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EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, I perused the first day’s scores over hot coffee and doughnuts in the pressroom. Tom Kite had fired a nifty 66 and was leading by one over three others.
Bert Lewis, I noticed, had shot 69. A good score for him, and if previous form held true, probably his low round for the week. It was also an excellent score if Bert Lewis was popping ’ludes. That’s a way to slow down your backswing that very likely won’t make it into the recommended list of any of the golf magazines.
But was he playing under the influence? Why had he purchased an extra supply from Jocko Moore this week? Had he ever paid off the shoot-out bet he had lost with John Turnbull? Had he, perhaps used that supply of Quaaludes to drug John Turnbull and murder him? Did he really deserve to be on my hot-list of suspects? All questions...no answers.
Bulldog O’Shaunessy would have gone out to the first tee, held Lewis off the ground by the neck, made him pee into a cup in full view of five thousand aghast fans and gotten some answers. I don’t think the PGA Tour would understand if I tried the same investigation technique.
I worked desultorily through the morning, making notes for my column for Sunday’s sports section. It was an easy-to- assemble amalgam of odd musings, tidbits of information from the weekly stats list, and gleanings from pieces some of my fellow writers had written in their papers. Not much in the way of original, hard-hitting journalism, but the readers seemed to like this kind of gossipy roundup every now and then. And today, my mind was busy elsewhere.
I realized that if either Becky Turnbull or my editor called and asked for a summation of any facts I had gathered concerning Turnbull’s death, my answer would be a sullen “I dunno.” My best candidate for some kind of foul play, Jocko Moore, was confirmed as a drug-dealing slimeball, but appeared to have an alibi for the night Turnbull died. It was likely that his punky girlfriend, a handful of the other caddies and probably the clientele of the Drowned Rat would all vouch for his presence someplace other than the bridge across the tidal creek on the 15th hole. Then again, that assortment of witnesses would never be confused with the Vienna Boys Choir, so his alibi might be questionable.
Jean MacGarrity just didn’t seem to fit into a picture that included murder or mayhem against John Turnbull. She was mixed up and confused, yes, and the relationship between the two was still not very clear. I didn’t know, for instance, if Becky knew about Jean, or even if I should bring the subject up.
That brought me back to Bert Lewis. He seemed to have a healthy dislike for Turnbull, which was not uncommon between players on the Tour, and he had lost a big chunk of change to Turnbull in that shootout. Was that enough of a motive for him to kill Turnbull? That didn’t seem likely. But what about that order of ’ludes? Was it for personal use? Or for something else, a bit more sinister?
Still more questions than answers, and that was beginning to grind my butt.
I finished my column and quickly sent it up to Boston without rereading it one last time. It was probably rife with typos– I’m a reporter, not a typist – but I didn’t really care. There must be days in Detroit when the guys on the line don’t bother to check if they’ve turned the bolts tight enough so that two months later the brakes fall off and a happy family of four goes flying into a concrete abutment. I have bad days too, but at least no one gets killed. I couldn’t even work up much enthusiasm for the seafood buffet that they set up for us. I wandered outside to watch some golf, something that takes little mental effort.
The day was typically sunny, bright and hot. Spectators cowered in the shade of the liveoak trees, fanned themselves with their programs and formed long lines at the refreshment kiosks in search of relief from the Carolina summer humidity.
The players, however, reveled in the heat which loosened their muscles and swings and which baked the fairways into rock, giving extra roll to their tee shots. At midday, the wind was but a whisper, so the players were firing their approach shots at the pins with impunity. Cheers from the gallery punctuating the air, signifying birdie after birdie from all corners of the golf course. It was a day to go low.
Yet Bohicket, with its unusually rolling fairways and small, hard greens, was not giving in easily. I stood at the tenth, a short par four, climbed sharply up a steep, manmade hill that fell off sharply on both sides so that all but the straightest drives careened down into deep rough. Offering reward for the risk, a long straight drive would bound up the hill almost all the way to the green, leaving just a short chip or pitch to get close for birdie. But from the rough, it was hard to control the ball, especially going uphill to a green protected by bunkers all around. I heard enough dark mutterings to know this rather penal hole was not one of the players’ favorites.
After a time on the tenth, I wandered back over to the eighteenth to watch some groups finish their rounds. Though I have been a golfer all my life and have been covering golf for many years, the abilities of these professionals to produce exact results under trying conditions never fails to amaze me. I watched golfer after golfer attack the last green with high, soft pitch shots that landed just beyond the hole, bounce once, bite into the turf and spin backward. It is a graceful, almost balletic thing to watch and it’s fantastic to watch it over and over again in the course of an hour or so.
I paid no attention to the golfers, just stood there and enjoyed their skills. This was just the second round, and the winner would not be crowned today. The pros call Friday position day: Make some birdies, make the cut, get in position for the weekend. Saturday is “moving day,” when you concentrate on moving up the leaderboard into the top ten, or higher if you’re on a roll. Sunday, of course, is it: That’s the day when you close the deal, leave nothing in the bag, go hell-bent for leather.
My reverie was broken only when I noticed Bert Lewis come trudging up the last fairway with his group. He played his wedge approach to the green, leaving the ball hole-high and about twelve feet for birdie. He stood aside then and waited for his playing partners to make their shots. He was playing today with Jamison Cox, the dashing young English pro, and Mark Sudderth, a brash Texan from El Paso.
After those two had played and the group approached the green, I caught sight of the scoreboard carried on a pole by a young volunteer with the scores for these three players.
Lewis was ten under-par—seven-under for the day. He was shooting lights out, and his birdie here at the last would give him a 64 for the round. I studied Lewis as he marked his ball and handed it to his caddie to be cleaned off. His face was steely, serious and somehow sad. The caddie handed the ball back and walked over to the edge of the green, just in front of the bleachers where I sat. I caught his eye as he put the heavy staff bag on the ground and raised my eyebrows in question. He smiled, shrugged and whispered “On automatic. Everything’s going in today.”
Cox lagged his approach putt within a foot of the hole and popped it in for his par. He acknowledged the scattered applause with a wave of his hand. Sudderth’s fifteen footer for birdie lipped out. More applause.
Bert Lewis stalked his putt briefly, which surprised me. He had a reputation as a plodder, and one would think that a putt for a 64 would demand some careful study. But he simply put his ball down behind his mark, took a quick look from behind, and then stepped up. He took two practice swings, moved forward a bit and then quickly struck the putt. It looked almost nonchalant. But there was never any doubt: The ball ran swiftly across the green and dropped with a loud rattle into the cup. The score of 64 was probably his best round of the year.
The crowd erupted in cheers and whistles, but Bert Lewis didn’t acknowledge it at all. Leaving the ball in the cup for his caddie to retrieve, he turned on his heel and headed off the green in the direction of the scorer’s tent, where he would check and sign his card. His eyes were glazed looking and his gait somehow stiff.
Jamison Cox intercepted him at the side of the green. Sticking out his hand, he gushed “Oh, lovely round, that. Your agent ought to buy you lunch. Nice job.”
Lewis never reacted. He walked past Cox, past the outstretched hand, and trudged silently towards the scorer’s tent.
“Funny chap,” Cox mused aloud to no one in particular. “Shoots the best round of the year and looks like he just lost his best friend.”