“You're crazy, do you know that—”
Teddy cocked his head to one side as he observed the argument taking place between his mother and Holly Grace. He didn't often see grown-ups argue, and it was interesting to watch. Teddy's nose was sunburned and his legs were tired from having walked so much the past two days. But he was looking forward to today's final round, even though he got a little bored standing around waiting for the players to hit. Still, it was worth the wait because sometimes Dallie walked over to the ropes and told him what was going on, and then everybody smiled at him and knew that he was a pretty special kid, since he was getting so much of Dallie's attention. Even after Dallie had made some bad shots the day before, he'd walked over and talked to Teddy, explaining what had happened.
The day was sunny and mild, the temperature too warm for his Born-to-Raise-Hell sweat shirt, but Teddy had decided to wear it anyway.
“There's going to be hell to pay over this,” Holly Grace said, shaking her head. “And why couldn't you put on slacks or shorts like a normal person wears to a golf tournament? You're attracting all kinds of attention.”
Francesca didn't bother to tell Holly Grace that was exactly what she'd intended when she'd pulled on this tomato red slip of a dress. The simple cotton jersey tube dipped low at the neck, gently cupped her hips, and ended well above her knees in a saucy little polka-dot flounce. If she'd calculated right, the dress, along with her unmatched silver “angst” earrings, should just about drive Dallas Beaudine crazy.
In all his years of tournament golf, Dallie had seldom played in the same group as Jack Nicklaus. The few times he had, the round had been a disaster. He had played in front of him and behind him; he'd eaten dinner with him, shared a podium with him, exchanged a few golf stories with him. But he'd seldom played with him, and now Dallie's hands were shaking. He told himself not to make the mistake of confusing the real Jack Nicklaus with the Bear in his head. He reminded himself that the real Nicklaus was a flesh and blood human being, vulnerable like everybody else, but it didn't make any difference. Their faces were the same and that was all that counted.
“How you doin' today, Dallie?” Jack Nicklaus smiled pleasantly as he walked onto the first tee, his son Steve behind him acting as his caddy. I'm going to eat you alive, the Bear in Dallie's head said.
He's forty-seven years old, Dallie reminded himself as he shook Jack's hand. A man of forty-seven can't compete with a thirty-seven-year-old at the top of his form.
I won't even bother spitting out your bones, the Bear replied.
Seve Ballesteros was back by the ropes talking to someone in the crowd, his dark skin and chiseled cheekbones catching the attention of many of the women who made up Dallie's gallery. Dallie knew he should be more worried about Seve than about Jack. Seve was an international champion, considered by many to be the best golfer in the world. His driving was as powerful as any on the tour, and he had an almost superhuman touch around the greens. Dallie forced his attention away from Nicklaus and walked over to shake Seve's hand—only to stop cold in his tracks when he saw who Ballesteros was talking to.
At first he couldn't believe it. Even she couldn't be this evil. Standing there in a bright red dress that looked like underwear, and smiling at Seve like he was some sort of Spanish god, was Miss Fancy Pants herself. Holly Grace stood on one side of her looking miserable, and Teddy was on the other. Francesca finally tore her attention away from Seve and looked toward Dallie. She gave him a smile that was as cool as the inside of a frosted beer mug, a smile so lofty and superior that Dallie wanted to go right over and shake her. She tipped her head slightly, and her silver earrings caught the sun. Lifting her hand, she pushed chestnut tendrils away from her ears, tilting her head so that her neck formed a perfect curve and preening for him—preening, for God's sake! He couldn't believe it.
Dallie began to stalk toward her to choke her to death, but he had to stop because Seve was coming toward him, hand extended, all flashing eyes and Latin charm. Dallie hid behind a phony Texas grin and gave Seve's hand a couple of pumps.
Jack was up first. Dallie was so aggravated he was barely aware that Nicklaus had hit until he heard the crowd applaud. It was a good drive—not quite as long as the behemoth drives of his youth, but in perfect position. Dallie thought he saw Seve sneak a look at Francesca before he teed up. His hair glinted blue-black in the morning light, a Spanish pirate come to plunder American shores, and maybe walk off with a few of their women while he was at it. Seve's lean body wound tightly as he drew back the club and hit a long drive out to the center of the fairway, where it rolled ten yards past Nicklaus and came to a stop.
Dallie sneaked a glance at the gallery, only to wish he hadn't. Francesca was applauding Seve's drive enthusiastically, bouncing up on tiptoes in a pair of tiny red sandals that didn't look as if they would make it through three holes of walking, much less eighteen. He snatched his driver from Skeet's hand, his face dark as a thundercloud, his emotions even darker. Taking his stance, he was hardly even thinking about what he was doing. His body went on automatic pilot as he stared down at the ball and visualized Francesca's beautiful little face imprinted right on the top of the Titleist trademark. And then he swung.
He didn't even know what he'd done until he heard Holly Grace's cheer and his vision cleared enough to see the ball fly out two hundred ninety-five yards and roll to a stop well beyond Seve's drive. It was a great shot, and Skeet slapped him jubilantly on the back. Seve and Jack nodded in polite acknowledgment. Dallie turned toward the gallery and nearly choked at what he saw. Francesca had her snooty little nose tilted up in the air, as if she were ready to expire from boredom, as if she were saying in that exaggerated way of hers, “Is that the absolute best you can do?”
“Get rid of her,” Dallie snarled under his breath at Skeet.
Skeet was wiping the driver with a towel and didn't seem to hear. Dallie marched over to the ropes, his voice full of venom but pitched low enough so that he couldn't be overheard by anyone except Holly Grace. “I want you to get off this course right now,” he told Francesca. “What the hell do you think you're doing here?”
Once again she gave him that lofty, superior smile. “I'm just reminding you what the stakes are, darling.”
“You're crazy!” he exploded. “In case you're too ignorant to have figured it out, I'm in a three-way tie for second place in one of the biggest tournaments of the year, and I don't need this kind of distraction.”
Francesca straightened, leaned forward, and whispered in his ear, “Second place isn't good enough.”
Afterward Dallie figured that no jury in the world would have convicted him if he'd strangled the life out of her right there on the spot, but his playing partners were moving off the tee, he had another shot coming up, and he couldn't spare the time.
For the next nine holes he made that ball beg for mercy, ordered it to follow his wishes, punished it with every ounce of his strength and every morsel of his determination. He willed his putts into the cup on one sure stroke. One stroke—not two, not three! Each shot was more awesome than the last, and every time he turned to the gallery, he saw Holly Grace talking furiously to Francesca, translating the magic of what he was doing, telling Miss Fancy Pants that she was seeing golf history being made. But no matter what he did, no matter how astounding his shot, how breathtaking his putts, how heroically he was playing—every goddamn time he looked at her, Francesca seemed to be saying, “Is that the best you can do?”
He was so caught up in his anger, so immersed in her scorn, that he couldn't quite comprehend the consequences of the rapidly changing leader board. Oh, he understood what it said, all right. He saw the numbers. He knew that the tournament leaders playing behind him had fallen back; he knew Seve had dropped off. He could read the numbers, all right, but it wasn't until he'd birdied the fourteenth hole that he could actually comprehend in his gut the fact that he had pulled ahead, that his angry, vicious attack on the course had put him at two under par for
the tournament. With four holes left to play, he was tied for first place in the United States Classic.
Tied with Jack Nicklaus.
Dallie shook his head, trying to clear it as he walked toward the fifteenth tee. How could this have happened to him? How had it happened that Dallas Beaudine from Wynette, Texas, was going one-on-one with Jack Nicklaus? He couldn't think about it. If he thought about it, the Bear would start talking to him in his head.
You're going to fail, Beaudine. You're going to prove everything Jaycee used to say about you. Everything I've been saying for years. You're not man enough to pull this off. Not against me.
He turned back toward the gallery and saw that she was watching him. As he glared at her, she placed one sandaled foot in front of the other and bent her knee slightly so that ridiculous little polka-dot flounce at the bottom of her dress rode up higher on her legs. She pressed her shoulders back, making the soft cotton jersey cling to her breasts, outlining them in memorable detail. Here's your trophy, that little body told him quite plainly. Don't forget what you're playing for.
He slammed the ball down the fifteenth fairway, promising himself that when this was all over he would never again let himself near a woman with a bitch's heart. As soon as the tournament was finished, he was going to teach Francesca Day the lesson of her life by marrying the first sweet-voiced country girl who came along.
He scrambled for par on the fifteenth and the sixteenth holes. So did Nicklaus. Jack's son was with him the whole way, handing him clubs, helping read the greens. Dallie's own son stood by the ropes wearing a Born-to-Raise-Hell T-shirt and a look of furious determination on his face. Dallie's heart swelled every time he looked at him. Damn, he was a feisty little kid.
The seventeenth hole was short and nasty. Jack talked a little bit to the crowd as he walked toward the green. He had cut his teeth on pressure shots, and there was nothing he loved more than a tight spot. Dallie had sweat through his golf shirt and through two gloves. He was famous for joking with the crowd, but now he maintained an ominous silence. Nicklaus was playing some of the best golf of his life, chomping up the fairways, burning up the greens. Forty-seven was too old to play like that, but somebody had forgotten to tell Jack. And now only Dallie Beaudine stood between the greatest player in the history of the sport and one more title.
Somehow Dallie pulled off another par, but Jack did, too. They were still tied going into the final hole.
Cameramen balancing portable video units on their shoulders followed every movement as the two players headed for the eighteenth tee. The network announcers heaped one superlative after another on them while word of the blood contest taking place on the Old Testament spread throughout the world of sports, sending dials flicking and the network's Sunday afternoon ratings soaring into the stratosphere. The crowd around the players had grown to the thousands, their excitement feverish because they knew that whatever happened, they couldn't lose. This crowd had been charmed by Dallie when he was still a rookie, and they had been waiting for years for him to win a major title. But the thought of being on the spot when Jack won again was irresistible, too. It was the 1986 Masters all over again, with Jack charging like a bull toward the finish, as unstoppable as the force of nature.
Dallie and Jack both hit solid drives off the eighteenth tee. The hole was a long par five with a lake placed diabolically in front of all but the left corner of the green. They called it Hogan's Lake, because it had cost the great Ben Hogan the U.S. Classic championship in 1951 when he'd tried to hit over it instead of around it. They could just as easily have called it Arnie's Lake or Watson's Lake or Snead's Lake because at one time or other all of them had fallen victim to its treachery.
Jack didn't mind gambling, but he hadn't won every important championship in the world by taking foolhardy chances, and he had no intention of going directly for the flag by making a suicide shot over that lake. He lined up his second shot safely to the left of Hogan's Lake and hit a beautiful fade that landed just short of the green. The crowd let out a roar and then held its collective breath as the ball bounced up in the air and came to a stop on the edge of the green, sixty feet from the pin. The noise was deafening. Nicklaus had made a spectacular shot, a magic shot, a shot for a possible birdie on the hole—a shot that even gave him an outside chance at an eagle.
Dallie felt panic, as insidious as poison, creeping through his veins. In order to keep up with Nicklaus he had to make that same shot—hit to the left of the lake and then bounce the ball up on the green. It was a difficult shot in the best of circumstances, but with thousands of people watching from the gallery, millions more watching at home on their televisions, with a tournament title at stake and hands that wouldn't stop shaking, he knew he couldn't pull it off.
Seve hit to the left of the lake on his second shot, but the ball fell well short of the green. Panic rose up in Dallie's throat until it seemed to be choking him. He couldn't do this—he just couldn't! He spun around, instinctively searching out Francesca. Sure enough, her chin shot up in the air, her snooty little nose lifted higher—daring him, challenging him—
And then, as he watched, it all fell apart for her. She couldn't pull it off any longer. Her chin dropped, her expression softened, and she gazed at him with eyes that saw straight through into his soul, eyes that understood his panic and begged him to set it aside. For her. For Teddy. For all of them.
You're going to disappoint her, Beaudine, the Bear taunted. You've disappointed everybody you've ever loved in your life, and you're getting ready to do it again.
Francesca's lips moved, forming a single word. Please.
Dallie looked down at the grass, thinking about everything Francie had said to him, and then he walked over to Skeet. “I'm going straight for the flag,” he said. “I'm going to hit across the lake.”
He waited for Skeet to yell at him, to tell him he was all kinds of a fool. But Skeet merely looked thoughtful. “You're going to have to carry that ball two hundred and sixty yards and make it stop on a nickel.”
“I know that,” Dallie replied quietly.
“If you make the safe shot—go around the lake—you've got a good chance at tying Nicklaus.”
“I'm tired of safe shots,” Dallie said. “I'm going for the flag.” Jaycee had been dead for years, and Dallie didn't have a damned thing left to prove to that bastard. Francie was right. Not trying at all was a bigger sin than failing. He took a last look over toward Francesca, wanting her respect more than he'd ever wanted anything. She and Holly Grace were clutching each other's hands as if they were getting ready to fall off the edge of the world. Teddy's legs had gotten tired and he was sitting on the grass, but the look of determination hadn't faded from his face.
Dallie focused all his attention on what he had to do, trying to control the rush of adrenaline that would harm him more than it would help.
Hogan couldn't carry the lake, the Bear whispered. What makes you think you can?
Because I want it more than Hogan ever did, Dallie answered back. I just plain want it more.
When he lined up for the ball and the spectators realized what he was going to do, they emitted a murmur of disbelief. Nicklaus's face was as expressionless as ever. If he thought Dallie was making a mistake, he kept it to himself.
You'll never do it, the Bear whispered.
You just watch me, Dallie replied.
His club lashed through the ball. It shot into the sky on a high, strong trajectory and then faded to the right so that it hung over the water—over the center of the lake that had claimed Ben Hogan and Arnold Palmer and so many other legends. It sailed through the sky for an eternity, but it still hadn't cleared the lake when it began to come down. The spectators held their breath, their bodies frozen into position like extras in an old science-fiction movie. Dallie stood like a statue watching the slow, ominous descent. In the background, a flag with the number 18 printed on it caught a puff of breeze and lifted ever so slightly, so that in all the universe only that flag
and the ball were moving.
Screams went up from the crowd, and then an earsplitting wall of sound struck Dallie as his ball cleared the edge of the lake and hit the green, bouncing slightly before it came to a dead stop ten feet from the flag.
Seve put his ball on the green and two-putted, then shook his head dejectedly as he walked off onto the fringe. Jack's heroic sixty-foot putt lipped the cup, but didn't drop. Dallie stood alone. He only had a ten-foot putt, but he was mentally and physically exhausted. He knew that if he made the putt he would win the tournament, but if he missed it he would be tied with Jack.
He turned to Francesca, and once again her pretty lips formed that one word: please.
As tired as he was, Dallie didn't have the heart to disappoint her.
Chapter
33
Dallie's arms shot up in the air, one fist holding his putter aloft like a medieval standard of victory. Skeet was crying like a baby, so overcome with joy that he couldn't move. As a result, the first person who reached Dallie was Jack Nicklaus.
“Great game, Dallie,” Nicklaus said, putting his arm over Dallie's shoulders. “You're a real champion.”
Then Skeet was hugging him and pounding him on the back, and Dallie was hugging back, except his eyes were moving the whole time, searching the crowd until he found what he was looking for.
Holly Grace broke through first; then Francesca, with Teddy in tow. Holly Grace rushed toward Dallie on her long-stemmed legs—legs that had first won fame as they ran the bases at Wynette High, legs that had been American-designed for both speed and beauty. Holly Grace ran toward the man she had loved just about all her life, and then she stopped cold as she saw those blue eyes of his slip right past her and come to rest on Francesca. A spasm of pain went through her chest, a moment of heartbreak, and then the pain eased as she felt herself let him go.