Amen Corner (6 page)

First it was the women's group causing problems during Masters Week, and now there was a very suspicious death. The body had not yet been taken to the morgue, but the medical examiner had already detected signs of trauma.

“Looks like he was strangled,” Garver told Porter. “It could have been one of your members.”

Porter, a slightly heavy man with a thick head of short, graying hair, fixed Garver with a stare that contained all of the dignity and authority that the Augusta National chairman could muster.

“That's horseshit, Leonard,” Porter replied.

“Now, it's not an accusation, David,” Garver said. “How many cabins do you have on the property?”

“Ten. Between the cabins and the residence wings of the clubhouse, we have beds for 105 guests on the grounds.”

“You got somebody in each one this week?”

“We're always filled during the Masters.”

“How many security guards patrolling overnight?”

“A dozen.”

“So you got more than one hundred members, family, players, and employees spending the night here. Could have been any one of them.”

“I'm telling you, Leonard, we're looking for an intruder here.”

“So tell me how this intruder got on the grounds.”

“My guess is he climbed the fence between our 12th hole and the Augusta Country Club. You should be talking to them about their security.”

“We're looking at that, David. But we got to eliminate any suspects who were already on your grounds, too. Now, I need you to be dead honest with me here: Do you know of any individual at the club who had a grudge against this guy?”

“Leonard, our members are not killers,” Porter said. “For Christ's sake, half the members here are too old to strangle a chicken.”

“You know how this looks, David. First Drucker announces she's going to hold another one of her protests. Everybody knows you got members who don't want women, and some who do. Then one of your boys turns up dead in Rae's Creek. My investigators are going to need to talk to your people.”

“I don't want you conducting some goddamn witch hunt, Leonard. We're a private club. Our members expect confidentiality when they join, and as chairman, I intend to protect their privacy.”

“Hell, David, this ain't a church and you ain't a priest,” Garver said.

David Porter paused to form the answer that would most directly address the sheriff's objection. Finally, he said:

“As far as our members are concerned, this is the Vatican, and I am the pope.”

Garver rolled his eyes. He'd rather be dealing with an uneducated car thief than these high-and-mighty tycoons.

“I could subpoena you and force you to give me names,” Garver said.

“You don't want to do that, Leonard,” Porter said. “We want this bastard caught more than you do. But nobody here is a killer.”

“It ain't for you to decide who did it,” Garver said. “That's our job.”

“Then I suggest you do it, Leonard.”

“Dammit, how'm I supposed to do my job when you won't cooperate? You think a bottle of George Dickel and a couple of Masters Badges lets you people hold yourselves above the law?”

“I can't stop you from talking to our members,” Porter said. “But you'll be wasting your time.”

“You're tellin' me,” Garver said. “You've got 300 members.”

“Now it's two hundred ninety-nine,” Porter corrected him. “And I'll vouch for every one of them.”

Chapter Five

The assistant pro ran his finger down the day's tee sheet on his clipboard and told Sam that he could get him out with Al Barber in about 45 minutes.

Sam knew his Masters history. Al Barber had won the tournament—and his lifetime exemption—during one of those years when Nicklaus was slumping, Palmer was fading, and Watson had not yet arrived. Playing with him would be an advantage. Even if Barber couldn't hit the shots anymore, he had 40 years of course knowledge, if he were willing to share it.

“Your caddie will be Dwight Wilson,” the caddiemaster said to Sam. “He's waiting to meet you in front of the locker room.”

Sam walked through the breezeway between the pro shop and the bag room and up the sidewalk to the locker room entrance, where an enormous black man in a white jumpsuit was waiting for him by the door with his golf bag.

The caddie extended his huge hand and shook Sam's with a firm but gentle grip—that of an experienced caddie, who would know that a golfer with crushed fingers wasn't going to earn him any money.

“Morning, Mr. Sam,” the caddie said. “Dwight Wilson.”

Sam assumed it was standard Masters caddie lingo to address players as “Mr. Phil” or “Mr. Ernie,” but this formality made him uncomfortable.

“Please just call me Sam,” Sam said. “You're the boss this week.”

“Yes, sir,” Dwight said. “But I'm here to help you. Ask me anything at all. There's nothing I don't know about this golf course.”

Dwight had a clean-shaven baby face, round jowls, and warm, friendly eyes shaded by his green Masters cap. Sam liked his face; he looked like he wouldn't be afraid to tell you what you needed to hear, even if you didn't want to hear it. He must have weighed 300 pounds, but appeared to be very strong. He slung Sam's bag over his shoulder as though it were a school kid's backpack, and they started walking across the parking lot to the practice range.

“I've heard all about you,” Dwight said. “You beat those college kids last summer.”

“Kind of a fluke,” Sam said. “I had a good week.”

“We're gonna have another good week right here,” Dwight said.

“It's a bad deal for you that amateurs can't accept prize money,” Sam said. “Ten percent of my winnings is squat.”

“Don't matter to me,” Dwight said. “I'm just glad to have a bag.”

“How long have you caddied at the Masters?”

“Since 1980. Three years before the club let the pros start bringing their own caddies here. Now, some years I get a bag, some years I don't.”

“What about the other caddies here?” Sam asked.

“Some still caddie for the members, like I do. Some quit. They made more at the Masters than they could make caddying the rest of the year.”

“Must be tough to get by.”

“We do all right. You can get out three, four times a week with the members, except for summer, when they close the place. And a lot of us make money on the side. I'm gettin' too old to do this full-time.”

“I'll bet you're named after Dwight Eisenhower, right?” Sam said as they emerged from the roped-off corridor onto the practice range.

“That's right,” Dwight said. “My mama met the president many times. She used to clean the cabins at the National. Says he was the nicest man she ever met at this club, except right after a round of golf. Then he could be a little out of sorts. One time when she knew he was kind of low about the way he'd played, she thanked him for winning the war. He cheered right up and said, ‘You're welcome, Helen.'”

Green mesh bags of range balls from every major manufacturer were piled up on a table at the right side of the range. Sam grabbed a bag of Pro V1s and found a spot on the range next to a bandy-legged older man wearing green checked pants, a white polo shirt, and a white Hogan-style snap-brim cap. He turned to Sam and introduced himself.

“Al Barber,” the man said, his eyes looking Sam up and down as though trying to guess his scoring ability from the way he dressed and carried himself. He took off his hat, revealing a silver crewcut, and extended his hand.

Sam shook the man's firm, knobby, age-spotted hand. He saw a determined glint in Barber's eye, the look of a competitor—even at his advanced age, the look of a champion.

“I saw a film of your Masters win on the Golf Channel.”

“I love that film,” Barber said. “Especially the ending.”

Dwight walked over to Barber's caddie, put an arm around him and gave him a soul handshake.

“This is my cousin, Chipmunk,” Dwight said, introducing him to Sam. “How you doin' this morning, Mr. Al?”

“Couldn't be better, Dwight.”

“Looks like they've got us playing a practice round together,” Sam said.

“Terrific,” Barber said. “I hope you brought some money.”

Sam began to stretch, holding his sand wedge out in front of him, one hand on the grip end and one hand on the hosel, and twisted slowly around without moving his feet until he could look behind him and see the player who had walked up to the hitting station to his left.

It was Shane Rockingham.

Sam turned all the way around in the opposite direction, still keeping his feet planted, until he could once again see behind him. It wasn't the Rockingham he remembered from college. He still had the same babe-magnet features—the thick dark hair, the two-day growth and the sleepy-looking eyes—but he'd lost weight and added muscle. As he stretched, his chiseled torso and knotted biceps looked as though they were going to rip through the fabric of his golf shirt. No wonder his nickname on tour was “The Rock.”

“There he is,” Rockingham said when he noticed Sam watching him. “What's new, Sam?”

“Since the last time we saw each other? Pretty much everything.”

Rockingham reached over and squeezed Sam's outstretched hand with a grip like a trash compactor.

“You've been working out,” Sam said.

“You noticed,” Rockingham said. “Yeah, I'm in the Tour fitness trailer five days a week. With all the money to be made out here, the guys who don't use it are idiots.”

“I'd rather sit in the shade with a cool drink,” Barber said, overhearing their conversation.

“You've earned a rest, Al,” Rockingham said. “You got a game this morning?”

“Just me and Skarda here.”

“Mind if Cody Menninger and I join you?”

“Your money is as good as anyone else's,” Barber said.

“You ever hear from any of the guys?” Rockingham asked Sam, though his tone suggested it was a perfunctory question. The son of a Detroit auto executive, Rockingham never had much in common with his college teammates—like Sam, who was the son of a Minneapolis cop.

“Now and then,” Sam said. “We usually talk about seeing you on TV.”

Rockingham nodded and continued with his stretching routine. Sam was still astounded by the physical transformation. He'd heard rumors that some guys on the pro tour were experimenting with steroids. Rockingham certainly looked like he might use substances stronger than milk and Wheaties.

“You seem to be taking better care of yourself,” Sam said. “I remember you sleeping it off in a Dunkin' Donuts parking lot the night before the Penn Invitational.”

“I've grown up since then.”

Rockingham bent at the waist and twisted from side to side several times, then straightened up.

“You're a cop now, right?” he said to Sam.

“Yeah.”

“What's that like?”

“Pretty much like TV, except for the tidy endings and the hot women.”

“So why do it? Can't be for the money.”

“No, the money sucks. But I do like sending assholes to prison.”

“Somebody else could do it.”

“I know. I'm on a leave of absence now. I'm trying to decide whether to go back, or try something else.”

“It's tough out here if you don't already have your name on your bag,” Rockingham said. “A lot of amateurs qualify for one Masters and think they can go pro. Most of them, you never hear from again.”

“I'm not going pro,” Sam said. “I know I'm not good enough.”

Sam turned back to his pile of balls and tried to concentrate on his warm-up routine. He would have felt self-conscious about hitting balls in front of so many critical eyes, but he realized that the crowd that had gathered in the grandstand behind him was there to watch Rockingham.

Rockingham's caddie was a skinny man with a droopy moustache and tattoos on his neck. The other tour caddies called him Weed, for reasons Sam could guess. Weed knelt next to his pile of range balls while his boss finished his stretching—or posing, as Sam would have described it. Then the floor show began.

After each shot Rockingham hit, Weed picked up a new ball and threw it directly at his boss' head. Rockingham caught each ball in his right hand with a loud smack, dropped it on the grass in front of him and exploded through the shot, grunting at impact like a pro tennis player delivering a 140-mph serve as ball after ball went screaming down the range. Then he stuck out his right hand to catch another fastball from his caddie. The crowds in the bleachers behind the range seemed to enjoy the pitch-and-catch act as much as the long, rifle-crack iron shots. Sam was as entertained as anyone. Weed turned around to look at him