Murder in the Rough

by Otto Penzler

  No: he did more than love her. He told her he loved her—and, unlike Allen, he acted like he meant it.

  And if he’d told Rachel then, one more time, that might have been enough. The sign she’d waited for, maybe had been praying for. She would have told him she loved him, too; and then he would have been able to show her. He could have taken her hand, led her up out of the church to the back parking lot—surely she knew the way. They could have been twenty miles away from the church before anyone was the wiser.

  All he had to do was say he loved her. But he didn’t. He said instead the words that would do the most harm, the other sentence he’d said to her a hundred times, but the one whose time was long past: the one phrase that would send her running.

  “Tell me what’s wrong,” he whispered.

  His mistake was awful, total. Rachel could not have told him what was wrong, because what was wrong was everything. They were past explanation; talking was for the Allens of the world. To demonstrate his love, all Pete had to do was demonstrate that he knew, that she need say nothing more. After all the times she’d pushed him away, had withdrawn herself from him, she was ready, this time, to submit. To let him fix things. To take her hand, to pull her to her feet, to say, Come with me and it’ll be fine. Just as Pete knew now that—no matter what she’d told him—sometime in the last few weeks, in a small motel room, she had sat still and wide-eyed while Ben Everly moved closer and closer; that she’d given herself to him because Everly had done what Pete hadn’t: led her where she could never lead herself.

  Rachel was right. She was weak. After all these years he understood. Everything had happened because Rachel was weak. And because Pete was, too.

  “Tell me,” Pete had said—and Rachel had only sobbed in the circle of his arms. Then she moaned and clung limply to him, while he stroked her back, which was now a little clammy.

  “I’m sorry,” she said then, her voice quivering.

  “Don’t be.”

  “I should get upstairs,” she said, close to his ear. “They’re probably looking for me.”

  Then, of course, he was surprised. He struggled for anything to say, and his words came desperately: “Are you happy?”

  With anguish, he felt her standing up. He grabbed at her fingers. “I can’t let you go unless you tell me you’re happy.”

  Insane. He’d give anything to erase that sentence from his life, all its hopeless cowardice.

  “Are you?”

  Rachel hugged him, briefly, and then pulled away; he felt her looking quickly across his face in the dark, not seeing him—dismissing her last chance at love and contentment as a trick of shadows, maybe, but dismissing it nonetheless.

  “Yes,” she said in the flattest and deadest voice he could imagine, and then walked out of the room, away from him, in a rustle of silk.

  Pete set his alarm early. He showered and dressed and then dug his clubs out of his apartment’s storage unit. He spent a few minutes wiping the spiderwebs from them, then put on his cap and his fake ring and his crucifix. One look in the mirror left him a lot less confident than he’d been the day before. He looked like Pete Shumaker with an awful dye job.

  He drank two cups of coffee on the hour-long drive north to the course. He thought over what he’d say, what the boy might say in return. The sun rose into a rich blue sky: it was good golf weather, at least.

  He reached the course when he’d planned: at seven, just as it opened. His was the only car in the lot. Beyond the parking lot the course glistened, still wet with morning dew and the nighttime work of the sprinklers.

  Pete walked up to the desk and paid his greens fee: an exorbitant hundred bucks. The man at the counter asked, “Do you want to hire a caddie?”

  “A friend of mine told me to ask for Ben Everly,” Pete said. The words came out like bricks. He smiled at the man; it felt like a grimace.

  The man checked a clipboard. “Ah, young Everly,” he said. And he left the desk and walked to a door behind him and leaned in. “Ben,” he said, “you’ve been requested.”

  And a few seconds later the door opened again, and Ben Everly appeared, smiling in the same deep artificial way the man at the counter was smiling. And—maybe Pete had imagined it—his face might have fallen, just a little, when he saw Pete. He’d heard the call and expected Rachel.

  “Morning,” Everly said.

  He was small—Pete had been expecting someone a bit more imposing, someone Allen’s height. Everly, though, could look Pete straight in the eye. He had a thin, narrow face, with wide, arching eyebrows and a mouth that didn’t seem to stretch far enough on the sides. Like he was sucking in his cheeks. His eyes were dark to the point of being black. His hair was styled so that it looked unwashed and uncombed—Jesus, the fucking kids and their hair! Peter hadn’t known that kind of cool extended to theology students from Georgia, but here was the evidence.

  Everly wasn’t handsome. No. He was pretty. Almost feminine. In a different kind of life, minus the suntan, he could have been a model, pouting with other thin boys in the front pages of Esquire. Maybe Pete thought this only because he knew the kid had been fucking Rachel—but he thought it all the same: Everly was sexy. Pete’s fingers squeezed in on themselves. Everly wasn’t so different from Allen, after all. Virtuous or not, he knew to prop his big Bible open in front of him in coffee shops and to style his hair and trim his nails, whiten his teeth. Pete could see it, just in the way Everly said, “Ben,” and held out his hand: he knew what he put out there into the world. And he knew what he’d get. He knew he could walk up to a woman like Rachel Beauleaux and look soulful and virtuous, and ask what was wrong, and she’d tell him and be grateful.

  Pete shook his hand and made himself smile and told Everly the lies he’d practiced: “My buddy Dick was out here a few weeks ago, said you did a pretty good job. Said to ask for you if I ever dug my clubs out.”

  “Dick… ,” Everly said, and glanced at the man behind the counter.

  “Dick Baldwin?” Pete said. “Tall guy, gray hair… ?”

  Everly grinned so that his eyes crinkled. “Dick, right! Right. Nice guy! Good golfer.”

  “That’s being too kind,” Pete said. “I can see why he recommended you.”

  They all laughed, fake as a sitcom.

  “And your name, sir?”

  “I’m Al,” Pete said.

  “Good to meet you, Al,” Everly said, and pumped his hand again. “By yourself today?”

  Pete nodded and squinted out at the course. “Yeah, I’m rusty. Figured I better not let anyone see me while I shake it off.”

  Everly grabbed his clubs and shouldered them, without any effort. He wore a polo shirt; his arm muscles flexed. “Well,” he said, “your secrets are safe with me. Shall we?”

  They walked out onto the course. Pete told himself to breathe deeply, to act like he was enjoying himself. He wouldn’t say anything until they were away from the clubhouse. But then, he was the only golfer out this morning—even at the first tee they had complete privacy.

  Not yet, not yet. He’d play for a while, find out more about this Ben Everly.

  Pete was an awful golfer, but at least that part of his story fit. He triple-bogeyed the first hole, double-bogeyed the second. Everly hung back, making nothing but absolutely noncommittal small talk on the walks between holes, offering him nothing but encouragement before and after each shot. His accent was buttery—studied, Pete thought. Playing up the southern-boy thing. Pete found it hard to say more than a syllable to him at a time. He kept thinking about Everly’s mouth, Rachel’s mouth. The smooth curve of her bare white ass under his hand. Everly chattered along, smooth and shallow. Professional. What had he said to Rachel? He’d have had a line. A man like him probably had a few. He probably drawled along in bed, called her sugar, baby, darlin’.

  On the third tee, Everly shaded his eyes and said, “So did ol’ Dick warn you about the trap at the dogleg?”

  “No,” Pete said, shading his eyes, too.

/>   “You can’t see it, but it’s there. Right past that stand of oak catching the sun.”

  “Nasty.” Pete took out his driver.

  Everly said, “Lots of guys have better luck with a 3-wood.”

  Pete wanted to shoot back—Oh, do they? This was perfectly sensible advice—Pete was spraying balls every which way—but all the same he ground his jaw when he took out the wood.

  “Try not to wallop it,” Everly said. “Lay it up a little short of the trap—right out there where that shadow is—and you got a pretty good line to the pin. Ground slopes back a little.”

  Pete followed Everly’s advice and watched the ball thump down almost where he’d aimed it, right in the middle of the fairway. Everly watched it, too, even gave a little Tiger Woods fist pump, like there was a TV camera on the two of them. The kid was good—for a second there he’d felt like a golfer.

  But. Hadn’t Pete seen a few cracks, too? And not just in the kid’s frantic eagerness to lie about ol’ Dick. Pete sneaked a glance at Everly as the boy shouldered his clubs. Were those shadows under his eyes? Did his lip droop when he thought Pete wasn’t watching? He thought of Daniel the violinist, thought of himself walking stunned around campus—and almost, for the space of a minute, felt sorry for Ben Everly.

  After all, what had Everly done that Peter hadn’t? To be scientific about it: Everly had put his cock in Rachel. Less than five times, Pete guessed, knowing Rachel and her conscience. Everly had given her nothing more than animal pleasure, and not enough of it to overcome the guilt she hauled around with her like a twin. Not enough, in the end, to make her keep him—and so here Everly was, sorry and sleepwalking, doing his best working his job, trying not to think about how many days it’d been since he’d left Rachel the note.

  Everly didn’t know about Rachel’s history with Pete, all that they’d done together. All they’d had. He knew only that she was unhappy with her husband—but he didn’t know her fears, her soft spots. Not the way Pete knew them. He bet Rachel had never pulled a sheet up underneath Everly’s chin. He bet she’d never looked him in the eye and said, I don’t want you to leave. By any reckoning Everly didn’t have Rachel’s love. That Rachel had slept with this—this boy—and not Pete was a matter of circumstance: when she’d met Pete, she was young and not fucking anybody, and now she was married, had at least a rudimentary sex life, and knew what she was missing, when it went missing. And she hadn’t called Pete at first, because she thought he was happily married—because, in her way, she loved him still and didn’t want to hurt him—the same reason Pete hadn’t called her when Maya left him. Everly had been right in front of her; that was all.

  He was lucky. Pete couldn’t hate him for that, could he?

  “Yessiree,” Everly said over his shoulder, coming up on the ball. “One heck of a shot there, Al.”

  But he did hate him.

  He watched Everly stride easily down the fairway—like the fit little twenty-year-old he was—watched him stride off into the sunlight, and felt his fists clenching. Poor sad little Everly with his bedhead hair and his tan and his muscles. Poor little Everly, who could have just about any woman he tried for—but who had tried for the big time. He’d known all along Rachel was married. Just as he’d known he was a long way from school, a long way indeed from his studies and the rules about open doors and long skirts and fucking chastity belts. Rachel hadn’t told him the details, but Pete could see them play out easily enough. Everly talked with sad, lonely Rachel and saw immediately what he could do, saw immediately what she was: a woman who was just married enough to know how to fuck, but who was really just a girl, underneath, still a sweet country girl who’d fall apart for a pretty face and a few mentions of Jesus. Why wouldn’t she? She’d married a pastor, after all. All he had to do was stand in the right place, work his charms, and in return he’d gotten from Rachel something precious—something Pete had been ready to die for, once.

  So Everly had fallen in love. So what? Falling in love with Rachel was hardly unusual. It didn’t make Everly special. And then, when Rachel took herself away, he threw a big ol’ ungentlemanly tantrum. Poor, poor Everly. Pete followed him down the fairway and imagined him praying, late at night: Oh God, why me? Why did you put her in my path? Why did I sin? What have I done to deserve this torment?

  He imagined Everly crying, snuffling, hearing nothing at all but his own puling weakness.

  He imagined Everly going down on Rachel, those thin panties thrown aside at last, knowing her taste, feeling her fingers twining in his perfect messy hair. Imagined him looking down at Rachel’s wide blue eyes while she sucked him off, while she gazed up at him, expectant, frightened. Prayerful.

  Pete looked up and down the fairway. They were as alone as they could be. Everly deserved everything that happened to him now.

  Everly stopped and dropped the bag; he hunkered down and looked at the ball. Over his shoulder, for the first time, Pete saw the sand trap the boy had warned him about. Maybe fifteen feet across and as well hidden as a tiger pit.

  “Straight shot,” he said to Pete. “And I have a feeling you’re warming up.”

  “I guess so,” Pete said. His heart was thumping; he could feel the roots of his teeth.

  “So, Ben,” he said, “Dick tells me you’re a Christian.”

  Everly looked up, surprised. He smiled, a little uncertainly. “Yes, sir,” he said. “That’s right.”

  “Baptist?”

  “Southern Baptist, yes, sir.” Everly, Pete could tell, was doing his frantic best to remember ever telling imaginary Dick any of this. “I’m studying theology at Kirkwood Seminary, actually. Down in Georgia. I’ll be a pastor someday, good Lord willing.”

  “That’s a fine calling,” Pete told him, looking off at the green.

  “So—you’re a Christian, too?”

  Pete took his 7-iron out of the bag. “As it happens, I am a pastor.”

  The kid actually said, “Well, I’ll be! What denomination?”

  Pete told him, and when he did, he saw Everly pause, for just a moment. That’s right, he thought.

  “I respect your church a lot,” Everly said.

  “Not too different, are they?”

  “No, sir, Al—I didn’t catch your last name?”

  “Purcell,” Pete told him, looking him right in the eye. “Allen Purcell.”

  Everly’s eyelids fluttered; he stood too straight, too still, hands jammed deep into his pockets. Pete held his stare, feeling his own cheeks flush. Everly looked him over, calculating, trying to see a way out. And not, Pete guessed, coming up with much.

  “Well,” he said finally, “it’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Purcell—”

  “I can’t imagine why that would be.”

  Everly swallowed. Pete tapped the head of the club against the deep green grass.

  “I mean,” Pete said, “I’d have to imagine Rachel’s told you some unflattering things about me.”

  The mention of her caused Everly to wince. Pete could barely name what filled him, seeing it. His arms pulsed; his fist tightened slickly around the club. He took in a great noseful of the thick grassy air. The boy seemed to shrink; Pete felt himself growing. Maybe this was how Allen felt all the time.

  Everly stammered. “So—”

  “So I know. So I know just about everything.”

  “Mr. Purcell—”

  “I know, for instance, that you tried to blackmail her.”

  Pete thought that maybe be could see the boy shaking a little.

  “Did you think she wouldn’t tell me?” Pete asked. “Really?”

  “No—”

  “What did you expect? Did you think she’d keep climbing into your bed? Did you think you’d have yourself a slave?”

  “No,” Everly said. “That’s not it at all.” He lifted his head and gazed at Pete. “I just thought—she told me she wasn’t happy.” He swallowed. “With you. I thought—”

  “Let me guess,” Pete said. “You thought she wasn’
t strong enough to leave me on her own? That all she needed was a little boost?”

  Everly looked at the green and then back. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s about right.”

  “Rachel and I have our problems,” Pete said. “As I guess most couples do. It’s fair to say we have big problems, Mr. Everly—or else why would we be here talking?”

  “But—”

  “Shut it,” Pete said. He looked at Everly dying a thousand deaths inside. He made himself think of the boy naked, sweating, Rachel kneeling in front of him. The boy’s come dripping down her neck. “Don’t go thinking you have rights here. We’re not having that kind of talk.”

  Everly’s mouth snapped shut.

  “Some Christian you are,” Pete said. “Threats. Carnal relations with a married woman. Kirkwood Seminary must have a little something to say about the Commandments, right? And you want to be a pastor?” Pete barked the last word, leaning forward on the balls of his feet to do it.

  “No!” Everly said, taking a step back. “That was—that was a lie. To you. I’m not some fool kid. I knew—I knew I was throwing it away when I—when Rachel—”

  “Yeah,” Pete said. “That’s something, at least.”

  “Mr. Purcell,” Everly said.

  Pete did his best to stare the boy into silence.

  “You said I didn’t have rights, Mr. Purcell,” Everly told him. “I know why you’re angry. Believe me, I know why. I’d be angry, too.”

  Pete took another step toward him. “You’re saying we’re alike?”

  “Yes. In some—we both love Rachel.”

  “I tell you what,” Pete said. “I’ll not hear my wife’s name in your mouth again. Boy.”

  There. Everly was mad now. He saw the kid’s jawbone outline itself against his neck.

  Everly’s voice was quiet now. “I know you hate me. But you better understand I love that woman. You’d better.”

  Pete laughed. He couldn’t help himself. Screw whatever Allen would say—this one he could field himself.