Free The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield Page A

“And do you know what, young Hardy? You were there too.”

Twelve
    I WOKE UP LYING IN THE BACK SEAT of the Chalmers with a pillow under my head and a blanket on top of me. Light was in my eyes and Bagger Vance was shaking my shoulder.
    “Wake up, young man, it’s almost six. Time to get your breakfast.”
    I crawled out, blinking. Spectators’ cars were already arriving; you could see their headlights in the foggy dawn, creeping down the lanes already packed on both sides with parked automobiles.
    People had slept in their cars, camped out right on the roadsides. Men were scratching their hindsides and pissing off into the cattails. An enormous kitchen tent had been set up on the rise inland from the hotel; sweet coffee and egg smells climbed from the stove flues that protruded from its bright arcing canvas. Latrine tents rose from the various parking areas; bleary-eyed galleryites were already forming lines.
    Vance wiped my face and poured me into a clean shirt andlong trousers, which he had brought along apparently for just this purpose. He gave me a two-quart steel jug and a rucksack-type pack, canvas lined with rubber. “Go to the employees’ kitchen, use this badge if they give you any trouble.” He handed me an official Krewe Island I.D., dove-gray with plum letters: COMPETITOR . (Vance wore one too, pinned to his caddie’s cap.) “Fill the jug with hot sweet tea. Put ice in the rubber pack, plenty of it, and nestle five crisp apples among the frozen blocks. Put a couple of bananas in the main pouch pocket and as many raisins and nuts as you can fit in the others.” He straightened my shirt and smoothed the hair out of my eyes. “Make sure you get a good meal in your own belly first. And empty your bowels before you start for the course!”
    “Where are you going?” I turned back as he scooted me on my way.
    “Meet me at the practice tee in an hour. I must wake Junah.”
    The carriage-house dorm was bedlam when I got there, looking for Garland. Men were trying to shave, peering over each other, five to each mirror, while the sounds of farting, pissing, coughing, spitting and hacking echoed like a TB ward. Every man was smoking already, and many of the boys. “Thirty-six holes today, lads,” Dougal McDermott was calling, already dressed and shaved, with a steaming mug of coffee in his fist. “Tee-off at eight sharp and no excuses!”
    I found Garland out in the tent kitchen. He was with the other forecaddies, dressed in shirt, tie and plus fours with his flags beside him at the table; they were all wolfing down chipped beef on toast and glowing like princes. Garland declared me a fool forgiving up such an opportunity, and vowed he wouldn’t switch back no matter how much I begged him. Then he tugged me aside and swore me to secrecy. “You’ll never guess what I saw, in the locker room not ten minutes ago. Swear to me on your soul, cross your heart Mama ’n’ Daddy never part, or I’ll never tell you.” The other forecaddies protested; Garland had apparently already told them the secret, which they now considered their own private treasure. “He’s my brother, dammit, and I’m gon tell him.” Garland glared. He ordered me to cross my heart and spit. I did. He tugged me closer.
    “I was washing up, back yonder in the dormitory, and my bladder was about to bust. The stalls were all full, so I went outside; I was about to let her go right there in the bushes, but ladies kept passing on their way to the dining room. I thought I was about to pee in my brand-new pants. Then I saw an attendant duck through to the players’ locker room; the door was open so I scooted in after and flashed off fast so he didn’t see me.
    “My, it was grand in there, Hardy, all carpeted and quiet with only three bags standing by themselves up against the wall, with the heads of their irons all emery-buffed and shiny, the woods all a-gleaming, and two sets of spit-polished shoes beside of each bag and little