An Open Case of Death

by James Y. Bartlett

  “What about a girlfriend? Or boyfriend, if that was his thing.”

  “Charlie never had any problems getting a girl,” Benji said. “He’d had a few girlfriends at Stanford, but none that got serious. He told me that he was waiting until he got a more permanent, settled job before he got serious about anyone.”

  “Sounds like he had planned things out,” I said.

  “Yeah, he was like that,” Benji said. “He was a planner. Thought things through. He was always very strategic on the golf course. Thought his way around a course as well as anyone I ever coached. Strong mentally. He was ambitious, too. He had a plan, and knew what he had to do to reach his goals. Unusual for a kid that age.”

  “Yeah, that day I played with him, he talked about being ready in case some opportunity walked in the door,” I said. “I thought that was mature for someone so young.”

  “That sounds like Charlie,” Benji said. “He was very aware. I think he knew from maybe sophomore year on that he wasn’t going to make it on the Tour. He was good, but not Tour good. There’s a difference.”

  “Was he the best player on his team?”

  “Nah. Maybe three or four. He had his moments. He had some game, for sure. But he knew, most days, he couldn’t beat Bill Hanniford, who’s playing now on the Web.com tour. He couldn’t beat Mikey.”

  “Mikey?”

  “Mike Nelson,” Benji said. “He was probably Charlie’s best friend on the team. They’d room together on the road.”

  Mike Nelson. Mike N. Fifty-five percent probability. I felt my heartbeat accelerate.

  “Where is Mikey these days?” I asked.

  “He’s working up at the Redwoods,” he said. He picked up his phone and started scrolling through his messages again.

  I looked at Sharky and raised my eyebrows.

  “The Ranch at Redwoods,” he said. “Super fancy-dancy real estate project up in the Santa Lucia mountains, about twenty miles east of here and a couple of thousand feet higher. Million dollar lots. Twenty million dollar homes. Two golf courses. Horses. Fly fishing. Playground for billionaires.”

  Time for a road trip, I thought.

  “So, Hack, what’s on your schedule today?” Sharky said, changing the subject.

  “I’m supposed to meet up with the USGA guys later this morning,” I said. “The agronomy experts are grilling the greenskeeper. They probably want fairways only wide enough for single-file walking, and he’s holding out for two abreast.”

  Sharky laughed. “Well, if I know Pete Daniels, he’ll be able to hold his own,” he said. “He keeps that course in pretty good shape, despite the quarter-million players that walk all over it every year.”

  “How about you, Benji?” I asked. “Going over to the course today?”

  “Nah,” he said. “I’m meeting someone for lunch. Up in Frisco.”

  “Hack, I’ll ride with you if it’s OK,” Sharky said. “I’ve got a parking pass for you. Gets you into the volunteers and officials lot. Pretty close to the Lodge. You need a badge?”

  “Nah. The USGA sent me credentials,” I said. “I’m an ‘Official Visitor.’”

  “That’ll get you into the Tap Room, anyway,” Sharky said with a chuckle. “I think I have a press pass somewhere if you need to get into the press tent. For old time’s sake.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “But I’ll pass on the pass.” I put down my coffee cup. “But I’m calling first dibs on the shower.”

  I drove Sharky over to Pebble Beach an hour or so later. Mondays at a PGA golf tournament are usually pretty boring: there is a lot of last-minute bustling going on, with delivery trucks dropping things off at various tents, booths and counters, and people with official badges running around checking on the logistics. There are few actual golf professionals on site as most would be flying into town tonight from Phoenix or wherever they lived. Here at the AT&T Pro-Am, there were a lot of the amateurs—Hollywood celebs, business magnates, some professional athletes—milling about, getting ready to play a practice round on the Pebble Beach course. That was part of the attraction of playing in this event: the chance to play Pebble, and Spyglass, and the Monterey Peninsula Country Club course. They’d get a practice round on each of those, play a tournament round with their pro on each and, if lucky or good at sandbagging, make it into the final round at Pebble on Sunday. Throw in the nightly parties and lavish dinners, and they’d all stagger home on Sunday night in need of sleep and alcohol detoxification.

  I knew that any golf writers in town would not be found anywhere near Pebble Beach until Wednesday at the earliest. If any had come up early, they would be out playing golf themselves, at Pasatiempo, or Bayonet at Fort Ord, Harding Park or Olympic up in Frisco, or at one of the fancy real estate projects up in the mountains rising above Carmel Valley. Like the Ranch at Redwoods. But there is nothing newsworthy going on Monday.

  I had an hour to kill before I was supposed to meet up with Jake Strauss at some conference room in the Lodge. Sharky had pointed to a couple of mess tents set up off the main pedestrian pathways.

  “Those are reserved to feed the tournament officials and volunteers,” he told me. “The food is catered by the Lodge and it’s always excellent. Also, free. Later in the week, you’ll find a lot of players and their caddies eating in there. Far away from the fans and, like I said, the food is great.”

  I followed his advice and walked up the hill to one and stepped through the tent’s entrance. There were rows of mostly empty tables and chairs, and at the back, a long steam-tabled food line. Because it was still morning, there were trays of eggs, pancakes, bacon and sausage, hash browns, Mexican breakfast burritos and platters of fresh fruit, baked goods and more. I grabbed a plate and loaded it up, and poured myself a big mug of coffee.

  Looking around for a place to sit, I noticed an older guy sitting by himself a table away. He looked familiar. I walked closer and recognized him: it was Will Becker, former Tour star and one of the four co-owners of Pebble Beach. I pulled out a chair and sat down across from him.

  He looked up at me and smiled. “Man, these hash browns are great,” he said. “They make ‘em fresh, y’ know. None of that pre-made, frozen crap that they put in the microwave. I’ve been down to the kitchen, talked with Chef, watched him make a batch.”

  I held out my hand and he shook it. “Hacker, Boston Journal,” I said, figuring a small lie wouldn’t condemn me straight to Hell. And it was easier than explaining my entire life history and all the changes that had befallen it.

  He nodded and went back to eating. Becker was getting up there in years, and it was starting to show. His head was mostly bald, save for a few hopeful strands of white gray hair crisscrossing his noggin here and there. His skin was patchy, with splotches of red and patches of white, along with some scary looking moles that were beginning to look like angry fighting animals. Those famous Becker eyebrows, that in his youth had distinguished him, made him look like one of the rugged pioneers in the Lewis and Clark expedition across the continent, were now snow white. He was wearing a long-sleeved chamois shirt with one dark, stained spot on the front, and some old-looking blue jeans. I watched him eating his breakfast for a bit, and noticed the tremors in his hands.

  Becker had to be in his mid-eighties. He had been one of the lions of the Tour back in the day, contending with Nicklaus and Palmer, Miller and Trevino. His tall, lithe frame, broad bony shoulders, and those knife-sharp eyebrows had made him as much matinee idol as champion golfer. Pebble Beach would roll him out in front of the cameras this weekend to remind older viewers of the golden days of yore when heroes strolled the fairways, men ruled the world and nobody took drugs.

  “Those bastards in Boston wouldn’t let me play a practice round at the Country Club,” Will said suddenly, snapping me back to the present. I realized he had heard me say “Boston” and his memory had dragged up some incident from his more youthful days.

  “Really?” I said. “How come?”

  He shrugged and
nibbled on the end of a piece of bacon. “They said it was too busy,” he said. “Members first. It was a freakin’ Tuesday morning. I think I was the only one there that day.”

  “Well, that place is known for being a little snotty,” I said.

  “I didn’t qualify for the Open in ’63,” he said. “I was just a year out of college then. Julius Boros won that year. He beat Arnie and Jackie Cupit in a playoff. I was pretty much done by 1988, when Curtis Strange won the thing. But I’ll never forget when they told me to take a hike.”

  “Did they know who you were?”

  He looked at me, and I could see a flame of pride shoot up in his eyes.

  “Sonny boy,” he said, “Back in the day, everyone knew who I was. Everyone. Will Becker was a name. Kids wanted to be like me. Women wanted to sleep with me. Hell, a lotta men wanted to sleep with me, too!”

  He thought that was funny and began to harrumph with laughter, which quickly devolved into a hacking cough that made me think I might need to remember how to do the Heimlich maneuver. But he slowly got control of himself, and wiped his streaming eyes with his napkin.

  “Well,” I said, “When I get back home, I’ll go out to Brookline and tell them that Will Becker says hello.”

  “Nah. Tell ‘em Will Becker says to go fuck yourself.” He began braying again.

  Two guys came up, told Will it was an honor to meet him, and asked for his autograph. He nodded silently, and scribbled his name on each of their golf caps. They thanked him profusely and backed away. When they were out of earshot, he looked across the table at me with a wry smile.

  “That was nice, right?” he said. “Except five’ll get ya ten that they aren’t fans at all. Autograph hounds, prolly. They’ll spend the week getting as many guys as they can to sign those damn fool hats and then next week they’ll be trying to sell ‘em on E-Bay for a few hundred bucks. I’d like to tell ‘em to fuck off, but my wife says I should just pretend they are fans. Sometimes, just for the hell of it, I write ‘John Lennon’ or ‘George Washington.’ They never notice.”

  “I get the impression that you’ve just about run out of craps to give about most stuff,” I said.

  He chuckled.

  “What did you say your name was?” he said. “I like that line. Gonna steal it. ‘Run outta craps to give.’ Beautiful.”

  “You still own a piece of this place?” I asked.

  He nodded and looked around the tent, as if he could see something to brag about owning, instead of the white plastic tent enclosing a field canteen filled with cheap rental tables and chairs.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Meyer and Udall got me involved, years ago. Talked my manager into it, really. I had to pony up ten million bucks. Luckily, I had it. I never cared much about the money. I just liked winning golf tournaments. My manager was pretty smart, though he wasn’t no Mark McCormack. That son-of-a-bitch made Arnie and Jack into billionaires. But they had to sell their souls to do it. Not me. I never did more than one or two commercials a year. Concentrated on playing golf. Winning. That’s what I liked.”

  “And you did a bunch of that,” I said.

  “Thirty-one times, bubba,” Becker said and sat back in his chair with a self-satisfied smile. “Woulda been thirty-two, except for that time when Joe Dey called me for touching the sand in that bunker down in Tucson. Fuckin’ bastard cost me two hundred thousand. Never forgave him. Never.”

  I vaguely remembered the incident he was talking about, but I was going in a different direction.

  “You ever going to sell your share?” I said.

  He looked at me, those famous eyebrows going up and down like kids on a seesaw.

  “Funny you should ask me that,” he said.

  “Why?”

  He looked around, to make sure no one was lurking and listening in. The tent had maybe seven people in it, total. Nobody but me was listening.

  “Well, now that J.J. is gone, there’s gonna be some big changes around here,” he said.

  “Revisions in the ownership deal?” I asked.

  He shook his head, took a swig of his coffee and smiled at me.

  “That’s what they’ll say in public,” he said. “But the truth is, the big cats are trying to get rid of the little cats and take over. J.J.’s death is just an excuse to clean house.”

  “Really?” I said. “Who are the big cats?”

  “Only one left is Harold Meyer,” he said. “Now that J.J. is gone. Jackie is a little cat, like me. We were useful twenty odd years ago. Now we ain’t, so out we go.”

  “How do you know this?” I asked.

  He nodded at me with the self-knowledgeable look of the cat that swallowed the canary. “He told me hisself,” he said.

  “Who did?”

  “J.J. Udall,” Becker said, rapping the table with his knuckles for emphasis. “I went up to see him when he got sick the last time, in the hospital. He told me to sit down and listen up. Laid the whole thing out for me. Told me to call my manager, call my lawyers and tell them to sit up straight and pay attention.”

  “Wow,” I said, “That sounds serious. What did he say was going to happen?”

  Becker sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

  “Sorry, young feller,” he said. “But I ain’t telling you that. J.J. said not to trust anyone, not to talk to anyone. He told me to just wait and watch and see.”

  “So you’re not supposed to trust anyone,” I said. “That include Harold Meyer?”

  “Oh, hell’s bells, I ain’t never trusted that sumbitch,” he said with a barking laugh. “You don’t get to be that rich and that powerful without being as dishonest as the day is long. But it ain’t just Meyer.”

  “Who else is there?”

  He touched the side of his nose with his finger tip.

  “Follow the money, young man,” he said. “Follow the ever-lovin’ money.”

  I was silent for a bit, thinking.

  “Baruch Brothers?” I said, guessing. But then, they were the money in this deal, even if all of the partners were not hurting for spare cash.

  He slapped his hand down on the table so hard, I jumped. So did some of the seven other people in the tent.

  “Bingo!” he almost yelled. “You stack my ten million against the kind of scratch those New York scumballs can throw against the wall and it ain’t even a close contest. J.J. told me they’d be coming after me, and coming after Jack Harwood, too. He said if my lawyers weren’t careful, they’d try to renege on the deal we all had, pay us as little as possible, pat us on the head and send us away. And as soon as that was done, they’d sell the place for a couple, three billion and walk on outta here with greenbacks stuffed in their pockets.”

  He paused, looked around. A few more people had come into the tent, and were over at the steam tables, loading up plates with food. The number of people paying attention to him was still none. Except for me, of course.

  “But I thought J.J. Udall was one of the big cats,” I said. “I thought he was on the same level as Meyer.”

  “He was,” Becker nodded. “But he was worried. He knew some shit that I didn’t. He knew some stuff was coming down. That’s why he warned me not to trust anybody. I think he meant that to include Harold Meyer.”

  “How about Jacob Strauss?” I said.

  “Strauss!” He said the name like he was naming the serpent in the garden of Eden. His sibilant pronunciation was dripping with dislike and disdain. “I never trusted that sumbitch from day one,” he said. “He’s like all them boys on Wall Street: they’re in it to win it. For they own selves. Nothing else.”

  “What happens next?” I asked. “When is this all supposed to come down?”

  “I dunno,” Becker said. “Next board meeting is right after the Open, in July. I got my lawyer prepped and ready. Expect Jackie Harwood does as well. We’ll see what bullshit they come up with and deal with it then.”

  He stood up and stretc
hed.

  “I gotta go do some meet and greet on the putting green,” he said. “Nice chatting with ya, Boston.”

  He left. I stayed there for a while, thinking.

  Pete Daniels, the greens superintendent at Pebble Beach, had been talking nonstop for the better part of forty-five minutes on the subject of poa annua, or the strain of bluegrass that was found in the greens on the Pebble Beach golf course. I learned that there were actually some 15 different strains of poa that could be found on Pebble’s greens—hence their characteristic splotchy look—and I tried to stay awake as Pete described each of them in some detail, right down to their Latin names. It made me want to go dig up the body of the great Swedish botanist Linnaeus, who had dedicated his life to identifying and naming and classifying every last plant known to mankind, and kill him again.

  When Daniels put a slide up on the wall screen which showed a graph comparing the various growth speed aspects of each of the strains of poa found at Pebble Beach’s greens, my eyes began to cross. I wasn’t sure I really cared that poa alpigena grew at an average rate of 0.376 mm per six hours at 75°F (23.88°C), while poa napensis sometimes exceeded 0.753 mm.

  The rest of the people gathered around the dark wood conference table, a combination of officials from the USGA agronomy department, greenskeepers from the next three Open sites and a few local academics down from Stanford and UCal, hung on Daniels’ every word. I started thinking about what he would look like naked. That worried me.

  Luckily, Jake Strauss poked his head in the door, caught my eye and motioned for me to come outside with him. I restrained myself from shouting “Yes!” and pumping my fist, and got up. But I did let out a sigh of relief, once out in the hallway.

  He chuckled. “Some people get off on that stuff,” he said.

  “Mazeltov for them,” I said. “I was about to start poking my eyes out with a pencil.”

  “Let’s go have some lunch,” he said and led me down the hall, a flight of stairs and around the corner until we arrived at the Tap Room. It was crowded, but we found a table over in the corner and sat down. A waiter brought the menus over and we ordered a beer.