James Ross - A Character-Based Collection (Prairie Winds Golf Course)

by James Ross

  “Six iron?” Ginny asked.

  Curt reached over and grabbed a handful of grass. He threw it up in the air. “That should be enough the way you hit them.”

  Ginny started laughing. “What did you throw the grass in the air for?” Curt shrugged his shoulders. “There’s no wind out here today.”

  Curt nodded his head and smiled. “You got me there.” He searched in his bag for the proper iron. “Habit, I guess. Normally on this shot we have to check that.”

  Ginny turned to him. “Five dollar greenie?”

  “Oh, you’re a gambler?” Curt smiled. He liked the action. “We’ve got a whole clubhouse full of those. Yeah, I’ll bet. I don’t have a problem with that.”

  Ginny stood over the shot and ripped the ball right of the stick with a slight draw. The ball hit on the green, bit, and rolled eight feet away from the pin. “That gives you something to shoot at.” She paused and then chided him a bit. “Big boy.”

  Curt got over the ball, bent his knees, and waggled his club. He really didn’t want to get beat by a woman so he bore down extra hard. With a great deal of concentration he slowly brought the club back and ripped a shot in the direction of the green. His tee shot landed twenty feet away from the cup. “You got me.” He reached into his pocket and peeled off a five-dollar bill.

  As they headed off the tee box and got into the cart Ginny said, “Look, people get killed every day. Somebody has to figure that out. Money gets moved every day. Somebody has to figure out how. Sporting events get thrown every day. Somebody has to figure out by whom.” Once again she twisted the top off of her bottled water and took a sip. “That’s all I’m going to say.” Curt slowed the cart as it reached the green. Ginny offered a second chance. “Double or nothing on the putt?”

  Curt looked at her. He thought he now had a good read on what she was up to. “Sure. Why not?”

  “And by the way, it never hurts to keep your ears open.”

  CHAPTER FORTY

  “Wow! It doesn’t look like you’re going to be late to the party,” Ricki Sandstoner said as Father Alphonso Blair approached her desk outside Harold’s office. The priest was dressed casually in a colorful double XL Aloha shirt. He wore it over his casual shorts. The look reminded her of how a poncho was worn . . . a hole for the head and hanging loosely over the shoulders. “You look spiffy.”

  Alpha Bear beamed at the compliment. It wasn’t too often that he went out in public without wearing his clergy garb. “Do you like?” He did a pirouette, spread his arms, and showed off his laid-back look. “Scottie got it for me.”

  Ricki quickly went to her top desk drawer and grabbed some gum. She had to pop a piece in her mouth and use her hand to stifle a giggle. His hairy, milky white legs looked as if they had never seen sunlight. “He has excellent taste.” She peered down to the footwear that adorned his feet. His toenails had never been groomed. Scraggly, discolored toenails gnarled in different directions. Several were overtaken with some sort of fungus. Dark hair curled uncontrollably. “Was it his choice of sandals too?”

  Father Blair smiled. “I picked those out.” He turned his foot sideways so she could get a better view. “I thought they would be better in the desert.”

  “The desert?” Ricki was confused.

  “Yes,” Alpha Bear said. “I’m going on vacation.”

  “A religious sabbatical or something?” She figured that whatever he was up to had to be work related.

  “Heavens no,” Alpha Bear lisped slightly as a weak wave followed.

  She couldn’t help but notice that his fingernails had been manicured and treated with a clear coat of polish. A tiny pinkie ring adorned the small finger on his right hand. “Is that new?” She eyed the jewelry and then reached for his hand.

  Alpha Bear was quick to offer. “This?” He stuck his finger out straight for her to get a better look. Several small diamonds were sprinkled on a quarter-sized black onyx stone with a large, two carat rock set in the middle. “Scottie got that for me too.”

  “I’ve never seen you wear anything like that.” She ogled the flashy piece of jewelry. “That’s beautiful.”

  Father Blair pulled his hand back. “Well thank you! Scottie has such good taste.” He stretched his hand out in front of his face and admired the look and feel of the ring on his finger. “I don’t have much occasion to wear it here . . . with my job and all.”

  “Where are you going?” Ricki probed.

  “Las Vegas!” the priest volunteered. “I can’t wait. We’re leaving this afternoon.”

  “We’re?” Ricki didn’t quite understand the nature of the trip. “Is there a religious conference out there in Sin City?”

  Alpha Bear once again waved his hand in her direction. “Heavens no, Scottie and I are going.”

  “To gamble?” Ricki was puzzled.

  The priest brought his forefinger up to his lips. “Shhhssshhhh! Not so loud.”

  Ricki figured that he was entitled to his private life. She whispered back. “I would have never guessed.”

  “I have to have some fun too once in a while,” Alpha Bear conceded confidentially.

  Ricki was taken aback a bit and didn’t quite know what to say to the priest. The very thought was a tad sacrilegious. “Well Scottie sure has dressed you well.”

  “I just love him so.” Alpha Bear reached inside his shirt and tugged his shorts up higher. “He knows exactly what to pick out.”

  “Where are you staying?” Ricki asked.

  “Harold didn’t tell you?”

  Ricki shook her head from side to side. “No. Why would he?”

  “You know the way he is,” Alpha Bear waved in Ricki’s direction. “He likes to be in the middle of everything.”

  Ricki knew her boss all too well. “Does he know somebody?”

  “Heavens yes, he knows all of the big shots over at the casinos here in town.” He stretched his right hand out in front of his face, pointed the tips of his fingers skyward, and admired his nails. With his left thumb his pushed back the cuticle. “He got us a suite.”

  Ricki knew that Little Italy Gaming owned several properties out in Vegas. “Are you staying at La Bamba or The High Heel?”

  Alpha Bear was smitten with the choice. “The High Heel.” He was disappointed that she would even suggest the La Bamba in the same sentence. “They don’t even compare. He got us a suite on the top floor.”

  Ricki cocked her head to the side. “One of those with two bedrooms and a bathroom in the middle?”

  “Heavens no, I hope not!” Alpha Bear said as he admonished the very thought of it.

  Ricki bit her lip and looked toward Harold’s office out of the side of her eye. “Let me see if Harold’s ready to see you.” She buzzed his line and got the okay to allow the priest to enter. “He’s expecting you.”

  “Thank you.” Alpha Bear picked up his briefcase and sashayed toward the bank president’s office.

  “I like your hair that way,” Ricki commented as she saw that he had cleaned up the back of his neck.

  The priest stopped and turned. He had gotten a close cropped crew cut and was thinning on top and in the front. “It was Scottie’s idea.” He rubbed his hand across a three-day growth of stubble. “He suggested this too. Scottie thought that it might protect my face from the sun.”

  “We sure wouldn’t want you to be a party pooper, Father Blair,” Ricki wheeled her chair around intentionally pointing her back to the priest and suppressed a chuckle.

  Harold greeted the priest warmly, but quickly shut the door and locked it after Alpha Bear entered his office. “Don’t you look relaxed?” The bank president had on a white dress shirt and flashy tie. Gold cuff links glittered in the ceiling lights. After Father Blair took a seat Harold immediately headed for his personal vault.

  “I am looking forward to this trip,” Alpha Bear agreed.

  “I hope so,” Harold said.

  “I need a little break.”

  “Good. You take your little
break. I need a big score.” He turned the tumbler on his safe. “The ref has been proving himself. He’s three for three.”

  “And he knows what we’re doing this weekend?” Alpha Bear probed.

  “Hell, yes. He loves the nice tip I’m giving him every Monday. He’s no different than anyone else. Everybody wants to make an easy buck.” Harold opened the safe and grabbed bundle after bundle of bills. “Put your briefcase on my desk.”

  Father Blair popped the combination lock on his attaché case and opened it. Harold loaded stack after stack of hundreds into the carry-on luggage. “How much do you have there?”

  “Let’s go for two hundred thousand this weekend. When you get out there just make sure you place the bets in all of the sports bets all around town. Spread it around.”

  “You think the guy will come through? That’s a lot of money.”

  Harold looked at the priest in astonishment. “Are you nuts? He’s got control of the game. You know . . . the whistle. The yellow hanky. He’s already had a great month for us.” Harold was practically frothing at the mouth. “We’re going for a big score this weekend and when . . . not if . . . he keeps coming through we’re going to pound the books out there.”

  “And you’re convinced by doing it this way nobody can trace the church’s money?”

  Harold grinned and nodded his head. “Don’t worry about a thing. It took a few weeks but I got it set up the right way. We’ve got a dummy corporation down in the Cayman Islands. It’s called the ARM.”

  Father Blair was confused. “How can a corporation be an arm?”

  Harold rolled his eyes. “This is no time to be playing stupid. The A-R-M stands for the African Relief Money. The donations at the church went into the fund and I transferred it down to the account in the Caymans. You and I are the only ones who have access to the account. Everybody at the church thinks that the money went to Namibia . . . and in time that is where it will go. We’re just going to use it for the rest of the football season.”

  “But what happens if we lose a game?” Alpha Bear was getting apprehensive.

  Harold shrugged his shoulders and glared back at the priest. “Duh. Then the poor little starving black kids won’t get any food.” Harold was ruthless when it came to money. “We’ll replace the funds after we win. All you and I are going to do is use it to make a profit and take the winnings.”

  “It sounds so easy.” Alpha Bear said.

  “Well, hell yes, it is easy! Especially when we have control of the referee,” Harold explained. “Just get the bets down and don’t get rolled.”

  “Don’t you think that it will look suspicious?” Alpha Bear started to backpedal again.

  “It might if you dress like a priest!” Harold was starting to get livid. “You go casual . . . like you are now . . . and get some big bets down. Save the tickets and we’ll get the funds wired back into the account after we win.”

  Alpha Bear stared at all of the hundreds that were stacked in his briefcase. “I don’t know.”

  “Hey, do you want to make some money or not?” Harold chastised the priest. “You’re spoiled. All you do is pass the plate up and down the aisle and get the parishioners to give you money. If you had to go out and earn it, then you’d do more stuff like this.”

  “Eventually I want that money to get to Namibia.”

  “It will! It will! But first we’re going to roll it over three or four times and line our pockets,” Harold persuaded. “I mean, what the heck, if we can put four or five hundred thousand each in our pockets and still feed the little black kids then it’s a no-brainer. Take the money and run.”

  “What about the IRS?”

  “Screw the IRS. A bet is a bet. You’ve heard about those coffee cans buried in the back yard, haven’t you?” He needed to take his cut as soon as he could and get it back into the account of Mrs. Harris before the unassuming widow discovered the shortage. “We’ll bundle our cash right here in my safe and nobody will know a thing . . . and you’ll be able to do anything that you ever wanted to do the rest of your life,” Harold said.

  A relaxed resolve spread over Father Blair. “Like vacation with Scottie.”

  Harold threw his arms into the air. “Yeah! Yeah! Like vacation with Scottie!” Harold knew that Scottie P. Lampe was a charming man, but Father Blair was love struck. It was comical how the car salesman had managed to wrap the priest around his little finger.

  Alpha Bear shut the briefcase and locked the combination. “Okay. We leave at three.”

  “Just don’t let that case off of your arm. I mean handcuff it to your wrist or something . . . and keep Scottie right next to you.”

  “Don’t worry; I’m not letting him out of my sight.”

  Harold glanced down to the floor and noticed the footwear that the priest was wearing. “You’ve got feet made for dress shoes, not sandals.” He stared at Alpha Bear. “After we win some money, why don’t you go get yourself a pedicure?”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Only a few leaves remained on the limbs. The cooler nights had knocked all of the foliage off the soft wood trees. Some of the hardwoods had kept their color but the gray sky and increasing wind was taking the beauty out of autumn. As the end of October approached, the sunlight hours decreased drastically. It wasn’t warm enough in the morning to tee off too early and the threat of darkness jeopardized any round that started after lunch. The loss of daylight saving time and the turning back of the clocks was on the doorstep.

  Tuey was an owner-operator who had the used excavating equipment that he needed on site. His main piece was a backhoe that had seen better days. After a couple of weeks he had gotten a few hundred feet down the creek with the help of a couple of part-time ditch diggers. Asia was a middle-aged black guy who wouldn’t hesitate getting down in the creek with a shovel. Fanbelt was a frail, white, burned-out hippie who looked twenty-five years older than his given age. But he could put Band-Aids on broken down equipment. The three of them had access to the engineered plans and were hard at work on Tuey’s Course.

  A pattern had developed early on in the project. Tuey would get the other guys working and then disappear for a while to bid other jobs or drum up additional work. With his troubles with the city he would try to put out fires as they cropped up. His absence from the job site wasn’t such a bad thing as long as the other two kept moving down the creek line. J Dub and Curt didn’t care. Their chief concern was to not upset the golfing public. And they had some maintenance to do on the golf course that only could be done in the winter months as well.

  One of the trees on the course had been tagged and was scheduled to come down. It just so happened that the old hickory was on the bank of the creek that Tuey was getting near.

  “Here it is,” J Dub said as he picked up the Black & Decker chain saw from underneath the work bench. “I knew that it was around here somewhere.”

  “When was the last time you used it?” Curt asked as he examined the blade.

  “I couldn’t even tell you the last time I started it up,” J Dub said. Puddles rubbed up against his leg purring loudly.

  “We’ll get some two-cycle oil in it and squirt some grease on the chain,” Curt said as he reached for a can of lube.

  After providing the necessary maintenance to the saw, J Dub opened the choke. The motor roared once J Dub deployed the fifth pull of the chain. Puddles jumped a foot in the air, bounded over the arm of the old couch, and disappeared behind the lawn mowers. “That’s our test drive.” He shut the engine off. “Let’s see if we can get that tree down.”

  The brothers boarded the John Deere utility vehicle and headed for the creek line where Tuey was laying the sewer line. “Where’s Tuey?” Curt asked as the pair approached Asia.

  The worker stopped shoveling mud and said, “Puttin’ on warm clothes.” He nodded in the direction of Tuey’s pickup that was parked under a grove of trees. Tuey was in the cab squirming to get into more attire.

  After what seemed like ten minu
tes Tuey exited the pickup and walked in the direction of J Dub and Curt. The noise of the chain saw had rippled across the course. J Dub was halfway through the trunk of the dead tree, the teeth of the blade sending sawdust chips flying through the breeze. He shut the motor off as Tuey walked up. “Where did you get that outfit?” Curt asked. “Were you in the service?”

  Tuey shook his head side to side. He wore insulated camouflage coveralls. “I’s got dese from uh mail orda house.” He broke out in a wide smile. “Dey sho’ be warm. Do you’s like dem?”

  J Dub and Curt looked at each other. “It sure is different from what we’re used to around here,” J Dub said.

  “Yeah, I sort of like Dockers and a golf shirt better,” Curt said with a grin.

  “I’s sho’ don’t want no golfa ta mistake me fo’ uh tree or nuttin’ like dat.”

  “If you stand in woods dressed like that, they’ll never see you,” J Dub replied.

  “Yeah, you blend in with the underbrush,” Curt added.

  “I’s gotsta wear dese tings when it gits cold out here. Dey sho’ do keep me warm.” He shivered as the wind kicked up and then adjusted his skull cap underneath the hood.

  “That has to be warmer than that sleeveless t-shirt,” Curt said.

  J Dub examined the cut line on the tree trunk. “We’re going to have this down in a few minutes. Then you’ll be able to put the sewer pipe down once you dig the stump out of the bank.”

  Curt pointed to an area away from the tree. “Stand over there. The tree ought to fall across the creek.”

  “Then we’ll clean it up and keep some for firewood,” J Dub followed. He fired the chain saw back up and the sound of the motor roared once again across the course. The tree started to list away from the new cut line. A couple of minutes later the dead hickory crashed to the ground.

  “I’s guesses dat dat sho’ answers dat,” Tuey said. “Now’s I’s knows fo’ sho’ dat’s on da gooch.”

  J Dub and Curt looked at each other not knowing the significance of what was just spoken. “Answers what?” J Dub asked.

  “What gooch?” Curt wondered out loud.