It seemed like there were a hundred people in the ring. They hoisted Jake onto their shoulders and waltzed him back and forth from one set of ring ropes to another. He felt like a dead man sitting on top of the world. When they put him down, Thelma Pearl was in the ring, looking petulant and bothered. He grabbed her, lifted her up, spun her around. When he put her down, she slapped his swollen mug. There was blood all over her new gold dress. She rubbed at it furiously. Jake tried to tell her over the din that soda water would take it out, but Thelma Pearl ignored him, wet her fingers with saliva, rubbed at a spot. Damn you, Jake McCloskey. Damn you, you stupid hillbilly. I can’t get this damned spot out. Look at this. You’ve ruined this dress, it’s just plain ruined. How can one man have so much blood in him?

By the time they got things calmed down in the ring, she was gone. Lionel Kane sat on his stool, glowering at Jake while his cornermen waved smelling salts under his nose. Kane had won the fight. No doubt about it. Won every bit of it except that last punch. Jake knew it, Kane knew it. Maybe the damned fools in the crowd didn’t know, but Jake knew. Kane and Jake, Bucky Betz and Herb Ferren, Thelma Pearl. Five people who knew he was done, no matter what the papers had to say. No matter what pile of hooey Ed Floate cooked up to keep Moe from cutting his balls off.

Moe Spitzer wasn’t one of those who had figured it out. He blew cigar smoke in Jake’s face. “Never in doubt, boychik. Never in doubt. With a fuckin punch like that, you got to be champ. You had me worried there a time or two, but I knew you’d drop that jig.”

Jake grinned a wobbly grin. Moe’s face came into focus and faded again. The lights were too bright and the ring was spinning. His legs gave way. He fell, crashing facedown onto the canvas.

When he came to, he was lying on a table in the dressing room with Bucky and Herb the cut man trying to clean him up. He was still there when Thelma Pearl marched in, still mad over the blood on her dress, Moe Spitzer with her. Moe was laughing.

“First time I ever seen the winnah carried outa the ring on a fuckin stretcher, I’ll tell you that much. The winnah! Hey, it don’t matter how you leave the fuckin ring, it’s what you do when you’re in there, am I right?”