The Putt at the End of the World

by Lee K. Abbott

  “Yes,” Rita said softly as if about to drift off into the Celtic twilight later. “Yes. And yes again. And again.”

  “A kick in the ass, man,” Zamora said.

  Bates was so overcome he couldn’t speak. So they played golf.

  On the eighteenth tee, Billy turned to Phillip Bates. “You’ve got the honors, Mr. Bates,” he said.

  “What?”

  “You birdied that hole,” Rita said. “We all had par.”

  “What?” Bates said as if they weren’t speaking English. He had been so happy he had forgotten to keep score or even count strokes. “My pleasure,” he said, thinking, Fuck my virtual self. Then he teed up and hit a perfectly good two-hundred-twenty-yard drive right into the fat middle of the fairway.

  The eighteenth at Rathgarve was a fairly easy five-hundred-seventy-yard hole with a slight dogleg to the left around a Semtex crater into a large but rolling green. Zamora and Billy were on in two. Rita and Bates in three. Zamora’s ball was fifteen feet left of the hole, pin high, dead straight. Billy’s ball was next to Bates’s, but slightly uphill of the hole with a small, steep little ridge between it and the pin, Rita’s ball just over the ridge.

  The few remaining golfers and their hairy-legged caddies, having heard about the bet in the way golf people always hear about bets, formed a small gallery around the green. Al Gore stood woodenly on the edge of the crowd, a gray ghost on a sunny day among his Secret Service agents. There seemed to be more of them, Bates thought. Another bunch around a tall man in a slouch hat and sunglasses. Nancy Lopez stood at the edge of the green. I thought she was taller, Bates mused.

  Sheena had followed Bates from the eleventh tee. She hated golf almost as much as she hated Bates, but as she followed him from hole to hole as his game improved dramatically, she couldn’t help but notice the change. Slowly the incarnation of evil became a silly schoolboy, all elbows and grins and aimless dance steps. To stiffen her resolve, Sheena occasionally touched the Walther sheathed between her pert breasts, but she found her breath quickening and her heart pounding beneath her hand as Bates chipped in a thirty-footer to save par on the fourteenth as he rolled in a real character builder of a six-foot downhill putt on fifteen, then hit the green on sixteen with a seventy-yard sand wedge out of a fairway bunker.

  Sheena didn’t understand her reactions. Perhaps it was just the knowledge that she had only one more body to add to the pile before she could abandon murder forever. Or maybe it was something else altogether.

  “Looks like you got me, man,” Billy Sprague said to Zamora as they stepped onto the green at eighteen.

  “I gotcha.”

  “Let’s throw our golf courses into the pot,” Billy said.

  What would I do with a golf course in Bumfuck, Ohio? was almost visible on Zamora’s lips as he hesitated.

  “Give me a stroke,” Billy said, “and I’ll let Mr. Bates putt it.”

  Nobody could resist a bet like that. “You’re on, man.”

  Bates hesitated, then shook himself like a dog rising from a nap. Hell, he’d never blinked when making deals for ten times half a million dollars. And it was just golf, a game, not God, or metaphysics, or even Chinese arithmetic, which he’d mastered at nine. “If that’s the way you want it.”

  “That’s the way we want it, Mr. Bates,” Billy said.

  “It’s our gift to you,” Rita added.

  Rita and Billy marked their balls. Bates leaned over his ball, realized that his hands were trembling. Why the hell was this so important? he wondered, then stepped back briefly to glance behind him. Billy and Rita wanted Bates to make this putt. Not because of the bet. They just wanted the best for him. At the edge of the gallery, Margaret Thatcher and Nancy Lopez smiled at him. They wanted him to make this putt.

  Phillip Bates considered the putt for another millisecond, then stroked it with a firm sensual softness. The gleaming white sphere rolled briskly up the small ridge, then broke smartly left into the heart of the cup with a clunk as solid as the sound of a rich man’s diamond engagement ring into the palm of the cutest hatcheck girl.

  Bates, dizzy with a wave of joy that swept over him like a tsunami, was jumping up and down madly, though he was not quite sure why. Nor was he sure why Mrs. Thatcher grabbed his hand in a brief but firm shake that made his heart kick like a magician’s bunny. He also wasn’t sure why Nancy Lopez was hugging him and jumping up and down with him, nor why she had a steel plate between her pert breasts.

  “What a beautiful fucking man you are,” she shouted into his ear while they were in the air. Bates was in love before he hit the ground.

  “But I thought you were married, Nancy.”

  “Not Nancy,” she said. “Monica Fairway,” she added, using the name off Edna’s fake passport.

  Bates, his joy at this news boundless, stepped back to survey his new love. “You’ll always be Nancy to me,” he said, hugging himself in ecstasy.

  Unfortunately, Phillip forgot that he had the radio detonator under his arm. Now all that remaining Semtex was about to drive its explosive force down through the rotten stones of the castle like hot ice picks through Havarti.

  He glanced up. If the looming towers of Rathgarve Castle didn’t topple onto the eighteenth green and crush them all, the accompanying shock wave would certainly finish the job. He’d meant to be far from ground zero when the explosion took place, only his virtual self at risk. His intention was that when the smoke cleared from the rubble covering every celebrity, every leader of note on the planet, only Phillip Bates would be left to lead the bereft masses. A wonderful plan it had all been, all right. But now that he’d finally accomplished something physical in his actual life and won the love of the most desirable woman who had ever drawn breath, look what he’d gone and done.

  The world as he knew it was about to end.

  Shit.

  But nothing happened. Then, three hundred yards to the west, where his sewer system dumped illegally into a Highland lake, a mushroom cloud of water vapor exploded into the sunlight. The sun shattered into a million tiny rainbows. The gallery cheered into the rolling waves of the explosion.

  “Fireworks in the daytime are always so boring,” Bates said. He didn’t get where he was because he wasn’t quick off the mark. “I thought rainbows more appropriate,” he added, wrapping his arm over Nancy’s shoulder and gazing soulfully into her sea-green eyes. “Will you have dinner with me, Nancy?”

  Sheena, not immune to the sympathetic power of love or the political clout of a marriage that would make her richer than the queen and a more effective friend of Scottish nationalism than her years as a terrorist had, nodded briskly.

  “Just one thing,” she said.

  “Anything.”

  “Call me Monica.”

  “Absolutely,” Bates answered.

  “How did you know?” Zamora asked Billy Sprague.

  “You just know,” he said. “Sometimes you just know.”

  “You never knew before.”

  “I know,” Billy admitted.

  Rita tipped the gnomish caddy as he stood close enough to hump her leg. Then she slapped his face gently, saying, “You behave yourself, you little devil, or I’ll spank your butt.” He swooned almost into a faint, but Rita didn’t notice as she followed Billy and Zamora over to Phillip Bates.

  “Great course,” Zamora said to him, “and a great round of golf.”

  “Come back anytime,” Bates said, then added, “Oh, you lost the bet. I’m so sorry.”

  “Not a problem,” Zamora said. “Win some, lose some. You only have to win more than you lose. And not be afraid to play.”

  Bates hugged Sheena closer to his chest. “What do we do now, Mr. Sprague?”

  “Usually, we go to the nineteenth hole,” he said, “have a beer, then play it all over again.”

  “Play it again?”

  “Tell stories,” Billy said.

  “Maybe even lies,” Rita added.

  “I’ve never done that,”
Bates admitted.

  “Come with us, man. We’ll teach you how.”

  And they walked arm in arm into the rainbow-bright sunset, not exactly understanding how or why they had saved the world. Might have something to do with love. Or games. Or maybe just a compact backswing.

  Epilogue

  CURSE OF THE

  NINETEENTH HOLE

  by Anonymous

  The two mackintosh-clad men, each bearing a shovel at the shoulder, trudged slowly through the windswept gorse, their progress impeded by the need to stop from time to time to readjust their hold on the heavy bag they dragged behind them. Nor did it help that they’d had to wait until the last group had come in from the course, leaving them precious little light to navigate by. There was a glorious wedding party at Rathgarve Castle — a double wedding party, actually — but they would not be taking part now, would they?

  “Reminds me of a certain joke, you know?” said the one named Mungo as they paused to catch a breath.

  “Which one is that?” replied Magnus wearily. He’d caddied forty years and had heard every joke there was. Still, there was always hope. He reached into his jacket for the flask of Wretched Feather he always carried there and helped himself to a nip.

  “You know, the boys who come in late, dragging their dead mate. ‘Oh it was horrible. All day long, hit the ball, drag Keddy, hit the ball, drag Keddy.’”

  Magnus nodded. “I never saw the humor in that. Should have left Keddy there on the first tee where he had the heart attack. Slowed up play the whole way around, I expect.”

  Mungo stared at him. “It’s a joke, man.”

  “Nothing funny about slow play,” Magnus replied.

  “Forget it,” Mungo said, bending to take hold of the bag again. It was an oversize canvas club carrier with the papal crest embroidered on one side, not only the perfect size for what they were carrying, but a nod toward a proper burial as well, so long as the man inside had been Catholic, that is. “You want to take your end?” he called to Magnus, who was at his flask again.

  Magnus grunted and finally bent to help. Another forty yards and they were over a hillock and out of sight of the green, the course, even the castle itself. The perfect burying place. They rolled the bag aside and began to dig by the light of the stars.

  An hour or so passed before Mungo’s shovel struck something solid and Magnus’s a moment after that. “Solid rock,” said Mungo. “Deep enough, then.”

  Magnus, however, was poking about the bottom of the pit with the point of his shovel. He brought an ancient Zippo out of his pocket and flicked it to life, knelt to examine something at his feet.

  “What is it?” Mungo asked, feeling a bit spooked by the shadows that flickered about the walls of the pit.

  Magnus brushed some dirt aside and glanced down at the intricate design of a pentangle cut into the top of what was unmistakably a sarcophagus.

  Mungo felt a chill run up his spine. “What’s a pentangle?” he murmured. “Moreover, what’s a sarcophagus?”

  Magnus stood, his face gray. “Bad luck is what it is,” he replied. “It’s my guess we’ve disturbed the cursed resting place of the devil’s own, the Untouchable Earl of Shank, and you know what that means. Let’s finish our business and be gone from here.”

  He reached above him then and yanked hard on one of the grips of the canvas bag. He pulled again and the thing gave way, tumbling into the pit with a thud that reverberated through the stone at their feet.

  “Come on, now,” Magnus said to Mungo. “Cup your hands together, give me a leg up out of here. I’ll pull you along after me.”

  “Nothing doing,” Mungo said. “Send me up first. I’ll do the pulling after.”

  “For God’s sakes, man,” Magnus said. “I’m the elder. I should be the first one out — ”

  He broke off suddenly, for the odd rumble they’d felt had not entirely died away, and in fact was growing louder by the moment. They looked down to see the top of the sarcophagus glowing red beneath their feet, a demon’s face visible now within the outline of the pentangle. The canvas bag had begun to writhe with a life of its own.

  “Cup your hands,” cried Mungo.

  “You first,” cried Magnus back.

  “Idiots,” cried François Le Tour, as his revivified form burst from the canvas. Zipper teeth flew like molten filings about the pit.

  Le Tour snatched Magnus by the throat with one arm and with the other caught a whimpering Mungo by the nape of the neck. He squeezed Magnus until the blood poured from his eyes and his ears, gave Mungo a shake that snapped his spine like a stick.

  “Now,” said Le Tour. He swatted at the golf cleats still embedded in the back of his skull and leapt to clutch the lip of the pit. His eyes were glowing red and tiny flames flickered where his nostrils flared. “Set another place at the table, children,” he called in a voice that swept down toward the castle like a wolf’s wail.

  “You think you’re going somewhere, do you?” came an answering voice from the darkness.

  Le Tour glanced up. His hands — more like claws now — dug deeply into the earth at the lip of the pit, and he pulled his head up high for a better look. What he saw, illumined by the rising moon, made his lip curl into a sneer: a wrinkled old codger in a kilt and a Sunday bag with a single battered club slung across his frail shoulders.

  “Squat Possum Toland,” Le Tour said. “You’re dead, old man.”

  “And so are you,” answered Doc Toland. “I intend to see that you stay that way.”

  “I’ll have you for dinner,” Le Tour growled, scrabbling at the edge of the pit. In an instant he’d have his haunches beneath him, he’d spring to the old man’s throat like El Puma going for the kill.

  “There was never a shank left the face of this mashie,” Toland said, whisking the club from his bag with a flourish that would have made Chi Chi Rodriguez blush.

  Perfect backswing, pause at the top, downswing, and pronate, all in the blink of an eye. The silver club face seemed to grow huge as it snapped through the ghostly beams of the moon, and when the blade bit deep at its target, there came the sweetest sound in all of golf: Dead. Solid. Perfect.

  Le Tour’s head soared up, arcing high out over the firth like a blazing comet. Alfonzo Zamora, still agog with his new spectacles, was standing on a balcony of Rathgarve Castle with an all-is-forgiven arm about Hector’s massive shoulders. They were the first to see it and call the alarm. Guests at the wedding of Phillip Bates and Monica Fairway would remark on the moment for years. And even Billy Sprague and Rita Shaughnessy, who were already otherwise indisposed, caught a glimpse of the blazing sight out a window of their honeymoon chamber.

  “That’s a good omen,” Billy said, nestling his nose back where it belonged.

  “Oh yes indeed,” answered Rita, wrapping her arms about him.

  And on they all went.

  CONTRIBUTORS

  LEE K. ABBOTT is a widely praised and often anthologized short story writer. His most recent collections include Living after Midnight, Strangers in Paradise, and Love Is the Crooked Thing.

  DAVE BARRY’s Pulitzer Prize–winning newspaper column appears in several hundred newspapers. His books include Dave Barry Turns 50, Dave Barry’s Guide to Guys, and the recent New York Times best-selling novel Big Trouble.

  RICHARD BAUSCH is the author of eight novels and four collections of stories. He is Heritage Professor of Writing at George Mason University. His most recent book is Someone to Watch over Me: Stories from HarperFlamingo, 1999.

  JAMES CRUMLEY is the author of such critically acclaimed novels as The Last Good Kiss, Dancing Bear, Bordersnakes, and The Mexican Tree Duck, featuring over-the-edge detectives C. W. Sughrue and Milo Milodragovitch.

  JAMES W. HALL is the national best-selling author of eleven highly praised crime/suspense novels including Under Cover of Daylight, Buzz Cut, Body Language, and, most recently, Rough Draft.

  TAMI HOAG’s most recent New York Times best-seller is Ashes to Ashes.
Her titles, which total more than ten million copies in print, include Thin Dark Line, Night Sins, and Guilty as Sin.

  TIM O’BRIEN won the National Book Award for Going after Cacciato. His two most recent novels, Tomcat in Love and In the Lake of the Woods, were both New York Times best-sellers.

  RIDLEY PEARSON is the best-selling author of fifteen crime novels, including Undercurrents, Probable Cause, and Beyond Recognition. His latest novel, Middle of Nowhere, is to be published by Hyperion Books in early summer 2000. In 1990, he was the first American to be awarded the Raymond Chandler Fulbright Fellowship at Wadham College, Oxford University.

  LES STANDIFORD is the national best-selling author of seven action/adventure novels, including Spill, Presidential Deal, and, most recently, Black Mountain. He directs the creative writing program at Florida International University.