Books & Rough Business

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47 Tullio Pironti X My commitment to boxing came after I’d turned fifteen. My father’s fencing impressed me terrifically, yes, and I would’ve loved to take after him. But the family could no longer afford for me to pick up even a mask and rapier, let alone pay for lessons. And bicycling was another passion, in those days when everyone was either behind Fausto Coppi or Michele Bartoli, and both had swept the Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France. But a proper bicycle setup cost even more than fencing gear. Boxing, ah, that cost nothing . Even The Fire Eater over in Piazzetta Miraglia had the equipment you needed to get the excitement in your blood. Soon enough, my teenage imaginings couldn’t stop coming back to it: the gloves, the ring, the man-against-man. And by then I’d spent enough time roving Tribunali and its piazzas to know who could help me arrange lessons. One of the boys with whom I’d kicked around my good leather ball was Vanorio. He was the younger brother of a local celebrity, a Neapolitan singer, one of those who helped make songs like “’O Sole Mio” famous. Vanorio, as I expected, knew the best gym in town. In one of the best neighborhoods: a waterfront zone called La Chiaia (key-AYY-ya), lined with foursquare baronial palaces, their brick or stucco decorated with baroque filigree. Vanorio took me there, about a quarterhour from Piazza Dante, mostly downhill, and then to a doorway under a working neon sign, rare in those days. A gleaming blue script spelled out the name Olimpia. After you passed beneath the buzz, you descended a handsome staircase, and the gym opened up before you, an airy space entirely beneath street level. The ring—I couldn’t help but notice—took 48 Books and Rough Business up the area beneath the stairs. Two boys were training, grunting between the slaps of leather, as Vanorio and I descended. The first man to come towards us had a towel over one arm, and that much I would’ve expected. But his bookworm’s glasses, with lenses like the bottoms of Coke bottles, those were a surprise. Especially when he wore such a tough expression, and asked what we wanted almost as if he were warning us off. “My friend here,” Vanorio responded mildly, “wants to learn how to box.” I got a close looking over, from behind those thick lenses. The man went so far as to briefly grip my bicep. “His name,” Vanorio put in finally, “is Pironti.” The guy could be intimidating, no question. His toughness was obvious and his manner often bordered on rude. Of course I was to get to know him much better, however, and to learn about the caring, even fatherly man beneath the jagged and discomforting surface. This was my Camerlingo, Nino Camerlingo. In those days, he was spoken of as the foremost trainer in the city. “Pironti,” he said now, slowly. “Your family works with books, don’t they? Now what do you do, you go to school?” “No,” I said. “You work in your father’s store, then?” I had to smile at that. “Not really.” He didn’t see anything funny in that. He had one of my hands by then, and he spread my fingers, studying the knuckles. “You’re how old?” he asked. I told him and mentioned my weight as well. All I knew was I had decent bulk, for my age; I would come to learn that my class was welterweight. The trainer went on scowling as he let go. He asked if I had gym shoes, something more appropriate than what I was wearing. Beyond that, he added only a single word: “Monday.” Yet after Camerlingo left me, that first time, I felt so buoyed up, so fascinated , I had to remain in the Olimpia a while longer. I pulled Vanorio over to the ring beneath the stairs, and we watched the two apprentices go at it. I noticed Camerlingo didn’t waste much time with these two, only lifting his gaze once or twice from his folding and cleaning. The two boxers in fact didn’t know much of “the sweet science.” The way they were beating each other up, they might’ve sent another boy straight back to the bookstore. But the following Monday I hoofed it swiftly downhill and up back into the good neighborhood, and then...