Black Ajax by George MacDonald Fraser

Author:George MacDonald Fraser [Fraser, George MacDonald]
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Historical Fiction
ISBN: 9780007325641
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1997-11-28T15:00:00+00:00

TOM CRIBB,

former heavyweight Champion of England,

retired publican

Truth to tell, master, I did not rate the black high. Well, there I were mistook. Now that I'm an old 'un, I can confess it. Yet, if I held him over cheap, 'twere natural enough. A man can only judge as he sees.

He'd beat Burrows. Well, who could not? He'd licked Tom Blake, but old Tom at Margate weren't half the man as I'd beat five year afore at Blackheath, when I were but a younker and Blake were in his prime. Ah, he were Tom Tough in them days, I can tell 'ee. Dead on his pins after an hour's stern milling, but still he came back at me. And rattled me all o'er the shop 'fore I put him down.

When he met Molineaux he were older and stouter and slower by far. The spirit were gone out of him, too, I reckon, or he'd ha' stood game longer than he did 'gainst a man who didn't fight well above half. Some said the black had been training on daffy and doxies, and had come to the ring half-soused, and that were the reason he showed so little style. I know naught o' that; he seemed sober enough at the end on't. But whatever o' that, 'twere no great mill. They flogged each other for five rounds, no science, no quarter, and when Blake went in his shell, Black Tom could not pry him out. Strength and youth did it at last. A hammering youngster thrashed a tired oldster. But I saw naught in the black to trouble me.

'Deed, I'd thought better of him when I'd watched him spar wi' Dutch Sam. I see then he could shift right sharp, guard well, and fib hard and fast, but he showed little o' that 'gainst Blake, only slogging. I said to Bill Gibbons: “This chap's one o' them as is champions wi' the mufflers, but half-starters when they come off.” See, master, 'tis one thing to trip about the Fives Court showing off your feints and dodges, wi' naught at stake, but another to stand bare-hand in earnest wi' a sixteen-stone bruiser who aims to smash you, and everything depending upon it. Many a brave man fights wary then, not 'cos he lacks bottom but 'cos o' the burden of knowin' 'tis now or never.

I've felt it. Why, I've sparred wi' big Bob Gregson, him they called the Lancashire Giant, and gone full tilt and fancy free, and if he planted me a melter, what then? It cost me naught, being only a breather 'tween friends. But when I faced that same Bob at Moulsey, an October day cold as January, knowing his weight and strength and that one false step and my title would be o'er the hills and far away, ne'er mind Mr Methuen's stake money and the side-bets, and all them years o' rough milling gone for nothing … ah, that's a different thing, master. But only them as has been there, knows that.

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