Amen Corner (29 page)

He turned the key in the ignition when he saw a white Cadillac exit the grounds, but the driver didn't look like either Caroline or Skarda. He managed to catch a look at the license plate, but it wasn't the one he was looking for. A few minutes later, another white Cadillac exited the club, and then another. Shit—they gave all the pros identical courtesy cars. He'd need to be very careful about reading each license plate, or he'd miss her.

A little after nine, one of the courtesy cars emerged from the driveway and turned left onto Washington Road. A man was driving, with a woman in the passenger seat. He couldn't tell if it was Skarda and his caddie through the tinted window, but the license plate was the one he was looking for: BGH398. It must be them.

Doggett put his truck into gear and pulled out onto Washington Road, staying just close enough to the Cadillac to keep it in sight. He assumed they were going to Caroline Rockingham's motel. Maybe Skarda would stay with her tonight, which would cause problems—though it was nothing he couldn't handle. He could kill two of them almost as easily as one. It made no difference to him, except that it would mess up the story line. If the public believed someone from the club was killing its political enemies, they'd buy Caroline's killing, too. But Skarda? Doggett couldn't recall hearing Skarda say anything about admitting women to the club. Killing the club's critics was one thing, but would anyone believe a club member would murder a player?

Then again, Skarda was the one who'd brought her to the club, who'd let her shoot her mouth off about women members. Someone at the club might be pissed off at him. Or maybe the spin would be even simpler: Skarda died trying to save his caddie—his lover. Yes, that could work. Either way, killing them both might be the end of it. They'd almost have to call off the tournament. Augusta National's reputation would never recover. Then he could kill dear old Dad.

Now that he'd found Caroline, he had to develop a strategy. He had to find out what room she was in. He had to slip past the front desk and somehow get inside her room—preferably after Skarda had left. Then it would be a simple matter of overpowering her and cutting her throat.

The Cadillac was holding steady at 40 miles an hour on Washington, heading west. Doggett found it easy to stay a half block behind them. If they made a turn, he'd have no problem exiting with them. He turned on the radio, wondering whether he was still the lead story.

“…Richmond County police and state investigators are thought to be focusing their investigation on someone with connections to Augusta National, though they would not say if there was a suspect. Mark Boyce of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation told reporters late this afternoon that all evidence points to one killer, with a political motivation. Each victim has been an open advocate for a change in the club's membership policies…”

*

“Did you hear that?” Caroline asked Sam, who had turned on the radio when they got into the car.

She now wished she had kept walking, instead of stopping to talk to Daly and the other reporters. But she was being paranoid, she told herself as she lowered the passenger side window and lit another cigarette. Nothing was going to happen. No one knew where she was staying.

“Yeah, I heard it,” Sam said, turning up the volume on the news station.

“It's creeping me out.”

“You shouldn't have talked to those reporters.”

“I know. I made a mistake. Let's drop it.”

Sam wasn't in the mood for music, so he left the radio on. Rachel Drucker and the WOFF were calling for the cancellation of the tournament, out of respect for the deaths of Ashby, Scanlon, and Milligan. As many as 3,000 protesters were expected to gather on Washington Road Saturday to condemn Augusta National. Sergio Garcia and Phil Mickelson were leading at the halfway point, seven under par. Fair skies and highs in the low 80s forecast for Saturday.

It was all so incongruous. The ideal Masters combination—beautiful weather, great scenery, outstanding golf—was locked in a death struggle with some madman.

Knowing that Brisbane would be hanging out with the Stanwicks in their cabin eased his mind a little. But he couldn't shake the feeling that Caroline had replaced the name on the back of her caddie suit with a big red target. He was going to stay with her tonight, no matter what she said.

The Southwinds Inn parking lot was full when they arrived at about 9:30. Sam circled the lot, finally finding a parking space on the opposite side of the motel from Caroline's room.

There was a gentle breeze in the air as they walked across the parking lot. Sam noticed a truck with a loud engine pull into the lot as they neared the lobby doors. Good luck finding a spot, buddy, he thought. This motel is jammed. This whole town is jammed.

They walked past the front desk and took a left down a hallway with brownish-maroon patterned carpet—the kind intended to disguise the spills and stains made by drunken tourists and their messy children; the kind that always looked dingy, no matter how new the motel. They went up the stairs to the second floor, turned left, and walked almost halfway down the hall. Caroline's room was about 15 feet from the Coke and ice machines, which both gave off a persistent electric hum.

“Does that noise bother you?” Sam asked, pointing to the machines.

“I can't hear it over my air conditioner,” Caroline said. “Five hundred bucks a night doesn't get you much in this town.”

She inserted her plastic key in the slot and opened the door to her room, and Sam immediately knew what she meant. The rattle of the air conditioner was instantly irritating.

*

As soon as Doggett saw Skarda and Caroline walk into the motel, he parked the truck just beyond sight of the front desk, blocking in two other parked cars, and walked quickly into the lobby. He carried the hunting knife in his gym bag.

The lobby was empty except for the clerk at the front desk. Doggett ignored him and walked straight through to the first-floor hallway, looking each way. At the end of the hallway to the left, he saw Skarda and Caroline turning right and walking up the stairs.

He walked quickly down the hall and up the stairs, opening the fire door at the top of the stairs and peering around it. They were halfway down the hall, stopped in front of a room on the left, with a Coke machine and an ice machine across the hall from the room. As soon as they entered, Doggett hurried down the hall to check the door they'd entered: Room 245.

He wondered what Skarda was going to do. He hadn't brought a bag in with him, so it didn't look like he was planning to stay. He would watch the door for a while to see if Skarda left. There was no reason to kill him if he didn't have to. Besides, Skarda looked like he was in good shape. It would be easier just to do the girl.

Doggett kept walking past the door and went to the far end of the hall. There was another flight of stairs behind a fire door on that side of the motel. He could stand in the stairwell and keep an eye on Room 245 from a safe distance. In a half-hour or so, he'd have to decide what to do next. But he'd wait for a while and give Skarda time to leave.

*

“I've asked them twice to come up and fix it,” Caroline said. “They must have a lot of stuff to fix in this dump.”

Sam bent down and turned the knob to “Off.” The noise stopped. He turned it back up to “Low,” then “Medium” and “High.” The noise returned. He opened the grate and looked at the fan inside, but couldn't see what was causing the problem.

“I tried all that,” Caroline said, lying back on the bed and sighing. “I've got two choices: Stay awake listening to it all night, or turn it off and stay awake sweating all night.”

Sam closed the grate and stood up.

“There's a third choice,” he said. “I'm going to the front desk and get somebody up here.”

“Well, maybe they'll listen to you,” she said. “I'm going to have a glass of wine.”

She got up from the bed and opened the mini-refrigerator. Inside was a bottle of pinot grigio. She got a corkscrew out of her purse, opened the bottle, went into the bathroom, and came back with two glasses wrapped in plastic sanitary wrappers.

“You can have a glass when you come back,” she said. “Then you should go.”

“We'll talk abut that,” Sam said.

He left the room, then glanced behind him to be sure he'd remember the number: 245.

Caroline's room was in the middle of the motel. Sam looked down the hallway in both directions, and decided to take the same stairs they'd come up.

A man and a woman were pleading for a room at the front desk when Sam got to the lobby. They'd driven all the way from Pennsylvania to see the Masters, the woman said. There must be something available.

“I'm sorry, folks,” said the desk clerk, a chubby man who didn't look sorry at all. “We've been booked for months.”

“Hell, I know how this works,” said the man, pulling out his wallet. “What'll it take, $300?”

The desk clerk looked amused.

“Our guests are paying $500 per night this week,” the clerk said.

“For this hole?” the man said, stunned. “Let's go, Linda. I'd rather sleep on a park bench.”

“You might have to,” the clerk said.

Then he turned to Sam.

“Can you imagine?” the clerk said. “Walking into an Augusta motel on Friday night of the Masters and offering $300 for a room?”

“What were they thinking?” Sam said.

“What can I do you for?” the clerk said, still smiling.

“My friend in Rroom 245 paid your ransom, and she'd like her air conditioner to work.”

The clerk lost his look of amusement.

“She'll need to call down here and request a repair.”

“She's done that twice since Monday. No repairs. Can you imagine?”

“Well, there's nothing we can do tonight.”

“Why not?”

“Rafael, our repairman, works from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.”

“And what exactly does Rafael do when he's working?”

“We have a long list of projects for him each day.”

“I'm not surprised,” Sam said, looking around the charmless lobby. The clerk frowned. “Put the air conditioner in Room 245 at the top of Rafael's list tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir,” the clerk said.

Sam turned and headed back to the stairs. He could use that glass of wine.

*

Doggett had been relieved to see Skarda leave Room 245—until Skarda looked down the hallway in Doggett's direction, as though he were going to take the stairs where he was hiding. Doggett ducked back to the stairs and quietly pulled the fire door closed behind him, then ran down the steps to the first floor. He listened at the bottom of the steps to hear if the fire door above him was being opened. It remained closed. Then he looked down the main floor hallway and saw Skarda turning the corner from the steps on the other end of the hall. He must be leaving, Doggett thought as he walked back up the stairs. Now it was time.

He hurried back up the steps, two at a time, and walked quickly down the hall to Room 245. He slung the bag over his shoulder, unzipped it, and put his hand inside, fingers curled around the knife's smooth wooden handle. Then he knocked twice on the door. He heard a voice inside say something, muffled, which sounded like “Coming.”

“You should have taken the extra key,” Caroline said, as she opened the door from inside the room. Doggett put his shoulder into the door and rammed it open, knocking Caroline backward onto the bed. He slammed the door shut behind him and pulled the knife out of the bag. Caroline screamed as Doggett advanced toward her.

“Shut up,” he ordered, lunging for her. But Caroline rolled sideways off the bed, pulling the bedspread with her. When she hit the floor, she reached out and grabbed the wooden desk chair, throwing it in front of her as she scrambled backward on her hands, not daring to take her eyes off Doggett. She screamed again as Doggett stumbled over the bedspread and the chair, trying to slash her with the knife.

“Shut up, I said!” he yelled.

Caroline was up on her feet again; before he could reach her, she managed to dive into the bathroom. Doggett was right behind her, and thrust his right hand, holding the knife, into the bathroom as Caroline pushed the door shut. She braced her feet on the toilet and put her back to the door, pushing with her legs, with all the strength she had, to keep him from getting the door open.

“Open the fucking door!” Doggett screamed, while Caroline screamed back at him as loud as she could.

Then they both heard a pounding on the door, Sam yelling from the hallway.

“Caroline! Open the door! What's going on?”

“He's in here! He's got a knife!” Caroline screamed.

Doggett stopped pushing on the bathroom door. He'd meant to get in, kill Caroline quickly, and get out. He hadn't counted on Skarda coming back. Half the people in the motel had probably heard the ruckus by now. There was no way he was going to pull this off. He just had to get away, to think. It couldn't end here. He wasn't through yet.