He stood alone. Headlights merged in the center of the courtyard and insects spun over the white haze as if it were a pool. Across it, the kid stood and squinted back. Had that jab been the first tap of knowledge? There was a lot of sound from such a small crowd. He’d always had the sense that toward the end of a fight the paying public wanted to climb into the ring to deliver the last decisive blows. He remembered how once on the mesa a horse broke its legs, and he and some other kids had had to stone the animal to death. It took a long time to kill a horse with stones.

The kid went right at the cut. In the middle of the court, Joe backpedaled and jabbed. Against the cars, he covered up, locking his fists against his cheeks, his elbows over the solar plexus, accepting the punishment on the ribs until he could escape. The kid winged first combinations and then single shots. An effusion, an undiminishing supply of rage, a hook to the kidney, to the ear, then the cross to the cut, like a busy sculptor working on a statue he passionately hated. Joe staggered, ducked, clinched and backpedaled until Hilario called time again.

On the hood of the patrol car, Hilario’s pockets were misshapen from the money he’d stuffed into them. He watched Joe carefully, looked at the kid.

Ray rubbed Joe’s back and massaged his arms. “Drop the fucker.”

The kid came out with another rush of punches, each punch a complaint from a small, withered soul. Joe answered with a fluid jab twice as fast as any other he’d thrown, but soft, just enough to tell the boy I understand. Understanding was contagious. The kid circled instead of wading in. Good as he was, he had never fought more than three rounds before. This was the fourth. He still hit hard, but he leaned on the jab and wound up for the hook. Joe slipped the hook and countered to the heart, a probe, a gesture of rising interest in the boy’s condition. Also an announcement: We are at a new level. The kid jabbed for time, for an opportunity to rethink the changing context. His jabs were short. Joe snapped a jab off the kid’s nose and for a moment the little eyes were glass.