13 Battle on the Twelfth Fairway
“I'm glad to see you, Harriet!” Kelly embraced the tall black woman warmly. “And you too, Calvin. I'm sorry it’s taken so long for Peter to invite you to the sailing club.” She nudged me in the ribs.
“Hey! Unfair!” I protested, though with a grin. “I'm not the social butterfly you are, dear.” We were both right. We should have invited Harriet and Calvin Stowe earlier. We'd struck up a friendship with them after meeting them – I had to think for a moment – only a couple of months ago.
I shook my head. So many things had happened in that time. Vic and I had launched the relaxation CD which we thought of on the day we met Harriet and Calvin. Kelly had thrown me out of her bed because, as she claimed at the time, I’d been gross in agreeing to Vic’s idea about the relaxation CD. She’d thrown Bethany Beaverbrook at me and I’d fucked Bethany’s brains out for a few weeks till Kelly allowed me back into her bed. Kelly had fought and beaten Jenn Peccavi – again – as well as Bethany’s sister. Bethany had fought a co-worker and incited Wendy – Vic’s mistress – to fight another girl. Then of course, Wendy and Elena –Malcolm Sergeant's new squeeze – had trounced two redneck sluts after a Cubs game. Most recently – and most importantly – Kelly had moved in with me in a newly refurbished brownstone. Yes, it had been a torrid ten weeks or so. What with work and sailing, Kelly and I had completely neglected the Stowes.
Now the sailing season was about to end. The club’s presentation dinner was in looming in just over two weeks and it was time to catch up on what we should have been doing, seeing the people we should have caught up with earlier and generally being the sort of people that our friends expected us to be. The clubhouse on a Saturday afternoon, after Kelly and I had finished the learn-to-sail class we ran on Saturday mornings, was a good time for us all to do that.
Calvin regaled us with their plans to take their children on a cruise in their large motor yacht. Kelly giggled. “You could sail to Australia in that.”
“They could…but I don’t think you could.” Alison broke into the conversation as she and Lawrence walked by. She gave a giggle of her own. “Not yet, anyway. You’ve made great progress in your sailing, but you’ve still got a long way to go. Which reminds me, I do hope you’re coming to the presentation dinner? We’d love to see you there…so would Brendon and Rowena.”
Kelly whitened slightly. Yet again, Alison was reminding Kelly and me that she and Lawrence, along with Brendon and Rowena, were co-holders of the club's major sailing trophy. Alison knew it annoyed Kelly to be reminded that there was at least one thing she could do better than Kelly. I'd tried to persuade Kelly that it didn't matter, and that in any case in a year or two she'd be a better sailor than Alison. Persuasion didn't work. Kelly was compulsively competitive and Alison knew it. Kelly reached out and squeezed my hand tightly – along with her pale face, that was a sure sign she was angry.
She turned to Alison. “What did you think of Alistair Cooke's
American Journey?” she asked. The book had been Kelly’s birthday present to Alison. Kelly was always – to use her word – ‘magnanimous’ to those she fought and beat, at least so long as they were people like her. Alison was a professional, a member of the sailing club, not white trash like Jenn Peccavi. Accordingly, Kelly offered her friendship to Alison after beating her. The birthday present was part of it.
To date, Alison’s response hadn’t been the gracious acceptance of Kelly’s bounty that Kelly had expected. Rather, Alison resented Kelly’s victory. She resented what she regarded – or so Lawrence had confided to me– as “Kelly’s condescension.” Kelly’s comment, when I told her about that, had again surprised me. “Like St Paul, she kicks against the goad…and just like Paul, she’s going to find that kicking against the goad only hurts the person doing the kicking.” I hadn’t realised until then that Kelly had such a knowledge of the Bible. Nor had I realised that Kelly knew Alison’s attitude and was – as she had said to me at other times about other people – going to bring her to heel. So far she hadn’t done that but I knew it was only a matter of time.
I smiled inwardly even as Harriet looked up. “Who?” On the surface this was a talk about a book but with Kelly and Alison, there was always going to be a subtext. I listened attentively to pick it up.
“The BBC commentator…he had that programme
Letter from America.”
I smiled inwardly as the conversation developed into a heated argument. In asking her question about Cooke's book, Kelly had lobbed some firecrackers and they were exploding beautifully. Somehow - I guess from talking to her earlier– Kelly had known that Harriet despised Cooke.
“Cooke started supporting FDR and the New Deal. He ended up as a Reaganite.” I already knew that Harriet and Calvin – both members of the NAACP – were liberal Democrats. They helped organise their ward voting and were active in Amnesty International. Harriet led the local chapter of the National Organization for Women. To call someone a Reaganite was about their worst insult. Harriet lambasted Cooke as an establishment hack, as a chameleon who changed his views to suit his audience and had no real convictions of his own.
Alison, for her part, defended Cooke as an urbane journalist, perhaps the most influential and distinguished commentator on America in the last 60 years.
Harriet continued her attack, labelling Cooke as a coward who, by becoming an American citizen in 1938, avoided any chance of British war service. She compared him to the actors David Niven who had rejoined his regiment when the Second World War started, Leslie Howard whose plane was shot down by the
Luftwaffe on his return to England from espionage work in Spain, and Jimmy Stewart who had flown many bombing missions over Germany.
“It's not as if he – Cooke – was a draft dodger,” Alison argued. “Not that there were many then. The greatest generation had to fight Hitler, not Ho. One war was right...the other was wrong.”
“At least we can agree on that.” Harriet smiled.
It seemed the argument had ended, until Kelly threw in another firecracker. “Did you know Cooke lived in a rent controlled apartment in NYC?” That wound the argument again. Harriet was angry at the thought of someone on Cooke’s income – he was very rich indeed – should be living on ‘welfare’ when people who existed on food stamps were attacked as having a sense of entitlement. Alison defended him, along with the rest of what she called ‘the productive class’. She sounded then much like Mitt Romney did later when running for President in 2012. Just like Romney antagonized many middle class voters as seemingly arrogant at that time, so Alison antagonized Harriet now.
The argument simmered until Lawrence dragged Alison away, reminding her they would be late for their race if they didn’t get going. They left Harriet seething.
So I was amazed when, the following Friday, Kelly called me at work. “Hun, I'm playing golf this evening.” That alone was a mild surprise. Kelly was a social golfer. It was the only one of her activities in which she didn’t feel the compulsion to excel. She had said to me once or twice, “I can relax when I'm golfing. It's like walking but with a purpose and a companion.” Personally, golfing for me was a good walk ruined. Kelly did have other motives, though. Golf was very good for business – well, her sort of business. She held court with her staff, met clients and generally networked at the socially superior Beverley Country Club. I was glad I didn’t have to go. One of the good things about making machine tools is that people don’t expect you to socialise with them; they just want the machine to do the job.
“So I won’t see you till later,” I replied, thinking I might even go and have a drink at the Richardson or the Union Club with some of the guys.
I was more surprised when she retorted. “No. I want you to caddy for us.” She cut off my spluttered protest. “There’s a special reason…and I think you’ll enjoy it. No, I’m not going to tell you any more now. Come along and see.” She hung up, leaving me wondering just what she was plotting.
My amazement grew when I arrived at the Beverley to find Harriet, Alison and Bea Holst. I’d known Bea’s husband Gustav – everyone called him Gus – from my college days and I knew Bea was a scratch golfer. Probably only her job as an actuary with one of the big insurers and her romance with Gus – they had met in college had kept her from the LPGA professional circuit. She was easily the best golfer I knew.
There wasn’t much small talk. Bea told me that Kelly had gone to get the game organized. I guessed she had to pay the green fees. Both Alison and Harriet sounded on edge. Harriet’s cell phone rang several times in the few moments we were standing in the club house and each time she excused herself, saying she had work issues that couldn’t wait.
My amazement was complete when Kelly returned, greeted me with a kiss and announced, “Now that Peter’s here to caddy, we can tee off. Alison and Harriet, you go first.”
“Peter’s caddying? That’s the best news I’ve had all week!” Alison smiled. “How did you get him to do it?”
Kelly giggled. “Peter knows his place.”
“Oh yeah…on my knees.” I joined in the fooling around.
“Not in public, Peter” Kelly pretended to be shocked, but her grin said otherwise. “That’s all very well for the bedroom, dear”.
Everyone laughed, even if both Harriet’s and Alison’s laughter sounded a little forced. I carried their clubs for them. “What’s wrong, Alison?”
“School,” she replied. “The kids are getting me down. There’s a review on staffing and I have so much administration work to catch up on. Worse still, one of the teachers has been hit with a molestation charge. There’s nothing in it, he’s followed all the protocols and it’s just some parent trying to get their own back. But it leaves a bad smell.” She sighed. “In short, it’s been a hell of a week. I could do with a good game.” I nodded. Alison was a keen amateur golfer, not in Bea’s class but much better than Kelly.
I took Kelly aside. “Why did you have Alison and Harriet as partners?”
“With Bea as my partner, we have a better chance of winning.”
I blinked. Until then I had thought that Alison’s golf ability hadn’t fazed Kelly – that she just accepted it. I thought that was because neither she nor I had any real attachment to the game. She regarded it as a social form of exercise and I didn’t like it at all. It wasn’t like sailing, which had been an important part of my life since I was a small child. I said as much. “Kelly you’ve never wanted to beat Alison at golf before.”
“I don’t care either way.”
“But...” I blinked again. Kelly had that inscrutable look on her face that told me to stop asking questions. I changed tack. “Alison likes to play on her own. Lawrence told me she thinks it’s a test of her own ability.”
“So?” She kissed me, then raised her voice. “I’m about to tee off, so get caddying!”
I went back to where I’d left the golf cart, with Harriet and at the first tee. Alison had already teed off and the ball was a good distance down the fairway. Harriet was on her cell phone arguing with someone. I couldn’t tell what it was about from her side of the conversation, only that it seemed important and complicated.
“Nine iron, please.” Kelly was curt. I passed her the stick.
“Good to see you’ve got him well trained.” Alison smiled.
Kelly teed off. Her stroke was shorter than Alison’s and sliced a little, landing just in the rough. Bea chuffed her, “We’ll have to do better than this if we’re going to win.” She proceeded to do better, landing the ball in the middle of the fairway not far from the green.
Alison was still cooling her heels waiting for Harriet to play her next stroke. Her tapping fingers told me she was neither patient nor happy. Harriet ended her call. “Sorry Alison, I didn’t expect that to take so long.” Alison’s silence was eloquent as Harriet took her stance, addressed the ball and hit. The ball landed almost on the left edge of the fairway. “Good shot!” Kelly encouraged her. She was right, the ball was in a good position for the dogleg left par four. Alison walked up to where the ball had landed. Her approach shot landed on the green, three feet from the hole. Kelly's next shot was better. Both Harriet and Bea had no trouble sinking their putts for a par.
The next hole passed without incident, save that Kelly’s shot again sliced, the ball landing in a bunker. Bea got the ball out but didn’t get it near the hole. They made the par three in four shots.
Kelly teed off for the third hole, a difficult par five with first a right-then a left-handed dogleg. She hit well but again Harriet had to take a call. She delayed, fluffed her shot and the ball landed in the rough. Bea got the ball around the first dog leg. Alison, grim faced now and glaring at Harriet, was holding her club a little more tightly than she should have. She succeeded in getting the ball back on the fairway, though it was a long way from the hole. She tapped her foot with the club, clearly annoyed at herself. Harriet used too long of a club– w ay too long – and the ball landed in a bunker on the right of the fairway.
“That’s a nasty trap” said Bea. “The designer was cunning. That bunker catches a lot of players who just hit a little too hard. You don’t even have to hit the ball into the bunker. There’s a slope so the ball will roll in if you land just this side of it.”
Alison muttered something as Harriet’s cell rang yet again. Alison got the ball out of the bunker but sliced it, so it came to rest in the rough on the other side of the fairway and still a long way from the green. She and Harriet finished the par five in seven shots. Alison’s face was like a thundercloud.
The sixth was a notoriously difficult hole. It had a dogleg, a water hazard – you had to hit your ball over the small swampy stream – and several bunkers. I’d seen players so infuriated at that hole that they’d give up the game and retire to the club house. I’d seen others lose their temper with their partners. Personally it was just another reason I didn’t play golf. Nevertheless, the girls got through without too much angst. Alison dropped her ball in a bunker, Harriet hit out into the rough. All of Kelly’s shots landed in the rough.
Harriet took a few calls. She had to make one or two as well. Alison finally snapped, “Play golf or run your business! Don’t try to do both!” The others brushed that off good humouredly and Alison tried to apologise. “It’s just that the phone calls are disruptive. They put me off my game.”
And so it proved. Over the ensuing five holes with Harriet intermittently on the phone trying to solve whatever work problem she had, her play deteriorated. Alison’s tension increased and she too began to make mistakes.
It was the next hole – the twelfth and a relatively easy one - where things finally boiled over. Alison was so agitated that she missed her swing – twice. Harriet tried to console her. “Don’t worry…we all do that.”
Alison rounded on her. “You might! I don’t! At least, I don’t if my partner doesn’t get in my hair! Your phone calls, your whole attitude has put me off my game. We’d be winning otherwise. As it is, we’re five strokes down, and it’s
your fault!”
“Don’t blame me for your problems!” Harriet shot back. “I’m not a teacher…I can’t just put away my work at the end of the day.”
“Don’t patronise me!” snapped Alison angrily. “Don’t you dare belittle my profession! I wouldn’t have a problem if it weren’t for you!”
“Typical of your sort! You whine about people on welfare holding out their hands, but you’re the first to blame someone for your problems.”
“Bitch!” Alison handed – almost threw – her club to me. “You think you’re so much better than the rest of us…so smug so superior. I’m going to
enjoy taking you down. Let’s do it! Behind those trees!” She pointed to a dense thicket which would shield the fight from any people passing on the course. “Let’s do it now!”
“Bring it on, woman!” Harriet retorted. We all walked up to the thicket.
Harriet and Alison kicked off their shoes. I looked at them. Harriet was perhaps five feet eight, the same height as Kelly and only just over an inch shorter than myself. At 150 lbs or so, she was considerably bigger than Alison. Although voluptuous with broad hips, a rounded stomach and impressive breasts, her solid arms emerging from her short sleeved cream blouse and red sleeveless sweater told of her strength. She wore jeans which masked what I knew were equally solid and strong legs. After all I’d seen her in a swim suit when she had destroyed Wendy Griffiths.
Despite her smaller size, Alison – at 130 pounds – was no lightweight. Her broad square shoulders and well muscled legs told just how much of that weight was solid strapping muscle, the sort of strength required to win sailing races. She too wore a sweater over her blouse but her sweater had a large red diamond on a white background- rather like an ace of diamonds playing card. She wore a skirt that reached almost to her knees.
For a moment the two women glared at each other as each assessed her foe. Then Alison swept in, arms high, snarling. Although Harriet bobbed down and to the side, Alison seized her hair in her right hand and, swinging from her shoulder with her arm extended, smacked Harriet’s face with her left hand. The blow struck the black woman’s face so hard that she yelped and stumbled. Before she could recover her stance, Alison had smacked her again, just as hard. Again Harriet yelped. She blocked Alison’s third attempted slap with her right hand and punched with her left. The punch missed as Alison stepped back and to her left, releasing her grip on Harriet’s hair.
Kelly glanced across to the white faced, clearly shaken Bea. I wondered whether the quiet actuary had ever seen a fight before. “Bea, leave them,” Kelly warned. “They can’t stand each other. There has to be a bloodletting, so let them at it.”
Harriet surged forward to hammer Alison’s body with a left-right combo. Alison parried the left but the right hit hard, eliciting a groan. Alison retaliated with another stinging slap. Harriet blocked it and pressed forward again but was stopped by Alison’s kick. Harriet pushed her thigh forward to take the blow.
“You whore! You tried to kick my cxnt!” Harriet snarled, punching at Alison’s chin. Alison’s head rocked back. Harriet clapped her hands on the brunette’s shoulders and shoved, trying to knock her down. She didn’t see Alison’s rising foot till too late and though she scampered back, she took the kick squarely in her stomach. She groaned.
Again Alison grabbed Harriet’s short cropped curls. She tried to drag Harriet down but the black woman was too strong, too solid for that to work. Instead Harriet lashed out with a kick of her own. Alison let go of Harriet’s hair and slipped to her side. Harriet followed, firing heavy punches from her shoulder, putting her weight behind them. Alison avoided the first two but the third hit. She staggered, then recovered , scurrying away to her left to avoid Harriet’s following punches.
Alison swung further to her left but then, as Harriet followed with her arms still up ready to punch, the brunette dived into a rugby-style tackle, sweeping her arms round Harriet’s legs and slamming her shoulders into the black woman’s thighs. Harriet crashed to the grass behind her.
I was almost as stunned as Harriet seemed to be. Alison was all over her, indeed the fight itself seemed almost over. Kelly gripped my hand so tightly it hurt. I glanced at her. She was pale as she always was when annoyed or troubled. “Peter, she’s working her over!” she whispered. Clearly my girl had expected – wanted – a different result.
Kelly’s description was apt. Alison was certainly working Harriet over. The older, bigger woman lay gasping, apparently unable to move as Alison clambered up to straddle her. She seized Harriet’s head, raised it up then slammed it down on the grass. If it had been concrete or even timber, I think the fight would have been as good as over.
The softer grass saved Harriet but not from pain. She groaned as her head hit the ground. She tried to punch out. She hit at Alison's chest. Alison grunted but hit back. Her punch would have hit Harriet’s nose had the black woman not turned her head. Even so it elicited a groan. Harriet’s legs pounded Alison’s back, rocking the smaller woman. Again Harriet’s fist hammered Alison’s stomach. Harriet wasn’t giving up. She tried to roll onto her side but Alison pinned her shoulders down again. “Not so fast bitch!”
Harriet’s powerful legs swung up, parted to slip round Alison’s body before locking in front of her. Harriet slammed her legs back and at the same time sent a straight arm jab into the pit of Alison’s gut. Alison grunted hard as the black woman’s fist slammed into her tight-stretched abs. She rocked as she tried to stay on top of a now bucking, twisting Harriet. She tried bracing herself, her hands pushing down on Harriet’s shoulders. She failed. Harriet punched her again in the gut and, pushing hard with her legs, forced Alison off. Alison rolled to the side and scrambled to her knees, her face screwed up tight with pain.
Instead of getting to her feet, Harriet launched herself on Alison, pushing herself up and forward from a crouch. Surprised, Alison went down on her back. For a moment Harriet was on top but Alison shoved hard and rolled. The two women rolled around madly on the ground, slapping, yanking hair, kicking and scratching at each other for a frenzied minute.
They broke apart and again Harriet attacked while still crouching, pounding Alison’s chin with her fist. Alison responded, grabbing Harriet in a headlock. Harriet punched Alison in the pit of her stomach. The brunette gasped and tried to drag the older woman down. Instead Harriet rose slowly to her feet, dragging Alison with her. Harriet raised her knee, slamming it into Alison’s gut. Again Alison groaned at the impact but managed to break away.
I felt Kelly’s grip relax. I glanced at her again. She was half smiling. I knew better than to comment.
Each fighter got to her feet and they stood panting, catching their breath. Both had torn clothes, twigs and grass in their hair along with scratches, cuts and the beginning of bruises in so many places.
Harriet closed, firing punches at Alison. The brunette ducked and weaved, avoiding the slugging blows. She danced around the almost stationary older woman, firing jabs. Harriet turned just enough to engage Alison, to block most of her punches and to fire one or two herself. For almost a minute she seemed content to let the younger, smaller woman attack. Then she saw an opening and her foot lashed out and caught Alison in her gut. Alison gagged and Harriet followed up with a punch, almost in the same spot. It crashed past Alison’s defence. The brunette let out a long sighing “Oooh”, her eyes rolled back momentarily and Harriet’s fist sailed into her jaw. Alison fell backwards, landing sprawling on the grass.
Harriet advanced but even in the few seconds it took for her to reach Alison, the brunette had rolled and got to her knees. She flung herself forward. Harriet backpedalled to avoid a head butt to her belly, and Alison got to her feet.
She stood breathing hard for a second or so. That was a mistake. Harriet waded in with a series of punches aimed at Alison’s middle, her head, her sides. Alison defended grimly but Harriet was mixing up her blows, not the very hard powerful knockout blows she had aimed earlier but enough for the blows that hit – and that was increasingly the case – to do some damage. Alison staggered back, grunting, gasping at each blow, towards the thicket of trees. Harriet’s strategy became clear, she’d shepherd Alison back until she could retreat no more, then finish her off.
Perhaps realizing her peril Alison tried to attack. She advanced, fists up. She fired a hard left punch at Harriet’s head, which the bigger woman brushed aside. Harriet likewise parried Alison’s right fist but not Alison’s kick which slammed into Harriet’s left thigh. Harriet buckled and staggered back. Alison came at her, trying to snake her foot behind Harriet, to slam and trip her to the grass. Harriet was too solid, or perhaps Alison was too tired for that to work. Harriet stood her ground. Her fists pounded Alison’s sides.
Alison retreated. Harriet feinted, her left fist snaking toward Alison’s stomach. Alison brought her arms down to defend and Harriet’s right lunged, hammering Alison’s jaw. The brunette crashed to the grass. Harriet stepped forward, stomping twice on the fallen girl’s stomach.
“No…no more!” Alison croaked, holding up her hand weakly.
“Don’t mess with me again, bitch!” Harriet snapped. She turned away from the beaten Alison. “Well,” she smiled wearily to me and Kelly, “I guess that’s the end of golf for the day.” She was right. It was twilight and far too dark to play now. “Delighted to meet you, Bea. Next time I hope we complete a round without interference.” She shook hands. Bea made some inconsequential remark. She was still shocked. Harriet shouldered her clubs with ease and walked off.
Kelly stepped in. She helped Alison to stand. I went back to the golf cart and brought it up the slope. We got Alison into it, then took her back to the club house which was thankfully nearly deserted. Bea went looking for someone with a key to the sick bay. We patched Alison up and I called Lawrence who came around and picked his fiancée up. I drove her car home then Kelly picked me up.
“You set that up, didn’t you Kelly?” I asked as we drove home.
“So? You enjoyed it. You enjoyed seeing them fight.”
“Yes I did…but not as much as you enjoyed the result. You wanted to see Alison get pounded.”
“And she did. So what if I wanted it?”
I shut up, but bought a bottle of champagne for dinner. We celebrated that night, and not just with the champagne.
I owe great thanks to The Scribbler for his editing help and to Braveheart for his golfing help and to many others who have given me suggestions or encouragement to keep writing. Thank you all. As always comments are welcome, especially those that help me improve my writing.
