The Club

Chapter 16 - The Grand Finale

On Monday I received a call from Deirdre. She would be in town on Thursday and Friday and wanted to get together on Thursday evening. I told her I would pick her up at her conference in Civic and from there we would head out to dinner in Manuka. I was looking forward to seeing her and catching up.

The Club was a hub of excitement. Everyone I spoke to during the week wanted to talk about the junior pennant team and their chances against King’s on the weekend. I feared that expectations were a little too high for the young players. One of the older members had unearthed a picture of the last junior pennant team to win the Regional Championship 22 years ago. A copy of the photo made it to the bulletin board at the club. No year was specified to identify the vintage but from the mop top hair styles it was clearly not a recent photo.

We received more stunning news from King’s, this week, when it was learned that their team had picked up another junior member. This player, like Charlie Parker, was also from Sydney and just happened to be the #3-ranked junior girl in Australia. They announced to everyone who would listen that Rhonda Tong would be playing 4th for their team on the weekend, thus going head to head against Lorna. When Lorna heard of the news she gracefully said, “It will be nice having a game with another girl”.

Of course the club members were enraged that King’s had gone to such lengths to stack their team so late in the proceedings but nothing could be done; they had signed her to their club in plenty of time and as such she was eligible. It all seemed a little farcical to me, and I responded by saying that I would be placing Big Al Greene in a school uniform and try to pass him off as a high school senior. Most people knew I was kidding but a few actually contemplated the suggestion.

Though I was nervous about the match on Saturday night, I was more nervous about my dinner with Deirdre. I presumed that our players might well have run out of steam but since all four of them had become much better golfers over the course of the past 8 months the goal had already been achieved. The only thing left to do was to win the trophy and have a team picture taken that would become old and faded until someone would take it out a quarter of a century later and laugh at Harry’s collar, Dick’s ultra-short buzz cut, and Tom’s skinny ankles. I doubted that they would be laughing at Lorna as she would no doubt be a picture of precise timeless grace when the photo was taken. Still, if King’s were to win – and to be honest, with their team they really should – I would be sparing the boys an embarrassing team photo. They really didn’t know how lucky they were!

Thursday night came and I picked Deirdre up at 7 p.m. As planned we headed to an Italian restaurant in the hip section of Canberra, the Manuka shops. We had a lovely time, talking all through dinner and into the evening. We went for a drive and a walk around the lake. I asked her why we never dated when we were younger and she reminded me it was because I never asked nor accepted on the 20 occasions when she had asked me. I admitted that it had been a glaring error on my part, one that I hoped could be overcome. She said that she would give me a chance to make it up to her. As it turned out the hotel chain that employed her was setting up a new hotel in Canberra and she would be spending several weeks in town, getting the new place operational.  I gave her a ride to the airport on Friday night and let her know I would be anticipating her return visit in two weeks.

Saturday morning came and on cue Dick’s father met the team at the Club with his SUV to take us to Queanbeyan. Lorna looked recovered from her illness of 2 weeks ago and the team looked to be in fine spirits. Tom and Harry were horsing around like two playful young roos learning how to fight. Dick was serious as can be.  I’m sure he had his end-of-game speech prepared weeks in advance. Lorna looked as cool as a cucumber; nothing fazed that girl.

We actually had a crew of well-wishers from the club who had come to see us off, and three or four members of the match committee intended to make the trip with us. They were uneasy about the King’s club and feared if they didn’t watch carefully rules would be breached and we would end up on the wrong end of a crooked decision. God bless them.