The protest could get ugly unless the cops decided to get the word out that they were looking for a psycho unaffiliated with the club—but that would create a climate of fear and panic among the badge-holding spectators. At this point, the public might not even believe the cops. They’d probably think the green jackets had bought off the investigators.
“What do you think they’d say if I went over there and told them what we know?” Caroline asked Sam.
“They’d blow you off,” Sam said. “You’d be spoiling their wonderful tantrum.”
Theirs was the first courtesy car to arrive in the lot that morning. The field had been cut to the low 44 scores and ties, and with the small number of players on the course during the last two rounds, the tee times began late in the morning. Nobody had to be up early on the weekend.
David Porter’s office had enough bodies in it to form a pickup basketball game. Boyce and Harwell were there, along with Leonard Garver; so were Porter, Brisbane, and Woodley. Sam brought Caroline in with him.
“Good morning, Sam,” Porter said. “Caroline, I’m David Porter, chairman of Augusta National. I’m very sorry about what happened last night.”
He extended his hand to Caroline over his desk. She shook it, then sat down in one of the two available chairs. Boyce was standing in the corner to the left of the door. Everyone else was seated, so Sam took the last spot open on the couch.
Porter remained behind his desk, looking glum with his chin in his hand, and let Boyce take charge of the meeting. The GBI detective’s folksy country lawman persona took on a more urgent tone.
“I talked to Ralph Stanwick’s wife last night,” Boyce said to the group. “He left their cabin right after Robert did. He hasn’t been home since then. She’s afraid something’s happened to him.”
“Did you call Peggy Francis?” Sam said.
“Yes,” Brisbane said. “She hasn’t seen him for two days.”
“We think he got a call from Lee Doggett last night,” Boyce said. “It came through the clubhouse switchboard. We’re working on finding out where it came from.”
In the meantime, Boyce said, he’d been working on linking Doggett and Stanwick, after the physical resemblance between Stanwick and Doggett’s booking photo became obvious. They’d located Doggett’s ex-wife Renee in Florida. She told them Lee’s real father was an Augusta National member, though she didn’t think Doggett had ever told her the man’s name. Lorraine Stanwick had been shocked by the idea that Ralph could have had a bastard son by one of the Augusta maids, but admitted that Stanwick had seemed terribly agitated all week, even before Ashby was murdered. When she saw Doggett’s photo, she’d started to cry.
Boyce then brought up Doggett’s conviction.
“Renee confirmed the counterfeit Masters badges,” Boyce said. “She saw him make the things with a home computer and printer. But she said Doggett never used drugs—hated them, in fact, and she’s got no reason to lie for him. She doesn’t care what happens to him.”
“So what’s with the cocaine bust?” Sam said.
“I asked Harwell to get me Doggett’s case files, and I think I’ve pieced together what happened here. I’d say somebody—probably Stanwick—found a willing cop to plant the drugs in Doggett’s house. Maybe he got the D.A. to do him a favor, too, in exchange for a few free Masters badges. He was hoping Doggett would go away for a long time. Maybe something would happen to him in prison. Unfortunately for Ralph, Doggett’s sentence was reduced and he made it out in one piece.”
Harwell said they ran the fingerprints found on the hunting knife in Caroline’s room. They were Doggett’s.
“Another thing,” Boyce said. “The blue pickup truck Sam saw leaving Caroline’s motel last night matches the description of a truck stolen from a farmer down in Claxton. The farmer and the truck had been missing since the day Doggett was released at Reidsville. The cops down there dug up the farmer yesterday afternoon in his cornfield, along with the ax that killed him.
“Doggett had to have figured out that Stanwick put him behind bars,” Boyce said. “His mother died while he was away. His wife left him and took his son. He lost his house, his family—everything. He must have been one angry boy. My guess is he spent the last eight years planning to come back here and get even.”
“Stanwick must have had a hunch it was his son doing the killings,” Sam said. “Otherwise he would have told me about Doggett when I asked about ex-employees. I’d bet he went into the employee files and removed Doggett’s folder, too.”
“And now Ralph’s missing,” Brisbane said.
Everyone in the room shared the same thought: the twisted father-son relationship that had existed between Stanwick and Doggett had probably ended last night.
“Now what?” Porter asked.
“We find Doggett,” Boyce said. “He’s out there somewhere.”
“He’ll come back here,” Sam said.
“Why do you say that?” Porter asked.
“He’s trying to stop the Masters,” Sam said. “That’s his ultimate revenge. He doesn’t just blame Stanwick for what happened to him. He blames Augusta National.”
No one disagreed.
“He’s got two more days left to pull it off,” Boyce said. “You could still cancel or postpone, David.”
“Never.”
“We could put his name and photo out to the media.”
“No,” Porter said, as forcefully as though he were turning down Rachel Drucker’s application for membership. “That would be worse than canceling. We can’t have it known that a madman may be wandering around the golf course. It would create a panic. We’re going to run the Masters as always.”
Boyce agreed not to release Doggett’s name and photo to the pubic. He couldn’t force Porter to stop the tournament, and he agreed that panicking 40,000 people wasn’t a good idea. Besides, he said, if Doggett didn’t know he’d been I.D.’d, he might get careless. It would be easier to find him if he didn’t know that every cop and security guard on the grounds was looking for him.
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Boyce said. “Mr. Woodley, alert your staff that we’re going to keep the gates closed an extra hour this morning. Get a copy of Doggett’s mug shot to all security guards, and make sure they study it. We’ll open the gates at nine, and I want every spectator eyeballed, patted down, and wanded after they come through the metal-detector columns. Harwell, we’re going to need more cops. Ask Sheriff Garver to free up as many as he can spare to work the grounds today and tomorrow.”
“We still might not spot him,” Woodley said. “He could change his appearance.”
“I realize that,” Boyce said. “This boy’s smart. He’s not going to jump into our laps. But if he’s trying to stop this tournament, that’s going to be tough to do with a few hundred cops and security guards watching for him, and 40,000 fans on the course.”
“Patrons,” Porter corrected.
“What about the TV cameras?” Sam said.
“What about them?” Boyce asked.
“Look, there’s 50 CBS cameras all over the course. Why not use them? We could put someone in the control booth with the producer, watching all the monitors for Doggett. Caroline knows what he looks like better than anyone. She could do it.”
Porter spoke up: “Caroline, do you think you’d be able to spot this man from a TV monitor?”
“I’ll never forget that son of a bitch as long as I live,” she said.
Boyce started to smile.
“I like it,” he said. “An entire television network helping us on a stakeout.”
“CBS will never agree to it,” Brisbane said.
“They’ll do what I tell them to do,” Porter said.
Sam had been waiting for Porter to start throwing his weight around in a way that would actually do so
me good. Now he was seeing it. He and Boyce exchanged grins as Porter reached for his intercom button.
“Ida? Call Peter Bukich at CBS headquarters and tell him I want to see him at his office in fifteen minutes.”
*
David Porter led the delegation out of the administration building like a heavyweight champion leading his entourage to the boxing ring. He got into his personal golf cart, with Robert Brisbane sitting next to him, and headed up the driveway toward the par 3 course. Sam and Caroline tagged along behind them in one cart, with Boyce and Harwell sharing another.
With the day’s crowd still waiting at the gates to be allowed inside, the carts made good time past the clubhouse and the cabins to the tree-enclosed TV production compound east of the par 3 course. Peter Bukich’s office was in a one-story green cabin flush against the dense stand of trees at the north end of the compound. Porter led his entourage through the screen door and down a hall to a cramped office where the preppie-looking Bukich sat in a padded leather swivel chair behind a desk with a computer, two TV monitors, several telephones, an Emmy, and a cigar humidor.
Porter took the only other comfortable chair in the room. Everyone else stood.
“I’d like you all to meet Peter Bukich, Executive Producer of CBS Sports,” Porter said, gesturing toward the man behind the desk. Bukich nodded. His bright blue salesman’s eyes attempted to be gracious and winning, but the oddity of the gathering had clearly made him less comfortable in his loafers.
“I’ve been explaining to Peter what we’d like his crew to do for us this weekend,” Porter continued. “Peter, this lovely young woman is Caroline Rockingham, who got a good look at our killer. She will be working with Tony during the broadcast.”
Tony Petrakis was the legendary CBS producer/director who’d been in charge of choosing the pictures used during Masters broadcasts for 30 years. His Greek temper was well known to even casual golf fans, earning him the nickname “The God of War.” It was said that the headstrong Petrakis had actually thrown the equally imperious Clifford Roberts out of his truck the first year he directed the Masters, and that there wouldn’t have been a second year had Roberts not committed suicide. Yet Petrakis told each succeeding Augusta National chairman that the only one he’d been able to work with was Clifford Roberts.
Bukich listened to Porter with a look on his face that suggested he’d eaten a bad breakfast burrito. His hair was fluffed and combed back in a style that would fit in at the board room or an airport sports bar; his green tie with the subtle Augusta National flag logo pattern came from the club’s Golf Shop. He tried to maneuver his way between the boss in New York and the one staring sternly at him from a chair in the cramped office.
“Now, David, we want to cooperate with the police, of course, but we can’t compromise our broadcast by having people in there looking over our shoulders,” Bukich said, with a condescending smile. Sam knew it wouldn’t work on Porter; David Porter invented that smile.
“Call Rudy Mendenhall and tell him we’re going to have a police officer and a witness working in the truck through the end of the tournament,” Porter said, oblivious to Bukich’s objections.
“David, I can’t do that,” Bukich said. “We’re an independent network, not your private production company. We always cooperate with you in every way we can, but letting the police get involved in how we cover the tournament is just impossible, on so many levels.”
“There’s only one level here—mine,” Porter said. “Call Rudy.”
Bukich sighed, picked up one of the phones on his desk, and punched a button on his speed-dial pad. Within 30 seconds he was talking to Rudy Mendenhall, President of CBS Sports. He explained what Porter wanted, and listened for a moment. Then he handed the phone to Porter.
“He wants to talk to you,” Bukich said. Sam thought he saw the slightest glint of satisfaction on Bukich’s face, as though he’d gotten a yes from Mom after Dad had said no.
Porter took the receiver and said, “This is David, Rudy.” He listened for a minute, then another, without saying anything. Then he spoke.
“I’m sorry you feel that way, Rudy, because we’ve enjoyed our relationship with CBS over the years. I’ll call NBC, ABC, and Fox this morning and tell them you’ve terminated your option to carry the tournament next year.”
Bukich’s tan seemed to slide off his face and land in his lap. He pushed his chair away from his desk and put his hand up to his head as though he’d suddenly felt a wasp fly into his neatly coiffed hair. Porter, meanwhile, sat placidly in his chair as he once again listened to the voice coming from the corporate headquarters 667 miles to the north.
Finally David Porter said, “I knew you’d understand, Rudy. Yes, we’ll be as unobtrusive as possible. Our goal is the same as yours: We don’t want our viewers to even suspect that there’s anything different about this year’s broadcast. We’re trying to avoid a massive panic here, but we’re also trying to prevent another killing.”
He listened for another moment.
“That’s right…I won’t be calling the other networks…Yes, I hope so, too. Come down soon, Rudy, and we’ll tee it up.”
Bukich’s breathing seemed to return to normal as he eased his chair back toward his desk. He would not go down in history as the CBS Executive Producer who lost the Masters to another network.
When Porter handed the phone back to Bukich, he gave a quick nod to Boyce. Bukich, meanwhile, listened to his boss for a few moments, then put down the receiver.
“Anything you want, David,” he said. “If Tony gives you any trouble, I’ll deal with him.”
Chapter Thirty-three
Porter and Brisbane left the CBS cabin and drove their cart back to the clubhouse. As Sam and Caroline got in their cart, Boyce got a call on his cell phone. He put a hand over his ear, listened for a minute, then snapped the phone shut.
“Our boys found out where Doggett’s been staying,” Boyce said. “They traced last night’s call to the Curtis Motel in Grovetown. Doggett checked in early Monday morning.”
“Right after Ashby was killed,” Sam said.
Boyce nodded. “Want to come along?”
“Sure,” Sam said, turning to Caroline. “You coming?”
“Of course,” she said.
*
The white paint was peeling off the siding of the one-story motel building, located next to the railroad tracks in a working-class neighborhood. The trees on the block looked as if they needed water, and the trash cans could have used more frequent collecting. A handful of kids were riding their bikes up and down the cracked sidewalks. Some barefoot young men in jeans and muscle shirts stood in a driveway next door, drinking Miller Genuine Draft and looking under the hood of a 1991 Mercury Sable. No one in this neighborhood would have paid much attention to Lee Doggett as he came and went.
An unmarked squad car was already parked out front of the building when Boyce and Harwell pulled up. Sam parked the Cadillac behind Boyce’s car.
“Nice ride,” said a shirtless kid wearing a sideways Braves cap as Sam got out of the car.
“It’s not mine,” he said.
“Yeah, I figured,” the kid said. Sam looked at Caroline, who had her hand over her mouth to hide a smile. “You all cops?”
“Some of us,” Sam said. “You know a guy named Lee Doggett? Stayed at this motel? Tall, thin white guy, losing his hair?”
“Nope,” the kid said, staring blankly at Sam.
“Drove a light blue Chevy pickup…loud engine?”
“Oh, him,” the kid said. “Yeah, I know the truck. It ain’t around today.”
Sam and Caroline went into the crowded motel room. The unit’s manager or owner, a dark-skinned man with a Middle Eastern accent wearing a white shirt, black pants, and sandals, stood with Boyce just inside the open door while two uniforms poked around t
he drawers and closet. Harwell was looking in the small refrigerator that hummed away on a counter back near the bathroom.
“Hey, Lieutenant,” one of the uniformed cops said to Boyce. “Take a look at this.”
He had lifted the bedspread off the floor and found a white shirt, a black tie, a black baseball cap, and a black stiletto-heeled shoe.
“Deborah Scanlon’s,” Sam said.
“Manolo Blahnik,” Caroline said, looking at the shoe.
“Who?” Boyce said.
“That’s the designer,” Caroline said.
Boyce picked up the shoe with a gloved hand and held it up to the light coming in through the window. He gripped it by the toe and examined the heel.
“Blood on the heel,” Boyce said. “Ten to one it’s Doggett’s.”
“She put up a fight,” Sam said. “I’m not surprised.”
“Why would he keep the shoe?” asked Caroline. “Souvenir?”
“Maybe because he knew his blood was on it,” Boyce said. “But he didn’t seem to care whether we found it here.”
“He isn’t worried about us knowing who he is—not anymore,” Sam said.
“Yeah,” Boyce said. “That’s what worries me.”
Boyce had one of the cops put the shoe in an evidence bag. There wasn’t much else, as far as Sam could see. It looked like the kind of place you’d expect to find a guy who was fresh out of prison.
Sam noticed a plastic squeeze bottle on the floor next to the dresser. It contained some kind of clear liquid. He called Boyce over and asked him to unscrew the cap. Boyce held up the open bottle with his gloved hand and Sam sniffed it. The sharp smell stung his nostrils.
“RoundUp,” Sam said.
Another uniformed officer walked into the room.
“Lieutenant, you know that black Mercedes we’ve been looking for? The one Stanwick drives?” the cop said. “It’s right up the block.”
Amen Corner Page 25