Chapter 9: Could She do it Again?

We took Wednesday off to relax and do a bit of sightseeing in Seattle. Catherine had been here before but it had been a long time ago and she didn't recall much of the city. I had never been here, so everything was new to me. If I took one lasting impression from the city it was traffic. It seemed to be present all day long, with rush hour being the worst. We ended up planning our day to avoid it, heading south back to the Kent area well before the normal crowd formed on I-5 or I-405.

Instead, we went just south of our hotel to Emerald Downs and watched the horse races. Catherine loved it and as the sun set and the temperature dropped to the high seventies we sat watching the races, betting small amounts without any clue about which horse might win. It was fun and when we drove back to the hotel we were both tired but happy with our day. We made love after another shower and slept soundly.

Thursday dawned sunny with the promise of another hot afternoon. Happily, our tee time was fairly early at nine-fifty. With luck we would avoid the worst of the heat. I watched Catherine carefully on the practice tee, looking for any sign of how she might play today. Her drives continued to be that perfect combination of medium height with a slight draw. Her long irons looked crisp and her short irons were her trademark height with a soft landing. She didn't have a backspin shot that she used regularly. She didn't feel confident with it I suppose.

We didn't bother with the greens at this stage. The practice round would tell her what to expect and how to read them. Again, years of experience came into play and she knew what she had to discover about this course. She was teamed with two other women, one of whom she knew, the other a college student at U.W., a complete stranger. The tall young woman had entered as an amateur for the experience. She was already a fixture on the Husky women's golf team.

The play was slow, as I was told to expect. Extra time was taken to measure and look at the course carefully by all three of the women. I was making notes as Catherine talked, again giving me the impression it was as much to herself as to anyone.

I liked the look of her game that day. She tried a few new things out, expecting that the narrow fairways would put her in the rough more than once. She took some chances she otherwise wouldn't try just to see what it took to extract herself from problems if they occurred. I think I learned as much from the practice round as she did.

Her sand shots were mediocre, so her strategy was to avoid the traps whenever possible. It was the one real weakness in her game. She wasn't as long off the tee as her opponents, but on this course, a par 72, 6500 yard test, that wouldn't be as critical. I thought accuracy would spell the difference. Her putting was normally very good, with her real strength at ten feet and closer. I couldn't recall her missing very many from that distance.

We didn't keep score, so the only notes I made were distance references, contour of the fairways and shape and contour of the greens. If the rough was any indication, it wouldn't be ankle deep so I expected she would be able to manage it without difficulty. She remarked that the greens were consistent for speed but not easy to read. I wondered how hard they would be late in the day with the hot sun beating on them. By then her soft shots might begin to bounce and roll a good deal farther.

We showered at the club and had dinner at a nearby restaurant before heading back to the hotel. We were tired enough to watch a bit of TV before retiring. There would be no lovemaking that night. It was important to be ready for the opening round in the morning. Again we had an early tee time.

After a light breakfast in our room we left for the Meridian Valley clubhouse, a very nice large structure built into the hillside overlooking the tenth tee and a large pond near the practice range. The walk to the first tee was across a bridge and past the range. Again she would be in a threesome, surprisingly including the young amateur from yesterday. She had proven to be very good and very long. She had also been quite polite and conducted herself very well considering her age. Someone had taught her the etiquette of the game and she had learned it well.

The third of our group was an older woman, nearing fifty I guessed. Catherine didn't know her and she kept pretty much to herself, not offering any information other than her name. The group shook hands and it was determined that the young amateur would go first.

Number one was a short par four, three-hundred and forty yards with traps on each side in the driving area and two traps on each side of the front of the green. Out of bounds on the left where there were houses and large trees around the green, but otherwise not a difficult hole.

The young student took the fairway traps out of play by blasting a drive well past them within sixty yards of the green. I just shook my head when I saw that. I couldn't hit it that far to save my life and it looked like she could do it all day, every day. Our older third hit a solid tee shot that was headed right for the traps but came up short by only a yard or two.

Catherine chose a three metal, setting up her second shot I assumed. She hit her patented right-to-left draw and watched the ball settle nicely in the centre of the fairway, about one-ten from the green. I smiled as she handed me back the club. She was off to a good start, once again playing her game and not someone else's.

At the turn, Catherine was still even par. She wasn't making any mistakes but she wasn't making any putts either. It was one of those days when they were all around the cup but just not dropping. She'd kept the ball on the fairway for the most part, but couldn't seem to get her irons close enough to take advantage of birdie opportunities. On the other hand, to see and talk to her you'd never know she was unhappy. She kept that level disposition regardless of what was happening with her game.

She bogeyed the par three twelfth when she found the left side bunker and couldn't convert her bunker shot when it came up fifteen feet long. Again, she didn't show any emotion and just kept moving along at her pace. I wondered just what kind of strength of character it took to be able to do that. I was much more an "A type" personality and I would be mumbling to myself at my mistakes.

The next hole, thirteen, was a long, uphill par four playing three-seventy-five today. Well trapped, the hole actually favored a fade off the tee but that wasn't a shot Catherine played with any regularity. Instead, she deliberately hit her drive right along the edge of the rough, allowing it draw back onto the right side of the fairway. Now that took guts. This was the number two stroke hole and with a two-tiered green it looked every bit a formidable challenge. On our practice round the pin had been on the lower tier but today it was on top near the front of the tier, a miserable location.

Catherine debated with herself on what to hit and finally chose a seven iron, which surprised me. It thought that would be far too much club for the one hundred and twenty remaining yards. Some day I'd learn to trust her judgment. She choked down on the grip and punched a low, running shot directly at the pin, watching it run up the fairway onto the green and up to the bottom of the slope to the upper tier before stopping. She had an uphill ten footer for a birdie. The last time I'd seen a shot like that was at Bandon Dunes and it was into the wind on a blustery day. I just shook my head and smiled. She knew exactly what she was doing.

As she handed me the club in exchange for her putter she smiled and said, "Scotty taught me that shot."

She got her first and only birdie of the round when she made a solid stroke up the slope and directly into the cup. It was a no-doubter all the way. A high five was in order along with a big smile. She was back to even par. When we had made the turn at nine I could see a couple of red numbers. It looked like someone was two or three under, but that was early on. We'd know better where we stood some time after our round was over. The last of the competitors had only just teed off.

Catherine finished the round at even par, with only one birdie and one bogey on her card. We showered in the facilities after she had handed in her card for the day. Sitting on the patio we had lunch and relaxed, keeping an eye on the scoreboard. At that point, several women were under par. The leader was on the fifteenth and at that point, four under par. We could easily be five or six strokes off the pace by the end of the day if one of the late starters got hot.

The only thing that got hot that afternoon was the sun. When the last of the competitors arrived at the scoring tent, one woman was six under, while there were a group of women at three and two under. Six back on the first day. That wasn't going to make it easy. Was another big comeback in the cards, I wondered?

Catherine wasn't bothered by the scores, either hers or her competitors.

"Two more rounds to go, Terry. As my father loves to say, 'early ripe, early rot.' Strange things can happen in a round of golf. I didn't take any chances today because I didn't have to. I just wanted to get my game going for me. I might have made three or four putts that didn't drop and I'd be up there in red figures too. But sometimes it's like that. Tomorrow's another day," she smiled optimistically.

That was Catherine. She wasn't going to let one round affect her, good or bad, or in today's case, a steady round in par.

Saturday there was a cloud cover that promised to hold the temperature down. There wasn't any threat of rain. According to the weather service it was just a small band of high cloud passing through. It would still be in the eighties but with a breeze that might cool things down for the afternoon. That would be a pleasant relief from the heat of the past four days.

If Friday's round was steady, Saturday's was almost frightening. Catherine was much more aggressive, something I hadn't seen in her before. But whatever the cause, she was shooting "lights out." Five birdies and one bogey on the front bore testament to her mood. I thought for a while she might be angry with herself but that didn't seem to be the case either. One thing was for certain, she was back in the hunt and whatever the reason she was going to be a force to be reckoned with.

She didn't change a thing until we got to the thirteenth. She had birdied twelve, canceling out yesterday's bogey, so she was now five under par. I wondered if she would try and drive past the traps today but again she opted for the three metal and once again flirted with danger by starting her drive out along the right rough before almost copying yesterday's draw back onto the fairway. She walked back to me with what I could only call a smirk on her face.

"Seven," she said without looking as she handed me the fairway metal. I pulled the club out of the bag and handed it to her. I knew exactly what she had in mind. It would be a copy of yesterday's shot, except today the hole was in the back left of the upper tier.

"It drops off behind the pin, Cat. You don't want to be long."

"Got it," she nodded, not looking at me. She was already shaping the shot in her head.

Once again, she choked down on the grip, took three or four looks at the pin, then snapped a low, running shot at the front of the green, ten or twelve feet right of the pin. The ball rolled obligingly up the slope, drifting left as it did so, and coming to rest six feet from the cup below the hole.

"How's that," she grinned as she handed me the iron and I exchanged it for her putter.

"Perfect!" I said with just as big a smile. There wasn't anything else that needed to be said. It was perfect. And so was the putt that put her six under with five holes to play.

Fourteen was a par five dogleg right and should have been an easy birdie hole at four-hundred-and-ninety yards. Unfortunately, Catherine's drive was further left than she wanted it to be and her approach to the green was blocked by a tree. She did the sensible thing and laid up, giving herself a short wedge to the green for a birdie opportunity. Like everything else that day, she hit it perfectly and walked off the green seven under and shaking her head.