Cinderella Man (15 page)

The saucer-shaped, upholstered booths were jammed with well-heeled customers. White-coated waiters raced to and fro, shouldering silver trays brimming with china and crystal. There were no hard times here, not like the grimy world beyond these elegant walls. The world of tenements, wharves, rail yards—of Hooverville and potter's fields.

Jim, Mae, Joe, and Lucille ate, drank, and laughed the night away. Now, with the remains of a fine meal on their plates and the ladies visiting the powder room, Joe and Jim faced each other across the linen-draped table. For a long time, neither spoke. Braddock broke the silence. “Since when did you get quiet?”

Gould chuckled, then grew serious. “These last three fights,” he said in a low voice. “We sure showed 'em, didn't we?”

Braddock glanced at his manager suspiciously.

“Look, I put you in some bad situations,” said Gould. He glanced away then. His mouth moved, but no words came out.

“What are you getting at, Joe?”

Gould squirmed, adjusted his collar. “Jim. You're the toughest kid on the playground. But this Max Baer. It's a whole other thing. You got nothing to prove to me or anyone.”

“You losing faith in me, Joe?”

Gould tapped his index finger on the smooth table top. “Never. Not for one goddamn minute.”

Jim knew it was true, could see it in Gould's eyes. So what was the problem? Why was his manager talking about throwing in the towel before round one?

Mae and Lucille suddenly appeared, hair and makeup restored.

“Jimmy,” Mae purred, running her finger up his arm. “Can we get silver faucets?”

“Yeah, I'll order a dozen.” He curled his arm around her slim waist, pulled her close.

Gould raised his hand. “Now, as promised, the
piece de resistance
.” He yanked a rolled-up newspaper out of his back pocket, slapped it down. “Little bird told me to check the evening edition. Let me see here…”

He flipped through the pages to the sports section, then began to read. “‘Boxer Jim Braddock has come back from the dead to change the face of courage in our nation—'”

Jim blinked. “Who wrote that?”

“Sporty Lewis.”

Joe shook the paper under Jim's nose. He swatted it away. Gould continued where he left off. “‘In a land that's downtrodden, Braddock's comeback is giving hope to every American.'”

Mae curled her fingers around her husband's.

“‘People who were ready to throw in the towel are finding inspiration in their new hero, Jim Braddock.'” Gould paused to scan their faces. “‘As Damon Runyon has already written, he's the Cinderella Man.'”

“Cinderella Man?” Jim didn't look happy.

Mae squeezed his hand. “I like it,” she laughed. “It's girly.”

“Oh, this is going to be fun,” groaned Braddock.

A server arrived to clear the table. Mae's eyes darted to her husband. “Jim.”

He stopped the waiter. “Not quite done here, friend.” The man nodded, slipped away. Mae drew crinkled waxed paper from her purse, carefully emptied each
plate onto it, and folded it around the food scraps. Lucille looked away.

“I'll get the bill,” said Joe, waving the card in his stubby finger. “Johnston's a big spender, and he's leaving a big tip.” He winked. “A
peach
. Gotta love the guy.”

Mae closed her purse, glanced up. Suddenly she tensed.

A broad-shouldered giant had just walked through the front door accompanied by two young women. Glittering playthings in gaudy finery, one hung on each of his brawny arms. But it was the man's shock of black hair, volcanic blue eyes, and savage, dynamic presence that drew everyone's attention. Conversations faded and died as the barbarian in bone-white evening clothes strode confidently to the polished oak bar. In the silence, a man sitting nearby whispered to his female companion. “It's Max Baer.”

Mae touched her husband's arm. “Jimmy…”

Braddock's mood darkened. He turned to Gould. “You think Johnston set this up?”

“Sure. Few extra pics for the dailies,” said Gould. With his manager's eyes, he appraised the fighter leaning against the bar across the room.

At over six feet and close to 200, the bronzed Baer had prime attributes for a ringman—slim waist, massive shoulders, long arms, and strong legs. Baer was also young, twenty-six to Jim's twenty-nine, and he had the deadliest right punch that Gould had ever seen, probably the most powerful in the history of boxing. His record included twenty-four KOs but he hadn't gone undefeated. Back in 1931, he'd lost to Tommy
Loughran, just like Braddock, but Gould knew that Dempsey had coached “Madcap Maxie” afterward, instructing him to shorten his punches to prevent the telegraphing that had cost him the match.

Baer was still a crude swinger, however, and he'd never bothered to develop a left, so Gould knew there were ways to beat him. And yet, he couldn't get that Long Island City Bowl massacre of Primo Carnera out of his head. The Italian giant had gone down eleven times at the business end of Baer's gloves.

Gould's gaze moved over the shapely females on each of Baer's arms, typical accessories for the on-the-town fighter, who'd been romantically linked to movie actresses, chorus girls, and Broadway starlets. There wasn't a more colorful character than Madcap Maxie in the boxing world, and the New York press loved him. Gould could see why. At a time when the country had hit the skids, Baer had made people feel better by having such a good time himself. Whether he made or lost money, Baer kept smiling, kept hitting the Broadway nightspots and picking up the tab. He'd made a movie with Myrna Loy, opened a song-and-dance revue at the Paramount, and had frequent roles in radio dramas.

“Boys, I've got the world by the tail on a downhill pull,” he'd told the press not long ago, “Hollywood, the stage, radio—how that dough is going to roll in. You guys will be writing about how I light cigars with thousand-dollar bills.”

The Roaring Twenties had never stopped for the champ, who'd famously pulled up to New York's Plaza Hotel five years earlier in a sixteen-cylinder Cadillac
driven by a chauffeur. He had ten pairs of trunks and thirty suits of clothes, and an entourage that included a secretary, a manager, and a trainer. But Gould knew Baer had traveled more than just a continent from his beginnings in his father's California slaughterhouse, where he'd killed steers with a sledgehammer, skinned them, and hoisted their carcasses up to drain. With his copy of Emily Post, he'd managed to smooth the rough edges, learning how to order a meal in a fine restaurant, eat salad with the correct fork. Nevertheless, no matter what social circles the heavyweight now traveled in, Gould had no doubt the man was still capable of delivering killing blows.

Joe's attention moved away from Baer when he noticed a white-coated waiter approaching their booth, a silver tray with crystal champagne glasses in one hand, an ice bucket in the other. He set down the tray and pulled a champagne bottle out of the bucket, displaying its label to Braddock and Gould. “From the gentleman at the bar…Mr. Baer said to wish you
Bon voyage
.”

Jim looked at Mae. The blood had run out of her face. He stood. The alarmed waiter backed up.

“Jimmy—” said Gould.

“Get the coats, Joe.”

Unable to grasp the situation, Mae didn't even try to restrain her husband as he crossed the dining room, excited whispers joining gawking expressions all around.

Leaning against the bar, Baer watched him approach, flashed a grin that displayed even, white teeth. His companions, a blond and a redhead, caressed Braddock with curious looks. Max set his martini on the bar, crossed his thick-muscled arms.

“If it ain't Cinderella Man,” Baer bellowed loud enough for the spectators to hear.

They stood toe to toe. “Thanks for the champagne, Mr. Baer. You keep saying in the papers how you're gonna kill me in the ring.”

“Yeah, so?”

“You know I have three little kids. You're upsetting my family.”

Baer leaned into Jim. “Listen to me, Braddock. I'm asking you sincerely not to take this fight.” His tone was unexpected. More of a trusted attorney than a deadly pugilist. Baer paused, scanned the room—wary of being overheard. “People admire you. You seem like a decent fellow. I really don't want to hurt you. It's no joke, pal. People die in fairy tales all the time.”

Max waited for a response. Braddock's gaze was stony. The chandelier above them could have been the sword of Damocles.

Suddenly a flashbulb popped. Shouts. “Max! Jim! Maxie!” A half dozen photographers and reporters burst into the club, running roughshod over the headwaiter. Max whirled to face the camera, showing teeth.

“You know, I was thinking…” Baer's voice was loud, now, the usual hot air inflating his chest. “Smart thing would be to take a fall. Circus act's over, old man.”

Jim's browns met Baer's blues. “I think I'll try going a few rounds with the dancing bear.”

Joe Gould suddenly pushed through the photographers and reporters, appeared between Braddock and Baer.

“That's a good one,” he laughed, too hard. His face darkened. “Okay. Let's keep it in the ring.”

Mae and Lucille stood nearby, wrapped in their coats, watching the confrontation with stunned expressions. Baer noticed Mae, bent low so he could peer into her face.

“You should talk to him, lady. You are sure too pretty to be a widow.”

The women on Baer's arm tittered. Jim balled his fist, leaned forward, ready to lunge. Gould held his fighter back. “Simmer down.”

Baer's smirk was mocking as he consumed Braddock's wife with his admiring gaze. “On second thought, maybe
I
can comfort you after he's gone.”

This time it was Gould who leaped, fists swinging, snarling like a rabid dog.

“Joe!” shouted Lucille.

Braddock seized his manager's coat, dragged him back.

While Jim struggled to keep Joe Gould in check, Mae stepped up to the bar. Baer watched her, his sky-blue eyes curious as she reached out, grabbed his martini, and dashed it in his face.

Flashbulbs popped. Baer chuckled—a deep, menacing rumble. He accepted the attention of one of his girls as she dabbed his white coat with a linen napkin.

“Get that boys?” Baer asked the photographers. “Braddock's got his wife fighting for him.”

Jim thrust Gould aside, stepped up to Max Baer, went nose to nose with his mocking face. The moment lasted long enough for a photographer to capture it for all time.

Then Braddock lips curled, but it wasn't a smile. “Yeah,” he said, “she sure is something, ain't she?”

Braddock turned, took his wife's hand, led her away.
Baer caught Mae's eyes before they left. Jim saw the exchange and a cloud passed over his face. Joe Gould, arm around Lucille, pushed the fighter toward the door.

Baer's laughter followed them into the street.

 

BAER TICKET SALE TO BEGIN

“Now, here's how you work a combination.” Still dressed in his Continental Club clothes, Jim loosened his tie, draped his suit jacket on the back of a chair and knelt on the floor, ready to demonstrate the tricks of his fistic trade to Jay and Howard.

“You have to keep your head down, chin tucked. Like this.” Jim struck a classic boxing pose.

Squinting in concentration, Howard lifted his fists and gamely tried to mimic his father. Jay, a little taller and longer limbed, had an easier time of it, his fighting stance a spitting image of Jim's.

At the basement apartment's cracked sink, Mae stood scouring a cast-iron skillet she'd used to warm the smuggled leftovers for the kids. As her husband
talked, she felt her fingers tightening on the wire brush, her circular motions becoming more violent.

“Okay, now give me a left, right, left,” said Jim.

Skinny arms windmilled, earnestly battling air. When Jay threw his right, he lifted his chin. Jim reached forward, gently bumping his son's jaw with a closed fist.

“Oops,” said Jim with a wink. “See what just happened?”

“Yeah!” Howard cried. “Jay got
clocked.
”

“You know why?”

The boys shook their heads.

“He was so busy punching, he wasn't paying attention.” Jim threw slow-motion punches. “Never take your eyes off your opponent.”

Mae spoke without turning. “That's enough, now.”

Jim glanced at his wife, unable to suppress his pride. “There's more than one fighter in the Braddock family, tell you that.”

Jay bounded around the cramped basement apartment, sparring against an imaginary foe. Howard looked up. “What about the
left
, Dad?”

Jim tucked his own chin, then feinted a straight jab at his son's nose. “Like that?”

Howard followed the jab until his eyes crossed, then nodded enthusiastically. Suddenly, Jay tossed off a right that threw him off balance. The boy slammed into the easy chair, rocking it.

Mae whirled, exploded. “I said that's enough, Jay Braddock!” The dripping skillet slipped from her hand and clattered to the hardwood floor.

The boys froze, doe-eyed. Jim stared too.

Mae clutched the edge of the sink with one hand. She'd tried to be stoic, but her head was pounding, the elegant dinner turned rancid in her stomach. “No boxing in the house. No boxing out of the house. No boxing, period.”

Ignoring her husband, Mae pointed at her slack-jawed sons. “You are going to stay in school. Then college. You are going to have professions. You are not going to get your skulls smashed in, is that clear?”

Before the boys could reply or even retreat, Mae turned her back on her family, yanked open the basement apartment's door and ran out.

Jim hustled the boys off to bed, tucked them in. He comforted Rose Marie, who'd been startled awake by her mother's loud voice.

Mae hugged herself against the damp April chill, her back turned against the dingy apartment house, against her husband. Instead, she faced the dismal silhouettes littering the dark weeds of the tenement's junk-strewn backyard—broken chairs, discarded pipes, and rising above it all a smokestack in the distance spewing choking fumes. A siren wailed somewhere north, and she suddenly saw the smirk of Max Baer in those billowing clouds. The sneer of Sporty Lewis—

“Mrs. Braddock, my question is for you…My readers want to know, how do you feel about the fact that Max Baer has killed two men in the ring?”

Mae heard Jim's steps behind her. He was coming for her, would want to know what was wrong.

“Mae?”

She didn't turn to face him. She just couldn't, not until she told him how she felt. In the distance, the siren's wail faded. She swallowed her nerves, tried to
summon her courage, then finally confessed to her husband the secret she'd kept for so many years.

“I used to pray for you to get hurt—”

Jim stepped back, the words hitting him physically.

“Just enough so you couldn't fight anymore,” she added quickly.

He blinked, speechless.

“And when they took your license, even scared as I was, I went to the church and thanked God for it. I always knew a day might come where a fight could kill you. I just knew…and now it's here.”

Braddock stepped forward, touched her shoulder, turned her to face him. “You're just getting the jitters.”

Mae shook his hand away. “There's more to it.” She closed her eyes and for a moment was back at ringside all those years ago, enduring the spectacle that had made her vow never to watch her husband fight again…

Blood. She'd seen blood before in a boxing match, but never so much, and never so much on Jim. He'd been brutally slammed to the canvas that night, his face bruised, streaked in crimson. And the men around her, the bookies, the reporters, the fight fans, they just kept talking about Jim as if he were some racehorse they'd laid a bet on. “Ain't showin' much stamina,” or “He ain't got the legs,” or “Nix to the odds with this guy…”

Mae opened her eyes in the tenement yard, found her husband's gaze in the shadows. “We've got enough now. Why can't you stop?” Her voice was pleading.

This time it was Jim who turned away.

Mae's fists balled. “He's killed two men, Jim. Why fight him? What's worth it?”

Jim frowned. Stared at the grimy brick wall. “This is what I know how to do.”

Mae watched his broad shoulders. Waited for him to turn back to her, to take her in his arms, to tell her he'd change his mind.

But Jim didn't turn. A part of him wished he could—the part that wanted to be a good husband, to give Mae anything she asked for. But life hadn't made that possible for him. His wife just didn't understand how he felt, how Mike Wilson felt. They were capable, strong, hardworking men, but the world had told them they were helpless, worthless. They were proud husbands and fathers who'd found themselves unable to take care of their wives, their families. He wanted to tell Mae about the thousands of other men living on the streets, in the shantytown Hoovervilles, the ones who'd gathered around him outside the Garden when he'd won the Lasky fight—men who were in the same fix as he was, and who now looked up to the boxer they called the Cinderella Man with something like hope in their eyes.

Jim struggled to find the right words, then turned and slowly shared them. “I have to believe I have some say over our lives, see? That sometimes, I can change things. If I don't…It's like I'm dead already.”

Mae bit her lip, seeing the stubbornness in her husband's face. “I need you to be safe…so much.”

Jim lifted his chin. “Look around, Mae. Nothing's safe anymore.”

Mae's anxiety shrank and her rage rose. Her husband appeared to be brushing off her fears as inconsequentially as snowflakes from his sleeve. In her mind,
he was treating her the very same way he had last summer, when she'd stood in this very yard and pleaded with him not to return to the ring. But she wasn't backing down this time, she told herself. This time was different. This was his life.

“I stood by until now. For all of it.” Mae's eyes, damp with tears of fright had turned to stone. “But not for this, Jim. I just can't.”

“Mae—”

“So you train all you want. Make a show of it for yourself, for the newspapers. But you find a way out of this fight, Jim.” Mae's voice went cold. “Break your hand again, if you have to. But if you set foot out of this door to fight Max Baer, I won't be behind you anymore.”

 

On June 13, 1935, Joe Gould pulled his roadster up to the curb, cut the engine. He stepped onto the sun-washed sidewalk, blinking against the glare. It was early—too early for reporters to show, to ask endless questions and take endless photographs. Too early, even, for the milk man. But it was already uncomfortably hot on the streets of Union City, outside Joe Jeannette's gym and Gould knew it was bound to get hotter as the day progressed.

He paused at the gym's front door to savor what remained of his morning cigar. Though Gould hadn't crossed the river in three days, he had been working harder than ever. Full time, and then some. All for Jim Braddock.

While keeping the public happy and hungry, and the fistic press close and at bay at the same time, Gould
was also trying to line up contracts to secure Braddock's future. Not fight contracts, either—these were deals for testimonials, endorsements, appearances, for advertisements and speeches. Lucrative contracts signed in advance and set to pay off in the event that Braddock won the championship title.

Boxing tradition allowed the heavyweight champ a two-year grace period before he was required to fight another challenger. That unwritten law allowed fighters who battled their way to the top spot an opportunity to make real money, provide for their retirement from the ring. With odds running ten to one against Braddock, Gould wasn't having an easy time securing the best deals. But he refused to accept anything less.

“When Jimmy wins the title, you'll be back,” he'd told anyone with doubts. “And by then the price will have doubled—tripled, even.”

Gould's goal was to make sure that at the end of the day, Braddock received one of the biggest paydays of all times. It was the least he could do for the man who would step into the ring with Max Baer that very evening, the man he had pushed to the limits of his physical and mental endurance each and every day for the past six months.

 

An example of this intensity had come early on, with the manager's choice of sparring partners. Though Gould retained Joe Jeannette's picks—including George Robbins, the quick and wiry welterweight—he also recruited a quartet of sturdy sluggers from across the country. The biggest of the bunch was Paul Pross, a two-hundred-ten-pound German boxer whose father died on the Western Front the day he was born. Not
only did Pross outweigh Braddock, he also had a longer reach.

Norm Barnett was another heavyweight. A former University of Maryland fullback who came in at 205, he ducked and swayed better than most champs, and he punched like a mule kick.

For stamina, Gould found Jack McCarthy, a beefy Massachusetts Irishman who'd sparred with Jack Sharkey and was still quick on his feet after hours of grueling work. For quickness and hitting power, Gould hired Don Petrin, a speed artist who'd been kicked out of Max Schmeling's camp for showing up the German in front of the national press.

“Together they formed the best set of sparring partners to prepare a heavyweight since Dempsey's days,” wrote Lud, sports reporter for Union City's
Hudson Dispatch
. Similarly, in his own column, Sporty Lewis compared the preparations for the Baer versus Braddock bout with the hoopla leading up to the Dempsey–Tunney title fight of 1924.

Gould thought it an apt observation. Back in 1924, after studying Jack Dempsey's technique on film, Gene Tunney easily evaded the champ's rushes to be crowned the new heavyweight champion. It helped that Dempsey was overconfident and out of shape as a result of his playboy lifestyle, and there was a parallel here too. Max Baer had not stopped making outrageous statements to the press about how easily he was going to defeat Jim Braddock. His latest demand—that an ambulance be posted at the Madison Square Garden Bowl to rush Braddock to a local hospital—was only the latest in a long string of contemptuous stunts. To Gould, Baer's hot air sounded an awful lot like over
confidence, which was something Braddock, like Gene Tunney, could exploit.

Also in the spirit of the Dempsey vs. Tunney bout, Braddock had made good use of Max Baer's fight footage provided by Jimmy Johnston. At the start of training, Braddock, Gould, and Joe Jeannette reviewed those films daily for hours at a time, often watching two or three fights in the same sitting.

“Watch him,” said Jeannette when they viewed the Primo Carnera title fight. “After all this time, Baer's still a sharpshooter. Dempsey tried to fix him but it didn't stick. Madcap Maxie still telegraphs every move.”

Jeannette, as intent as Braddock in going for Baer's jugular, ran the footage back and forth until the film broke. While Jeannette and Jim talked strategy, Gould—who'd watched Baer's power punches with mounting dread—secretly concluded that strategy could get Jim Braddock only so far. Probably not far enough.

After that, sparring became all-out war with both sides taking punishment. By early May, the workouts at Jeannette's gym had become furious punching bees with six, seven, even eight three-minute-round bouts mounted every afternoon around four o'clock. During these grueling marathons, Gould alternated sparring partners so that Jim faced a fresh fighter every single round.

The press was surprised to find there was real boxing going on at Joe Jeannette's gym, and flocked to see more. In the early going, Braddock's performance did not impress those who witnessed it. Heavyweights
Pross and McCarthy connected regularly with right handers—so many that one newspaper reported that Braddock had been “hit fifty times on the lug in eight rounds.” Other sportswriters wondered whether the challenger and his manager had gone complete crazy. Things had become so brutal that Braddock's training camp became known as Murderers' Row.

But if Gould was crazy, there was a method in his madness. Every day Braddock was learning how to withstand right-hand punches, and how to block them too. In the long run, these harsh tactics paid off in spades. By the beginning of June, less than two weeks before the fight, Gould and Jeannette both agreed that Jim Braddock was in the finest shape of his boxing career. Though Jeannette voiced doubts about Jim's ribs, both agreed that Braddock could easily go a full fifteen rounds.

That same afternoon, Murray Robinson of the Newark
Star Eagle
had heard Gould, in a burst of exuberance, crow, “Look at Braddock, will you! He's going to be in wonderful shape, if he lives!”