The Players (21 page)

“Ah well, nothing ventured, and all that.”

She smiled winningly at Jack, and he grinned back. He crossed to the door and started out.

“Goodbye, Christy.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Barrett. I presume I’ll see you at Wimbledon this afternoon?”

“I presume.”

“And don’t worry about Tim. He just might be tougher than you give him credit for.”

“He might, at that,” Jack said, and walked out of the girl’s flat and back down the stairs.

When he was back out on the street, the sense of unreality returned to Jack Barrett. Had he really been standing there in the apartment of a pajama-clad girl of twenty-one calmly discussing the possibility of their going to bed together? He shook his head and smiled, wondering whether he was a virtuous fellow for walking away, or a damn fool.

He walked a block to King’s Road where he flagged down a taxi. On the ride back to the Regency House he tried to sort out his thoughts. In her feather-headed, earthy-wise way, Christy Noone might just have taught him a valuable lesson this morning. At least he knew now that Tim would have to win or lose his own matches, on the tennis court and elsewhere. Also, Jack would have to stop making a career of being Tim Barrett’s father.

The first Saturday of the fortnight marks the halfway point in the Wimbledon tennis tournament. Out of 128 young men who began play the previous Monday in the men’s singles, sixteen were still in the running for the championship Saturday morning. By now the pretenders were out of it—the players who were too weak or too slow or who didn’t want to win badly enough. A few of the good ones were gone too—those who were not in good physical condition or took their opponents too lightly or eased up too soon in a one-sided match only to lose control. By Saturday night there would be eight left.

Mike Wilder sat with Paula Teal sipping a tall drink at one of the blue wicker tables in the Players’ Tea Room. At Mike’s feet rested a soft leather carryall like the ones used by the players for their equipment.

It was shortly before the traditional two o’clock starting time, and the tea room was even busier than usual. Players who were not involved in today’s matches were eating the hot lunches served only to players. Reporters were crowded around the bar. Deals were in the making everywhere. Mike fancied he could hear the ringing of cash registers in the din.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Paula said, gazing around at the frenetic activity.

Mike said, “It’s a little like the floor of the Stock Exchange during a panic.”

“I didn’t know you were interested in the market.”

“I’m not. I wandered into the place one day looking for an off-track betting office.”

“Hey, Mike! Mike, of buddy!”

Mike swiveled toward the voice calling his name and saw J. J. Kaiser coming toward the table. He was towing along a jut-jawed woman with massive forearms.

“This is luck, running into you,” J. J. enthused. “Hi, Paula, good to see you again. Quite a crowd, isn’t it, Mike.”

“Hello, J. J.,” Mike said.

Once again the little man performed his trick of produring a chair from nowhere. He deposited his female companion in it and squatted beside her on the floor. Mike glanced around looking for Geneva Sundstrum, but the big blonde was nowhere in sight.

“You people know Tina Gottschalk, of course,” J. J. said, indicating the woman he had brought with him. ‘Tina’s got a real shot this year at winning the women’s singles. Tina, this is Mike Wilder, top sportswriter in the whole U. S. of A.”

“Hello, Miss Gottschalk,” Mike said. “J. J. exaggerates.”

“About what?” Tina said, thrusting her jaw forward aggressively.

“About his ranking of the country’s sportswriters.”

“For a minute I thought you were talking about my chances of winning.”

“I assure you that’s not what I meant. I have no idea what kind of a tennis player you are.”

“I’ll bet you haven’t. Have you even watched a women’s match yet?”

“A little here, a little there.”

“You’d never know it by reading your fucking column. There’s never a word in it about women unless you’ve got some smartass remark. You and your asshole sportswriter buddies are all the same.”

Mike looked at the woman and blinked.

J. J. moved into the silence quickly. “Ha ha, don’t let Tina throw you, Mike, she likes to come on a little strong sometimes just to shock people. Tina’s going to be using some of our Gilfillan equipment, aren’t you, honey?”

“I told you I’d try it out in practice is all,” Tina said. “I want to know if your shit’s any good before I use it in a match. And don’t ever call me honey again.”

“Yeah, yeah, right,” J. J. said hurriedly. “Mike, how about working Tina into one of your columns, or maybe a
Sportsweek
piece? She’d make good copy.”

Mike rubbed his jaw and studied the scowling woman across the table. “I might do something on her at that,” he said.

“You see, Tina,” said J. J., “I told you he was a buddy of mine.”

Tina looked squarely into Mike’s face. “Don’t do me any favors, big shot,” she said.

“Don’t worry, Miss Gottschalk,” he told her. “I don’t intend to.”

“I gotta go,” Tina said, standing up abruptly.

“Yeah, right,” said J. J. “I’ll see you after your match, okay hon-, uh, Tina?”

Tina Gottschalk turned her broad back on the table and walked away without further conversation.

“She’s always tense before a match,” J. J. explained.

“Sure.”

J. J. dropped into the wicker chair vacated by Tina, and the bright smile slipped off his face as though it had come unglued.

Paula looked questioningly from one of the men to the other, then stood up. “If you’ll excuse me for a few minutes, I think I’ll go … ‘powder my nose’ I believe is the expression.”

When he was alone with Mike, J. J. said, “Who do I think I’m kidding?”

“About what?”

“That Gottschalk dame is a royal pain in the you-know-what. I’d like to tell her to go get fucked, but I think that’d be asking the impossible.”

“What are you saying, J. J., that you don’t like your job?”

“Job? This is a job? I’m nothing but a frigging kissass. My so-called job is sucking up to sonsofbitches like Yuri Zenger and foul-mouthed dykes like Gottschalk. Excuse me for laying all this on you, Mike, but sometimes this ‘job’ drives me right up the wall.”

“If you feel that way, why don’t you get out?”

“What else could I do? I’ve been hustling one thing or another since I was twelve years old. And I’m pretty good at it, if I do say so myself. Trouble is, hustling’s the
only
thing I’m good at. I’ve got no talent, no skills, no education to speak of. I’m not crazy about the work I do, but it beats starving.”

“I never knew you felt that way,” Mike said.

“I never did before. I don’t know what’s come over me lately.”

“Well, you’re not alone, J. J. Almost everybody has spells where he feels crummy about what he’s doing for a living. Most of the time we get over it and realize we really haven’t got it so bad after all.”

“Even sportswriters feel that way?”

“Even sportswriters.”

“I don’t quite know how, but I think you’ve made me feel better. Thanks, Padre.”

“Bless you, my son.”

J. J. grinned at him, and Mike grinned back, surprised to find himself actually liking the little hustler.

There was a change in the tone of the conversations in the room, and Mike turned to look for the cause. It was not hard to spot. Geneva Sundstrum in a form-fitting pink dress was moving toward their table, her splendid blonde head well above the crowd. In her wake she left little eddies of admiring males.

“How did it go, J. J.?” she asked after greetings had been exchanged.

“So-so. Gottschalk wants to try out the stuff before she makes a commitment. If you ask me, all she’s looking for is a load of free equipment.”

Geneva leaned across the table and spoke confidentially to Mike. “J. J. thought he might do better with Tina if I wasn’t around.”

Mike eyed the lush figure of the big blonde and made a mental comparison with the muscular lady tennis player. He said, “I see his point.”

“We better buzz off, Mike,” said J. J. “Zenger’s got the opening match on Centre Court, and I want to be sure he sees me cheering for him. Thanks for the sympathetic ear.”

“Don’t mention it,” Mike said. He watched the tough little man walk away with the statuesque girl at his side. Silently Mike wished him luck.

Paula returned and sat down at the table. “Did J. J. leave?” she asked.

“Yeah. Geneva showed up and they took off together.”

“I saw Geneva out in the ladies’ room and we talked a little. She’s a nice girl.”

“Seems to be.”

“And you know, I think she really loves the guy.”

“I don’t think J. J. is aware of it yet, but it looks to me like he’s getting hung up on her too.”

“Isn’t that fascinating? You could probably write a book about Wimbledon without ever mentioning the tennis.”

“Very likely. Here’s another story coming in the door now.” Mike nodded toward the entrance where Jean-Pierre Leduc, young conqueror of the old champion, was coming in trailing a crowd of reporters and hangers-on. The French boy’s command of English was small, but his answers to the reporters’ questions were animated, and seemed to delight everyone within hearing.

“Today’s hero,” Mike remarked.

“He’s gorgeous,” Paula said. “He’s been in the papers and on television ever since he beat Ron Hopper on Tuesday.”

“The kid may develop into a top player,” Mike said, “if the girls don’t eat him alive first.”

“Yum. If only I were ten years younger. Better make that fifteen.”

“You’re a lascivious old lady.”

“Ain’t it the truth.”

“Fred Olney ought to be along soon,” Mike said. “He said he’d meet me here by starting time.”

“Is he the little Australian? The one who’s getting you a pass to the dressing room?”

“Ssh, not so loud. If the other reporters find out I’m being smuggled inside they’ll march on the American embassy. Here comes Fred now.”

The Aussie bounced over to the table and dropped into a chair across from them. He winked at Paula by way of greeting, and said to Mike, “I hope you appreciate all the trouble I’ve gone to for you. I’ll be scalped if anybody finds out.”

“Torture won’t drag your name out of me,” Mike said.

“I’ll expect nothing less than a biographical article about me in that magazine of yours.”

“I’ll see what I can do. I take it you got the pass.”

Fred glanced furtively over one shoulder, then the other. From a shirt pocket he produced a plastic-covered card which he slipped across the table to Mike. “If you’re captured,” he said, “eat this.”

“Thanks, Fred, I appreciate it.”

“You’ll have a chance to appreciate it properly tonight at the Bull and Crown over in Knightsbridge. Do you know the place?”

“I’ll find it.”

“You did say I could bring along as many of my mates as I liked?”

“That was the deal.”

“Smashing. You’ll be there too, Miss?”

“You couldn’t keep me away,” Paula said.

“All the better. I must pop off now and cheer on whoever’s playing against Denny. First thing you know that bloke will start thinking he’s a singles player and I’ll have to get meself a new partner for the doubles.”

Watching Fred Olney swing off toward the door Mike said, “I have a friend on the
Daily News
who always said tennis players were a pimple on the face of sports. He said they were arrogant, clannish crybabies, and were spoiled rotten. And I used to more or less agree with him.”

“And now you’ve changed your mind?”

“I’ve just learned once again what a bad practice it is to generalize. There are some bad people in tennis, no doubt about it, but there are baseball and football players I know who couldn’t carry that little Aussie’s jock strap.”

“Does everyone you know play some sort of game?” Paula asked.

“We’re all players at one game or another. Some of us win, some lose, some cheat, some are champions.”

“My, aren’t we philosophical?”

Mike grinned suddenly. “Must be something I ate. Maybe those sausages you cooked for breakfast.”

“Not ‘saugages,’ Yank, ‘bangers.’ Do you want people to take you for a foreigner?”

“Sorry. Bangers, then. Hey, look at the time. I’d better get changed and assume my new identity, namely …,” he paused to read the name on the card Fred Olney had provided, “Henry Penny.”

“Henny Penny?”

“Henry.”

“Is that a real name, or is Freddie having you on?”

“If he’s pulling a fast one, the Aussies are going to be drinking beer on their own money tonight, and I don’t think he’d risk that. Let’s go.”

They left the tea room and walked along a path through the hydrangeas to a public rest room. While Paula waited outside Mike went in and changed into the tennis clothes he had brought along in the carryall. No T-shirt and gym shorts this time. Mike had outfitted himself in Adidas shoes, shorts by Fred Perry, and a shirt that bore the familiar alligator emblem of Réné Lacoste. Mike glanced at himself in the mirror and decided that if Wimbledon had a best-dressed division he would easily make the semi-finals.

He left the rest room, rejoining Paula outside. He gave her the suit, shirt, and shoes he had come in, tucking the dressing room pass into the pocket of his tennis shorts.

“Now if you’ll drop these clothes in the car,” he said, “you can go on out and enjoy the matches. I’ll meet you back here at, say, six o’clock.”

“Righto, Captain,” said Paula, giving him a snappy salute.

“I hope you don’t mind too much watching the tennis alone,” he said. “This is a chance I couldn’t pass up.”

“Not at all,” Paula said. “In fact I find this cloak-and-dagger business quite exciting. Rather like a James Bond plot.”

“I don’t think it’ll be all
that
exciting, but I do appreciate your help.”

Paula walked off in the direction of the parking lot carrying Mike’s shoes in one hand with his suit folded over her arm. Watching her, Mike smiled, admiring the springy grace of her walk. He took a sun visor from the carryall and fitted it on his head, pulling the green plastic shade down to his eyebrows, and started for the dressing room. He stopped again and took out his horn-rimmed glasses. With these on under the green eye shade, he decided he was sufficiently disguised. Not that his face was all that familiar, but a few of the players might know him. He would rely on the principle that nobody recognized his mailman out of uniform, or his bartender sitting on the customers’ side of the bar. Nobody would expect to see a sportswriter dressed like a tennis player, especially in an area where only players were allowed.

Mike swung into what he hoped was an athletic stride, and walked up to the dressing room entrance where the two bobbies stood guard. He showed his pass to one of them. The policeman examined the card, glanced at Mike’s face, and nodded an okay. With a silent sigh, Mike passed into the dressing room. He was just a little pleased at being accepted so readily as a tennis player, even a senior.

The spacious locker room was aswarm with activity as players in various stages of undress prepared for the afternoon’s matches. In addition to the singles players still in contention, there were doubles players and men in the seniors competition. Mike sauntered through the room, concentrating on being inconspicuous.