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EVERY JOURNALIST DEPENDS on his sources, and every journalist who is any good spends a lot of time developing them. When I was on the police beat back in Boston, trying to lose myself in the misery of late-twentieth-century American culture, I had a bunch of good ones: the bartender in the Combat Zone strip joint, a couple of secretaries at City Hall, a beat cop who’d tell all the gossip for a cup of coffee and a jelly doughnut.
I’d developed some good ones on my current beat, too. One of the more talkative players’ agents, a minor tournament official or two, most of the players’ wives and Fireman.
Jackson LeRoy Johnson was a fixture on tour, known to one and all as Fireman. He had been a caddie since the days of Bobby Jones and had carried the bags of all the greats: Snead, Hogan, Demaret, Casper, Player and even old Arnie himself once or twice. He seemed ageless, which was not a bad trick for a man who had to be close to eighty years old. He didn’t caddie much these days, but served as the unofficial leader of that traveling band of gypsies who worked as regular caddies on the tour. Fireman drove from tournament to tournament in an ancient motor home, actually an elongated pickup truck with covered bed, a vehicle that looked as though it had been made somewhere around 1963. He’d park that damn thing close to the clubhouse at every tour stop, much to the consternation and bluster of the local bigwigs, calmly set out his WalMart vintage folding lawn chair, dig out his old pocket knife and a piece of wood, and sit there doing nothing but whittling and whistling softly to himself for the next five days.
But Fireman did more than that, of course. He kept track of his boys, the ever-changing cadre of caddies. If a pro needed someone to carry his bag, Fireman would arrange it. If one of the boys dropped out for a few weeks or months or even years to dally in the pleasures of a bottle or to chase a woman or to enjoy the fruits of a Top Ten finish, Fireman would know it. And when the prodigal caddie eventually returned, as they always did, Fireman would rant and rave and lecture him for a while, and then set about getting him a bag again.
Fireman knew the nomadic life of following the professional golf tour. It was all he had ever done. He knew the excitement of carrying the winner’s bag at a major tournament, he knew the helpless pressures of carrying the bag of a perennial cut- misser. He knew that a golfer on a bad streak would seek to lay the blame on the imaginary mistakes of his caddie, and that a player winning big would rarely give any of the credit to the guy lugging his clubs. And he knew all about The Life. Legend has it that he earned his nickname decades ago when another caddie overheard him yelling from the converted bed of his pickup late one night “Ooo baby, I’m on fire for you!”
I’d never figured out quite how Fireman supported himself. My best guess was through a combination of good poker hands, shrewd investments in the weekly caddie Calcuttas, occasional dividends paid by the ponies, and a well-structured network of sympathetic friends strategically located at tour stops from coast to coast. But then, for all I really knew about the man, I wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that he had a five-million-dollar portfolio on Wall Street, and was living off the interest.
Fireman was my best source for inside stuff. He was the central conduit of information from the most unbiased sources on tour: the guys who carried the clubs. The caddies knew who was playing well, and who wasn’t. The caddies knew which player still had a hurt shoulder, an angry wife, a hangover, an empty bank account or an eye on the girl in the red shorts in the gallery. The caddies knew all about weaknesses and strengths, ups and downs, successes and failures, good luck and bad. And everything the caddies knew, Fireman knew. He knew which player’s wife had just ordered expensive new carpeting for the whole house, and how that might affect the guy’s play: make him stressed and try too hard, or blow it off with a shrug. There was a good-sized pile of wood shavings at Fireman’s feet when I walked over. He had attached an old golf umbrella to the back of his folding chair with some imaginative use of duct tape and was sitting in the shade away from the hot Carolina sun.
“Whatcha making, Fireman?” I asked as I perched on the back bumper of his ancient truck. I had a paper bag with me, and I pulled out the two cold six-packs of Budweiser and opened two. It was Fireman’s favorite brand.
“Nuthin’, Hacker, nuthin’ a’tall,” Fireman wheezed. “Jest passin’ the time and keepin’ myhands from the arthuritis is all.” His creased face lit up with pleasure as he took a long draught from his can. He eased himself out of his chair and carefully packed the remaining beer away in a Styrofoam cooler in the back of his truck. A place for everything and everything in its place. He sat back down and picked up on his whittling again.
“So, who’s hot this week?” I asked.
“Well,” he drawled, scratching on his chin, “They be a number who be swingin’ pretty fine lately,” he mused. “Mister Kite be swingin’ pretty fine, an’ he do like the hot weather, and Mister Mahaffey, he do like this course. An’ I hear some mightly good things about Mister Turnbull...mighty good.”
“John Turnbull, eh?” I said. “Who’s carrying his bag this week?”
Fireman turned his head and his pink-rimmed eyes peered up at me from his weathered face. “The Hacker-Man has been a busy one,” he said softly. “Won’t be needin’ to come see his ole friend Fireman no more.”
I grinned at him. “Only doing my job, Fireman,” I said. “You see things, hear things. I saw Turnbull fire Jocko up in Atlanta Sunday.”
“Yeah, that be comin’ from a long way back,” Fireman said, returning to his stick. “That Drugstore be a bad dude, real bad. He be sellin’ reefer and pills to my boys for a long, long time. Mister Turnbull, bein’ himself a fine Christian gentleman, tried to get Drugstore to stop sellin’. But Gypsy and Wheezer see him sellin’ reefer to some be-bops in the parking lot up to Atlanta last week, and the word got back to Mister Turnbull, as it always do. Boom! No more bag for Drugstore.”
He bent to his stick, slashing at the wood and shaking his head sadly. In the Life, no one makes judgments about another. Everyone always knows everyone else’s business, but in the Life, a caddie is free to make his own decisions about life, about working or not working, about right and wrong, and no one says a thing against him. Except for behavior on the golf course: there, a caddie must adhere to all the rules about doing the work, not showing up your man, being invisible, being professional. Off the golf course, it’s your own life to lead and no one is going to say a word.
Suddenly, a big, black crow walked calmly around Fireman’s truck from the front, stared at the old black man for a long moment with dark, liquid eyes, and then took off into the Carolina sky with a loud and raucous cry. It sounded like the cry of a dying man.
Fireman was visibly shaken. He reached into the neck of his shirt and pulled out a cross on a long, silver chain. He bent his head down and kissed it, then closed his eyes tightly and mumbled what sounded like a prayer or an incantation.
I laughed, a little embarrassed. “I didn’t know you were superstitious,” I chided him gently. “I know black cats are unlucky, but crows?”
“Not good, not good a’tall,” Fireman said, his eyes darting at me nervously. “They be trouble in dat crow. Trouble.”
We both sipped some beer. Fireman went back to his whittling.
“You get Jocko another bag?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Fireman smiled. “He be a good caddie for a bad dude now. He got hisself a bag right away. But he still be steamin’ at Mister Turnbull. His own damn fault, you ask me.”
“Jocko doesn’t sound like the best kind of caddie for a good Christian gentleman like Miter Turnbull,” I offered.
“Now don’ you go jokin’ ‘bout Mister Turnbull,” Fireman jabbed his pocketknife at me. “He be a fine gentleman and he try an’ do the right thing. He talk and talk at that Drugstore and gave him stuff to read an’ all. But that boy be a bad’un, just a bad’un. He laugh at Mister Turnbull behin’ his back. Nossir,” he shook his head. “Mister Turnbull try an’ bring his faith to that boy, but it don’ do no good. No good at’all.”
“You think that faith helps his game any?” I asked.
“Now that’s another question in the altogether,” Fireman said. “They be a bunch who read they Bible and go to they studies. My boys say they come out next day and some look like robots. They hit that ball right down the’ middle and shoot four, five birdies until Pop! Long ‘bout hole twelve, it’s like they be wakin’ up from sleep and they start playin’ like they always does. And some of they others, they come out an try real hard and they ball be goin’ ever’where, and they try and they try and just get so flusterated they can’ do nuthin’. I dunno,” he said, “Seems to mess up they swing. Golf be an easy game. All you got to do is swing purty and let the ball fly away.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Easy.”