William Kennedy - Roscoe

“Pit,” said Jack Gray, and the handlers took the birds to their lines while Jack counted to twenty.

Bindy said, “Way to go, Swiggler.” And that bird of yours really is a bit of all right, Bin. Patsy, you’re not happy, but what the hell, it’s chickens. You only think you know them.

“I got a hundred to eighty on the Swiggler,” somebody said.

“On,” said Johnny Mack.

“. nineteen, twenty,” said Jack, and the electric hum rises again as the birds resume the dance, the Ruby with wings wide to hit the Swiggler from the top down, but where the hell did that Swiggler go? There he is, up, up, and slashing with both feet at the Ruby one’s head and chest, but the Swig feels steel himself — through the throat, is it? And he’s on his side, the Ruby’s beak holding his neck, Break it, Ruby, bust him in two, but the Swiggler rises from below and whack, whack, you bitin’ bastard, and they stick each other and fall over, the Swig bleeding from the throat, and it rattles, but lookit that Ruby fella, gushing it from his chest, pooling.

“Pit.”

“Five hundred to two fifty on the Swig,” a bettor offered.

“On,” said Johnny Mack.

So it’s two to one against, Patsy. Your boy is game, but what about the fabled strength and cunning of those Albanys?

“Give him hell, big fella,” Patsy said.

“. eighteen, nineteen, twenty.”

The birds rise, flying up to heaven, high as Jack Gray’s belly, a pair of wild fliers pecking, pecking, popping their wings, born to fly but not far and not high, those bloody heels shuffling now on the way down, faster than angels dance, feathers cut and fluttering, a wing broken — the Swig’s or the Ruby’s? The Ruby’s — but, hey, that won’t stop that Ruby fella; wing or no wing, he’s kicking, on his back and he’s gotcha, Swig, got your eye. Oh, how we all hum as the one-eyed Swiggler moves and kicks, but oh so slowly, where’d he go, that Ruby sucker? He flies at the Ruby, sinks a needle into his heart, yes? No. But it’s close and it’s hung, one more time.

“Pit.”

Pull that needle from the flesh, Cy. How’s your Ruby lad doing? Not well. But we won’t count him out.

“Two fifty to fifty,” said a sport.

“On,” said Johnny Mack.

“. fifteen, sixteen. ”

Patsy cleans his glasses at five to one, and Roscoe knows the gesture means Patsy is worried. Roscoe is worried by the pain in his own chest, maybe what Ruby feels with those holes around his heart. Roscoe has stayed longer than he planned (he does that), but who could leave now? He holds the wooden post by his seat. Don’t fall over, Ros, and, no, you’re not identifying with wounded Ruby. None of that maleficent animal death symbolism, you did that with rats. No more martyrdom to your own ineptitude. But to tell the truth, Ros, if you had any sense you’d be in the hospital.

“. nineteen, twenty.”

The noise of this crowd will destroy Roscoe’s hearing. This is a fight and a half, a sweet-Jesus-lookit-that kind of fight, them are dead-game chickens, I’m givin’ ten to one on the Swiggerooney — gutsy bastard, that bird — and, hey, Bindy’s offering fifteen to one now; come on, little chicken.

The pain is gouging Roscoe’s heart, and he again wonders if he’s doing it to himself: all this tension with pimps, cops, lawsuits, whores, votes, birds. Same old story, Ros. You can’t get away from yourself. If he could, if he could even stand up, he’d blow this joint, but he can’t take his eye off the Swiggler, who faces off Ruby boy, both chickens too tired to fly to heaven, so whack that chest, Ruby, knock out his other eye, kill that fucker. But good old Ruby can’t quite. He’s got the Swiggler’s neck, going for the break, “Break it, break it,” and they’re moving, the Ruby’s wing dragging, blood flying. Whose? Who knows? The Swig has a spur in Ruby’s chest, Ruby’s kicking, and they roll, then the Swig’s spur is out but Ruby’s second wing is dead and he’s on his side looking mortal, so up goes Swig, his very last flight tonight, up and then down onto fallen Ruby, and the hum is a roar as the spurs go in, one a heart shot? Did he hit it? Doesn’t matter. He whaps into the Ruby head, straight into the old medulla oblongata, and Ruby is stilled, but on and on the Swiggler stabs.

That’s quite enough now, Swig. Your work is done.

Let’s hear it for the Swig.

And he does crow, for now he knows, and he stands and preens with his own steady blood-flow, where’d you learn to fight like that, young fella? He crows victory. Ruby is dead, long live swingin’ Swig.

And Roscoe saw it all, even Patsy’s head shaking out the loss, and Emil picking up the Swig, who’s still crowing the news in Emil’s arms. Cy Kelly picks up dead Ruby — give him to the Little Sisters of the Poor. Johnny Mack pays Patsy’s debts, and the winners smile as the losers lean back. Bridie Martin collects her fifty, and Tommy Fogarty hands the forty thousand to Bindy, who is halfway out the door as soon as he takes it. Roscoe should follow suit, but Bart is asking, “What’s wrong, Roscoe?”

Roscoe doesn’t reply. All he knows is that people are leaving and taking their noise with them. It’s quiet, which is nice, and the chickens have gone away. And you know what else, Ros? All of a sudden, so has the light.

Roscoe, carrying his valise along the road, came upon an aged billygoat who resembled Elisha. “You may be a goat,” Roscoe said, “but your death doesn’t make sense.”

“Try looking at Pamela’s grab for Gilby as a paternity suit,” the goat said.

“Ah! So you did fall into Pamela’s clutch.”

“You think so? What’s her leverage in threatening a dead goat?” And the goat sniffed at Roscoe’s valise. “What’s in this?”

“It could be money, it could be rocks,” Roscoe said. “My question is, Why do I have all this pain?”

“Pain,” said the goat, “is the only music you ever dance to.”

“I’m tired of it,” Roscoe said. “I must upgrade life.”

“Upgrade life again?” The goat smiled. “Have you heard of the fum?”

“The fum? I have not.”

“The fum,” said the goat, “is a musical instrument that predates the Aeolian pipes. You string clavichord wire across the asshole of a dead cat, and you play it by picking its strings with your teeth. And, Roscoe, I believe if you thought it would improve your condition you’d start practicing the fum.”

“I’m in no position to argue. Care for a treat?” Roscoe put a Hershey bar in the mouth of the goat, who ate the wrapper, spat out the chocolate.

“Cakey action don’t kibble at the Café Newfay,” the goat said.

The needle went into Roscoe slowly, the surgeon aspirating the syringe as he pushed through skin and flesh toward the pericardium, the sac enclosing Roscoe’s heart.

The cardiac monitor and a tank of carbon dioxide for resuscitation sat beside Roscoe, who was strapped to a stretcher in a sitting position. His heart readings as the result of his tamponade were dangerous: paradoxical pulse, high venous pressure, low arterial pressure, muffled heart sounds. The surgeon, fearing cardiac arrest, had reacted with salvational speed after Patsy and Bart Merrigan carried Roscoe into the emergency room. Now the surgeon aimed his needle at Roscoe’s sternal notch, its route anesthetized by l-percent-plain Xylocaine, and as it entered, with difficulty, the leathery, membranous pericardium, six centimeters into the corpus, the pain intensified sharply in Roscoe’s chest and he cried out.

“Good,” said the surgeon. “We hit it.” And he withdrew the needle a few millimeters, until Roscoe’s cries eased. He then aspirated the syringe, drawing out blood from the pericardium. “There it is,” he said.