Six Strokes Under

by Roberta Isleib

  In the present circumstances, that seemed like a safe enough generalization. I spotted Julie Atwater standing with a cluster of golfers. She leaned against one of them, tears leaking from under her dark glasses and down her face. Why was she still here? If I'd missed the cut yesterday, as she had, I would have been gone, baby, gone. Plantation Golf and Country Club a speck in my rearview mirror. Maybe she had left, then returned when she heard the news about Kaitlin's murder.

  The minister led the crowd in a unison recitation of the Twenty-third Psalm. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me ...," I mumbled.

  This was the other part that stunk about death. Each time someone I knew died, all the other sadness from my life piggybacked on the recent one. Just now, I had Coach Rupert's unexpected advice about my father fresh in my mind. I struggled to push back the memory of watching Dad's truck vanish down Cherry Lane, only black smoke from his cracked muffler and a fine silt of dust left behind. As I wiped my tears on my shirtsleeve, Jeanine tapped my shoulder.

  "Hey, Cassie," she said.

  "Hey."

  "This is really hard. I didn't even know her, but I feel awful about this." I nodded, another tear running down my cheek.

  "Gosh," she said. "I didn't realize you felt that close to her."

  I shrugged, deciding it would be both too complicated and beyond rude to explain that my grief was really for fatalities in my own past, not for Kaitlin. The minister read a final blessing and the crowd began to disperse.

  "Are you busy later?" I said. "Why don't you join Laura and Joe and me for dinner—meet us sometime around seven at the Starlight?" I gave her a quick hug and headed back to the car, where I'd planned to catch up with Laura.

  "I need a nap," she said. "I've got a big goose egg and a headache to match."

  "Can you find a ride home? I wanted to try to catch Tom Reilly, the publicity guy, before he leaves. Ask him a few questions about So Won Lee."

  I snaked my way through the cars in the parking lot toward the LPGA office. In the row closest to the clubhouse, I saw the Deikon honcho unlocking the door to his SUV. "Excuse me," I called and trotted over to his vehicle. "I'm Cassie Burdette, one of the golfers. I've been very impressed with your equipment this week,"

  The Deikon man smiled and shook my hand. "We're always pleased to find a new customer. Did you have a good day today?" He perked up when I told him about my sixty-eight.

  "I'm going to need woods and irons," I said. The rep's face crinkled into an even wider smile. "Who should I contact about trying some clubs? I take it Walter Moore's on the way out."

  "He's out, not just on the way out. I'll give you my card, you can call me at headquarters," he said.

  "How long did Walter work for you? It must have been a shock when all this happened."

  "A couple years," answered the rep, his smile gone now. "I warned my boss not to hire him."

  "You predicted trouble?"

  "It didn't take a brain surgeon," said the rep. "A guy comes to you with work experience as a bouncer and a used car salesman, plus a manslaughter charge in his curriculum vitae. You be the judge."

  "A manslaughter charge?"

  "I have to get back," said the rep, sliding into his front seat. "Give me a buzz and I'll be sure you get fitted for those clubs. I can't promise we'll sponsor you, but a sixty-eight is a darned good start." He winked and slammed the door shut.

  I continued on to the LPGA office and found Tom, alone, typing furiously on his laptop. "Give me a minute," he said. "I need to send out the quotes from today's round. I see from your interview that you hit the sweet spot."

  I laughed and wandered back out into the hall to peruse the players' bulletin board. The Bible study notice and list of nonconforming drivers were still posted. The Fairway Bruiser brouhaha continued to puzzle me. Why would Kaitlin Rupert have put the illegal club in the Korean golfer's bag? Was the elimination of So Won both from Q-school and Walter Moore's elite stable of sponsored golfers worth the risk Kaitlin would have been taking?

  I tried to picture the scene around the building where the carts were stored, where she could have tampered with So Won's golf bag. There would have been a crowd of milling golfers, as well as volunteer expediters, and club personnel tending to the carts. Easy enough to slip the driver into someone's bag, presuming you weren't caught in the act by its owner.

  Then it occurred to me that So Won's golf bag looked a lot like Kaitlin's Deikon monster—dark green plaid with brown leather piping, and a forest of expensive woods sprouting from the lip. Maybe someone had intended to place the club in Kaitlin's bag and chose So Won's by mistake. Standing behind So Won's bag, an observer might not have noticed that the Deikon logo was missing. And I could make a long list of girls who might have enjoyed seeing Kaitlin knocked on her ass for breaking a USGA rule. In fact, there'd be a catfight to get top billing.

  "I'm ready for you, Cassie," said Tom Reilly, poking his head out into the hallway. "How can I help? I hope you're not here to complain about your write-up—it's already been e-mailed to headquarters and posted on the website."

  "I'm sure it's fine," I told him. "I'm just curious about So Won Lee."

  "That was a darned shame," said Tom. "From what I saw, she was a nice girl, and a nice player."

  "I know you can't show me her profile," I said. "But could you look it over and tell me if you see anything unusual, anything that might possibly connect her to Kait-lin's murder?"

  He brought out a thick notebook containing the profiles from the entire Q-school field. Mine would be there, too. Husband, no. Children, none. Hobbies, none I cared to make public. Organic gardening made me sound like a dork, and I didn't want someone goading me to perform hot licks on a banjo I hadn't touched in years. Lowest score ever, sixty-five, Palm Lakes Golf Course, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Lowest score in competition, sixty-eight, Seminole Golf Course, Tallahassee, Florida— a flat, wide-open layout that took some of the bragging rights out of the number. If I had planned on playing here next year, I'd be able to replace that score with today's round. Teachers or individuals having influenced your career—this blank was remarkable only for the absence of my father's name.

  Tom interrupted my thoughts to read from So Won's page in the notebook. "She was born and raised in Korea, has been playing on the Futures Tour this year, enjoys time with her family, shot a sixty-two at her home course in Seoul, sixty-three this year at the Lincoln Futures Golf Classic in Avon, Connecticut. I don't really know what you're looking for, there's no question asking whether you'd cheat or kill somebody to make it onto the LPGA Tour. Point is, she didn't need to do either. You could see from her scores the past two days, she's one of the ones who's going to make it. Unless this whole illegal golf club affair brings her down."

  "I hope not," I said. "Thanks anyway, for looking."

  "You might try speaking with Jung Hyun Ro—she's the gal who does most of So Won's translating. I saw her earlier on the range."

  I accepted a second round of his congratulations and best wishes and left the office. I stopped again at the players' bulletin board and read the Bible study notice and list of illegal drivers for the umpteenth time. I wondered if Maria Renda was out shopping for a club to replace the driver she'd destroyed earlier today. I still didn't understand how her caddie tolerated her over the long haul. Some quirk in his personality—masochism maybe—allowed him to interpret her volatile nature as part of her charm.

  Which again brought Kaitlin to mind. Loving Kaitlin either took someone half-cocked, and I'd place Walter Moore squarely in this category, or a person who took the "love your neighbor as yourself commandment very much to heart. Like Julie Atwater. Former Bible beater and possible lesbian. I no longer knew what to think of her. No way around it: her friendship with Kaitlin seemed odd, her calm presence a major contrast to Kaitlin's turbulence. And despite her explanation, I didn't understand the bad blood between her and Gary.

  I gr
abbed my putter from the trunk and trotted over to the practice area, my mind running loose with possibilities. Suppose Julie had developed a crush on Kaitlin after Kaitlin helped her out with the referral to Dr. Bencher. What if Kaitlin gave her the cold shoulder and the crush evolved into a jealous rage once Kaitlin turned her advances down? This theory would raise Julie to the status of murder suspect, as well as explain Gary's dislike for her.

  I found Jung Hyun Ro at the Panther putting green. She nodded politely at my greeting, then refocused on her putting stroke. "How is So Won Lee holding up?" I asked, dropping three balls down onto the short grass. "It was such a shame, what happened to her."

  "She was very sad," said the girl. She sunk two three-footers. "It was not her golf club that they found in her bag." Clunk, clunk, two more balls deposited in the heart of the cup. "But she is at peace, if it is God's will. And she has forgiven those who have wronged her." I looked carefully to see whether Jung Hyun Ro was including me, the obvious beneficiary of So Won's misfortune, in that company. Her face was blank. I rolled a putt well past my targeted hole.

  "Is she still in town?"

  "She left for Orlando yesterday afternoon."

  So much for the theory of So Won Lee as killer. It's hard to have a murder pinned on you if you were miles away from the immediate vicinity.

  I returned my putter to the trunk, slid into the driver's seat of the car, and pointed it to the Starlight—home away from home. None of my ruminations fit just right. Walter Moore, with a manslaughter charge in his history, was developing as a solid suspect. Other than that, my latest brainstorm about Julie Atwater made as much sense as any of the other theories we were working with. Not a lick.

  Chapter 23

  It was twenty to six when I arrived back at the motel. Walter Moore ducked into the reception area ahead of me.

  "Walter!" I called out when I reached the vestibule. He turned back from the elevator. Every crease in his face contributed to the intensity of his scowl. "Do you have a minute?" I tipped my head toward the empty breakfast nook. Manslaughter charge or not, I figured he was unlikely to hurt me in full view of the motel lobby.

  "Make it snappy," he said. "I'm on my way out of this stinking town."

  "You've had a rough week. That was hard, the service for Kaitlin. They did a nice job, though." Now I was babbling. Frankly, I was surprised the cops would allow him to leave the area.

  He clenched his teeth until the small muscles around his nose and eyes began to twitch, but said nothing. Either he was struggling to contain his sadness or really, really angry.

  "Let's see, I've lost two contracts, a girlfriend, and my professional credibility. Plus, the cops are on me like flies on a cow's ass. Rough week? You make the call."

  "What's next for you?" I asked after several silent moments. It was a clumsy question, but I couldn't think of a casual entree into the subject of his plans.

  "If I knew," he said, spittle forming little hills of bubbles in the corners of his mouth, "if I knew, I don't believe I would pass the information along to you. Some people are better than others about keeping quiet about subjects that are none of their fucking business." The last few words were more hissed than spoken.

  "I didn't say anything—" He stood up and shut down my objections with a sharp wave.

  "Well, good luck," I said to his back as he strode out of the room.

  I flipped on the TV and surfed through reruns of Maury, Ricki Lake, and Queen Latifah. From this quick review, it appeared I could choose between programs about dictatorial husbands and fathers, gender-bending affairs, or two-timing gold-diggers. Who watched this garbage? And more to the point, where did they find the losers willing to expose their bizarre problems to public ridicule? I shut the television off—I was wound way too tight to sit through any of the available nonsense. The conversations with Walter's boss and Walter had turned the screws a little tighter still.

  Returning to our room was not an option yet. Laura would kill me if I woke her up ahead of schedule to yak about my murder theories. That left pulling the trigger on the cocktail hour ahead of the others—not the smartest move just before the final round of Q-school. Or I could work some of my tension out in the miserable motel gym.

  The desk clerk waved me over on the way through the faux green lobby to the small room that housed the exercise equipment. "I have two messages from your mother," she said, holding out a pair of Starlight-logo sticky notes. "She told me she hadn't been able to get through to you. She asked me to deliver these to you personally."

  "Is something wrong?" I wasn't particularly worried. Mom's baseline level of hysteria tended to escalate when I'd been out of touch for more than three days.

  "She just said she hadn't heard from you. She thought maybe there was a problem with both your voice mail and your cell phone." She shrugged apologetically. "You know mothers."

  I sure knew mine. I thanked the clerk and continued on to the gym. The room was dim and empty, the skeletons of the equipment lit only by the flickering television that hung from the ceiling. I slid my key card into the slot, opened the door, and flipped on the overhead lights. The previous patron had left the TV volume blaring. Maury was attempting to intercede between a snotty teenaged girl wearing black lipstick and double nose rings and her enraged father. Unable to find the channel changer or reach the volume button on the television, I left him holding forth and turned to the exercise equipment.

  Having run this morning, I skipped over the selection of cranky aerobics machines and went straight for the weights. No LifeMaster computerized machines here. The motel had provided an unlikely assortment of free weights—two pounds and three pounds, then skipping directly to fifty. I knew bicep curls with the fifty-pounder would leave me crippled, probably unable to swing my clubs higher than shoulder level tomorrow. The lighter weights were not worth the effort, even with multiple repetitions. The only other selection was a vaguely familiar Smith press bar, this one produced by EZ-Fit. I read the description and instructions from a faded printout on the wall. The bar targeted pecs with bungee cord counter-resistance and had a built-in spotting system that eliminated the need for a lifting partner. Who wouldn't want firmer pecs?

  I squinted at the faint numbers on the upright sidebar. The weight on the EZ-Fit was set for forty pounds, which seemed ambitious but not unmanageable. As instructed, I lay on my back on the bench, with my chest centered under the barbell. I grabbed the bar with the overhand grip illustrated on the wall, disengaged it from its selectorized safety system, and lowered the weight to my chest. I braced my feet against the footholds at the end of the bench and slowly extended my arms to lift the barbell. It felt refreshingly heavy.

  By the third repetition, the muscles in my arms and chest had begun to shake with the exertion; I was no longer feeling refreshed. Either I wasn't as strong as I liked to think, or the EZ-Fit could use a recalibrating tune-up. I needed to reduce the amount of weight on the barbell, or else quit. Quitting sounded good.

  I extended my arms again and pushed the bar up and over into the safety slot. Instead of catching when I flipped the barbell over, the entire weight dropped and banged down toward my chest. By sheer reflex, I absorbed enough of the impact with my hands to avoid being knocked breathless or cracking a rib. I stared up: the selectorized safety spotting system had apparently failed, and the bungee cord cable supporting the weights had snapped in half.

  "Stay calm," I told myself. "Breathe easy." Not so simple with forty pounds pressing on your windpipe. The scene on the television came into focus as I regrouped. Maury motioned the studio audience and the father for quiet.

  "I'm seventeen years old," shrieked the teenager with the nose rings. "He can't tell me how to run my life." The gem-encrusted ring in her exposed, pierced navel glinted in the studio's harsh light.

  "I will not allow my daughter to behave like a common slut," said the father. "As long as she's in my house, she'll live by my rules." He slammed his fist down on Maury's flimsy studio desk
. At first glance, he had long ago lost the battle of controlling this girl.

  Three more times, I positioned my sweaty hands on the barbell and heaved up. But I did not have enough strength left to move the weight more than an inch above my quivering pecs. Breathe in, breathe out... now on the TV, Maury and the teenage she-devil had agitated the dictatorial father into a seething rage, which reduced him to speechless grunts.

  "You've put my brother down all his life," said the girl, pointing at her father with a long black fingernail. "He's a failure, a fucking flop." The audience hissed at her use of the f-word. "You've told him that every day of his life until he finally bought it. You're not going to do the same thing to me."

  A small contingent of the audience rose to their feet and began to chant: "Loser! Loser! Loser!" Where the hell was the girl's mother? Couldn't she pull the plug on this embarrassing display? I glimpsed a janitor passing by the small window in the gym room door.

  "Help!" I yelled. "Help!" The fight on the television drowned out my screams.

  I studied the safety clips that dangled several feet above me. Even if I was able to summon the strength to lift the bar again, the latches hung uselessly from the poles. Next plan: if I could roll left and tip the barbell sideways onto the floor, I thought I might have room to slide out from under it. I shifted my body right. The legs of the bench collapsed, slamming my head against the floor. The barbell bounced off my windpipe and rolled up under my chin.

  I lay stunned and choking, my eyes filling with tears. I fought back the urge to struggle against the weight across my neck. My left leg had caught under the bench as it fell. Each movement I made increased the pain. I wondered how long I had to lie here before another motel resident had the bright idea to work out. Certainly from the looks of the wall-to-wall, grime-gray carpet, the housekeeping staff did not often visit the gym.

  From down near my hips came a familiar buzzing noise. The cell phone had dropped out of my pocket during the collapse of the bench and lay vibrating with the news of an incoming call. Although my hands were free, the phone was out of reach. The chatter of the vibrating phone stopped, then started up again. I shifted my body toward the phone, ignoring the sharp pain in my leg, and rolled over onto the talk button with my right buttock.