Who, What, Where, When, Why - story

The Supreme Court confirmation hearings are indeed vapid (thank goodness Kagan has a sense of humor). The Oil spill is growing worse by the minute and is going to continue getting worse for a very long time. The "war" in Afghanistan is unspeakably absurd. Republicans continue to block any attempts to better the lot of average citizens. Israel continues to colonize the West Bank and mistreat the Palestinians. I am so sick of the whole business I decided to just fool around. So here is another contribution to my collection of unfinished, unwanted, uncollected, unknown and unpublished short stories to be entitled simply, Encounters.

Who, What, When, Where, Why
A Short Story
Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God's great Judgment Seat;
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
When two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth!

Who would have been involved in what is still remembered and often recalled as the greatest fight ever witnessed in our little mining town was probably not only inevitable but in retrospect, entirely predictable. Although a relatively small community, the population was unusually diverse, with Italians, Germans, Finns, Frenchmen, Swedes, Irish, Norwegians, Slavs, and a few American Indians, all of whom arrived there by the lure of good paying jobs in the mines, mills, and forests that made up the economy of the aptly named,” Silver Valley.” In spite of this unusual diversity, mostly confined within one narrow, small valley, there was remarkably little conflict between these groups as such, but there were often fights between individual representatives of them, especially those who had acquired reputations.
One such individual was Victor Semenza. Some referred to him as “The Wop,” but with one exception no one ever addressed him as such to his face, for Victor Semenza was more than a Wop, he was a Super Wop, and was both gifted and without fear. Victor’s gift, or curse if you prefer, was that he knew how to hit people. Now you may think this ability is relatively common but it is not. Victor was apparently born to instinctively know that if you wanted to hit someone on the nose you did not aim for that feature but, rather, six inches behind the person’s head. Such a blow was devastating. It was a skill that most professional boxers have to learn and practice, with Victor it was perfectly natural. Victor acquired his reputation as a fighter in High School when, after a football game with our hated nearby rivals, it was believed that Victor had killed an opponent in a fight after the game. Such fights were common in those days. It was never proven that the teenager died because of Victor’s blows, but everyone believed he had. This followed and haunted Victor, and became even more complicated over time because of his physical appearance. He was small, never more than a welterweight at best. And he was a handsome Sicilian, with curly dark hair, an unmarked face, dark piercing brown eyes, beautiful olive skin, and the hands of an artist. His appearance unfortunately misled many into believing they could bully him, but at 27 years of age, and after many contests, Victor was still undefeated.
Victor’s challenger was Paddy O’Conner, as Irish as it was possible to be. He was what was often referred to as “Shanty Irish,” and could have been referred to as “Shant,” except that Paddy was even more pejorative, although I’m not certain people there realized it was a derogatory term. For all we knew, Paddy could have been his given name. Paddy was as homely as Victor was handsome, with pale white skin, sandy, slightly reddish hair, blue eyes that often twinkled with mischief, hard, heavily calloused hands that revealed a lifetime of work in the woods and mines, a muscular body as hard as a body could be, and an odd, wrinkled countenance, that made him appear older than he was. Two years older than Victor, he was blessed with a wonderful, engaging personality, a fine sense of humor, and was an extraordinary raconteur. Paddy’s reputation had been established while he was in the Civilian Conservation Corps, building Forest Service camps and roads in the mountains surrounding our little town. The same size as Victor, he had dominated his peers, taking on all comers, including many much larger men. As lithe and strong as a panther he was also a champion arm-wrestler.

What happened between Victor and Paddy was not unusual given the ethos of the mining community. Our town was the county seat and the center of a rich mining and lumbering district. Most of the miners and lumberjacks were unmarried and spent most of their time in the mines and forests, coming in on week-ends for the recreation provided by the many bars, brothels, and gambling halls. Fights were commonplace and usually for no good reason, other than proving one’s merit and superiority over others, most often after a few drinks. Paddy and Victor did not know each other except by reputation. Neither of them were excessive drinkers, perhaps not willing to risk their reputations under adverse circumstances. But with two such champions in the same place at the same time the tension and the peer pressure became overwhelming. Paddy’s entourage began provoking him to challenge Victor, knowing that Victor was undefeated. “Come on, Paddy, you can beat that Wop, he ain’t as tough as they say.” As the evening progressed the urging became more intense, some began to subtly accuse Paddy of being afraid. “Look at that Dago bastard sittin’ there like a pretty boy,” they said, “You can take him easy Paddy,” and they could not stop making other even more provocative comments.
Victor, sitting at a table on the opposite side of the room, was unaware of what was happening with Paddy, simply enjoying the companionship of his friends and nursing a beer. When he rose to go to the bar to order another round of drinks, Paddy, goaded beyond his patience, and now having to prove himself, crowded in front of Victor and said, “Hey Wop, wait your turn, I was here first,” a challenge as unmistakable as it was false. Victor, experienced in such confrontations, ignored him and ordered beers for his friends. But as he turned to return to his table Paddy made the mistake of blocking his way and put his hand on Victor’s chest. When Victor tried to push it aside, Paddy grabbed his shirtfront, pulled him towards himself and attempted to land a punch. Victor had no choice but to return a punch. “Tiny,” the 300 pound Swiss, who owned and operated the bar and was bartending at the time, was almost instantaneously around the bar to separate the two and usher them outside. Fighting was never allowed inside the bar.

What ensued, while not entirely predictable, was not without precedent. As the two fighters started to exit through the front door, with Paddy in the lead, he suddenly turned and sucker-punched Victor who was somewhat constrained by the doorway. This was not regarded as unfair as it was a tactic often employed in barroom brawls. There were, of course, no Marquis of Queensbury rules in our town, but there were some widely recognized and accepted rules. You could not, for example, bang your opponents head on the floor or the sidewalk, kicking someone while down was forbidden, chairs, knives, clubs and brass knuckles were not allowed, and guns made the contest entirely outside the definition of an ordinary fight. What made this particular fight into something unusual is the fact that Victor fell backwards into the bar and Paddy fell on him, punching so viciously as to make it impossible to separate the two. Thus the fight continued inside the bar itself. Victor managed to throw the Irishman off and rose to his feet throwing his own punches. It appeared that Paddy was the stronger of the two. He grabbed Victor by the shirtfront and pulled him around with ease, attempting to punch him at the same time. But each time it appeared Paddy would control him, Victor would squirm away and wait for an opportunity. A crowd quickly gathered, even the card players in the back room stopped their games to watch, people were standing on chairs and on the sidelines urging their favorites on as the battle continued. Paddy was playing with him like a cat with a mouse, as he whirled him about, crashing him into chairs, the pool table and the walls. Finally, it looked like Victor might be doomed as he was seemingly unable to regain his balance and stood awkwardly, his nose and face bloodied, a cut over his left eye, his hands at his sides. But Paddy, exhausted by his efforts, made a careless mistake and relaxed his grip for an instant. Victor’s famous straight right hand shot out smashing bone and cartilage, blood gushed from Paddy’s broken nose, he fell heavily backwards to the ground, unconscious. It was over just like that. No one cheered, the entire bar was engulfed in a momentary silence, the room quickly cleared, the sport was over.

When Paddy regained his senses and rose to his feet, the two gladiators shook hands, and each held up the other’s arm as if they were both triumphant. It was not an unusual event. Such fights were common on Saturday nights, the opponents often didn’t even know each other, or have any particular grudges to bear. It wasn’t that they didn’t like each other, nor was it really the Irish against the Italians, or the French against the Germans, or the Finns against the Russians. More often than not these Saturday night events featured fights between Missourians and non-Missourians. Missourians were disliked far more than either the Irish or Italians. Indeed, Missourians were regarded with utter contempt because once a battalion of soldiers from Missouri had been brought in as strikebreakers. The town never forgot or forgave.

Where the fight occurred was unusual in that ordinarily fighters were ordered outside into the alley or onto the sidewalk in front of the bar. Usually there was no damage to property or a mess to clean up. But in this case the barroom was spattered with blood, chairs had been broken, card games interrupted, and the pool table left far from level. Tiny was outraged at this violation of protocol but knew his chances of reimbursement were non-existent. It was just another cost of doing business and as he had plenty of that he simply stood with his arms crossed and stared glumly around the room. He knew that “Idaho,” the janitor, whose speech was badly garbled as a result of a similar fight, would clean it up before opening time the next morning.

Why the fight occurred was the topic of conversation for weeks, months, even years. And of course the accounts became increasingly confusing over time. Some thought Victor had it coming, for reasons they never made clear. Some admitted that Paddy had been provoked by his friends into insulting Victor. Still others claimed there had been bad blood between the two for years but offered no evidence for such a claim. Paddy was described as a hothead who was always looking for a fight, some said Victor was to blame for having tried to stare the Irishman down. It was even suggested that Paddy was jealous of Victor’s good looks and wanted to change them. There was for a time even a rumor the two had fought over a woman, but everyone soon recognized the absurdity of such a notion as no one had ever seen Paddy with a woman. In fact, they fought simply because they were men, and men at that time and in that context, fought, especially if they had reputations to defend. Victor was undefeated, that was challenge enough. It was the argument over who was really the best man that continued most often over the ensuing years. Many thought Paddy was clearly the best and that Victor had merely landed a lucky punch. “Paddy mopped the floor with him,” was the phrase most often repeated, and there was some truth to the claim. But others defended Victor, pointing out that Paddy had sucker-punched him and not given him a fair chance in the beginning. One of Victor’s two younger brothers usually brought the argument at least temporarily to a close when he said, “It don’t matter what the ‘Mick’ did, when Victor saw his chance he dropped him like a used rubber,” a point as indisputable as it was colorful.