Part 8 (2/2)

In 1991, a few weeks after he pummeled Gilbert Dele to win the WBA world junior middleweight t.i.tle, Vinny woke up in the hospital with a broken neck. A car crash had cracked his third and fourth vertebrae. Doctors told him he would never fight again. He was lucky he could even move his legs. Three months after the accident, he limped out of the hospital with a medieval-looking brace still screwed to his skull and went right into the gym. Just thirteen months later, he outpointed former WBC world super welterweight champion Luis Santana in a tune-up fight and set his sights on bigger things.

Over his twenty-one-year ring career, Vinny took some beatings. Hector ”Macho” Camacho bloodied him. Roger Mayweather and the great Roy Jones Jr. knocked him around the ring. But along the way, he beat the legendary Roberto Duran twice, and by the time his final fight ended with a victory in 2004, he was a five-time world champion. His final pro record: ten losses and fifty wins, thirty of them by knockout.

When I walked into the gym Joseph was already at work, his fists thudding against one of the heavy bags hanging on a chain from the ceiling. Each time he slugged the bag, it swung away from him as if it feared for its life. He had to wait for it to swing back so he could punish it again.

”Hold this f.u.c.kin' thing still for me, will ya?” he said.

I stood behind the bag and steadied it while Joseph clubbed it with lefts and rights. He fired a ten-punch combination of hooks and uppercuts, backed off to catch his breath, and then went at it again. He completed his workout with a flurry of blows that traveled through the bag, up my arms, and down the length of my spine. Then he backed away, snorted like a bull, and said, ”Your turn.”

Joseph showed me how to wrap my hands with strips of two-inch-wide cloth, weaving it between each finger, over each knuckle, and back around the wrist to protect the joints and tendons. When I was ready, I approached the bag and threw a couple of tentative left jabs. I tried a right cross, a left hook, a right uppercut, and found a rhythm. I liked the smacking sound my fists made when they met the bag. It felt good to be beating on something that didn't hit back.

Afterward, we reconvened over beers at Hopes.

”You beat the c.r.a.p out of that bag,” I said. ”That how you hit King Felix when he pulled a gun on you?”

”f.u.c.k, no. a.s.shole wouldn't still be walkin' around, I hit him like that.”

He chugged his Bud and waved for another. ”You know,” he said, ”you smacked the bag pretty good yourself. For a rookie. Got some pop in that skinny-a.s.s frame.”

”Maybe we can do it again sometime.”

”Sure. Anytime you want.”

When the waitress arrived with his beer, I ordered another for myself, but I was already two beers behind him.

”I need to ask you something,” I said.

”If it's for the f.u.c.kin' paper, I ain't got nothin' to say.”

”Off the record,” I said.

”That means you won't write what I tell you?”

”That's what it means.”

”What, then?”

”Think the Maniellas could be making child p.o.r.n?”

Joseph's face drained of color. ”Do you?” he said.

”I don't know. That's why I'm asking.”

”I ain't ever heard nothin' like that,” he said. ”If I thought they was...” He clenched his fist and shot a right jab past my ear.

”One more question.”

”Still off the, uh...”

”Off the record. Right.”

”What?”

”Ever heard the Maniellas or anybody who works for them mention a guy named Charles Wayne?”

”Who the f.u.c.k is that?”

13.

The Brown University Medical School's official name is the Warren Alpert Medical School. Despite what it says on the stationery, n.o.body calls it that. Aside from getting sick and dying, Alpert didn't have anything to do with medicine. He was the founder of Xtra Mart, a convenience store chain that keeps America hooked on nicotine, caffeine, and high-fructose corn syrup. But he gave the medical school a hundred million dollars a couple of months before his death.

Dr. Charles B. Wayne, the school's dean of medicine and biological sciences, had an office on the third floor of the Metcalf Infant Research Laboratory just off Waterman Street. I had no reason to think he was connected to the Maniellas, but outing a Brown honcho as a pedophile would make a h.e.l.l of a story.

I found a parking spot across from the building and saw that the front door was blocked by a knot of people waving hand-lettered picket signs: ”Brown Trains Abortionists.” ”Thank G.o.d for Abortion Clinic Bombers.” ”G.o.d Hates Brown.” ”G.o.d Hates Rhode Island.” ”G.o.d Hates America.” And just so everything was covered: ”G.o.d Hates the World.”

As I started up the walk, a lean septuagenarian in a porkpie hat and a long black coat separated himself from the group, tottered up to me, and placed a skeletal hand on my shoulder. He reminded me of Reverend Kane, the creepy old man played by Julian Beck in Poltergeist II. For a moment, I was afraid he was going to deliver the scariest line in the movie: ”Are you lost, sweetheart? Are you 'fraid, honey? Well then, why don't you come with me?”

What he did say wasn't much better: ”Do not enter this house of evil, brother. Heed my words or you will be doomed to eternal h.e.l.lfire.”

”Thanks for the heads-up,” I said, and brushed by him.

He yanked my shoulder with unexpected strength and spun me back to him. ”Pray with me,” he said, ”and let us save your immortal soul.”

”Don't go to any trouble on my account,” I said. ”It's too late for me anyway.”

”It's never too late to turn your back on Satan and return to the righteous path, brother.”

I extended my hand, and he shook it. ”My name is Mulligan,” I said, ”and you must be Reverend Lucas Crenson of the Sword of G.o.d. I've seen your picture in the paper.”

”At your service,” he said, removing his hat to display a few wisps of white hair on a s.h.i.+ny bald pate. Then he honored me with a theatrical bow from the waist. Gee. I guess he'd seen the movie, too.

”Look, Reverend,” I said, ”I don't work in there. I'm a reporter for the Dispatch. I'm going inside to see if I can expose the evils that lurk within.”

”Don't you lie to me, boy!”

”It's the truth. I swear.”

”On your soul?”

”On my immortal soul,” I said, although I wasn't sure I had one.

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