“And get out?”
“Sure, with a little luck. It’s a big place, man. Lot of people.”
“Well, tomorrow I’ll see. I got us all tickets so we don’t have to deal with the scalpers.”
“All right,” Hawk said.
“Hate corruption in all its aspects, don’t you, Hawk.”
“Been fighting it all my life, bawse.” Hawk drank some more champagne. Kathie filled his glass as soon as he put it down. She sat so that her thigh touched his and watched him all the time.
I drank some ale. “Been enjoying the games, Kath?”
She nodded without looking at me.
Hawk grinned at me. “She don’t like you,” he said. “She say you ain’t much of a man. Say you weak, you soft, say her and me we should shake you. I getting the feeling she don’t care for you. She think you a degenerate.”
“I got a real way with the broads,” I said.
Kathie reddened but was silent, still looking at Hawk.
“I told her she was a little hasty in her judgment.”
“She believe you?”
“No. You buy anything besides booze, like for supper?”
“Naw, man, you was telling me about a place called Bacco’s. Figured you’d like to take me and Kath out and show her you ain’t no degenerate. Treat her to a fine meal. Me too.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Okay. Let me take a shower.”
“See that, Kath,” Hawk said. “He very clean.”
Bacco’s was on the second floor in the old section of Montreal not far from Victoria Square. The cuisine was French Canadian and they had one of the better country pâtés that I’d eaten. It also had good French bread and Labatt 50 ale. Hawk and I had a very nice time. I was thinking that Kathie probably did not have nice times. Ever. But she was passive and polite while we ate. She’d bought a kind of dungaree suit with a vest and long coat that she was wearing, and her hair was neat and she looked good.
Old Montreal was jumping during the Olympics. There was outdoor entertainment in a square nearby, and throngs of young people drinking beer and wine and smoking and listening to the rock music.
We got in our rented car and drove back to our rented house. Hawk and Kathie went upstairs to what had become their room. I sat for a while and finished the O’Keefe’s and watched the evening events, wrestling and some of the weightlifting, alone in the rented living room, on the funny old TV set with the illuminated border.
At nine o’clock I went to bed. Alone. I hadn’t had much sleep the night before and I was tired. I felt middle-aged. I was lonely. It kept me awake till nine-fifteen.
26
We took the subway to the Olympic Stadium. Subway is probably the wrong term, if what I ride occasionally in Boston is a subway, then what we rode in Montreal was not. The stations were immaculate, the trains silent, the service on time. Hawk and I forced a small space for Kathie between us, in the jam of bodies. We changed at Berri Montigny and got off at Viau.
Being a supercool sophisticated worldly-wise full-grown hipster, I was unimpressed with the enormous complex around the Olympic Stadium. Just as I was unimpressed with going to the actual, real, live Olympic games. The excited circus feeling in my stomach was merely the man-hunter’s natural sensation as he closes in on his quarry. Straight ahead were food pavilions and concessions of one kind or another. Beyond was the Maisonneuve Sports Center, to my right the Maurice Richard Arena, to my left the Velodrome and, beyond it, looming like the Colosseum, the gray, not quite finished, monumental stadium. Cheering surged up from it. We started up the long winding ramp toward the stadium. As we went I sucked in my stomach.
Hawk said, “Kathie say this Zachary a bone-breaker.”
“How big is he?”
Hawk said, “Kath?”
“Very big,” she said.
“Bigger than me,” I said, “or Hawk?”
“Oh yes. I mean really big.”
“I weigh about two hundred pounds,” I said. “How much would you say he weighs?”
“He weighs three hundred five pounds. I know. I heard him tell Paul one day.”
I looked at Hawk. “Three hundred five?”
“But he only six feet seven,” Hawk said.
“Is he fat, Kathie?” I was hopeful.
“No, not really. He used to be a weightlifter.”
“Well, so, Hawk and I do a lot on the irons.”
“No, I mean like those Russians. You know, a real weightlifter, he was the champion of somewhere.”
“And he looks like a Russian weightlifter?”
“Yes, like that. Paul and he used to watch them on television. He has that fat look that you know is strong.”
“Well, anyway, he won’t be hard to spot.”
“Harder here than most places,” Hawk said.
“Yeah. Let’s be careful and not try to put the arm on Alexeev or somebody.”
Hawk said, “This dude trying to save Africa too?”
“Yes. He... he hates blacks worse than anyone I’ve seen.”
“That helps,” I said. “You can reason with him, Hawk.”
“I got something under my coat for reasoning.”
“If we run into him we’re going to have trouble shooting. There’s too many people.”
“You think we should wrestle him, maybe?” Hawk said. “You and me good, babe, but we ain’t used to no giants. And we got that other mean little sucker we got to think of.”
We were at the gate. We handed in our tickets and then we were inside. There were several tiers. Our tickets were for tier one. I could hear the crowd roaring inside now. I was dying to see.
I said, “Hawk, you and Kathie start circling that way, and I’ll go this way. We’ll start at the first level and work up. Be careful. Don’t let Paul spot you first.”
“Or old Zach,” Hawk said. “I be especially careful about Zach.”
“Yeah. We’ll keep working up to the top tier, then start back down again. If you spot them, stay with them. We’ll eventually intersect again as long as we stay in the stadium. ”
Hawk and Kathie started off. “If you see Zachary,” Hawk said over his shoulder, “and you want to do him in, it okay. You don’t have to wait for me. You free to take him right there.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I think you ought to have a shot at the racist bastard.”
Hawk went off with Kathie. He seemed to glide. I wasn’t so sure he couldn’t handle Zachary. I went off the other way, trying to glide. I seemed to be doing pretty well. Maybe I could manage Zachary too. I was as ready as I was going to be. Pale blue Levis, white polo shirt, blue suede Adidas with three white stripes, a blue blazer and a plaid cap for disguise. The blazer didn’t go but it provided cover for the gun on my hip. I was tempted to limp a little so people would think I was a competitor, temporarily out of action. Decathlon maybe. No one seemed to be paying me any attention so I didn’t bother. I went up the ramp to the first-level seating. It was better than I had imagined. The stadium seats were colorful, yellow and blue and such, and when I came out of the passageway there was a bright blaze of color. Below the stadium floor was bright green grass, ringed with red running track. Directly below me and near the side of the stadium, girls were doing the long jump. They had on white tops mostly, with large numbers affixed, and very high-cut tight shorts. The electronic scorekeeper was to my left near the pit where the jump finished. Judges in yellow blazers were at the start point, the take-off line, and the pit. A girl from West Germany started down the track in that peculiar long-gaited stride that long jumpers have, nearly straight-legged. She fouled at the take-off line.
In the middle of the stadium, men were throwing the discus. They all looked like Zachary. An African discus thrower had just launched one. It didn’t look very good, and it looked even worse a minute later when a Pole threw one far beyond it.