Slim and None Read online

  Only seven. You could punch that number upside the head and it wouldn’t budge.

  I’d been talking about this since my birthday on Sunday and all day long on the golf course that Tuesday. Jerry Grimes and Grady Don Maples may well have gotten tired of hearing about it.

  Julius Boros is still the oldest player to do it. Boros was forty-eight when he won the PGA in ’68 at Pecan Valley in San Antonio. Boros won by one shot over Arnold Palmer and Bob Charles when he got up and down for a par from forty yards off the final green.

  I’d heard it was so hot and humid in San Antonio that week the Alamo almost melted into a Taco Bell.

  Jack Nicklaus was forty-six when he shot that 65 in the last round and won his sixth Masters in ’86. Reached in and snatched it away from Greg Norman and Tom Kite. They finished one back.

  That was some scene, Jack striding up the last fairway, coming out of nowhere to grab his twentieth major. Everybody standing, applauding, not a dry eye in the gallery. Jack hadn’t won a major since 1980 and most people thought he was all done, lift him on up.

  I’d played in my second Masters that week. I was in the crowd on 18 when Jack came up. I wanted to see the historic event in person, and I shed a tear myself.

  But not for Jack. The tear I shed was for the 79 I shot in the last round. I coughed up money on every hole. It was a Perle Mesta deal. I threw a party on every one of those slick greens, and delivered myself from sixth place after fifty-four holes to forty-third.

  Hale Irwin was the last guy to do it. Hale was forty-five when he won his third Open at Medinah in ’90. That time he made the long putt on the last hole, did the victory lap around the green to the delight of TV, slapping palms, and then beat poor old Mike Donald in the playoff.

  I played in that Open, too, but I don’t remember much about it. It’s hard to remember anything about a tournament when your swing disappears for no reason and you finish in a tie for last, or sixty-first, whichever you prefer.

  I do remember the goofy Medinah clubhouse. It was either built to look like a temple for Shriners or the architect designed it after he put on a fez and hit every bar on Rush Street.

  Chicago is where a lot of peculiar stuff happens. Another forty-fiveyear-old won a major there, the ’61 PGA at Olympia Fields. Jerry Barber sank putts from three area codes on the last three holes to tie Don January. It was a daylight robbery. Then he robbed January again in the playoff when he sank putts from two more area codes. A robbery may have been appropriate. Olympia Fields was where Al Capone once played golf.

  Jerry Grimes said, “I read somewhere that a gangster named Machine Gun Jack McGurn used to play at Olympia Fields, too. He was one of Capone’s buddies. Great name.”

  “He should have been there to machine-gun Jerry Barber,” I said.

  “You hold it against a man for making putts?” Jerry said.

  “Only for the rest of his life.”

  Then I came to the forty-four-year-olds.

  Harry Vardon was forty-four when he won his last British Open, at Prestwick in 1914, the last of his six. Roberto de Vicenzo was forty-four when he won the British Open at Hoylake, in ’67. And Lee Trevino was forty-four when he won the PGA at Shoal Creek in ’84.

  “What about Vardon in Toledo?” I said. We were somewhere on the back nine waiting for a group of slow-playing plumb bobbers to plumb-bob their asses out of the way.

  “Sumbitch had a grip,” Grady Don said. “Vardon.”

  Jerry rewarded him with a chuckle.

  I said there was no doubt Harry Vardon should have been the oldest man to win a major. He should have won the U.S. Open in 1920 at Inverness when he was fifty years old. Think about that, I said. A fifty-year-old man. He had a mortal lock on that Open, too.

  “What happened to him?” Grady Don said. “His pipe catch his tweed coat on fire?”

  I explained how even though Vardon missed a one-foot putt on the first hole the last day—a one-foot putt—he went on and shot his way into a four-stroke lead with only seven holes to play. But at the 13th he missed a two-foot putt—a two-foot putt—and he three-putted the next three holes in a row, and double-bogeyed the 17th when he hit a ball into the water, and despite all that he still finished only one stroke back of the guy who won, Ted Ray, another Englishman.

  “Tell me Vardon shouldn’t have won that Open,” I said.

  “You won’t hear it from me,” Grady Don said.

  “My lips are sealed,” Jerry said.

  Grady Don said, “I don’t see what’s so bad about forty-four, Bobby Joe. It’s better than twenty-four. When you’re twenty-four you don’t own shit, you can’t afford shit, and you can’t see how you’re ever gonna own shit, do shit, or amount to shit.”

  I said, “All I Know is, I’m forty-four and if I don’t win a major this year I’ll only have two chances left.”

  Nobody had to say it. We all Knew what those two chances were.

  Slim and none.

  4

  here are no good opening lines left—they’ve all been used up by married guys in singles bars.

  Honey, I hope you’re not gonna hold it against me because I was born rich.

  Excuse me, sweetheart, but my buddy and I were just talking about how much you look like Rebecca—that’s my wife who died a year ago.

  Hi, my name’s Bond . . . James Bond.

  Hi, my name’s Kent . . . Clark Kent.

  Darling, you can’t be this beautiful and not have a valid passport.

  Baby doll, I’ll bet your armpits taste like apple juice.

  You and me, angel pie . . . want to form the perfect race?

  You throw all those out now.

  Which was why, when I went over to Gwendolyn Pritchard on the veranda, I merely said, “If your name is Amber, I Know you’re not married—there’s never been a wife named Amber.”

  “What?”

  Attention, irritable-squint collectors. Found one.

  “It’s true,” I said. “There are no wives named Amber.”

  “Gee, that’s interesting,” she said.

  “Ashley sometimes. Never Amber.”

  “Do you mind?” She turned away.

  Undaunted, I moved around to confront her. “Your wives are basically Mary Margaret . . . Ruth Ann . . . Dorothy Sue . . . Betty Jean. There are occasions where you might run into—”

  “It’s not working,” she said.

  “It’s not?”

  “Nope.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m positive. Trust me on this.”

  I wanted to tell her I hadn’t seen lavender eyes on a brunette since Elizabeth Taylor, but she was looking through me or around me. I never could do that. When I looked at somebody in the face, I usually saw their face.

  She sipped her tall drink and smoked her long cigarette while I dealt with the problem of trying not to be too Keenly aware of her body. It was good I didn’t see any jewelry stuck in her navel, and it was only mildly terrifying that up close her lung problem had become more severe.

  I glanced at Jerry and Grady Don. They were twenty yards away, trying to act like they weren’t watching us. Trying to act like they were listening to the equipment salesman. The equipment salesman was babbling at them nonstop, taking the dimple pattern on his new golf ball— the 401-K, Airborne Express, I-95—to a new scientific level, I assumed.

  Under the other big tree on the veranda, a three-man Japanese TV crew was setting up to interview a Jap contestant. The contestant was holding a putter in his hand and glancing around, changing stances, looking impatiently inscrutable, like he hoped the interview would be over pretty quick so he could go inscrut the putting green.

  I don’t honestly Know what they talk about on Japanese TV, but I do Know the difference between the TV wizards in the United States and the ones in Great Britain.

  Hit a bad shot in America and every announcer but Johnny Miller will throw you a softball. Say something like, “That’s not exactly what he had in mind.”

>   But hit a bad shot overseas and the Brit on the mike will say, “Ah, there’s old Aunt Martha, trying to play golf again.”

  Off to the side were two geezers in green jackets. Augusta members. They were peering with puzzlement at the Japanese TV crew.

  “See those two gents over there?” I said to the chick-babe-mom.

  She scanned the crowd.

  “Over there,” I said with a nod. “The green jackets staring at the Yamamotos. They look like they’re wondering who dumped the fucking stir-fry on their veranda.”

  One of the things I’d learned as I traveled life’s weary path was that a man could say fuck in front of a lady dressed as sexily as Gwendolyn Pritchard was and she wouldn’t be offended.

  “This the restart?” she said.

  Quick lady.

  I liked quick ladies. Most guys don’t. Most guys don’t like ladies who talk at all. That’s because the ladies most guys Know like to talk about drapes, furniture, hardwood floors, children, and relationships. That book about men coming from Mars and women coming from Venus could have been called Men Are from Carpet, Women Are from Hardwood Floors.

  “You can call it a restart,” I said to Gwendolyn. “Nice day.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Handy for your outfit. Which I admire very much.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What comes with it, I mean.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “Any other day here, you couldn’t dress like that. The thing about the Masters, the weather’s different every day. You can usually count on one day hot, one day cold, one day windy, one day of rain.”

  “Amazing,” she said.

  “I suppose it is, when you stop to think about it.”

  “No, I mean here I am talking to a meteorologist, and all along I thought you were Bobby Joe Grooves.”

  5

  It’s difficult not to look pleased when somebody recognizes you.

  Even Knows your name. I tried not to act too surprised. Me, a lowly twenty-third on the money list. One of the guys walking around with no majors. “In other news,” as some golf writers refer to us.

  She said, “I follow golf rather closely. I’m Gwendolyn Pritchard.”

  She dropped her cigarette on the ground, stepped on it, and extended her hand for a formal intro.

  As I took her hand a black Kid in white coveralls and green cap appeared instantly with a plastic trash bag and a pointed stick and plucked the cigarette butt off the elegant lawn.

  I said, “You might as well drop that on the carpet in the clubhouse. Don’t you Know this place is a cathedral?”

  “I am aware it’s the ‘cathedral of pines,’ but I could have sworn we were outdoors.”

  “Easy enough to field-strip your smokes when you’re out on the course, or even standing here. We like to Keep it pristine.”

  “You’re a member?”

  “Grizzled veteran. It’s a curious thing. Come here a few years and you develop a pride of ownership, even though you’re only a guest.”

  “You’ve seen my son play? You’ve watched Scotty?”

  “You Know, I just heard you were Scott Pritchard’s mother. Grady Don Maples and Jerry Grimes over there . . . they told me. I was sure they must have meant you were his sister.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “But you win ‘Low Mom.’ The trophy’s being engraved.”

  “What do you think of Scotty’s game?”

  I said I was aware of how well he’d done as an amateur. I’d only seen him on TV, and on the practice tee this week, but I was impressed with his action, the way he went at it. I said he was a sweet-swinging lad, and Jesus Christ, he was long.

  “I mean long,” I said. “I don’t cook chili that long. Listen, why don’t we go sit at a table under an umbrella and talk golf? I’ll have a beer and you can smoke with an ashtray?”

  “Why not?” She started toward the tables.

  As we threaded our way across the veranda, I said, “I have an in-depth question. Is there no Mr. Pritchard in town this week?”

  “Good catch,” she said.

  “Even in your life . . . presently . . . ?”

  “You got it.”

  Another thing I’d learned as I traveled life’s weary path was that it wasn’t remotely possible for a woman dressed in public like Gwendolyn was to have a husband in town with her.

  “Marital discord strikes again,” I said.

  “Marital discord has legs.”

  “You’re separated or you went all the way with Tammy Wynette?”

  “I Tammy’d out. Two years ago.”

  “You sluffed him or he sluffed you?”

  “I was the sluffee.”

  “The guy must be crazy,” I said. “Where is the demented Mr. Pritchard these days?”

  “He’s in Beverly Hills with Lolita, of course.”

  It was no strain for me to envision Lolita.

  “Younger than you?” I said.

  “Only by fifteen years.”

  “Blonde?”

  “Uh-huh.” That answer had a melody to it. “I Kept the house in La Costa.”

  “La Costa? You’re too young to live at La Costa,” I said brilliantly.

  “Spent some time there, have you?”

  “I’ve been roughed up by the gold lamé out there, yeah.”

  “I’ll bet you have.”

  “What was in it, I mean.”

  “I know what you mean . . . Rick and I grew up in Encinitas. We both went to SC.”

  “Southern Cal?”

  “Is there another SC? I was a cheerleader. Yep. I was Gwendolyn Gayle Turner, cheerleader for the cardinal and gold.”

  “Gwendolyn Gayle Turner is a Miss America name if I’ve ever heard one. Were you in the contest?”

  She shook her head. “I couldn’t sing ‘On a Clear Day.’ Cheerleaders were a normal size in my time—they didn’t have to do Mary Lou Rettons. I don’t apologize for being one. It was a big deal and gobs of fun. Rick was a fullback. He carried the ball some, but blocked mostly. We went to the Rose Bowl one year. Beat Ohio State. It was my favorite day in the whole world till Scotty won the Amateur at Oakmont. Scotty’s size comes from his dad. After college Rick took over his father’s signboard business. I got pregnant. Rick’s been very generous. He’d give me anything I asked for. Guilt, right? I don’t have to work, but I enjoy it. I have this shop in Del Mar with a co-owner. My friend Sandy Knox. Sandy’s husband dumped her . . . to marry her tennis partner. Is that California enough for you?”

  Gwendolyn explained that the ladies of La Jolla, Del Mar, Rancho Santa Fe were always looking for places to spend their husbands’ money.

  I said, “A college buddy of mine was married to a La Jolla lady one time. He said when La Jolla ladies discuss a maitre d’, they’re talking about the one in Zurich.”

  “Those are my customers.”

  “Gwendolyn, I have to confess. All my life I’ve lusted after Southern Cal cheerleaders. I finally Know one but she’s not a blonde—”

  “Poor baby.”

  “I was going to say it doesn’t hurt that much.”

  “I put the first golf club in Scotty’s hand when he was five, I’m proud to say. That’s when we moved to La Costa—so Scotty would have a golf course to grow up on. I like to think golf Kept him from becoming a surf captain or a weed grower—there’s a lot of that where I live. Rick and I spent our lives going to junior golf tournaments. Up and down the coast, all over the country. I thought it was fun. Rick acted like he thought it was fun, too, until one day he decided Lolita was more fun.”

  “Her name can’t be Lolita.”

  “It’s Ashley. I can’t believe you said Ashley when you came over and hit on me.”

  “That wasn’t a hit. You can’t call that a hit. I didn’t slap you around with my money clip . . . offer you a round-trip ticket to St. Croix.”

  “Your wife must not be with you this week, Bobby Joe Grooves—and don’t tell me she die
d tragically a year ago.”

  I confessed that I had been married—and more than twice. How else would I Know how to write poetry and overhaul a diesel truck at the same time? One wife was a good person, I said. Still is. The other two, it was a toss-up as to which credit card they liked to test-drive the best. Some days it was Amex, some days it was Visa. I said my most recent wife, Cheryl, instead of dying, had chosen to divorce me and seek out someone who liked seated dinners more than I did.

  “You were married to a socialite?”

  “Socialite is what she’s aiming for.”

  “How far does she have to go?”

  “She still has some trailer park to shake off.”

  “I see.”

  “Gwendolyn, all this means is, I’m a lonely single guy. I’m at the Magnolia Inn, and have no dinner plans. Where are you staying?”

  “You’re staying at the Magnolia Inn?” she said brightly. “ I’m staying at the Magnolia Inn.”

  I said, “Further proof that fate don’t have a head.”

  She repeated it. “ ‘Fate don’t have a head’?”

  “Fate’s a funny old boy. You never Know which way he’s apt to turn.”

  “I’m Keeping that for my own,” she grinned. “Fate don’t have a head.”

  If I’d put the over-under at ten minutes on Grady Don and Jerry coming up to our table, I’d have bet the under—and won. They were now standing there, looking down at us.

  “We’re going over to the practice joint,” Jerry said.

  “I’ll be there in a while,” I said. “Tell Mitch if you see him.”

  Roy Mitchell was my caddy. He’d been with me for ten years. There were those who thought he looked like a shorter version of Michael Jordan, but he’d looked like that before people Knew who Michael Jordan was or what Michael Jordan looked like.

  “You Know these guys?” I said to Gwendolyn. “Good pals of mine. Grady Don Maples . . . Jerry Grimes.”

  “I Know who they are,” she said.

  “How you, Gwen?” Jerry said.

  “Good, thank you, Jerry,” she said. “You played awfully well at Bay Hill on Sunday. You were in the group ahead of Scotty.”