The Franchise Babe: A Novel

by Dan Jenkins

That drew an inquisitive look from me. What did Thurlene have in mind?

  Tang said, “I tell truth, you can fix?”

  “If I hear the whole truth, I might try.”

  “No Debbie. She do nothing.”

  “You acted alone? No Debbie?”

  “No Debbie.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “I do myself. But I never want to hurt Ginger. Just scare.”

  “You could have killed Ginger with the rat poison, goddamn it!”

  “No, no. Never. I only use tiny bit. Make sick.”

  “How would you know how much to use?”

  “Everybody in China have do-shoo-chang…know how to use. I get do-shoo-chang from father. China have many rats. I only want to scare. Bad joke. Very bad joke. I do it for money.”

  “You tried to harm my daughter for money?”

  “I poor China girl. I make mistake.”

  “You sure as hell did! Who paid you? Debbie?”

  “No Debbie. Debbie my friend. Miz Wendell pay. I so sorry now.”

  “Mrs. Wendell?”

  “Miz Wendell pay me to scare Ginger…make her no win, maybe.”

  Thurlene was too stunned to speak for a moment. She looked at me with what I would describe as fire in her eyes, if that description hadn’t already been used somewhere.

  “Can you believe this?” Thurlene said to me.

  I shrugged my shoulders and raised my eyebrows. Which generally translates into “Stuff happens.”

  Thurlene looked back at Tang. “How much did she pay you?”

  Tang Chen said, “She pay two thousand dollar.”

  “Ann Wendell paid you two thousand dollars? That’s what I’m hearing?”

  “I poor Chinese girl…have nothing. I buy good jeans. Government buy golf clubs, no buy clothes.”

  “Come with me,” Thurlene said.

  “Come where?”

  “We’re going to the LPGA office. It’s in the clubhouse. You’re going to tell them exactly what you told me. In fact, you’re going to put it in writing. You come along too, Jack. Having the press there will guarantee their full attention.”

  “Pleased to be invited,” I said.

  Tang Chen said, “Why I go with you? Why I do this?”

  Thurlene said, “Why you do this? I’ll tell you why you do this. You do this because your fucking life depends on it!”

  And Thurlene dragged Tang Chen away by her shirt collar.

  38

  We barged into the LPGA office unannounced. I took a seat in a corner as Thurlene slammed Tang Chen into a chair across from Claudia Bradley, the deputy commissioner, and told the Chinese girl to start talking.

  Everything was news to Claudia.

  The deputy had not heard a word about the poison incident six months ago. Claudia was appalled to learn that Tang Chen was responsible for Ginger being bushwhacked last week in Ruidoso, and only moments before the deputy had found us in the trees outside the Port-O-Let.

  When Thurlene mentioned that Ann Wendell had slapped her own daughter around at the Estee Lauder Classic, it was news to Claudia.

  Claudia paused between the revelations to stare out a window, and it crossed my mind that the deputy was wondering if all this could add up to Marsha Wilson losing her job and Claudia taking over as commissioner.

  Claudia called out to someone, “Go find Ann Wendell for me…and bring her in here at once. The last time I saw her she was in Norris Mason’s hospitality tent.”

  “It’s Mason Norris,” Thurlene said politely.

  Claudia said, “Of course it is. Thank you.”

  Then she yelled at the doorway, “And find Marsha somewhere!”

  While we waited for Ann Wendell, Claudia asked Thurlene what she would like to see done about all this. Did she wish to press charges against Tang Chen?

  Thurlene said, “No, not now. For months I’ve been thinking Tang and Debbie were the culprits. Now I know the real culprit is Ann Wendell. Debbie had nothing to do with any of it, and poor Tang here…she knows not that she knows not. I do have an idea Marsha may go along with, knowing how much she dislikes scandals involving the tour.”

  Claudia said, “You’re referring to the Tricia Hurt affair. I wasn’t on board then, but I do believe the commissioner was acting in the best interest of the tour. What are you suggesting?”

  Thurlene said, “Tang Chen will put a confession in writing, right here, right now, in English…explaining what she did and who paid her to do it. In exchange for this, she never turned in a scorecard today with the ninety-one on it. She withdrew. Her scorecard has been corrected by an LPGA official. You, perhaps. Tang meant to withdraw, but she wasn’t sure how to do it, being unfamiliar with the language. So she actually hasn’t broken the eighty-eight rule. Therefore, she’s not barred from competition in the United States.”

  Claudia stared at Thurlene. “And what do we do about the player Tang was paired with, hypothetically?”

  Thurlene said, “She was paired with Fujita Izama of Japan. Fujita speaks no English. She was shooting an eighty-five herself and paying no attention to what Tang was shooting. She signed the card without looking at it…and I’m sure she has no earthly idea the eighty-eight rule exists.”

  Claudia studied Thurlene again for a moment, then said, “I’ll take a wild guess at something. If we don’t go along with this charade, is it likely that everything I’ve heard here will appear in SM magazine? Is that a possibility?”

  “A very real one,” Thurlene said.

  Claudia fixed a look at me. “And what is going to keep you from writing this anyway, Jack Brannon? You are a journalist, are you not?”

  Thurlene answered for me with a smile. “I will ask him not to.”

  Claudia Bradley gave Tang Chen four sheets of blank stationery and a pen and told her to sit over to the side and start writing. Next, she asked an office worker to go to the scorer’s tent and bring her the scorecards for the last twenty players who had completed their rounds—there were things she needed to take a look at. Nothing important. Just checking figures on various holes.

  While we waited, the deputy asked if any of us wanted something to drink. Tang shook her head no. I passed. Thurlene said she’d take a Coke but what she really wanted was a cigarette.

  “Have one of mine,” Claudia said, and offered her a Merit Ultra Light.

  Thurlene was shocked to learn the deputy smoked, but recovered hastily and took the Merit. Claudia lit it for her, and one for herself.

  “I knew there was something I liked about you,” Thurlene said to Claudia Bradley.

  “I’m gradually quitting,” Claudia said.

  Thurlene replied with a grin, “Yeah, me too.”

  Tang Chen coughed and waved her hands.

  “No smoke ’em. Smoke ’em very bad.”

  “You,” Thurlene snapped at Tang. “Shut the fuck up.”

  Taking an ashtray out of a desk drawer and pushing it toward Thurlene to share, the deputy said, “I assume you have an idea about what should be done with Ann Wendell.”

  Thurlene said, “She ought to go to jail, but I’ll settle for her being barred from the tour for as long as possible. I’ll help make the case in front of the board, if that’s necessary.”

  Claudia Bradley said, “It’s frustrating that Marsha kept me out of the loop on all this.”

  “Yes, it is,” Thurlene said. “Not very commissioner-like, if you ask me…if you want of the opinion of Ginger Clayton’s mother.”

  Claudia said, “You don’t need to turn up the heat, Thurlene. I get it.”

  The office worker, a young woman, brought the stack of scorecards into the room and put them on Claudia’s desk. At the same time she looked horrified to find Claudia and Thurlene smoking cigarettes.

  “We’re not smoking,” Claudia said, glancing at her.

  “No. Of course not,” the young woman said, and fled.

  Claudia thumbed through the scorecards until she found Tang Chen’s and pull
ed it out of the stack. Then she reached for a pencil.

  “It seems a little artwork is required here,” she said, scratching out the 91 on the card and drawing lines all over it and marking a big “WD” on it.

  “I’m not seeing this,” I said. “I’m not here, I wasn’t in the room, I don’t understand the question—and nobody is smoking.”

  Tang Chen finished the confession, then sat quietly with her hands folded in her lap, staring at the floor. Claudia made copies of the confession on a machine behind her. Thurlene stuck a copy in her shoulder bag.

  About then, Ann Wendell entered the office, jerking her arm away from a security guard.

  “What am I doing here?” she snarled.

  Claudia Bradley handed Ann Wendell a copy of Tang’s confession.

  “Read this and we’ll talk,” the deputy said.

  Ann Wendell momentarily looked alarmed as she began to read the document but swiftly managed to cover it up with a chuckle.

  She sneered at the paper.

  She tossed it on Claudia’s desk.

  “Anything in there look familiar to you?” Thurlene said.

  Ann Wendell glared at Thurlene with a world of hate. “Did you put her up to this, Thurlene? What is she getting out of it? How much money?”

  “Good act, Ann,” Thurlene said. “It’s not working.”

  Ann Wendell squinted at Claudia Bradley. “Are you prepared to take the word of this lying little Chinese slut over mine?”

  Claudia said she was bringing the matter before the LPGA’s board of directors in an emergency session as soon as this championship was over.

  The deputy added, “You will be asked to appear, and you are welcome to bring an attorney. We understand and accept that your daughter is in no way involved in any of this. As for Mrs. Clayton, she’s not interested in filing criminal charges against you, provided our board of directors bars you from our tour, but she may ask for a restraining order.”

  “A restraining order for what?” Ann Wendell said.

  Thurlene said, “To keep you a hundred miles away from my daughter, you sick piece of shit!”

  Thurlene told me later that she’d been torn between “low-rent cunt” and “sick piece of shit” and settled on the latter. It was more ladylike.

  Ann Wendell gasped. Then gruffly said, “I don’t have to listen to any more of this!” And she marched out of the office, holding her head high, doing her best to look offended.

  Moments later Monique Hopkins, the assistant who handles player interviews, stuck her head in the door.

  “I hear you’re looking for Marsha,” she said to the deputy.

  Claudia said, “Do you know where she is?”

  Monique said, “Marsha’s in Denmark.”

  “She’s where?” Claudia almost shouted.

  “She flew to Copenhagen last night. She’s attending a world seminar on marketing and branding.”

  Claudia said, “Are you standing here telling me that Marsha Wilson, the commissioner of the Ladies Professional Golf Association—in the middle of our first major championship of the year—has gone to Denmark?”

  “I thought you knew.” Monique shrugged and left the room.

  Thurlene and Claudia stared at each other and began to laugh. After they had gotten back under control, Thurlene said, “This looks like something else to bring up before the board.”

  Claudia said, “I won’t rule it out.”

  Out on the course, where Ginger was working on a 73, Thurlene kept saying the same thing over and over and laughing at herself after she’d say it. I would hear:

  “‘Excuse me. I’m here for the first major of the year. I would like to see the LPGA commissioner, please.’…‘Oh, I’m sorry. She’s in Denmark.’”

  “You like that, don’t you?” I said.

  “It will stay with me for years…‘May I speak to Commissioner Wilson, please?’…‘I’m sorry. She’s in Denmark.’”

  I was happy to see Thurlene in a good mood. It kept her from moaning about Ginger spoiling her two birdies on the back nine with four bogeys, all of which resulted from tee shots that rolled into the rough.

  At the end of the second round, the score sheet looked like this:

  1. Penny Cooper

  73–71—144

  2. Natalie Gulbis

  75–70—145

  3. Mandy Park

  75–71—146

  4. Paula Creamer

  73–74—147

  T4. Linda Merle Draper

  73–74—147

  T4. Cristie Kerr

  76–71—147

  T4. Jan Dunn

  72–75—147

  8. Annika Sorenstam

  72–76—148

  T8. Sophie Gustafson

  74–74—148

  T8. Angela Stanford

  74–74—148

  T8. Marian Hornbuckle

  74–74—148

  9. Ginger Clayton

  76–73—149

  T9. Suzy Scott

  71–78—149

  T9. Suzann Petterson

  75–74—149

  T9. Morgan Pressel

  72–77—149

  T9. Lorena Ochoa

  70–79—149

  T9. Tricia Hurt

  74–75—149

  T9. Hee Bee Kim

  78–71—149

  Thurlene studied the sheet and sighed. “My God, she’s in a seven-way tie for ninth…and still five strokes and eleven players behind. Penny Cooper’s going to be tough to catch. She’s a good frontrunner.”

  “Penny Cooper was one of the first Lolitas, wasn’t she?”

  “Yes. Penny was part of the first group of good young ones…Penny, Tricia, Paula, Michelle, Natalie, Morgan…”

  “The new wave of cupcakes.”

  “The cupcake Lolitas, that was them.”

  I said, “It’s good for Ginger the course is playing tough. She shoots three over par today and still moves up from twentieth to ninth.”

  “Her bad start isn’t helping your story, is it?”

  “The story’s not riding on whether Ginger wins here or not.”

  “Do you think she’ll still make the cover if she finishes sort of okay? Like, I don’t know…top ten or whatever?”

  “There’s no way to outguess my boss. I don’t know what else could be competing for the cover this week. Middle of March? Probably a college basketball player somewhere…maybe an NBA guy. We’ve had hoops on the cover three weeks in a row, but that doesn’t bother Gary Crane. He likes armpits.”

  39

  Ginger Clayton wasn’t surprised by the news regarding the Thermostat Queen. Ann Wendell had long ago retired the trophy for Mom from Hell. Ginger said she must have had a best-buy thing goin’. She only paid the lettuce wrap two large to do the deed. Jesus.

  This was Friday evening before dinner. I was with Thurlene and Ginger in the living room of their cabana. We were filling Ginger in on everything that had taken place that afternoon.

  Well, nearly everything. We skipped the scorecard artwork. Maybe when the statute of limitations was over—around 2019.

  Thurlene informed Ginger that the kid wasn’t to discuss any of the rest of it with anybody, not even Tyler, her caddie.

  Ginger said, “I’m happy Debbie skated. I’ve never been able to get my head around Deb wanting to hurt me.”

  Thurlene said, “I owe Debbie a big apology.”

  We started out as a table for four in the hotel dining room. Thurlene and myself with Ginger and Tyler. But soon we made room for a fifth person at our table—Debbie Wendell. We noticed her sitting alone across the room. Ginger waved her over, and she eagerly joined us.

  It was quite a contrast to me, seeing Ginger and Debbie together. Debbie was a year older, but she seemed much younger, not to mention naive and sort of clueless.

  Her mom, Debbie said, was suffering from a bad headache and staying in the room. And her friend Tang Chen, in case we didn’t know it, had withdrawn with a wrist
injury. Tang was in her room tonight, not feeling well either.

  Debbie had barely made the cut with rounds of 77 and 79, but she was was hoping to play better over the last thirty-six holes and pick up a good check.

  “You’re still in it, Gin,” Debbie said.

  “Maybe, but I gotta lay down a good one tomorrow,” Ginger said. “I couldn’t stay out of the damn rough on the back side. If you go one yard off-line, you’re scrambled eggs. That stuff is so grabby. And these fairways are like cement. The ball keeps rolling. Man, my tee ball got broke today.”

  “Your tee ball ‘got broke’?” Thurlene said. “I knew you should have gone to college.”

  Tyler Hughes said, “We’re fixing her tee ball tomorrow morning. I know what’s wrong. She started to stand too far away from the ball—and spread her feet too wide. Players do this without realizing it. It makes them feel strong. Ginger was going for distance instead of accuracy.”

  At the risk of finding myself trapped in a Golf Digest instruction article and thereby falling into a coma, I said, “What’s the remedy?”

  Ginger said, “I stand up taller and relax my upper body.”

  “Set your feet the same width as your shoulders,” Tyler said.

  “You don’t want your body tense,” Thurlene said.

  “No, you want to be able to give yourself time to wind up, and you want to keep your left shoulder behind the ball,” said Tyler.

  Ginger said, “Swing inside out.”

  “Right. That way, your weight will move in the same direction as the club. When the club goes back, your weight goes back. Same thing when you come forward. We’ll work on it.”

  By then, I was pretending to doze off, leaning sideways, looking as if I was in danger of falling out of my chair.

  Nobody laughed.

  Saturday brought out bigger crowds—it didn’t hurt that network TV was on hand—and prominent among the galleries were the roving bands of postgraduate female drunks in shorts, tank tops, and flip-flops, most of them dangling beer cups at ten in the morning