The Power of One

THIRTEEN

While Geel Piet was growing rich and even seemed to be getting a little pot belly, he had also become indispensable to the boxing squad. He maintained the gym, organised the laundry and even had the blue and yellow boxing singlets and white trunks made in the prison workshop. But most importantly his knowledge of boxing was encyclopaedic and he was a demanding and resourceful coach. The squad kids had been turned into clever boxers, our natural aggression combined with real skill. From the under fifteen division down to the under twelve, the Barberton Blues hadn’t lost a fight in two years.

How I got my first real fight was a matter of sheer luck. The championships in Nelspruit were in early August, only days before my tenth birthday, and I had tried to persuade anyone who would listen that ten was almost eleven and that one year wasn’t much to have to forfeit. But Lieutenant Smit wasn’t the sort of man who changed his mind and nobody, least of all me, was willing to petition him on my behalf. In fact the two under twelves, Snotnose Bronkhorst and Fonnie Kruger, were almost twelve and therefore two years my senior, and being Boer kids were much bigger.

Geel Piet claimed he saw intelligence and speed in me that more than made up for my lack of size. He was a fanatic about footwork. ‘You must learn to box with your feet, small baas. A good boxer is like a dancer, he is still pretty to watch even if you look only at his feet.’ He taught me how to position myself so the full weight of my body was thrown behind a punch, and despite my size and my speed my punches were capable of gaining respect from a bigger opponent. ‘If they do not respect your punch they simply keep going until they knock you down, man. A boxer must have respect.’

I longed to have a real fight against an unknown opponent. In two years I had never missed a day of boxing and I had worked with all my heart and soul for the moment when I could climb into a boxing ring with real people watching and an opponent whose every blow, unlike those of my sparring partners, could not be anticipated.

On the Monday of the week of the championships Snotnose didn’t turn up at the gym. After the session Lieutenant Smit called Geel Piet over and they talked earnestly for quite a time, every so often looking in my direction. Finally Geel Piet came over to me. He was trying hard to keep the smile off his face. ‘Ag man, I’m a heppy man today, small baas. You want to know why?’

‘They going to let you out of jail?’ I said.

He laughed, ‘No, never no more. I’m heppy here, man. I got my own stable of boxers, I got a good scam going. I will die heppy in this place.’

‘What then?’

He bent down so his face was only inches from my own. His breath smelt foul. ‘You got your first fight, man! Small baas, Bronkhorst he is sick with the yellow disease, you got his place.’

I couldn’t believe my ears. Snotnose had jaundice, which had been going around school. I went to hug Geel Piet, but he quickly sidestepped. ‘No, no, small baas, the lieutenant will come over and beat me.’ He grinned. ‘Today this black bastard is too heppy to have his nose busted. Better go over quick, man, and thank the lieutenant. Make quick or maybe he changes his mind, hey?’

I ran over to where Lieutenant Smit was talking to Klipkop and stood and waited. They ignored me for a long time and then the lieutenant said in a brusque voice, ‘What is it, Peekay?’

‘Thank you for the fight, Lieutenant Smit,’ I stammered. ‘I will try my hardest.’

He massaged his knuckles. ‘That won’t be enough, you’re going to get your head knocked in, but it will do you good. Nobody should win their first fight.’ He turned and walked away.

Geel Piet told me to bring my tackies in the next morning so they could be properly cleaned for me to wear at the fight. Using a piece of string he measured my chest and my waist. When I got home after school I told Dee and Dum my tackies should be put next to my school satchel so I wouldn’t forget them, as Geel Piet needed to clean them. Dum got up quietly from where she was sitting on the floor at my feet while I drank a cup of coffee. She returned a few moments later with my tackies. They had been scrubbed and were spotless. ‘Who does this yellow man think he is?’’ she asked. ‘Does he think we let our baas go around in dirty things?’ She and Dee were clearly hurt. I had to go to some lengths to explain that Geel Piet did all the things for the boxers and that now I was one of the squad he would do the same for me. ‘He will not wash your clothes or clean your tackies,’ Dee said. ‘It is a woman’s work and we will look after the clothes of him who belongs to our own kraal,’ Dum added.

I wasn’t at all sure how my mother would take the news of my inclusion in the squad. Boxing was never mentioned, and as far as she was concerned my early morning journey to the jail was in order to take piano lessons. She had been very busy of late with a commission from a Johannesburg shop to make three ball gowns and her Singer machine could be heard whirring away late at night. I knocked and entered the sewing room. It seemed full of a plum-coloured taffeta evening gown which was almost finished. My mother rose and held it against her body and she looked just how I imagined Cinderella must have looked when she went to the ball. The neckline plunged in a deep vee-line and the sleeves were puffed. The skirt billowed from the narrow waist and as she moved, the taffeta caught the light and rustled in a most expensive and provocative way.

‘Such an extravagance, I can’t imagine where they found the material for this in the middle of the war.’ She kicked at the skirt and it billowed out to reveal a second layer of net in a peacock blue.

‘You look beautiful,’ I said, not thinking to flatter her.

My mother laughed, and reaching for a cloth-padded hanger proceeded to hang the dress up on a rod protruding from the wall. Even away from her body the dress had a life of its own, filling the small sewing room with glamour. ‘That’s the trouble with the things of the devil, they are often sorely tempting and very pretty,’ she said with a sigh.

I had forgotten for a moment that dances were very high on the Lord’s banned list. My heart sank. If dancing was frowned upon by the Lord, what would he think of a boxing match? I immediately consoled myself with the knowledge that, as far as I knew, God was a man, and therefore He’d obviously like boxing a lot better than dancing.

‘You’ve come about the boxing, haven’t you?’ my mother said, resuming her seat at the sewing machine.

‘Yes, Mother.’ I was unable to conceal the surprise in my voice.

‘Yes well, Lieutenant Smit, a very nice man, came to see me this morning, though I’m not at all sure I liked what he had to say. I’ve spoken to your grandfather about it and I made it the subject of my quiet time with the Lord after lunch. I have to tell you He gave me no clear guidance on the matter, though your grandfather seems to think it can’t do you any harm.’ Her head jerked back in a sudden gesture of annoyance. ‘Oh, how I do wish you’d stick to the piano. It’s quite clearly the Lord’s wish that you do so or He wouldn’t have made it possible for you to learn under such trying circumstances. Lieutenant Smit seems to think you have a natural talent as a boxer which is more than the professor has admitted about your music.’

‘Doc has said my Chopin is coming along extra good,’ I said, mimicking him ever so slightly.

My mother was sewing a press stud onto what looked like a cummerbund for the taffeta dress, and she now looked up at me. ‘I do wish you wouldn’t call him by that silly name. Heaven knows this town has few enough nice people and, after all, he is a real professor of music and merits your respect. His being German is simply unfortunate. I suppose we’d all talk German with a funny accent if Hitler won the war. You’ll have to sleep on Friday afternoon if you’re going to be up that late on Saturday night.’

I jumped with joy. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you,’ I cried and gave her a hug and a kiss.

‘I’m not at all sure the Lord approves,’ she said, but I could see she was glad I kissed her. ‘Run along now.’

On Friday morning, after callisthenics, Lieutenant Smit called us all together around the ring. ‘I want to tell you first a few things,’ he said. He turned to the five kids standing to one side with Geel Piet. ‘The rules for under fifteen says you get knocked down, you out. No use getting up, man, you finished and klaar. So don’t get knocked down, hey.’ He indicated Klipkop who was standing on his right. ‘Sergeant Oudendaal is a semi-pro so is not allowed to fight, so Gert will fight in the heavyweight division and Sergeant Oudendaal and me will be your seconds. You do as you told, man, and no monkey business, you hear? Don’t go thinking you know better. You all know the rules, the most clean blows landed wins, that’s how Geel Piet here taught you. The rest of you in the weight divisions just fight your normal fight, if you need to change tactics I’ll tell you, man.’ He was turning to leave the ring when his eye caught something at his feet. He stooped down and picked up a small blue singlet, on the front of which in yellow were the letters BB, standing for Barberton Blues. He turned the singlet around to face us; on the back, written in neat cut-out letters, we saw PEEKAY. ‘Welcome, Peekay,’ he said and everyone clapped. ‘Welcome to the Barberton Blues,’ There was a roaring in my head and my throat ached as I choked back the tears. Lieutenant Smit bent down again and picked up a pair of blue shorts with a yellow stripe down the side, and bundling the shorts and singlet together he threw them at me. They parted company in mid-air and my left hand shot out to grab the singlet while my right fetched the shorts out of the air. ‘The little bugger is fast and uses both hands well. I only wish he carried another fifteen pounds,’ he said as he climbed from the ring.

I showed Doc my singlet and shorts and he seemed very pleased for me and I told him about the three rounds. ‘Do you think you can go three rounds with Mr Chopin, Peekay?’ he asked. I nodded, determined to show Doc that his precious music was not taking a backseat, although I suspect he knew that my mind was more on staying on my feet and not getting knocked down than on the étude with which I was trying to come to grips. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Geel Piet enter. I knew that if he wanted to he would come in unnoticed, that he had worked out the exact angle to enter so he was seen without disturbing anyone. It was unusual for him to come into the hall at this time. I always put the day’s mail in the piano seat and later, when he came in to polish the Steinway, he would retrieve it. We had decided the three of us should never be seen together near the postbox. I glanced over to where he stood pretending to clean a window, a bucket at his feet. Finally Doc noticed him and raised his hand for me to stop.

‘You must not come when we practise, that is the rule,’ he admonished. The battered little man quickly picked up the bucket and trotted towards us. Doc looked annoyed. ‘What is it?’

‘Please, baas, it is very important, baas,’ Geel Piet put down the bucket and withdrew a parcel wrapped in a piece of cloth. ‘The people have put money together and in the bootmaker’s we have made for the small baas a present.’

He opened the cloth to reveal a pair of boxing boots. I gasped. They were beautiful, the black leather brought to a soft sheen and the soles the bluish white of raw new leather. ‘It is from all the people, a present for the Onoshobishobi Ingelosi, it is from all of us so you will fight a mighty fight tomorrow, small baas.’

I leapt from the piano stool, unable to contain my delight. ‘It is why I asked you for the tackies, small boss.’ He gave me a big, toothless smile. ‘It was to know the size.’

I quickly pulled my school boots off and put the boxing boots on. The leather was soft and pliant and the boots felt light as a feather and fitted perfectly. ‘Geel Piet, they are the nicest present anyone ever gave me, honest.’

‘They are from all the people, it is their way to thank you.’

Without warning he dropped to his knees, and using the cloth in which the boxing boots had been wrapped he started to polish the floor around my feet. Some instinct in him which never rested had sensed danger. A good five seconds elapsed before the warder actually stood at the entrance to the hall.

He was a new sergeant whom we’d only met once in the mess. His name was Borman and he had been transferred down to the lowveld from Pretoria Central because of his wife’s asthma.

He stood, one hand holding the door frame. ‘Professor, the Kommandant wants to see you, report to administration after breakfast you hear?’ he turned to go, then caught sight of Geel Piet. ‘Kom hier, Kaffir!’ he rapped.

The little man jumped up and ran across the hall. ‘Ja, baas, I come, baas,’ he cried.

‘What you doing in this place?’ the warder demanded.

Doc bent down and picked up one of my school boots. ‘The boy got some kak on his boots, he come to clean them.’ He appeared to be scrutinising the sole of one of my boots. ‘Ja this is so,’ Doc said, waving the boot at the warder and then pointing to where Geel Piet had been cleaning the floor. ‘Also some was on the floor when he walked in.’

Sergeant Borman grinned. ‘Next time make the black bastard lick it clean, he is used to eating shit.’ He turned to Geel Piet, ‘That’s right isn’t it, Kaffir? You all eat each other’s shit, don’t you?’

Geel Piet had his head bowed and was standing to attention, though his thin, bandy legs, crossed with scars and blobbed with black scar tissue from past bush sores, didn’t actually come together at the knees. ‘No, baas,’ he said softly. There was no fear in his voice, only a sort of resignation. He seemed to know what would happen next.

The warder reached out and grabbed him by his canvas shirt. ‘When I say so, you say yes, understand? Now, do you eat shit, Kaffir?’

‘Yes, baas,’ Geel Piet replied.

‘Loud! Say it loud, you shit-eating bastard!’

‘YES, BAAS!’

‘Yes, baas what?”

‘Yes, baas, we eat each other’s shit!’

The sergeant from Pretoria turned to us. ‘There you are, Professor. I told you they eat each other’s shit. Next time make him lick it up, it will be a proper treat for him.’ He turned and walked away.

Geel Piet came padding over to us, his bare feet making hardly any sound on the sprung wooden floor. ‘Thank you, big baas,’ he said with a grin. ‘He is right, man, in prison we all eat shit.’ He turned to me as he picked up the bucket. ‘Your feet, small baas, box with your feet, punch clean so it is a scoring shot. No clinches, that way a bigger boxer can push you over. Good luck, small baas, the people are with you.’

‘Thank you, Geel Piet, tell the people I thank them.’

‘Ag man, it is nothing, the people love you, you are fighting for them.’ He was gone.

Doc cleared his throat to break the silence. ‘Maybe now we can play Chopin, yes?’

I gave him a big hug. ‘That sure was quick thinking, Doc.’

He chuckled. ‘Not so bad for a brokink-down old piano player, ja?’ He frowned suddenly. ‘I wonder what wants the Kommandant?’

We were to leave for Nelspruit, a distance of some forty miles, at eight a.m. the following morning. Though I avoided having to rest on Friday afternoon, I had been ordered to bed at six o’clock. I woke as usual just before dawn and lay in bed trying to imagine the day ahead. What if I was beaten first off? How would I hide my despair? With seven Eastern Transvaal teams competing, I had to win twice to get to the final. I had never boxed six rounds in my life, and even if I got through them I would have to box another three in the finals! What if I lost concentration and the other kid pushed me over? Even if I was winning, I’d lose because I’d hit the canvas!

I couldn’t stand the ‘What ifs’ any longer and I quickly got out of bed and dressed and ran through the garden. In a little more than ten minutes I was on top of the hill sitting on our rock.

It was early spring and the dawn wind was cold, I shivered a little as I watched the light bleed into the valley and merge with the darkened town below me, smudging the darkness until the roofs and streets and trees were rubbed clean. The jacaranda trees were not yet in bloom but patches of bright red from spring-flowering flamboyant trees already dotted the town. I tried to think how Granpa Chook would have looked at the situation. He would have taken things in his stride, just like any other day. While Granpa Chook was a less important mentor now, he remained a sort of check-point in my life. A reference on how to behave in a tight spot. I thought of Hoppie too. If only Hoppie could have been there to see me. ‘First with your head and then with your heart, Peekay.’ I could almost hear his cheerful and reassuring voice.

After a while I felt much calmer. I made my way back down the hill as the sun began to rise. Some of the aloes, mostly the taller Aloe ferox, were showing early bloom. I watched as a ray of sunlight caught a tiny jewelled honey-sucker as it hovered around a spray of orange aloe blossom. Its long hooked needle beak probed for nectar, the tiny bird’s wings beating so fast they held it suspended in one spot, too fast even to make a blur in the surrounding air. I imagined being able to punch that fast, my opponent retelling the fight to someone else. ‘I was still thinking about throwing a right when the welterweight champion of the world hit me three hundred times on the chin.’ Even to me it sounded improbable.

When I got back to the house Dee and Dum had prepared breakfast, brown Kaffircorn porridge, fried eggs and bacon. On the kitchen table stood my school lunch tin. After their day spent as purveyors of sandwiches to the Earl of Sandwich Fund at the Easter fête they regarded themselves as world authorities on the sandwich and my school lunch was always a bit of a surprise. Grated carrot and jam was one of the combinations that would crop up once in a while, or avocado pear and peanut butter. I had drawn the line at onion and papaya, and gooseberry jam and Marmite was another variety struck off their culinary repertoire.

I wondered briefly what they’d packed to sustain me, hopefully for nine rounds of boxing, but refrained from looking. Until, unable to contain themselves, they opened the tin to show me six pumpkin scones neatly wrapped in greaseproof paper. ‘We baked them last night, your favourite!’ Dum said and I could see they were both very pleased with themselves.

I packed all my stuff into my school satchel, including my beautiful boxing boots which Dee had given another polish, even though they were spotless. At half-past seven I had already said my farewells to my granpa and my mother and was sitting on the front wall waiting for the blue prison light utility which was to pick me up. I could have gone to the prison but Gert said, ‘No problems, it’s only a few minutes out of our way, save the energy for the ring!’ Gert wasn’t like the other warders. Indeed all the kids thought he was the best thing since sliced bread. He like to help people and he once told me he only hit Kaffirs if they really did wrong. ‘A Kaffir hurts also, maybe not like a white man, ’cause they more like monkeys, but they hurt also when you hit them.’

After breakfast when I had gone to bid my granpa goodbye I put the question to him about being knocked down so that even if I was winning the fight I would lose it. The usual tamping and puffing and lighting up took place. Finally, squinting into a haze of blue smoke he answered.

‘I think you’d best do what I did in the Boer War.’

‘What was that?’ I asked anxiously.

‘Why lad, run away as much as possible.’

That was the trouble with my granpa, the advice he gave when you needed it most wasn’t always very useful.

I saw the blue prison ute coming up the hill with Gert at the wheel. Next to him someone sat reading a newspaper; I couldn’t see who it was. Gert stopped outside the gate. ‘Jump in the back with the other kids, Peekay,’ he said cheerfully. I climbed into the back of the ute, helped by one of the others. It was an exciting business all right as Gert changed gears and we pulled away. A fourteen-year-old called Bokkie de Beer was in charge and he told me no one was allowed to stand up. All the other kids were giggling and splurting into their hands as they looked at me.

‘What’s so funny?’ I shouted above the sound of the wind and the roar of the engine. Bokkie de Beer pointed to the rear window of the driver’s cabin. I followed his hand and there, framed in the window, wearing his unmistakable panama hat, was the back of Doc’s head. I couldn’t believe my eyes and all the kids fell about laughing at my astonishment. I just couldn’t believe my good fortune.

It was the first time since my arrival by train three years earlier that I had left the small town. It was a perfectly clear, early spring morning as we travelled across the valley towards a row of distant hills. The thornveld and the flat-topped acacia had already broken into electric green leaf. In a month they would be a mass of tiny pom-poms that turned the valley into a sea of yellow and pink.

The road from Barberton was tarred all the way and by nine-thirty we’d reached Nelspruit. My wind-blown skin felt tight around the eyes and cheeks, and I was glad to get out of the back of the ute when we drew to a halt in a parking lot behind the town hall. I rushed to Doc’s side to open the door for him. His blue eyes were shining and I think he was almost as excited as I was.

‘We are together outside again, Peekay. It is goot, ja? Absoloodle.’

‘How did you escape?’ I asked clumsily.

He chuckled. ‘With the permission of the Kommandant. That’s what he wished to see me about after breakfast yesterday.’ He saw me frown, we both knew the way of the prison system where nothing is given unless something is taken in return. Doc shrugged. ‘It is not so much he wants. He wants only I should play a little Chopin when the brigadier comes from Pretoria next month.’

I knew how Doc felt about playing in public. He refused to play at any of the town concerts and had long since retired as a musician. While he overcame his fear when he triumphed at the Beethoven lunchtime recital in the market square, Doc was a perfectionist and it gave him great pain not to meet the standards he demanded for himself. When I told him Mrs Boxall had said there was no one in Barberton who didn’t think he was the greatest pianist they had ever heard, he had replied, ‘You must thank Madame Boxall for her kindness, but I am too old and too weak to inflict badly played Beethoven and Mozart on myself.’

‘You should have said no!’ I said.

‘Tch-tch, Peekay, then I would not see you in your début. One day I will say, I was there when the welterweight champion of the world made his boxing début. Absoloodle!

‘You still shouldn’t have.’

‘Beethoven yes, Mozart yes, Brahms yes, but Chopin I can still play enough not to tear myself to little bits. I will play Chopin to this Mr Brigadier. That is not so hard, ja.’

We entered the town hall through a back door and walked down a corridor until we reached a room which said Barberton Bloue on a piece of paper stuck on the door. The room smelt of dust and sweat, even though nobody had changed yet. Lieutenant Smit was standing against the far wall and next to him stood Klipkop.

‘This is where you will change today, but not all at once, hey?’ The room tittered. ‘This morning are the preliminary fights for the kids and this afternoon for the weight divisions. Tonight, starting six o’clock, the finals. Nobody leaves the town hall and if I catch anyone drinking a beer, I’m warning you now, there’ll be trouble. We come here to win and that is what we going to do! Okay, so what’s our motto?’

‘One for all and all for one,’ we all shouted. Doc put his hand on my shoulder and I felt very proud. ‘I wish Geel Piet was with us,’ I whispered. The room emptied and Klipkop shouted for the kids to say behind. Doc, who was in charge of first aid, left to fetch the towels and the first-aid kit from the parking lot but promised to be right back.

Klipkop grinned. ‘Today, man, I’m Geel Piet.’

‘Does that mean we can hit you and you can’t hit back?’ Bokkie de Beer said cheekily, and we all laughed.

Klipkop smiled. ‘I will look after you, and the lieutenant and me will be your seconds. You can all get changed now and I’ll fetch you in fifteen minutes. Don’t nobody go nowhere, you hear?’

I found a corner and took my boots from my book satchel and put them on first. All the kids crowded around. ‘Where’d you get those, man?’ Bokkie de Beer exclaimed. I had been too excited to think up an explanation.

‘My, my granpa made them,’ I stammered.

‘Boy, you lucky having a bootmaker for your granpa,’ Fonnie Kruger said.

‘Well, he’s not really a bootmaker, more a sort of gardener.’

‘Well he’s blêrrie clever, that’s all I can say.’ Bokkie de Beer said enviously and the other kids seemed to agree with him.

I rolled my grey school socks down so they made a collar just above the boots. Then I put my lovely blue singlet on and the blue boxing shorts with the yellow stripe down the side. Geel Piet had sized the waist perfectly but the length was wishful thinking. The bottoms of the shorts went way past my knees. When I stood up the other four kids broke up. Maatie Snyman and Nels Stekhoven even rolled on the floor. I guess I must have looked pretty funny with my sparrow legs sticking out, but I also felt terribly proud.

Fonnie Kruger and myself were the first of the Barberton Blues to fight as we were in the under twelves, the most junior division. We waited for Klipkop and followed him into the town hall. Kids from other major towns in the Eastern Transvaal were standing in groups with adults and they too were changed and ready. I looked around wondering whom among them I would have to fight.

Doc entered the hall and moved over to me. We sat on two chairs, slightly away, but within easy beckoning distance from the others. Doc held my hand and I think he was more nervous that I was. He had taken out his bandanna and was wiping his brow. ‘I think examinations in the conservatorium in Leipzig when I was so big as you was not so bad as this, ja. Absoloodle.’

‘I’ll be okay, Doc. I’ll dance and everything, just like Geel Piet says. Lieutenant Smit says I’m blêrrie fast, you’ll see they won’t hit me, for sure.’

‘It’s nice of you to say this, Peekay. But what happens when comes one big Boer and connects?’

I grinned, trying to make him feel better. I repeated Hoppie’s comment. ‘Ag man, the bigger they are the harder they fall.’ I felt pretty corny saying it and I knew now why Hoppie had said it to me. He must have felt pretty corny too.

Doc groaned and buried his head in his red bandanna. ‘Peekay, I want you should be very careful. In that ring are not nice people.’ Just then Klipkop called me over and Doc squeezed my hand. ‘You must use your feet to run away, Peekay. In my head I can hear only Wagner. No Mozart, only Wagner.’

Klipkop and Lieutenant Smit were standing with a large bald man with a big tummy who wore long white pants and a white singlet. A few feet from them stood two adults and a kid. The kid was quite a bit bigger than I though not as big as Snotnose. He wore a red singlet and in white on the front was the word Sabie. That was the town where Klipkop had his nooi, to whom he had recently become engaged.

The big man in the singlet looked at me and then at Lieutenant Smit. ‘He is not very big. Are you sure you want him to fight?’

The lieutenant nodded. ‘It will be good for him.’

The big man looked at the boy from Sabie and then looked doubtfully back at me. He turned to Lieutenant Smit. ‘His opponent is eight inches taller and has probably got five inches more reach, man.’

‘If I think he’s getting hurt I’ll pull him out.’

‘I blêrrie well hope you know what you doing, man,’ the big man said, shaking his head. The two men from Sabie were grinning and I could hear what they were saying inside their heads. They were glad their kid was going to get an easy fight first up.

Klipkop turned to me. ‘This is Meneer de Klerk, Peekay. He is the referee and also the judge. He just came down from Pretoria last night.’

‘Good morning, Meneer,’ I said, sticking out my hand. The referee took it and shook it lightly.

‘You got nice manners, son,’ he said. Behind his back I could see one of the men pushing the kid from Sabie so he would do the same thing. Meneer de Klerk turned and indicated a large wooden crate on the floor below the boxing ring. Inside the crate were at least fifty pairs of boxing gloves. ‘I want ten-ounce gloves. I don’t want to see no kid hurt. Pick your gloves and then show them to me, you understand.’

‘We got our own gloves,’ Lieutenant Smit said.

‘Then bring them, let me see.’

‘Us also,’ said one of the men from Sabie and stepped forward holding out a pair of gloves.

Meneer de Klerk examined both sets of gloves and declared them suitable. ‘Okay, glove up. We on in five minutes.’ He turned to a man sitting at a table directly beside the ring. ‘Five minutes, you hear?’ The man nodded and consulted a large pocket watch in front of him. He also had a bell and was obviously the timekeeper.

Klipkop and Lieutenant Smit both worked on lacing me up. I felt very important as neither of them had ever actually supervised any aspect of my boxing before.

‘Remember, Peekay, boxing is a percentage game. Just make sure you hit him clean and more times than he hits you. No clinches, in clinches he can throw you off your feet. Stay out of the corners, stay off the ropes.’

The man at the table rang the bell and we walked over to the ring. Klipkop helped me through the ropes and then he and the lieutenant climbed in after me. There was a proper stool in the corner and Lieutenant Smit told me to sit on it. I felt a bit silly because the kid from Sabie was standing up and punching into the air and I was sitting like a little kid on a chamberpot.

‘Right! Both in the middle,’ Meneer de Klerk called and climbed into the ring. ‘What’s your names?’

‘Du Toit, Meneer.’

‘Peekay, Meneer.’

‘I want a clean fight, you hear? No clinches. When I say break, you break. No hitting below the waist or behind the head. One knock down and the fight is over. You understand, Peekay? Du Toit?’

‘Ja, Meneer,’ we both said.

‘Right, when you hear the bell you come into the centre of the ring, touch gloves and start boxing. Good luck.’

I walked back to my corner and on Lieutenant Smit’s instructions sat down. Because it was the first fight of the day, all the teams were gathered around the ring and there were even some people from the town watching. It was my first boxing crowd and my heart was beating. Du Toit was standing in his corner and he too was looking around. I don’t think either of us wanted to make eye contact. Seen from my stool he seemed very big, but I had waited too long for this moment to be afraid.

The bell rang. ‘Box him, Peekay, you hear,’ Klipkop said as I jumped from the stool.

We touched gloves in the middle of the ring, and as he pulled away I darted in and snapped a left and a right to Du Toit’s jaw. His eyes widened in surprise. I could see that the punches hadn’t hurt him, but nevertheless my early aggression had caught him unawares and he looked surprised.

He was a good boxer and didn’t lose his composure but circled around me. He threw a straight left which went over my shoulder and flew past my ear. I went in under the arm with a quick uppercut and caught him hard in the ribs. I heard him wince so I knew I’d hit him hard. He caught me with a right on the shoulder and spun me around. I anticipated the left coming at me and ducked under it and got another good body blow on exactly the same spot as before. His arms wrapped around me and I was in a clinch, which I wasn’t supposed to be in. I hit him furiously in the ribs with both hands, but my blows were too close to be effective and I knew he could hold me as long as he liked.

‘Break!’ I heard the ref say, and as Du Toit’s arms slackened I got right out of the way. For the rest of the round I let him chase me. I was much the faster boxer and had much better foot work. Towards the end of the round I could see by the way he set his feet which punch was going to come next. Just as the bell went I got inside with a short right and clipped him neatly on the point of the chin.

I had heard nothing during the fight and now realised that the crowd was making quite a noise and that my name was being shouted in encouragement. At the end of the round there was a lot of clapping and one or two whistles.

‘You done good, Peekay!’ Klipkop said. Lieutenant Smit wiped my face with a towel. ‘He’s missing with the right cross, but not by much. Watch it, man. If that kid finds his range he’s going to hurt you bad. Keep your chin buried in your shoulder, that way if he gets one through you’ll take most of it on the shoulder.’

The bell went for the second round and I let Du Toit chase me around the ring. I think he must have been told to try to get me into a corner because he would work me carefully towards one but at the last moment I’d feint left and duck out right and his right cross would miss by miles. But then I did it once too often and he caught me with a left uppercut in the gut and had it not been for the ropes behind me I might have gone down. He knew he’d hurt me and in his anxiety to capitalise was telegraphing his blows, trying for the big hit. All I could do was duck until I could use my feet to get out of trouble.

To my surprise, in the second half of the round he seemed to be tiring. He’d thrown a lot of punches, most of them landing on my gloves, though he did hit me a good body blow that hurt like hell. I began to move in quickly and pick him off. Towards the end of the round the crowd was beginning to laugh as I seemed to be able to hit him almost at will. A look of desperation had crept onto his face. I don’t think I was hurting him much but I was making him very tired and very frustrated, just the way Geel Piet had said it must be done. The bell went and I was sure I had won the round.

‘You don’t have to hit him again to win,’ Lieutenant Smit said. ‘Just stay out of his way, you hear? Just counter punch, no attack. You going to win this clear, man, unless he cops you a lucky one.’

‘You do like the lieutenant says, Peekay. You just stay out of trouble.’ Klipkop added with a grin.

The bell went for the final round and we went into the centre of the ring and touched gloves. Du Toit must have had instructions to nail me because he kept rushing me, throwing wild punches. I’d nail him with a straight left or a right hook as he passed, but I was careful not to get set to throw a big punch. The crowd was laughing as I made him miss and I was beginning to feel pretty good. I had out-boxed him and hadn’t been hurt, the bell would go any moment and I’d won. The right cross came at me and I couldn’t move out of the way. It smashed into my shoulder and into my face and I felt as though I had walked into a telegraph pole. I felt myself going and grabbed at the ropes behind me to stop myself falling. The next blow came but I managed to get my head out of the way, then Du Toit threw another right and it just grazed my face. But my legs felt okay and my head had cleared. I ducked under a straight right and danced out of the way just as the bell went.

‘Phew!’

Doc was at the ringside jumping up and down. ‘Eleven out of ten. Absoloodle!’ he yelled at me. It was the happiest moment of my life.

I had started to move back to my corner when Meneer de Klerk called us both into the centre of the ring. We shook hands and I thanked Du Toit for the fight but I think he knew he’d lost as his eyes brimmed with tears and he didn’t reply. ‘You got nice manners, you been taught right, Peekay,’ Meneer de Klerk said again. Then he took us both by the hand and said: ‘The winner three rounds to nothing is Gentleman Peekay!’ He held my hand up and the crowd clapped and laughed at my new name. The Barberton Blues all yelled and whistled.

‘That was good,’ Lieutenant Smit said. ‘But it’s early times, you were lucky, man, you got a palooka. When I tell you to stay out of the way you stay out of the way, you hear? That right cross nearly brained you, man. Two like that early in the next bout and we throw in the towel, you understand!’

I nodded, and tried to look contrite. As Klipkop pulled the big mitts off my hands I suddenly felt light, as though I was going to float away. It was a wonderful feeling. It was the power of one stirring in me. Nothing Lieutenant Smit said could dampen my spirits. I jumped down from the ring feeling ten feet tall.

Doc gave me a big hug and then he held both my hands and we did a little jig which made me feel a bit silly but he was very happy. ‘Peekay, I am very proud today! Absoloodle!’ Then he stopped and reached into his pocket for his red bandanna and sniffed into it. He looked up, his blue eyes all watery. ‘Such a dancer, already. Absoloodle.’ I had never heard him say so many absoloodles before.

Fonnie Kruger won his fight against a kid from Boxburg and so did Maatie Snyman in the under thirteens, Nels Stekhoven in the under fourteens, and Bokkie de Beer in the under fifteens. I’m telling you, we were a pretty proud lot in the Barberton Blues, every one of us had advanced to the semis. Fonnie Kruger and I were both in the under twelve division, if we got through the semis we’d be in the final together. But our hopes were soon dashed. There was a kid from Lydenburg called Kroon who was the biggest eleven-year-old I had ever seen. He was at least a foot higher than me and twice as wide. He wasn’t a boxer, but he polished off a kid from Nelspruit in the first round when he sat him on the canvas after about one minute. We instantly dubbed him Killer Kroon. We all got scared just looking at him and Bokkie said he was glad he was fighting in the under fifteen division and not in the under twelve.

Fonnie Kruger got Killer Kroon in the semis and managed to go one round before he was sat on his pants, seconds after the second round had begun. I think he was glad that it was all over, Killer Kroon had closed his right eye. ‘It’s like boxing a blêrrie gorilla,’ he said when he climbed down from the ring.

Just before lunch I entered the ring again to fight a kid from Kaapmuiden. He was a square-built, nuggety sort of bloke and very strong around the shoulders but not a lot taller than me. It was the first time I had stood up to another boxer whose chin level wasn’t above my head. It was a good fight and my speed saved me from taking the weight of his blows. He hit hard and straight, but I was able to move away as the punch came so the sting had gone out of it. Nevertheless he landed quite a lot of punches and was scoring well. Before the final round began Lieutenant Smit wiped my face.

‘You’re not doing enough to make certain of this fight. Watch his straight left, he keeps dropping his right glove after he’s thrown the left. Get in under the blow and work him with both hands to the body. I want to make certain you got enough points.’

We touched gloves for the final round and Lieutenant Smit was quite right. The kid, whose name was Geldenhuis, threw his left and then curiously dropped his right. I went in underneath and got five or six good blows to the body before he pushed me away. The final bell went and the crowd chanted, ‘Gentleman Peekay! Gentleman Peekay!’ They were all Afrikaners and the English word obviously amused them. I thanked Geldenhuis who also thanked me. Then Meneer de Klerk announced for the second time that day, ‘The winner in two out of three rounds, Gentleman Peekay!’ The crowd laughed and clapped and the Barberton Blues went wild.

Doc could hardly contain himself. ‘Not even one scratch, black eyes not even one. Perfect, you should play Chopin so good as this, ja?’ He laughed and handed me a towel. ‘Lieutenant Smit says you must have a shower and change into your clothes again. Tonight, six o’clock, we fight again.’He suddenly grew serious. ‘Peekay, in the finals is a big Boer, you must dance very goot, in him is too much Wagner. You must box like a Mozart piano concerto, fast and light with perfect timing, ja?’

Doc found a small antechamber leading off the corridor in which there was a leather couch. After lunch he made me lie down. I was anxious to watch the adult preliminary fights and succumbed with ill grace. Despite the heat he threw a prison blanket over me, and to my surprise I fell asleep. It was five o’clock when he came to fetch me and I felt a little stiff and sore. He made me have a warm shower before I changed into my boxing things again. By the time we got back into the town hall it was almost six o’clock and the preliminaries were over. Bokkie de Beer said five of the Barberton Blues were through to the finals, including Gert who had had an easy and a hard fight, but was okay. That made nine of the fourteen Barberton Blues in the finals. I went over to Gert to congratulate him and he seemed pleased.

‘Ag it wasn’t too hard, Peekay. I think I got lucky. But like you, man, I got a Boer in the finals that’s as big as a mountain, a super heavyweight. He won both his fights on knockouts in the first.’

‘You got the speed, speed is everything,’ I quoted Geel Piet.

‘Not if he gets me in a corner,’ Gert said solemnly.

‘Then stay out of corners, man!’ I said flippantly, but the advice was meant as much for myself as it was for him.

‘You on soon, I’ve got money on you, Peekay. You can do it, I’m telling you.’ But I could hear him talking in his head and he was very, very worried about me.

Fonnie Kruger came over and said that Lieutenant Smit wanted me.

Lieutenant Smit and Klipkop were in earnest conversation with Meneer de Klerk and seemed not to notice my arrival. I stood and waited for them.

‘The Boer kid has thirty, maybe forty pounds on yours. I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit,’ the referee was saying, shaking his head.

‘You saw him in the other two fights. He hardly got touched, our kid’s a good boxer,’ Klipkop said.

‘He’s better than that. He’s the best I’ve seen in a long time. But he’s a midget compared to Kroon. Kroon dropped both his opponents in the first. That’s a bad kid. I work with young boxers every day, I’m telling you, this kid is not a sportsman.’ Meneer de Klerk threw his hands open in a gesture of reconciliation. ‘There’s plenty of time, he’s only ten. Let the boy grow a bit, wait till next year. He’s champion material, too good to spoil with a mismatch.’

I could see a hesitant look cross Lieutenant Smit’s face. The voices going on inside his head were confused. My heart was going boom, boom, boom, and I couldn’t swallow, there was a huge aching lump in my throat. Then he cocked his head and squinted at the bald referee. ‘I make you this promise, Meneer de Klerk. If my boy even looks like being hurt we throw in the towel. You don’t know Peekay. That kid has worked three years for this fight. In three years he hasn’t missed one training session. For two years he just fought the bag and the ball. I can’t pull him out without giving him a chance.’

‘I’ll give him one round, Smit. If he even looks like being hit in the first round I’m giving the fight to Kroon on a TKO, you understand?’

Lieutenant Smit nodded his head, ‘Ja, okay, you the ref, man.’ He turned and saw me and I grinned at him as though to indicate I’d just arrived. They had to give me a go. I had to fight Kroon. Kroon was no bigger to me than Jackhammer Smit was to Hoppie. I could take him, I knew I could take him. ‘We got to glove up now, Peekay,’ Lieutenant Smit said as he took a glove from Klipkop and slipped it over my left hand.

I climbed into the ring and sat on the little stool and Killer Kroon also sat on his. When he sat down he didn’t look as though he was on the potty. He stared directly at me. Shit he was big! He had a grin on his face and I could hear his conversation to himself, ‘I’m going to knock this little bugger out first round.’

‘You got to catch me first, you bastard,’ I said to myself. But I could feel his hugeness growing and beginning to fill the ring.

With the arrival of the townspeople for the finals, the town hall was at least half full. I had looked down on a bigger crowd when I played Chopin at the Barberton concert, but a boxing crowd is different, much more raw or something. I remembered Doc’s words, ‘You must box like a Mozart piano concerto.’ In my head I could hear the way Doc would play a Mozart concerto, no arpeggio, fast and straight, the timing perfect. It made sense to box Killer Kroon in the same way.

‘Never mind his head, Peekay. You just keep landing them to the body. Quick punches in and out with both hands. Scoring shots. Stay out of reach and don’t let him get you against the ropes, not even once. You box him in the middle of the ring. Make him work, make him chase you all the time, you hear?’

I listened to them carefully, but I knew the real answer came from Geel Piet. That I had to box with my feet. I had no idea what sort of a boxer Killer Kroon was. His first opponent had lasted less than a minute and Fonnie went down a few seconds into the second round but had spent all of the first back-pedalling.

As I just sat there waiting, Kroon stared at me with an evil grin and I began to feel very small and a little bewildered. The feeling of being in front of the Judge came back to me and the ring became the dormitory and the audience the jury.

I closed my eyes and counted from ten to one. I stood on a rock just below the full moon, the roar of the falls in my ears. The river and the gorge and the African veld stretched out below me in the silver light. I was a young Zulu warrior who had killed his first lion and I could feel the lion skin skirt around my hips, the tail of the lion wrapped around my waist. I took a deep breath and jumped the first of the falls into a pool lashed with white spray and thunder, rose to the surface and was swept to the rim of the second, plunged downwards and rose again to be swept to the edge of the third pool where I fell again, rising to the surface at the bottom of the falls where the water danced with silver and the first of the stepping stones shone wet in the moonlight. I crossed the ten stones to the other side and opened my eyes and looked directly at Kroon. Killer Kroon saw something in my eyes which made him turn away and not look at me again.

The referee called us up, and taking us by the wrists he held our hands in the air, introducing me first. ‘On my left, Dames and Here… Gentleman Peekay of the Barberton Blues.’ The crowd gave me a big hand, although this was mixed with laughter as they saw my size next to Killer Kroon. ‘On my right, from Lydenburg Martinus Kroon.’ The crowd had already chosen sides and with the exception of the Lydenburg squad the clapping was only polite. I went back and sat on my stool. It was the first fight of the finals and anticipation made the crowd enthusiastic even though it was the most junior fight of the night.

The bell went for the first round and I sprang from my stool while Killer Kroon got up slowly, almost disdainfully. We moved to the centre of the ring, and he threw a left at my head which only came up to below his shoulder. I could see it coming for miles and let it pass my ear. He followed with a right and I ducked under the punch. It was almost the same opening Du Toit had used and I followed it the same way with a left and a right under Kroon’s heart. I got some body behind the two punches which I drove in hard but he didn’t even seem to notice. I danced quickly out of the way and a clumsy uppercut with his left missed my chin by six inches. The crowd winced at the ferocity of the punch even though it was all show and no blow.

I stayed in the centre of the ring, moving around Kroon who threw four more punches and missed. He threw another right which parted my hair but the punch was too hard, throwing him off balance. I moved in fast and hit the same spot under the heart with a left and right combination which I repeated. Four good punches with plenty of shoulder behind them. But I’d been too greedy getting the extra two punches home, his huge arms locked around me and, lifting me bodily, he threw me away from him. I was sent spinning across the ring, my legs working like pistons to keep me on my feet. I bounced into the ropes, and grabbed the middle one with both arms to steady myself. I was wide open as the straight right came at me. It should have been an uppercut, I was against the ropes and would not have been able to move out of the way of a punch coming up at me. To put everything he had into the punch, Killer Kroon had pulled his shoulder back just a fraction too far. It allowed me a split second to move my head to the right. Instead of sending me bye-bye-birdie, the blow caught my ear and it felt like a branding iron had been pushed into the side of my head. But I’d taken worse from the Judge and I feinted left and moved off the ropes under his right arm. He turned quickly but my feet were already in position and he walked into a perfectly timed right cross, coming at him with the full weight of my body behind it. The punch had landed flush on the point of his chin and his head snapped back. I knew I had hurt him. It was the best punch I had ever thrown by far. Gert said later, had I been nearer to Killer Kroon’s size, he’d have been out for a week.

Kroon shook his head in bewilderment. He was hurt and he was mad and he came looking for me. I stayed out of his way, taking a straight left on the shoulder moving away, and managed two more good punches to the spot under his heart when he telegraphed another right cross. The spot under his heart had developed a red patch. The bell went for the end of round one, and as I returned to my corner I could see a grin on Meneer de Klerk’s face.

Doc was standing outside the ring in my corner as Lieutenant Smit and Klipkop climbed in to attend to me. He had his bandanna in both hands and was twisting it round and round with the tears falling down his cheeks.

‘You done good,’ Klipkop said with a huge grin. Lieutenant Smit said nothing at first but smeared Vaseline over the ear where Kroon had glanced his big hit off me. He covered my good ear with his hand.

‘Can you hear me, Peekay?’ He spoke from the side I’d been hit.

‘Ja, Lieutenant, I hear you good,’ I replied.

‘If a thick ear is all we get out of this fight we’ll be blêrrie lucky.’ He turned to Klipkop. ‘Give him another half-glass of water. Rinse only, don’t swallow.’ He looked directly at me. ‘Now listen good, Peekay. It looks like this gorilla’s only got four punches. Straight right, straight left, right cross and left uppercut. He’s a fighter and he’s never needed any more than those, every one is a good punch and he throws them well except the left uppercut is a bit clumsy and he tries to hit too hard with the right cross so you can see it coming. You done good to move under it and hit him under the heart. That’s a damn good punch. He’s very strong but if you can get in enough of those they’re going to count in the end and you’ll slow him down for the third. Keep moving, you must keep moving, you hear? Make him work, he’s not as fit as you, make him work and keep hitting him on that spot under the heart, okay?’

I had never heard Lieutenant Smit talk so fast, and listening to what he wasn’t saying I could see he now thought I had a chance. ‘No more attack, counter punch, you hear? Only counter punch.’ I nodded and the bell went for the second round.

Kroon came storming out of his corner and I could see from the look in his eyes that he wanted to finish the fight. For the first half of the round I ducked and weaved and back-pedalled and moved him around. He must have thrown fifty punches without landing even one. The crowd was beginning to laugh as he repeatedly missed and he was becoming frustrated. Towards the second half of the round he slowed down just a little and his right cross wasn’t coming quite so fast. He was breathing heavily and to my surprise I could smell his sweat. A kid’s sweat doesn’t smell until he’s about Bokkie de Beer’s size, but I could smell Killer Kroon’s sweat all right, plain as anything. I moved up a little closer and started coming in under the right cross again, to land on the same spot under the heart time and time again. I couldn’t believe his lack of imagination. The right cross came at me regular as clockwork and I moved under it and landed two and sometimes four punches to the spot under his heart. His breathing was getting heavier and heavier and he grunted as I landed a left and a right and I realised that my punches to the heart were beginning to hurt him. I was getting pretty tired myself when the bell sounded for the end of the second round.

The crowd stood and clapped. As I returned to my corner I looked towards Doc. He had the bandanna in his mouth and was chewing on it.

‘He’s going to try and finish you this round, Peekay. You got both rounds, you miles ahead on points. He is going to try to put you down.’ Lieutenant Smit’s usually calm voice was gone and he was breathing hard. ‘Stay away, man. I don’t care if you don’t land a blêrrie punch, just run away, keep clear, you hear? Keep clear, you got this fight won. Magtig! You boxing good!’ His eyes were shining as he spoke.

The bell for the final round went and we met in the centre of the ring and touched gloves. Killer Kroon was still breathing hard and his chest was heaving. As we moved away he said, ‘I’m going to kill you, you blêrrie Rooinek.’

Geel Piet said you always had to answer back, so they know you’re not afraid. ‘Come and get me, you Boer bastard!’ I shot back at him. He rushed at me and I stepped aside but his swinging arm caught me as he passed and knocked me off my feet. It wasn’t a punch, it was the inside of his arm, but it sat me down. I couldn’t believe it had happened. One knockdown and you lose the fight! I had lost the fight! I had opened my mouth to talk, lost my concentration and lost the fight! I couldn’t believe it was me sitting on the canvas. There was a roaring in my ears and a terrible despair in my heart.

‘No knockdown, continue to box!’ I heard Meneer de Klerk shout as though in a dream. I was coming to my feet but it felt as though I was underwater. The thought of defeat had drowned my senses. Killer Kroon rushed in and that clumsy left uppercut just missed my chin. This time he should have used the right cross as I couldn’t move upwards to my feet and sideways at the same time. A right cross would have caught me flush on the chin and finished me for keeps. Instead I simply moved my head backwards and the uppercut whizzed safely past the point of my chin. I was back on my toes and dancing out of reach, moving around him. The stupid bastard couldn’t box for toffee. No way was he going to get a second chance at me.

I was making him miss pretty easily and began to realise that there was something wrong with him. His breath was coming in rasps and his chest was heaving, his punches had lost their zing. I moved up and hit him as hard as I could with a two-fisted attack to the spot under his heart and his hands fell to his sides. His gloves came around my waist but there was hardly any strength left in him and he leaned heavily on me, his gloves working up and down my waist. The thumb of his glove must have caught the elastic band of my boxing shorts for they slipped neatly over my hips and fell to my ankles. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t step backwards for fear of falling, anyway his arms and weight made it impossible to move. So I just stood there and hit him again and again as he draped his arms over me, my bare arse pointed at the crowd. Then he gave me a last desperate push and I tripped over the shorts caught around my ankles and fell down. I tried to pull my pants up with my boxing gloves but without success. The crowd was convulsed with laughter and Killer Kroon was standing over me with his hands on his knees, head hanging. He was rasping and wheezing and trying to take in air.

‘No knockdown!’ Meneer de Klerk shouted. ‘Get back to your corner, Kroon!’ He grabbed me by the wrist and jerked me to my feet and then pulled my pants up. I had been covering my snake with my gloves. In those days nobody wore underpants and I was bare-arsed and fancy free in front of everyone. But I didn’t care a damn, the only thing that mattered was Killer Kroon in the ring with me. I would have fought him with no clothes on if necessary. Meneer de Klerk wiped my gloves on his pants. ‘Box on,’ he said. I turned to face Killer Kroon’s corner. He was standing with his back to me and his chest was still heaving. Suddenly a towel lofted over his head and landed at my feet. I couldn’t believe my eyes, Kroon’s corner was throwing in the towel, the fight was over! Meneer de Klerk moved quickly over to me, and with a huge grin on his face held my hand aloft. ‘Winner on a technical knockout, Gentleman Peekay!’ he announced. The crowd stood up for the second time and shouted and cheered and Lieutenant Smit and Klipkop jumped into the ring. Klipkop lifted me up and held me high above his shoulders and turned around in the ring and everyone went wild.

Meneer de Klerk had moved over to Kroon’s corner and now he came back to the centre of the ring and held his hand up for silence. The timekeeper rang his bell until the crowd quietened down. Klipkop put me down again. ‘The Lydenburg squad want me to say that Martinus Kroon retired because of an asthma attack.’ A section of the crowd started to boo and there was general laughter. ‘More like a Rooinek attack!’ someone shouted. The bald referee held up his hand once more. ‘I just want you to know that I had the fight scored two rounds to none for Gentleman Peekay and I also had him ahead on points in the third round. The technical knockout stands. Let me tell you something, this boy is going to be a great boxer, just remember where you saw him first.’ The crowd whistled and stomped and cheered again and Lieutenant Smit held my hand up and then we left the ring. Doc was crying and I had to sit down and hold his hand for a bit and then we went together to the showers. But first Doc and I shared the last two pumpkin scones.

‘I think Geel Piet and the people will be very happy tonight,’ Doc said as he handed me a towel. ‘I go to get you a soft drink? What colour do you want?’

‘But we haven’t got any money,’ I said.

‘That’s what you think, Mister Schmarty Pantz!’ Doc fished into the pocket of his white linen suit and produced two half-crowns.

‘Five shillings! Where’d you get that?’ I said in amazement.

He grinned slyly. ‘I am making this bet with a nice man from Lydenburg.’

‘A bet! You bet on me? What if I’d lost? If I’d lost you couldn’t have paid him!’

Doc dropped the coins back into his coat pocket with a clink and then scratched his nose with his forefinger. ‘You couldn’t lose, you was playing Mozart,’ he said.

I asked for an American cream soda. It was the drink Hoppie had bought in the café at Gravelotte after we’d changed the tackies at the Patels’ shop and it was still my favourite. It was also the closest I could come to sharing my win with Hoppie. If Geel Piet and Hoppie could have been there, everything would have been perfect. Not that it wasn’t perfect. But more perfect.