Riverbank Tweed and Roadmap Jenkins (eBook)

Chapter One: Riverbank Tweed

If I was to sum it up in a single burst, I'd say that in my line of work, you basically come across two kinds of people -- the ones who remember and those who forget. The forgetful folks are downright plentiful, and they require the services of people like me whenever they wander onto a golf course. I may be a caddy with some mileage on me, but if there's one thing I'm good at it's remembering, once I see the line or learn a distance, I never lose track of it. Let me walk a hole and watch a man play it and I'll know things about him that he doesn't even know about himself. And once I know them, brother, they're with me for the duration.

When you see an experienced caddie, watch him close. You'll see he's got a feel for the land and the game, a sixth sense of what's about to happen when a man puts his club to the ball. I remember one gimpy old bag man the boys called Searchlight, he was weathered and stooped but he wouldn't quit looping. We called him Searchlight on account of his ability to see in the dark. He could read greens like they were books, and he could read them pretty good, even when the lights were turned out. One time, after his lamps got bad and he couldn't hardly see even at high noon, the boys called on him for help. He was just standing around inside the caddie shack at San Francisco Golf Club while a bunch of the big wads were putting for fifty dollars a hole. It came down to the end and the pot was something like $900. They were looking at a ten-footer for all the cash when one of them called over to Searchlight. It was nearly pitch black outside, but old Searchlight went out there, walking real slow, listing as he limped to the spot they led him to. Then he kneeled down and felt the damn green with his fingers. Couldn't see a thing, just ran his hand over the grass, felt it all the way from the ball to the hole. Then he looked up at no one in particular and said in a coarse whisper, 'Two balls out on the right.'

One of the guys looked at Searchlight like he was conducting a seance or something, then asked him, 'How hard do you want me to hit it?' Old Searchlight, he didn't even flinch, just answered him straightaway.

'Gonna take a firm stroke,' he said.

They all just stood there looking at him, not knowing whether to trust him. Then he said, 'You're puttin' uphill, into some grain with a hint of dew layin' on top of it.'

They trusted him then, and one of those boys, he stepped up and gave it a good hard rap, just like Searchlight instructed. Damn ball found the hole, all right. Sucker disappeared like a freight train going into a tunnel.

To tell you God's truth, they aren't all legends like old Searchlight. Some of the caddies I've come across are downright ornery, and if you look at them cross-eyed you're asking for trouble. You take Nitro Duffy, for instance, he was a man who acted normal most of the time, but then he'd just blow like a volcano and start doing things you'd shake your head at. One thing he couldn't tolerate was people who didn't listen to him. Every once in a while, Nitro would find himself looping for folks who could barely remember their home address, let alone how to play the game. For folks like that, you've got to just about tattoo the instructions on their body, or else they'll plum forget what they have to do.

Well, wouldn't you know it, one day Nitro Duffy found himself toting at San Francisco Golf Club. He was carrying for this doctor fellow, a bone man or something, who was so bad that Nitro ended up having to write the distance on the man's wrist. The trouble started on the 1st hole and continued all the way around the course, Nitro would slip the...