The Tennis Player from Bermuda

by Fiona Hodgkin

  My parents had been mixed doubles partners for many years, and they knew how to coordinate with one another. I recognized a planned, combined attack at the net. They must have discussed this in advance of raising it with me.

  “I told Mother I would help in the clinic tomorrow.”

  “Oh, Fiona,” Mother said. “You’re home on holiday. Go to Tempest and enjoy yourself.”

  I said I would go, and Mother left the table to ring Mrs Pemberton.

  I took the bus to the Mid-Ocean Club and then walked about 15 minutes to Tempest. I was met at the door by the housekeeper, who took me down to the grass court. The setting was beautiful, even by Bermuda standards, which in terms of natural beauty are about the highest in the world. The grass court was on the edge of a cliff, looking over the Atlantic to the southeast.

  When you tossed the ball for your serve from the north end of the court, the last thing you saw before hitting the ball was the sharp horizon far out on the Atlantic. Looking exactly in that direction, there was nothing except the blue water of the Atlantic – and I mean nothing – between you and Antarctica, about 13,000 kilometers away.

  In the other directions, the court was so well protected by Bermuda cedars and oleanders that the prevailing wind from the west usually didn’t affect play. This grass court is still there today, and it must be one of the most spectacular tennis courts in the world.

  It belongs to me, now.

  I knew all the young people there except one, who I thought must be Mark Thakeham. There were seven people, plus me, evenly divided between girls and boys, so the plan must be for some ghastly round robin, mixed doubles play. I would rather have swallowed a lizard. I said my hellos to my friends, and Mrs Pemberton swooped down to introduce me to her nephew.

  I realize how silly this sounds today, because my daughters roll their eyes when they hear me talk about it. But in 1962, in Bermuda, an 18-year-old girl like me could speak appropriately on a social basis with a young man she did not know only if and not until she had been introduced by an adult. I swear it’s true.

  Mrs Pemberton said, “Miss Hodgkin, may I introduce you to my nephew, Mark Thakeham?”

  Mark said, “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Hodgkin. I’m told you play tennis.”

  “Mr Thakeham, welcome to Bermuda. Have you been on our island before?”

  “Never. I’m probably not the first person to say this is a beautiful place. So is it true that you play tennis?”

  “I do play, Mr Thakeham, but not as well as I would wish.”

  Mark had strikingly good looks, with strawberry blond hair, and that classic English complexion. He was attentive and polite, with an aristocratic English accent. He was plainly intelligent. He asked me about Smith – only approximately one percent of the members of Mark’s social class in England at that time would have heard of Smith, so he must have been briefed on me in advance – and he asked what course of study I was pursuing.

  “My parents are both physicians, and I hope to be one as well, and so I am what we in the States call ‘pre-med.’”

  “I am planning to be a physician myself, Miss Hodgkin. I think our fathers served together as doctors in the war.”

  “That is my understanding as well,” I said.

  Mark surprised me. When I said I wanted to be a physician, men reacted with derision and women at best were skeptical – this was 1962, remember. Even people who knew my mother and grandmothers, and therefore understood that my career in medicine had been decided the moment I was born, were still quite uncomfortable with the idea. Mark, though, seemed to feel that my plan to be a physician was nothing out of the ordinary.

  But maybe he had been advised that this was just the way I was and to accept me on my own terms.

  To me, this had the earmarks of a setup. Some people, including my parents, had apparently reached the conclusion that this toff and I should meet, and maybe one thing might lead to another.

  “Mr Thakeham, I was told you played for Cambridge?”

  “Yes, Miss Hodgkin.” He laughed. “But understand that the university has only an informal team. It’s just club play. I’m told you are a superb player, and you shouldn’t expect much from me, I’m afraid.”

  “Mr Thakeham, I know we’re planning to play some mixed doubles this afternoon, but would you consider playing a match of singles against me first?”

  “I’ll certainly play against you if you will please call me Mark.”

  “Then I hope you will call me Fiona.” The social convention in Bermuda at the time was that, because we were close in age – Mark was about four years my senior – we could, by mutual agreement, decide to use our Christian names for one another.

  So while the others were still chatting, and before the round robin, or whatever other awful scheme – probably something dispensing with advantage scoring – was organized, Mark and I walked out onto the beautiful grass and knocked up.

  After a few minutes, I stopped, casually tossed my wooden Maxply racket onto the grass, and asked him, “rough or smooth?” Mark said “rough” and won, so he would have the first serve. I looked up to see where the sun was shining and decided I wanted to receive on the north end of the court.

  Mark served, hard. It wasn’t placed well – it bounced smack in the middle of my deuce service court – but all I could do was block his serve back. He came in on my weak return and blasted a forehand deep into my ad court. I wasn’t anywhere near it. I felt as though I was playing mixed doubles, but without my male partner at the net to cut off shots like that.

  As I walked over to the ad court, I told myself that Mark just wanted to show me how strong he was, and that now he would slow down. But no. His next serve was faster than his first, though again not well placed. I got my racket on it but made another weak return. Again, he hit a strong forehand crosscourt. I got to it, barely, but only clipped it with the rim of my racket. The ball glanced off into the oleanders.

  My girlfriends were watching us and giggling. One of them called out, “Careful, Mr Thakeham. Our Fiona doesn’t care to lose.”

  30-love. I went back to my deuce court. I was inwardly fuming. This time Mark’s serve was well placed, right down the middle, and even harder. I hit it with my backhand, but late, so the ball popped up and floated over the net. Mark was waiting for it. He smashed it.

  I motioned to him that I wanted to talk at the net.

  “Mark,” I said, “I’m about seven stone seven.” I meant that I weighed 105 pounds. “I’ll guess that you must be 13 stone. And you’re fit. Have we established to your satisfaction that you’re the more muscular player?”

  He grinned. “You said you wanted to play singles.”

  I turned away from him. Over my shoulder, I said, “Not any longer.”

  As I walked off the court, he jumped over the net and took my arm.

  “Fiona.”

  I shook his arm off. I regretted agreeing to come to this tennis party.

  I went and sat down with my girlfriends. They had concocted a complex round robin mixed doubles format with games to five points, no ad scoring, one team serving all five points. The winning team then would sit out. It made no sense to me. Luckily, I was able to avoid being paired with Mark. I noticed that during the round robin his serves were good, but he didn’t try to overpower anyone.

  After tennis, the housekeeper served tea on the lawn beside the court. After we had tea, I looked at my watch. All the others lived in Tucker’s Town or close by in St. George’s parish, so they could bicycle home, but the last bus back to Hamilton left in half an hour, and I needed to be at the Mid-Ocean Club to catch it. I stood and said to the group that I needed to leave for the bus, and that I would go inside and thank Mrs Pemberton for inviting me.

  Mark said, “Fiona, don’t leave yet. I’m sure my aunt would loan me an auto to drive you home.”

  “Mark, that’s kind of you, but my parents probably would prefer I took the bus.” I left before he could reply.

  When I walke
d into the sitting room in Midpoint, Mother was writing notes in the charts of patients she had seen that day, and Father was reading The Lancet.

  Mother said, “Fiona, it’s good to see you. Did you enjoy the party?”

  “Yes, Mother.” I sat down and picked up Life magazine.

  I saw them glance at one another.

  “Have you had your tea?” Mother asked.

  “Yes, Mother. I had a good tea at Tempest.”

  Father said, “Sweetheart, did you meet young Mark Thakeham?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  They glanced at one another again.

  “Well?” Father asked.

  I was leafing through the magazine. “I didn’t care for him.”

  Mother bent over her charts, and Father went back to The Lancet.

  After a minute or so, Father’s curiosity got the better of him. “Why not?”

  Mother glared at him, and he went back to the article on the new Sabin polio vaccine he was reading.

  The next day, I was filing charts in the clinic Mother shared with my grandfather. One of my girlfriends, who had been at the tennis party the afternoon before, came in through the screen door of the clinic. She was agog about Mark.

  “Fiona, after you left, he asked Mildred to go out with him. He borrowed a roadster from Mrs Pemberton and took Mildred to St. George’s for pints at the White Horse.”

  “Good for her.” Mildred was quite good looking. This boy was going to cut a wide swath in Bermuda in the two weeks he was upon us.

  “Mark’s father is Viscount Thakeham.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “You don’t seem interested.”

  “I’m not,” I said, slamming shut a file drawer of patient charts.

  “Mark likes you.”

  “Why in heaven would you say that?”

  “When you left just after tea, he kept asking us about you.”

  “Then why did Mildred go out with him?”

  “Who wouldn’t? He has use of an auto. He’s cute. And his father’s a viscount.”

  Later that afternoon, the screen door opened and then slammed shut.

  “I’m sorry,” Mark said. “I didn’t know it would shut so quickly.”

  Then he said to me, “Hello, Fiona.”

  “Hello yourself.” I turned back to my filing work.

  Mother happened to come to my desk with several patient charts. “Fiona, take these home, will you? I need to write some notes in them this evening.”

  She noticed Mark. “May I help you?”

  I said, “Mother, this is Mark Thakeham. Mark, this is my mother, Doctor Fiona Wilson.”

  They shook hands. Mother said, “Mr Thakeham, I’ve met your parents on two occasions in England. You’re a medical student at Cambridge, I’m told.”

  “Yes, Doctor Wilson, I’m in my first clinical year.”

  Mother looked at Mark, and then at me.

  “Well, I have patients waiting for me. Good luck in the clinic, Mr Thakeham.”

  Mark said, “Fiona.” Then he stopped.

  “Yes, Mark? I have work to do.”

  “Fiona, I apologize to you. I know I was rude to you when we played.”

  “Apology accepted. And thank you for coming to see me.”

  “Fiona, perhaps we could play tennis tomorrow?”

  “I have a match already.” I was meeting Mrs Martin at nine the next morning at Coral Beach. “Perhaps you might arrange to play with Mildred.”

  “Well, news must travel fast.”

  “It’s a small island.”

  “You and I might play just a set after your match tomorrow? Or we could meet for lunch.”

  Now I felt that I was the one acting impolitely. After all, he was a visitor to Bermuda.

  “My match is at Coral Beach. But I’ll be finished by 10:30 or so. If you want, we could play after that. You’d have to come to Coral Beach. Do you know where it is?”

  He didn’t, but I showed him on a small tourist map.

  The next morning, when Mark arrived at Coral Beach, I introduced him to Mrs Martin. She said to the two of us, “Would you young people mind if I watched a bit of your match?”

  This was meant for Mark, not me, and Mark replied that he would welcome having her as a spectator. I hadn’t explained to Mark who Mrs Martin was for me.

  Then Mrs Martin said to us, “I take it your match will be merely social?” Translated into today’s English from the language of early 1960s Bermuda social conventions, she was asking whether she might coach me while I played Mark.

  I turned to Mark and asked, “Mark, would you mind if Mrs Martin spoke to me during our match? Please don’t hesitate to say if it might distract you.”

  This bewildered Mark. “It wouldn’t distract me in the slightest. Not a problem for me.” So Mrs Martin sat on a bench beside the court, and we began our match.

  Mark served softly to me in the first game. I noticed that Mrs Martin’s forehead was furrowed, as though she were puzzled.

  At the changeover, she said to Mark, “Are you intentionally backing off your serve?”

  “Perhaps a bit.”

  “No. Hit the best serves you can.”

  He looked at me, and I shrugged.

  In Mark’s next service game, he began sending hard, fast serves over the net, and I either didn’t get my racket on them or, at best, blocked them back.

  Mrs Martin signaled that she wanted to stop play. She walked over to me. “Don’t block his serve. Stroke through your return.”

  “I can’t, at least not on his first service. He hits it too hard.”

  She snorted. “Nonsense. You’ll play plenty of women in international competition with more effective serves than this young man. Don’t give him any more lollipops.”

  This was her term for a soft return: a ‘lollipop.’ She didn’t approve of lollipops.

  I tried moving back well behind the baseline to return his first service. I glanced over and saw Mrs Martin shaking her head. She didn’t approve of standing behind the baseline. On his next serve, I held my ground at the baseline. Mark had little control over his serve. He could make the ball land in the service box, and hard. Whether it went wide, straight down the middle, or directly into my body, was mostly a matter of chance. But the ball certainly came over the net fast.

  Mark served to my deuce court. I saw the ball was going to be down the centre line, to my backhand. I took the throat of my racket in my left hand and pulled the racket well back and down. But his serve was so fast I connected with the ball late, probably just a few centimeters in front of me, and my return went wide and landed well out.

  I looked over at Mrs Martin. She was nodding. I guessed what she was thinking: ‘Better to try, and hit it out, than not to try at all.’

  I walked across to my ad court for his next service. I set up on the baseline. Mark tossed and hit a remarkably fast serve, which again went straight down the middle. A beautiful serve. It kicked up above my shoulder. I took the ball with my forehand, above my shoulder, as hard as I could swing, and sent the ball crosscourt into his deuce court. I hit the return so hard and flat that Mark didn’t get within a meter of it. A clear winner.

  I looked over at Mrs Martin.

  She said, “Like that.”

  No more lollipops.

  Mrs Martin left for home after our first set, and then Mark and I played two more. That was a total of six sets for me that morning, and I was done in. I had to shower before lunch, so I pointed Mark in the direction of the balcony overlooking the Atlantic where we would have lunch, and I went to the dressing room.

  My hair was wet when I arrived on the balcony and sat down with him. “I hope you don’t mind my hair being wet. To dry it would delay lunch by probably an hour.”

  “Your hair looks beautiful wet.”

  I had no idea what to think about that.

  The waiter came and we ordered. Mark began to ask, “Who on earth – ”

  I put my hand on his forearm t
o stop him in mid-sentence. “I should have warned you about Mrs Martin. But I had no idea she would stay to watch us play.”

  “Who is she?”

  “Well, really, she’s my coach, but since on Bermuda it’s considered unsporting and Not Done for a young lady to have a tennis coach, Mrs Martin would never think of herself as my coach.”

  “What would she say she is?”

  “She would say just that she and I play tennis together. She’s my father’s cousin, so we’re related. She’s a wonderful person and good to me, but she’s a bit of a character. She reached the singles final at Wimbledon just before the war.”

  “Wimbledon? Can you beat her?”

  “Yes. For years I couldn’t, but now I haven’t lost to her for a year or so. But her play is at an international level, still.”

  “How long has she been coaching you?”

  “Well, longer than four years.”

  “How often do you play with her?”

  “On spring holiday, we’ve had good luck with the weather, and so we’ve played every morning. She thinks the tennis coach at Smith has given me some bad habits, and she’s trying to fix them in the short time before I go back to school.”

  “What bad habits?”

  “She thinks the Smith coach is making me play more cautiously and to work the percentages. He’s influenced by Jack Kramer a great deal.”

  “So Mrs Martin doesn’t believe in playing the percentages?”

  “No, she doesn’t.” I thought for a moment. “I think she believes in playing each point as though your life depends on winning it.”

  After lunch, we walked down the steep staircase to the beach, took off our shoes, and walked along Coral Beach together.

  “This must be the most beautiful beach in the world,” Mark said.

  “Most people would say this isn’t even the most beautiful beach in Bermuda.”

  “Which beach is the best?”

  “Oh, probably one of the beaches farther along the South Shore. Warwick Long Bay is where I usually go to swim.”