Free Boxer, Beetle by Ned Beauman

table for a second time. ‘Aloysius Somebody.’
    ‘Aloysius Fielding,’ said Kölmel. ‘Won’t be any trouble. Long as our kid shows a little bit of discipline. Right, Seth?’
    ‘You’ll make your name, Sinner,’ said Frink. ‘Straight into the big leagues.’
    ‘How much are the tickets?’ said Berg.
    ‘Two dollars, if you can’t get an Annie Oakley,’ said Kölmel.
    ‘I think I can stretch to that.’
    ‘Whose is this?’ said Sinner. He was holding up a Bulova men’s wristwatch with a black strap. ‘It was on the floor.’
    ‘Oh, that’s Balfour’s,’ said Siedelman.
    ‘Why would he have taken off his watch?’ said Berg. ‘Oh dear. Can we catch him up?’
    ‘He’ll be on the subway by now.’
    ‘We’ll telephone. His wife may be at home.’
    ‘She’s at her mother’s house on Long Island.’
    ‘His maid, then,’ said Berg. He took down his huge leather-bound address book, which his friends sometimes referred to as
The Book of Life (Lower East Side Edition)
even though most of its hundreds of crinkled pages were long out of date. Sinner leaned over to watch as his finger slid down past Paliakov, Papirny, Pasternak, Patsuk and Pazy to Pearl.
    But there was no one at home to answer Berg’s call. He shrugged. ‘I will try again tomorrow.’
    They talked about boxing for a little longer, and then Sinner said, ‘’Scuse me,’ and got up. Kölmel looked at Frink. When Sinner had gone for a piss earlier on Kölmel had waited outside the door of the lavatory, having already checked that it had no window big enough to climb out of. But now both men were sated and sluggish, so it wasn’t until four or five minutes had passed that Frink got up to check on Sinner. And by that time, the boy was almost on East Broadway.
    On his way out he’d snatched Kölmel’s wallet from his coat, which had been hung up in Berg’s hall. In the wallet was twelve dollars. And he still had the watch, although he didn’t think he had much chance of pawning it at this time of night.
    Before long he found a liquor store. They had real imported London dry gin but it was too expensive, so he bought a bottle of bourbon and some boiled sweets. Outside, he saw three chaffinches pecking at some cigarette butts. Did American birds eat ash? He hailed a cab.
    ‘Where to?’ said the driver.
    ‘259 West 70 Street,’ said his passenger.
    Sinner was not the sort of drunk who made a sighing, squinting, groaning, chuckling performance out of how much he enjoyed his first pint of beer after a long day, and he was certainly not the sort of drunk who got shakes or sweats if he went without – and he had a lot of contempt for either of those failings. But there was still half a smile on his face as he sipped his bourbon.
    ‘West 70th.’
    ‘Yeah. Is Times Square on the way?’
    ‘If you want.’
    ‘Go through Times Square.’
    The light in Times Square seemed like the light that would bleed out of any solid object in this world if you could somehow scourge away its surface. Sinner was astonishedby the light, and also by the number of men promenading around outside the bars and restaurants and theatres whose dress and gestures would have fitted in perfectly well at the Caravan. A gaunt old man was out walking his rabbit, which he picked up and held under his arm as he crossed the street, its leather leash over his wrist. Sinner had heard that now during the day they ran soup kitchens here out of the back of old army trucks, but even that temporary dreariness couldn’t dim this place. The taxi got caught in a clot of traffic, and spaced along the nearby pavement Sinner noticed three blokes in smart suits greeting everyone who walked past like an old friend.
    ‘What’s their game?’ said Sinner. ‘Pimps or something?’
    ‘Travel agents,’ the cab driver corrected him. ‘You want to go to Los Angeles, they find three other guys who want to go too, and then they find a guy who’s driving there anyway and they take a