Deep Rough

by A. J. Stewart

  “Sir, now,” said the security guy. “Move.”

  Which probably wasn’t the way to go with it. Because it made me turn off my ignition. My Porsche shuddered into silence, and I looked at the guy and gave him the raised eyebrows.

  “Sir, you don’t want me to call the police.”

  I disagreed. I was okay with calling the police. “Tell them it’s Miami Jones.”

  The security guy was sweating now. Someone powerful was behind me, someone who needed in through the gates I blocked. But even if I wanted to, I couldn’t reverse out now. The Bentley blocked me in. The security guy vacillated and then strode back to the car behind and spoke to the driver. He was there a while, having a chat with whoever was in the back. Then he strode back to the gate. He walked right by me and hit a button somewhere and the gates yawned open.

  I started the Porsche and pulled in and stopped forward of the valet station. The Bentley pulled in behind me. I got out and stood by the steps up to the main house and watched the driver get out and run around to open the rear doors. Two guys got out. One I didn’t know. The other was instantly recognizable to me. He was big and broad and looked like an ex-football player. That was because he was an ex-football player.

  BJ Baker was now a color commentary guy on television and a stalwart of Palm Beach society. I recalled that Nathaniel Donaldson hadn’t been too complimentary of BJ, but I suspect everyone’s money was the same color green to Donaldson. And media people attracted other rich but not famous people. BJ took two long strides toward me.

  “Still the same minor league pain in the neck I see, Jones.”

  “It’s great to see you, BJ. Really. I didn’t know you were a member here. That seals it—I’m definitely in now.”

  “You’re not Bonita Mar material, Jones. We both know that.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. I’m far too honest, aren’t I?”

  BJ gave me a look like he’d sprayed on cheap cologne, and the other guy wandered around the back of the Bentley to him. I didn’t know the other guy. He was tall but didn’t wear the physique of an athlete, even a former one.

  “What have you boys been up to?” I asked.

  “Bit of golf,” said the other guy.

  “I didn’t know Bonita Mar had a course.”

  BJ took to walking up the stairs and the other guy dropped in beside me. “It doesn’t.” He leaned in all conspiratorial-like and spoke softly. “You’d think for a hundred grand they’d have a golf course.”

  “Where’d you play then?”

  “They truck you out to PGA National. In a Bentley. Like that softens the blow of wasting a couple hours in traffic. As if I don’t have a Bentley at home.”

  The tall guy grinned and kept walking as I slowed. “See you ’round,” he said.

  The man in the pinstripe suit I had met on my previous visit approached me. The suit looked the same, the pocket square was a new color.

  “I am sorry, Mr. Jones, but Mr. Donaldson is unavailable.”

  “Sure, Jeeves. Whatever. Just tell him the sheriff’s office investigators will be here soon.”

  “Sheriff’s office?”

  “Yes. Since Mr. Donaldson’s personal details were found on the body.”

  “The body?”

  I nodded with an emphatic eyebrow raise.

  The pinstripe told me to wait and dashed off, his heels clicking on the Italian marble. He was gone but a minute.

  He said, “This way, please.”

  I followed him out through the club and across a lawn to a pool area. As we walked I asked him who it was that I had been talking to.

  “The guy with BJ Baker,” I said.

  “He runs Microsoft.”

  I nodded. So he probably did have a Bentley at home.

  The man in the pinstripe deposited me at a large table under an even larger umbrella. Nathaniel Donaldson sat in the shade sipping on an iced tea.

  “Get Mr. Jones an iced tea.”

  I sat, and the pinstripe poured me a cool glass of tea and left us. I had to give it to Donaldson—he was the consummate host and one charming son of a hotelier. But his eyes gave him up. He looked like he wanted me dead.

  I sipped the tea. It was cold and strong and good. No sugar, just how I like it.

  “To what do I owe this pleasure,” he said.

  “I thought you’d like to know—your name came up.”

  “That happens when you are the premier property developer in the world.”

  Humble, too.

  “In regard to a body that was pulled from the water at South Lakes this morning.”

  “A body?”

  I told him the story. Not all of it, but the highlights. I left out the alligator. The more I told, the more his smile grew. Even when I pointed out it was his card that was found on the body, he didn’t flinch.

  “So why are you telling me this, Mr. Jones?”

  “I thought you might have something to say on it, before the sheriff arrives.”

  “You think I had something to do with it?”

  “The thought crossed my mind.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “That’s what they all say.”

  “Tell you what, Mr. Jones. Why don’t we invite the sheriff over to join us for lunch? Maybe you can put your theory to him directly.”

  “The sheriff is a member here?”

  “No, Mr. Jones. But he did get elected on the back of some major contributions from me.”

  “Of course.”

  The man in the pinstripe returned. He leaned down and whispered into Donaldson’s ear. Donaldson smiled, and then frowned, and then looked at me. Then the pinstripe stood up and marched away again.

  “You didn’t tell me the full story, Mr. Jones.”

  “I’m not good with details.”

  “You left out the alligator.”

  “I did?”

  “You left out the damned alligator.” He spat the last words. His face was getting red and not just from the heat. He was working himself into quite a mood. “Damn you, Jones. Why did you have to sit on the damn alligator!”

  Now he was fuming. I had no idea how he knew about the alligator, let alone me sitting on it. But either way, he didn’t seem to like it. I figured I’d turn the ratchet.

  “It’s odd that your club doesn’t have a golf course. You must be the only club in Florida without one.”

  His face was building to a perfect crimson.

  “I know some guys down in the Lauderhill. They get together to play dominos. They have a little dominos club. Even they have a golf course.”

  “Damn you, Jones!” He yelled it so loud the entire pool area went silent. I felt like I was getting somewhere. He wasn’t as unflappable as he made out to be.

  “You’ve got your eye on South Lakes, haven’t you? It’s only ten minutes from here. It would be perfect for your members. If only their members agreed to sell it to you.”

  “You idiot. You think I fed a caddy to an alligator to hurt South Lakes and get them to sell to me? You don’t know anything about the deal, Jones. Nothing! Sure, I’d love South Lakes. It’s a two-bit dump of a club that I could make world-famous. They’re happy with a run-of-the-mill tour event. I would create the fifth major. You get it? And you think I’d feed a guy to an alligator?”

  I did think he would feed a guy to an alligator, but I was beginning to feel like at least one of my working theories was wrong. He seemed agitated, but for all the wrong reasons.

  “I could have had them, Jones. I would have had them. I know how to put a deal together. I know who to move and where and when. And now this damn gator, and this damn caddy, and you—you idiot—have gotten in my way.”

  “Gotten in your way?”

  “You’re wandering around in the dark, aren’t you? You don’t get it. That club was slowly but surely going down the drain. Nothing surer. Their ratings were poised to be the worst of any tournament for the season. I don’t need the club to fail, Jones. I just need the PGA
Tour to walk away. And they were going to. Their broadcast partners were ready to walk too. But now . . .” He snatched at his tumbler of iced tea and took a gulp. “Now you’ve handed them ratings on a platter. A gator attack? A man riding the killer gator? Some bright spark will name the seventeenth hole Gator Alley, you mark my words. Everyone is going to want to watch the killer gator tournament.”

  White foam formed at the corners of his mouth. He was seriously unhappy. And he wasn’t that good an actor. He didn’t have anything to do with the gator. I couldn’t help explain how his card ended up in the caddy’s pocket, but what I knew was he wasn’t a direct party to it. He saw the whole episode as a boon to South Lakes. At the same time South Lakes saw the whole thing as a disaster. They were different ways of looking at the same problem, and in a large way it explained why Donaldson was so successful. Sure he knew business, the art of the deal, and he was ruthless to a fault. But he also saw the opportunity in every situation. Suddenly I knew who would be wearing the alligator boots after the necropsy.

  “Well, if I can help further, just let me know,” I said.

  Donaldson looked at me and said, “Pah, pah.” He was like a spluttering engine, and I decided to leave before he exploded. I found the valet. He was standing next to my car. He hung the keys out for me. Before dropping them in my hand he spoke.

  “I was given a message. The message is, don’t come back.”

  I smiled.

  So did the valet. Then he winked, and dropped the keys in my hand.

  “Drive safe.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  I made it back to South Lakes in good time, and I had to admit it really was close enough to Donaldson’s club to be a good option for his exclusive members. He had a number of golf properties in South Florida, but the gaping hole in his crown was one nearby to his flagship club. It was an almost unbelievable oversight for an empire that ran some of the most exclusive and expensive courses in the world. And it was obvious that it rankled him to no end. But I had to admit his outburst was genuine. I suspected I’d have to look elsewhere for whoever was behind events. Which made me think back to Keith Hamilton. He was involved in the purchase of the old power substation, and he had conveniently neglected to mention that. It didn’t explain the gator. It was possible that the beast had gotten into the lake all by itself. But the tire tracks that didn’t match any course maintenance vehicles were suspicious at best. And the cuttings of St. Augustine grass made me think of Dig Maddox. Which made me think of property fraud. Which made me turn full circle back around to Donaldson. Which gave me a headache, so I stopped thinking about it.

  It was like Christmas Day on the battlefields of the Somme when I got back to the club. There were people everywhere but not a shot was fired in hostility. It was as if a truce had been called, and everyone was standing around waiting and thinking and wishing they could stop thinking. I parked and wandered around the far side of the clubhouse. I could see the driving range was in full swing. There were players at every tee box and other players waiting their turn. It was first in, best dressed, I imagined. I saw Heath McAllen smashing little balls way into the distance. I wondered how he would play the tournament without a caddy, and then I wondered if there would even be a tournament. And then I wondered if they would get paid if there was no tournament. I supposed not. Which wasn’t so bad for the top guys but not so great for the strugglers in the field.

  There was a minimum purse of six million dollars at every PGA Tour tournament, and the winner usually took home north of a cool million. A top player could earn three million in a year and not win a single tournament. A few wins in tournaments you and I have never heard of could see that hit six to eight million. Plus endorsements. But the guys who made up the bulk of the field were not so lucky. The tour midpoint on the money list was closer to six hundred thousand. Which sounds pretty sweet, but that figure was the mean, not the median, and it dropped off pretty quickly from there. The tour low from the previous year, I learned, had been only six thousand dollars. And because the players were for all intents and purposes independent contractors, they had to cover from that their travel, accommodation, food and caddy payments. And then there was the secondary tour, like the minor leagues of golf, where the players struggled week to week in pursuit of that treasured PGA Tour card. The midpoint of the secondary tour was sixteen thousand for the year. That’s below the poverty line. I wondered how those players did it, let alone the caddies. I supposed the caddies didn’t pay for their expenses—that was taken care of by their employer golf pro. But down there, near the bottom of the jar, a guy could make more teaching golf. And it made sense why the caddies waited to do their drinking at an open bar. Which made me think of the English guy who had been munched by the gator. Which made me think of the run-in I had had with him. Which made me think of the caddies drinking out back, and what I had seen and heard.

  Which made me break into a sprint.

  I ran down the seventeenth fairway for the tent. I got there and found some of the county investigators, but no Catchitt. So I turned and ran back to the clubhouse, which I realized was a false flat. It was actually uphill. I was sweating by the time I got back to the clubhouse. I found Ron there.

  “You seen Danielle?”

  “Not lately. You coming?”

  “Coming?”

  “To the meeting. We’re reconvening in the boardroom. To decide if we’re calling the whole thing off.”

  I went with Ron. We got to the briefing room with the concertina walls. Only now it seemed we were referring to it as the boardroom, since the board was coming in rather than caddies. It was like Air Force One.

  Keith was waiting. I whispered to him that we needed a word, and then moved into the room. Martin Costas and Barry Yarmouth came in with the PGA Tour liaison guy, Kent Andrew. Another guy came in. He was dressed preppy, blazer and slacks, and he wore a CBS logo on his breast pocket. He had excellent hair. Thick and full and lush, like a golf course, but black. He leaned against the wall. The final person to wander in was Dig Maddox. I hadn’t seen him in too long.

  Keith coughed to bring attention to himself, but it was habit rather than necessity since we were all looking at him already. He seemed to be searching for the words.

  “I don’t really know where to begin,” he said, which was a beginning in itself. “We have lost a caddy. A well-known and well-liked member of the tour community.”

  I wasn’t too sure about the well-liked bit, but I figured maybe the big cockney caddy was a swell guy when he was off the booze. He wouldn’t have been the first.

  The door opened and another guy came in. Him I knew. He wore a sportscoat in a herringbone pattern and fancy boat shoes. He had no hair. Not on his head, not where most of us have eyebrows. His face looked like a baby’s. Keith frowned at the interruption.

  “Can I help you?” Keith asked.

  “I seriously doubt it,” the guy said. He leaned against the wall next to the CBS guy.

  “This is a private meeting,” said Keith.

  “I know. Continue.”

  “I don’t think you understand.”

  “No, Hamilton. You don’t understand. You are about to cost our great state of Florida millions of dollars, and the governor of said state up to ten approval points. That isn’t going to happen. So continue. I’ll tell you when to stop.”

  Keith’s mouth had fallen open and he seemed to have the opposite problem of an alligator—he didn’t know how to shut it.

  I said, “Keith, this is Max Beck. The governor’s chief cook and bottle washer.”

  “Chief of staff, thanks, Jones.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  Keith looked at the hairless man. “You’re from the governor’s office?”

  “You catch on quick, but no. I am the governor’s office. Now let’s move on.”

  Keith brushed himself off as if he had gotten dirty from the exchange with Beck, and he continued.

  “The Palm Beach County Sheriff ha
s declared the Pacific a potential crime scene. They do not anticipate being done before Thursday, when play begins. I have investigated with Kent the possibility of rerouting the course onto part of the executive course, but with the corporate hospitality tents already in place the PGA Tour has deemed it impractical.”

  Excellent deflection of blame, Keith. Spoken like a true lawyer.

  “Our sponsors also have grave reservations about their brand being associated with the incident.” He looked at the guy in the CBS jacket. “Paul? What is the network’s position?”

  “Our advertisers are uneasy, Keith. I’ll admit that. But mostly they’re uneasy about the tournament being pulled. That is going to cost them, and in turn cost the network. We will lose a million viewers nationwide, minimum. That will hurt us, and I have to be honest, it will hurt you too.”

  “Us?”

  “If those losses come about due to the negligence of the hosting club, well . . .”

  “Negligence? There’s no negligence.”

  “A caddy got eaten by an alligator, Keith. On your course. You owe a duty of care as a minimum. But allowing killer alligators?” Paul the CBS guy looked around the room. He stopped on Martin Costas. Martin nodded.

  “He’s right, Keith. This does not bode well. I think we need to start looking at indemnification.”

  “Martin, that’s preposterous.”

  “It’s not, and you know it.”

  “What do you mean, indemnification?” asked Barry.

  Martin said, “I mean, Barry, covering our backsides. The sponsors, the players, the caddies, the family of the lost caddy, the tour, the networks, the advertisers. They all lose if we kill the tournament. And if the area around the Pacific is off limits due to a police investigation, I see no other option.”

  “The governor will not be happy about that,” said Beck. “You’re talking millions of eyeballs in the Midwest and Northeast—where they have just had a late-season snowfall—lost to the charms of our great state. That’s a lot of tourist money down the sinkhole. The governor will not be happy at all. Not with the club, not with you clowns as custodians of the club. I’d say you can kiss your club goodbye.”