Broom drew Branders, and Corning drew me. He looked at the slip and then at me as though he smelled something bad. Broom drew Billy Ruff and Corning drew Rick Lorry. Broom drew Lambertson and the only man left was Sixty-six Clyde, so he belonged with the Corning group. That was the way it was set up. Rick Lorry, Sixty-six, Steve Corning and me, in one foursome and Bobby Broom, Billy Ruff, Lambertson and Branders in the other. The high total for the group had to tee off first, and of course, with my 216, that was our group.
Steve Corning put his hand on my shoulder as we left the room. He was smiling but his eyes were frigid. A wiry man with square wrists, sideburns a shade too long, a white peaked cap. “Kid,” he said, “this’ll be good experience for you.”
“I guess so, Mr. Corning.”
“Just remember that we’re in there for blood, kid. This is our living even if it’s just a game to you. You know all the customs and courtesies, don’t you?” I shrugged out from under his hand, faced him in the corridor. “I’ve played the game before,” I said.
He laughed. “Don’t get rattled, kid.”
Rick came up behind him. His Oklahoma voice was soft. “What are you doin’, Steve? Get down off the horse; it’s too tall for you. I’ll take Tommy Firth and you take anybody you want to and one of these days we’ll play you any way you say.”
Steve spun around and his smile was gone. “This kid is just a lucky plumber.”
Rick studied him. “Luck doesn’t figure much in your game?”
“I don’t let it.”
Rick balanced himself on the balls of his feet and smiled sleepily. “Sure, I remember that five iron at Albuquerque. Cost me two hundred and fifty bucks.”
“Maybe you can make it back today,” Corning said. “And maybe not.” He walked away.
“Did he bother you, Tommy?” Rick asked.
“He made me a little sore.”
“That’s what he was trying to do. There’s always a chance he could blow and you could burn up the course and squeeze him out of a money place. He doesn’t miss any bets, that boy. There are probably two or three pros on the circuits would sell that boy a bucket of water if his pants were on fire. Come on, let’s eat a little something. Two hours before we got to go out there and beat on that ball again.”
Sam Clyde joined us. I hadn’t had a chance to talk to him before. I liked him. He had a long sad face and steady eyes, with weather wrinkles at the corners. He seemed calm, but I noticed that there was a small tremble in his hands.
“How’s Sammy?” Rick asked him seriously.
Clyde shrugged. “Why, he’s doing fine. He’s walking all the way ’cross a room now. Kit wanted to bring him on down here, but the doc said no.”
“Glad to hear it.”
Sam Clyde studied me. “You got a good game for your first big one, Firth. Ever think of taking it up as a business?”
“Not before today,” I said, grinning.
For a moment the sadness and despair showed through. “I wouldn’t advise it,” he said.
“Listen to him!” Rick said. “Trying to cut down the competition. He doesn’t want you working on the southern circuit against him this winter.”
Sam didn’t smile. “This is the last one, Rick. If I place high, maybe I’ll try again. But if I don’t—”
The tension was uncomfortable. Rick met my glance and looked away. After we ate lightly, I went to one of the rooms they had provided and stretched out on a couch. The sleepless night crept up on me. The next thing I knew Rick was shaking me.
“Trying to hold up the game, boy?” he said.
I was on the first tee before I had shrugged off the last mists of sleep. We drove in the order of score. Corning hit his crisp, straight, mathematical drive out to about two-twenty-five. He’s a picture golfer, with every swing right out of the book. Rick swung in his slow sleepy fashion, with the wrist-snap at the last moment. He outdrove Corning by twenty yards. I could feel the tension in the gallery. Sam Clyde, Old Sixty-six, stepped up with his unorthodox swing — the shortened backstroke and the power coming from the right arm — and dropped one in between them. The recent sleep had relaxed me. I glanced at Corning’s expressionless face and whipped the club down through the groove. I outdrove the lot of them and the tail on the ball took it a shade too far to the left.
We trudged on out across the fairway. Four players and four caddies, with a swarm following us and another batch around the green, and a thin line on both sides of the fairway.
Corning took what looked like a three iron. He played the gentle wind and dropped dead on the front of the green, with two bounces and a gentle roll taking him nicely up to the pin. Sam Clyde used more loft and his ball was not more than one inch off the green, on the left, nestled in the stubbly grass which prevented it from rolling down into the smaller trap. Rick made his slow-motion swing and clicked one up to within six feet of the pin, two feet outside Steve Corning’s ball. My turn. All the tension was gone. My hefty drive had put me within six iron range. I kept my head down well after the ball was gone and lost it high in the air. I was still squinting when the yell went up. I looked at the green just in time to see its last foot of roll and see it lodge against the pole.
Rick cuffed me across the shoulder and Sam Clyde gave me a broad smile. Corning held his back rigid as he walked toward the green. Sam Clyde, away, took his time and curved in a long putt that hesitated on the lip and then dropped as the crowd applauded. Rick tapped his almost negligently. It bounced against the back of the cup, almost too hard, and stayed down. I knew how Steve Coming felt. He had been the first man to hit his second shot, and had laid it up there for what seemed to be a sure birdie. He had seen the next two shots land for a probable par and a possible birdie. Then the dub of the group had eagled out on him with a miracle shot and the other two had gone down for their birds. That little four-footer had suddenly stretched itself way out. He had to hole it or take a four to a pair of treys and a deuce.
He took so long addressing it that the green crowd shrank down to almost nothing as they walked off to pick spots for the second hole. It rolled up and dropped. Steve’s mouth relaxed after it went down.
The second hole is two hundred and sixty-five, par three, untrapped, but with the green set up on top of a five-foot knoll with steep sides. The drive has to be close enough for an accurate clip in order to collect the three. Birdies are as rare as star rubies.
My honor. Expanded with the glory of that eagle and with the applause still ringing in my ears, I really uncorked one. I’ve never hit a straighter drive, or a lower one. I don’t know what I did to it, but it never did get more than three feet off the fairway. Thirty yards in front of the green it turned into one of the fastest rollers I’ve ever seen. It hit that sharp incline and shot a good thirty feet into the air. Miraculously, it bounced on the green, bounded once more, and rolled to within three feet of the pin. If the green had been on the level of the fairway, I would have been thirty yards beyond it.
“That’s just the way I told you to play it, Tommy,” Rick said easily. I turned to grin at him, but his face was sober. Sam Clyde looked mildly astonished and Steve Corning’s expression was one of disbelief, mingled with faint horror. When Steve marched over to drive, Rick Lorry winked at Sam and held his finger to his lips.
Steve banged out the normal drive, close enough for a clip to the pin. Rick took a long time over his drive. I noticed that he played it well back off his right foot. He hit what was almost a duplicate of my drive. Not quite as hard, however. It, too, scooted up the incline hard enough to shoot six feet in the air before dropping to roll on the green. Sam hit his out next to Steve’s. Corning, once again, was away. He chipped it up to within a foot of the pin. Sam Clyde chipped his in for a two! Rick dropped his for a two. I had my three-footer to make for a two. It dropped, but just. And there Corning was, with picture golf and yet needing a one-footer to come in last man.