Whatever business he had with the club manager or the pro, that was when he did it, before the members showed up and saw an unnecessary nigger in the clubhouse. But the Cadillac was gone, and the shed was still locked up, and Train walked out in back, where last Christmas some members had nailed a fruit basket against the side of the building for the caddies to play basketball while they was waiting for totes. He found some golf balls from the practice range and began hitting soft little shots off the dirt, opening the blade of his nine iron and cutting under the balls, almost without touching them, lifting them up against the side of the shack until he found the right spot and began dropping them through the hoop.
Just like Bob Cousy at the foul line.
He did this for half an hour, until after they turned off the sprinklers and he heard the tractors out on the course, cutting the grass; until he’d dropped nine in a row through the fruit hoop. That was his lucky number, nine. Born on the twenty-ninth day of the ninth month in the year 1935.
The ninth ball in a row dropped through the hoop, and a few seconds later he heard Sweet’s Cadillac coming into the parking lot at fifty miles an hour, throwing up pebbles and dust, and took that for a good sign.
And then he saw there was another Cadillac in the lot too, gleaming in the sun. He couldn’t tell what color it was, blue or black, but it was parked close to the driveway, overlooking the caddy shed, somebody in it, relaxing against the seat, maybe watching.
Train felt himself trying to hide the club. He was always thinking that today was the day somebody might come around about his missing nine iron.
Train heard Sweet open the car door and slam it shut; then Sweet come down the slope of the hill toward the shed and went past Train without saying a word, smelling stale— most days he splashed himself with toilet water— and opened the padlock to the shed. He stepped inside, hurrying, and then unlocked the cage. He sat down back there and began drawing plans on a pad of paper. He was in a hurry, like there was something he wanted to get wrote down before he forgot.
Train walked in behind him, then went over and hung his hands in the wire separating the two sides of the room, but didn’t try to get any closer. The cage was off-limits.
It looked like Sweet was drawing the rooms of a house. The lines were zigzag and jagged, some places the drawing looked like he’d stabbed it.
He waited for Sweet to look up and see him so they could talk.
A little time passed, and then it was almost seven o’clock, and the other caddies begun coming in. One and two at a time, smoking Luckys and eating a jelly roll or a sausage. Some of them come to work with hangovers or without cleaning up, some of them talking about the cars they want to buy, or the girls they want to fuck. Henry Disharoon wanted everybody to smell his finger.
Sweet looked up at Henry, and the caddies noticed he was drawing pictures, and the room went quiet. Everybody knew not to bother Sweet when he was drawing, even though they never seen him at it before. The next time Sweet looked around, it was to ask if anybody knowed where Arthur was at. He paid no attention to Train, still standing there by the cage.
The phone began to ring, and Sweet handed out the totes. The caddies saw he was still drawing his picture, and nobody complained about who they got. They just put on they hats and went out to the first tee when he told them to go. Train went to a spot on the bench near Plural and took a seat.
Arthur come in finally at eight o’clock, and him and Sweet whispered awhile, and then Sweet showed him the picture he made. They whispered some more about that, and afterwards Sweet leaned back in his chair and relaxed, looked more like his old self.
Train got up and walked to the cage again. Sweet was staring at the tips of his shoes.
“Sweet?”
And now that Sweet looked up, Train was already sorry he bothered him at all. “Wait your turn, man,” he said.
“I had to ast you a question,” he heard himself say.
Sweet squinted up at him now like he couldn’t place the face.
“About Florida.”
“I took care of that.”
Train could feel the stir go through the room. “You took care of it?”
“What did I just say, cat? I said I took care of it.”
Train stood there, not knowing what else to do. If he walked away, it was like he given him permission. So he stayed where he was, and then Sweet looked at him again and Train saw the clouds rolling in. “Man, what do you
want
?” he said.
Train caught the glint off Sweet’s diamond tooth. “It was the widow,” he said, “I was supposed to get a receipt from the widow.”
“Receipt? What re-cept you talkin’ about?”
“The man that give me the money, he said he want a receipt from Florida’s wife.”
Sweet stood up and stepped a little closer to the cage and cocked his head, as if he couldn’t decide if it was his eyes seeing this shit or his ears hearing it. “What for?” he said.
“Him and another man had a bet,” Train said. “Would I give her the money or not.”
“And what kind of receipt this man want?”
“I don’t know,” Train said. “Something from the widow is all I know.”
Sweet studied him, and Train could feel all the eyes in the room on the back of his head; everybody there known he was lying. Sweet said, “What’s this cat’s name?” And as he said that, he unlocked the cage door.
“Mr. Packard, I think,” Train said. “From Hillsdale . . .”
Sweet nodded, like this was all reasonable after all, and come through the door. A little sideways, Train noticed. “An old man with that lizard look?” Sweet said. “Mr. Packard?”
Train looked around at the other caddies, and there was something exciting going on, but he couldn’t quite tell what it was. “No,” he said, “he wasn’t old.”
Sweet was moving closer, still trying to place the name.
“He was a guest,” Train said, “played with that fat man named Pinky.”
“Pinky . . .” Sweet said, and took another step closer, still walking a little sideways, and now Train felt it coming. “Don’t believe I am familiar with that name.”
“That’s the only name he called him,” Train said.
Sweet nodded, as if that was the point, as if everything was reasonable. As if Train was blind and stupid both.
And for some reason, being treated like he was blind and stupid, Train acted like it. “Whoever that fat man is you sent out with me and Florida,” he said. And he was sorry that he brung up Florida’s name into it again.
He saw the glint off Sweet’s front tooth, and then the glint off the pool cue. He knew it was a pool cue; in the instant before Sweet laid it across his ear Train saw the polished wood and the design markings in perfect detail. And then he heard a clicking noise, about like somebody turn off a light switch, and the lights in fact went out. When he woke up, he was on the cool earth floor; his leg was up under him and felt like it had went to sleep. Someone was yelling.
Train looked up and the sky was full of Sweet. He was standing over him, hollering things Train was just beginning to pick up . . . “Nigger call me a thief better come down here with something on his person” . . . blowing little specks of white foam off his lips, and every now and then he brought the pool cue down across Train’s leg or his arm, or slammed it on the floor next to his head.
Train lay as still as he could, waiting for Sweet to let him up. He felt blood running down his neck, but he couldn’t tell where it was from. The words come and went, and every now and again he went back to how next time Train better “come down here with something on his person.”
And then he heard Plural. “That’s it,” he said. “The boy has had enough.”
And as quick as it started, it stopped. Sweet straightened up, looking at Train from two sides, like a paint job he just finished, then turned around and walked back into the cage and locked the door.
“That’s it,” Plural said.
Train lay still, getting himself right. He pushed himself up and lost his balance and rolled over on the floor. The other caddies watched him, and watched Sweet, and Plural, and nobody cared to help him up. Henry Disharoon sniffed at his finger and Plural seem to go to sleep.
Train become aware again of the blood on his arm and on his hand. It was pooled near him on the floor, and he saw that he’d slipped in it when he tried to rise off the floor. He sat up, getting his arms around his knees. The room seem to come up with him, like it was stuck to his head. He looked around at the other caddies, couldn’t remember nobody’s name. He dropped his head onto his arms and waited, and when the room stopped moving on him he pushed himself up on his feet.
Train walked back to his spot in the corner slowly, his hand touching the lockers along the wall for balance, and sat down. His head was suddenly too heavy for his neck to hold it, and he leaned back into the wall. A little later he felt blood dripping onto his shoulder. He thought it was an insect at first.
He was suddenly thirsty. He lifted his head to see if things was cleared enough to walk, and then got up and weaved over to the soda machine. It occurred to him that no one had said a word since Sweet went back into the cage. In all that time— how much time was it?— he hadn’t heard nothing but an empty hum, like the background noise when the operator called long-distance.
He put a nickel in the machine and pulled out a grape Nehi. He took a sip, which tasted different than it should, and then held the bottle against his forehead and walked back to the corner. On the way he glanced sideways and caught Sweet staring at him through the cage. Sweet looked away; Train dropped back onto the bench and then lay down.
The Nehi was cold and sweet going down and stung his nose coming back up. When that happened, the other caddies moved further away. Some of them even got closer to Plural. Train got up again and rinsed out his shirt with the hose where they all drank water.
The phone rung and Sweet answered. He listened a moment, then called out two of the caddies and told them to report to the first tee. His voice turned nicely cheerful, like he was trying to line up everybody on his side.
Train glanced at the clock; it was only 8:30.
