?” Arroyo asked.

“Mind your mouth,” Zocchi growled. “We’ll see.”

Saturday, June 16. The Day.

Moe Kellman had phoned Doyle earlier in the week, to touch base and offer congratulations. “You did real nice,” Kellman had said. “I’ll see you Saturday night at Dino’s. Just keep your mouth nice and shut-I know that’s hard for you-and your favorite bank teller will be in for a big surprise.”

Before hanging up, Moe asked, “Doyle, you going to bet some for yourself? Our action’s mainly going down in Vegas. If you want to play some of your twenty-five grand out there just say so, we’ll take care of it.” Doyle turned down this offer.

That afternoon at Heartland Downs, an hour before City Sarah’s race, Doyle-his adrenaline meter on fast-forward-was pacing in front of the horse’s stall when E. D. Morley sauntered up. He was accompanied by none other than Doyle’s counselor from Cork, the elusive Maureen. E. D. had on his “going to the races” outfit of white shirt, pressed jeans, and white cowboy hat atop his dreadlocks. Maureen, wearing a bright green pants suit, regarded Doyle from behind a pair of oversized sunglasses.

She gave Doyle a big smile, then a hug. “You’re lookin’ grand,” she said, “and so’s your little harse. Don’t ya tink so, E. D.?” she inquired of her companion. Morley nodded in agreement, a big grin on his broad, black face.

Doyle said to Maureen, “I tried to call you the other night. Couldn’t track you down anywhere.”

“Ah, well, I’ve moved on from O’Keefe’s,” Maureen answered. “I’d tell you where I’m going to be, but sure I just don’t know that now. I’m kind of between apportunities, as you lads put it over here.”

“Well, speaking of opportunities,” Doyle responded in a low voice, “you might risk an Irish punt or two on City Sarah this afternoon.”

Maureen lowered her glasses and raised her eyebrows. “After the miserable way the poor ting’s been runnin’ here lately?”

“She’ll run big today,” Doyle vowed. Maureen looked at him, smiling broadly. Morley winked at Doyle and clapped him on the back. “Good luck, mon,” he said.

Minutes later, when Maggie Howard stopped to chat, City Sarah was full life, poking her head out of the stall to nuzzle Maggie, then bouncing around behind the webbed barrier.

“Hey, she’s a different horse today,” Maggie said appreciatively. “She’s looking good. You know,” Maggie added, “I hardly ever bet, but I think I’ll put a few bucks on Sarah today.” Maggie handed E. D. a $10 bill. “On the nose, okay? Will you take care of that?”

“Aay, Moggie, we do dat,” E. D. said with an accent more exaggerated than usual. Turning to leave with Maureen, E. D. gave Doyle another broad wink.

After they’d departed, Maggie said to Doyle, “Ain’t you gonna bet on this pretty little horse?”

“Already have,” Doyle said.

En route to Dino’s Ristorante that night, the joyous sounds of Angelo Zocchi’s work force still resounded in Doyle’s ears as he drove through the Chicago streets.`

“She win for FUN, mon….”

“All by herSELF….”

“City Sarah’s BACK!” This from Maggie Howard, who was far more pumped by the filly’s return to regular form than by the proceeds of her bet.

City Sarah that afternoon had romped by five lengths, paying $18.60 to win for each $2 bet. Utilizing his trademark “victory leap,” jockey Willie Arroyo had dismounted from her in the winner’s circle as if coming off a trampoline, vaulting upward from the stirrups before landing lightly aside City Sarah.