“Yes.”
“I think, Mr. Callaghan,” Elaine McGee interrupted, firmly in control of herself again, “that Miss Parson’s story tells us that she is not Mr. Steed’s friend. And on that basis, I’m asking you to listen to her plan. She and I have discussed it in some detail while Tom was out looking for you. I think it has merit. There is risk to you and to her, but if we succeed, William Steed will be finished in Denver forever.”
Pandora Parson wet her lips. “It really all depends upon you, Mr. Callaghan. Can you defeat Lighting Dan?”
Corey nodded firmly. He had never seen Dan fight, but he trusted Patrick’s opinion. The Gentleman confirmed his appraisal. “Dan’s fast, but Callaghan is tough. The real question is, can Callaghan knock him out quickly enough?”
“No, Mr. McGee,” Pandora corrected him. “The real question is, can Mr. Callaghan convince Mr. Steed that he has reluctantly agreed to throw the fight in order to save Mr. O’Sullivan?”
The second time William Steed approached Corey Callaghan, his flanking men were armed with axe handles. They were standing between the same two buildings, waiting patiently for Corey to run past.
Corey had considered running a different route — no sense in making things easy for Steed — but his pride hadn’t permitted it. Besides, if he was to hold up his end of the plan, he would have to confront Steed sooner or later. In truth, Callaghan’s calculated submission was no more humiliating or distasteful than Miss Parson’s role. She would be gambling her virtue on Corey’s fists — and her peculiar gambler’s honor might well force her to pay her debt to Steed if Corey failed.
Corey halted his run and faced Steed and his men. “I see your boys learned a lesson yesterday,” he told him.
“The question, Mr. Callaghan,” Steed replied, “is did you learn a lesson last evening?”
Corey scowled. “Aye, that I did. Now what do you think is to prevent me from pulling out of the fight?”
Steed smiled, a cruel upward turning of his thin face. “Why nothing at all, Mr. Callaghan. But if you do pull out, the next time Patrick O’Sullivan is robbed in the night you have my personal guarantee that he will not survive.”
Corey bristled. The men with the axe handles tightened their grips. Corey forced his Irish temper back down under firm control. “Aye,” he said quietly. “I figured you’d say something like that. I just wanted to hear the words.” He spit distastefully on the ground between them. “No use beating around the bush. I’ll take your dive.”
Steed’s smile broadened. “Sense at last.”
Corey spit again. “There is one condition.”
“Condition?” Steed’s smile hardened, then relaxed again as understanding lit his features. “Oh, the matter of payment.”
“Save your money,” Corey told him. “I’m not doing this for that.”
“Really?” Steed looked genuinely surprised, then a faint trace of suspicion touched his face.
“Aye, my condition is that no one ever tells Patrick. If he knew I took a dive, I could never look him in the face again.”
Cruel pleasure replaced suspicion on Steed’s features. Corey wondered if Steed knew his face was so expressive, or if the man simply didn’t care if the boxer knew Steed was lying to him. “I accept your condition, Mr. Callaghan. Mr. O’Sullivan will never learn of our arrangement.” Corey could not help but wonder how long after the fight was finished Steed was actually planning to wait to break the news to Patrick and gloat over the old man’s pain. Not that it ultimately mattered. Corey wasn’t going to throw the fight. Making the condition had been Miss Parson’s idea. She felt it would encourage Steed to believe he had broken Corey.
“Alright then,” he muttered, and turned to leave.
“One more thing, Mr. Callaghan,” Steed interjected.
Corey turned back to face him.
“I want the fight thrown in the fourth round. No use making my Lightning get too winded.”
Corey saw none of his coconspirators over the next two days, although he knew in general what they were doing. The Gentleman was quietly using all of the influence he had to convince the wealthiest and most unforgiving men in Denver to bet heavily with Steed that Corey Callaghan would defeat his lad. Many of those gentlemen would guess that a play was in the works, but Tom McGee’s reputation was golden. He would bring the gamblers in, and with luck, Steed, in his certainty that the fight was fixed, would over-extend himself and anger some very dangerous people.
Miss Parson, for her part, would also appear taken by Rock Quarry Callaghan’s reputation. She would, of course, know that Steed liked to be certain of things, but would bet her mother’s ring against her virtue that Corey Callaghan would not surrender to Steed’s plans. Steed had worked at breaking Miss Parson to his will for seven long months. He would take great pleasure in the thought of completing his conquest. Miss Parson was certain he would gamble on his sure thing.
As for Corey, he had but to keep training and keep tending Patrick — waiting for Friday night.
The fight began with the clear ring of the bell, and Rock Quarry Callaghan and Lightning Dan both danced into the ring. Patrick stood in Corey’s corner where he always did, a large white bandage still plastered across his head. William Steed and Pandora Parson stood side by side in the front of the crowd near Dan’s corner. Corey wasn’t certain if either of the McGees had come to see the fight.
Lightning Dan danced around Corey, a confident sneer upon his face. He did look fast — his body supple and lean — but Corey still had a solid thirty pounds on the man. He felt confident he could knock the sneer off his face if he could land one solid blow to the head.
Dan darted in and jabbed Corey twice on the chin. The blows stung, sort of, but they certainly weren’t punches like the Gentleman would have landed. Dan’s sneer progressed to a nasty grin, as if he thought he had just really pummeled Callaghan. It suddenly occurred to Corey that Dan was a man who had never won fairly in the ring. Steed didn’t just fix the big fights — he fixed all of his boy’s battles.
Dan shot back within range and stung Corey with a quick combination. Stung Corey, not hurt him, but from the cocky look on the boxer’s face Lightning Dan was sure these were punishing blows. Could it be Dan didn’t know his fights were fixed? Could Steed have actually hidden that from him?
If so, Corey knew how he would beat him. When Lightning Dan approached again, Corey retreated, overreacting to each glancing blow. The crowd did not like it — did not really believe it — but Lightning Dan believed, and Corey let him go on believing until the bell sounded, ending the round.
“What’s gotten into you, lad?” Patrick asked him. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of those little girly slaps he’s giving you.”
Corey sloshed water around his mouth, then spit it into the bucket. “Did you train me to be afraid, Patrick?”
“I did not!” the older man sputtered.
“Then trust your training,” Corey told him, and jumped up and ran back to the center of the ring. Miss Parson was observing him with what could only be concern in her eye. The man next to her yelped as he leaned too close to his smoking friend and set his own mustache on fire. A foamy beer extinguished the flame before it could actually burn the man, soaking his shirt and adding to the confusion.
Lightning Dan approached Corey from his corner of the ring. “Ready for more pain?” he asked. Corey forced himself not to smile. “When I’m finished with you,” Dan promised, “they’ll call you Gravel Pit Callaghan.”
Corey’s only answer was another round of retreating around the ring.