Amen Corner (21 page)

“Bullshit!” Rockingham yelled, causing the other players in the locker room to look up quickly. He put his pants back on and followed Sam to the oak tree, where Weed confirmed that he'd counted the clubs three times, with Caroline watching.

“This is your doing,” Rockingham said, glaring at Caroline.

“If you mean, your caddie wouldn't have turned you in if I hadn't been there, then yes, it's my doing,” she said.

“So what am I supposed to do now?”

“The right thing,” Sam said.

“You were a lot of things when we were together, but you were never a cheat,” Caroline said. “On the golf course, anyway.”

“Let's take care of this,” Rockingham said, stalking back toward the scorer's hut.

Rockingham told the official scorer that he'd just found out he had played the round with 15 clubs. Caroline and Weed confirmed it. Robert Brisbane and Ralph Stanwick were both summoned to the scorer's hut, and Rockingham explained again what had happened.

“Robert, there's got to be some way that I don't end up DQ'd for this,” Rockingham said, but Brisbane shook his head.

“I'm sorry, Shane,” he said. “I wish there was something I could do, but the rules are clear. You signed for a lower score than you shot. Then you left the scorer's area. We have no choice.”

“But I never left the grounds. I was in the locker room.”

“That's not the scorer's area,” Stanwick said. He turned to the scorer and said: “Disqualified.”

“Fuck!” Rockingham said, slamming his hand on the table. Then he turned to Weed.

“You're fired.”

Rockingham stormed out of the scorer's hut, banging the door shut behind him, but a moment later he opened the door again, and said to Caroline, “You're going to wish you'd never come here.”

Sam stayed with Caroline until she assured him she was all right, then he followed Rockingham to the locker room. The pro was angrily stuffing his belongings into a travel bag. Sam came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Shane, for some reason I thought you had more class than that…”

Rockingham turned quickly and threw a right cross at Sam, who was half-expecting it, and managed to duck away. He used Rockingham's momentum to pull him forward and shove him into a bank of lockers. Rockingham bounced off the lockers and came at Sam again, his eyes blazing and his right hand pulled back to throw another punch. Sam almost felt sorry for him, but sentiment didn't stop him from blocking the punch with his forearm and delivering one hard punch of his own to Rockingham's ribs. The blow dropped Rockingham to the floor, doubled over in pain.

“You might want to call Harbor Town and tell them you're withdrawing next week,” Sam said as he turned to leave the locker room. “Those ribs are going to hurt for a while.”

*

Sam returned to the scoring hut and found Caroline. He didn't tell her about what happened in the locker room. A red “DQ” went up next to Rockingham's name on the scoreboard next to the first fairway just as Sam and Caroline passed by the big oak tree on their way to the caddie building.

“Hey, Skarda! Over here!”

Russ Daly's gruff voice pierced through the crowd noise. He waved them over to the roped-off media area under the oak.

“What the hell happened out there?” Daly asked.

Sam explained that Rockingham discovered after his round that he'd had 15 clubs in his bag. He turned himself in, but he'd already signed for a 65, instead of a 69, and the tournament officials had to disqualify him. Sam looked at Caroline and she nodded; that was going to be her version of the story, too.

“Why didn't he find out until after the round?” another reporter asked.

“His caddie forgot to count them,” Caroline said.

“And you are?” a third reporter asked Caroline. She identified herself as Sam's caddie, and spelled her name as more print reporters and TV crews began to swarm around them.

“You're also married to Shane Rockingham,” said a reporter whose media badge identified him as a reporter for Golf World. “You used to caddie for Shane. You two are separated now, right?”

“That's right, but before you jump to conclusions, this wasn't payback or anything like that,” Caroline said. “Weed discovered the mistake. Shane didn't know anything about it until Weed came forward.”

The reporters pressed for more details, but Caroline stuck to the story: It was an innocent mistake, and Rockingham and Weed called it on themselves. That was all she knew. A few of the reporters rushed off to try to find Rockingham and Weed before they left the club. Russ Daly and the others lingered.

“Did you hear the other big news?” he asked Sam.

“What news?”

“They just found Danny Milligan at his home,” Daly said. “He was murdered.”

“That's awful,” Caroline said.

“They won't be lowering the flags in the Founders Circle to half-staff,” Daly said.

“How was he killed?” Sam asked.

“Last night somebody went to his house and cut his throat,” a TV reporter said. “He was left outside for the fire ants to work on him.”

“Fire ants?”

“Seems our killer is a bit of a sadist,” Daly said. “He spread some kind of bait on Milligan, and the fire ants ate most of his face off.”

“Jesus Christ,” Caroline said. Despite the heat, she shuddered.

“The same last masters message was sprayed next to the body,” said a woman reporter with an ABC News I.D. dangling from the chain around her neck.

“What are your thoughts?” said a man with a spiral notebook in his hand, looking at Caroline.

“Why ask me?” she asked.

“You're the only chick on the course,” Daly said. “Looks like somebody would rather shut down the Masters than let people of your particular gender join the club.”

“That's ridiculous,” Caroline said. She glanced away from Daly and noticed that all the TV cameras had clustered around her, waiting for her response.

“What's ridiculous?” one of the reporters prodded.

“That somebody thinks women don't belong here,” Caroline said. She was angry now, because of Milligan's murder, because the killer seemed to hate women, because she'd had to help disqualify her husband, because she was tired and sweaty, and because she had been ambushed by a pack of reporters who expected her to speak for womankind everywhere.

“Of course women belong here,” she continued. “I mean, look around. There are women everywhere. They're certainly willing to sell us tickets.”

“So you think women should be members at Augusta National?” one of the reporters said. The cameras stared back at her.

“Yes,” she said. “I didn't really care one way or the other when I got here. I just really like coming here. But maybe allowing a woman to join would put a stop to these killings.”

“That's good,” said a woman holding a microphone with a CNN logo.

“That's all I have to say,” Caroline said, feeling a bit dazed. “I'm very sorry for Danny Milligan's family.”

“Please spell your first and last name for us, Miss…?”

“I already…”

“Again, please.”

“Rockingham. Like Shane. First name Caroline.”

“Usual spelling?”

“C-A-R-O-L-I-N-E.”

“And you're caddying for…”

“Sam Skarda,” Sam said. “S-K-A-R-D-A.”

They walked off together toward the locker room. Behind them they could hear the TV reporters standing in front of their cameras, working on the intros and wraps to their interview. “Here at Augusta National, the only female caddie in the field has become embroiled in controversy…”

“What time tomorrow?” Caroline asked Sam.

“One-fifteen.”

“I guess I'll be awake by then.”

“I wasn't sure you wanted to loop for me again,” Sam said.

“Why not? The only way to get away from people here is to be inside the ropes.”

“I have to go,” Sam said. “If you'll meet me back here for dinner at seven-thirty, I'm buying.”

“I might be hungry by then,” Caroline said. “Right now, I need a drink and a nap.”

“Take my courtesy car,” Sam said, taking the keys out of his pocket and dangling them in front of her. “I won't need it this afternoon.”

“Which one is it?”

“The white Cadillac.”

“Very funny.”

“License number BGH398.”

“Okay, thanks.”

She took the keys. Sam gave her a quick peck on the cheek, and walked into the locker room.

Caroline just wanted to get into the courtesy car, turn up the air conditioning, and get the hell away from this place for a while.

Chapter Twenty-one

Sam had returned to the locker room when he saw the story about Milligan on TV. Several of the pros gathered in front of the wall-mounted Sony plasma to listen to the details. One of them said a hushed, “Damn”; another muttered, “This is getting weird.” They all shook their heads and drifted away after watching for a minute or two. The news of Milligan's murder wasn't going to disrupt their preparation for the Masters.

Sam couldn't help thinking about Ralph Stanwick. The message burned in the grass indicated it must have been the same killer—though the fire-ant bait was an escalation in the level of hostility. Now the killer had struck outside the gates of the club, but the warning was the same: Speak out against the all-male status quo at Augusta National and your life was in danger. The signs still pointed back to a club member—and one member had a history of trying to keep women from getting through the door.

He had called Stanwick's cabin the previous night. His wife had said he couldn't come to the phone, and had hung up. Sam couldn't guess if she was angry with him for calling, or with her husband for not being there.

The warm April breeze had almost dried Sam's hair, still damp from his shower, when he walked up the steps of the administration building to Porter's office. Ida told him Robert Brisbane was in the chairman's office. Sam didn't bother to wait for permission to join them.

Porter and Brisbane were watching clips of Milligan's NBC interview on television; the voiceover stated that yet another critic of the Augusta National membership policy had been “cut down.”

“Mr. Skarda,” Porter said by way of greeting. His eyes did not have their usual solicitous sparkle. He lowered the volume on the TV. “Hell of a thing about Rockingham today.”

“Hell of a thing about Danny Milligan, too.”

“We're sorry it happened,” Brisbane said.

“This year's tournament seems cursed,” Porter said, waving his hand listlessly toward the Milligan interview on the TV screen. Sam took the opening.

“Where was Ralph Stanwick last night?”

Porter picked up the remote control on his desk and shut off the TV.

“In his cabin, I suppose,” Porter said. “Why?”

“Did you see him?”

“No. Robert, did you?”

“No,” Brisbane said.

“Why are you so interested in Ralph?” Porter asked.

Sam explained his case: The signs still pointed to a club member; Stanwick's wife was the only one who could account for his whereabouts last night when Milligan was being murdered, and even she didn't seem to know where he was; and Stanwick was openly opposed to women joining all-male institutions, going back to his days at Yale.

“Is that true, Robert?” Porter asked.

“He's wrong about Ralph,” Brisbane said. “Lieutenant Boyce has already spoken to him—here in your office.”

“That wasn't exactly a grilling,” Sam said. “The cops have over a hundred interviews to do. If I tell them they should be looking more closely at Stanwick, they will. Tell me why they shouldn't.”

Brisbane looked at Porter, then got up from the chair next to Porter's desk and closed the door to the outer office. When he returned to his chair, he looked at Sam.

“Ralph has a girlfriend who lives here in town,” he said. “If he wasn't with Lorraine, that's where he was last night.”

Now we're getting somewhere, Sam thought. Not necessarily any closer to the killer, but at least the green jackets were giving him something besides the carefully orchestrated bullshit they fed the press.

“He wouldn't want the police—or anyone else—to know that,” Brisbane said.

“At this point, he doesn't have much choice,” Sam said. “Does his wife know?”

“Lorraine doesn't know who he sees when he leaves the grounds. I don't think she wants to.”

“She's willing to look the other way?”