Amen Corner Read Free

swallowed a handful of Advils, and did it all over again.
    By the time the Publinx came to town, he was walking well and playing even better—much better than his days on the varsity at Dartmouth, when he’d actually harbored some thoughts about turning professional. But that had been a decade ago, before he chose law enforcement over the living-out-of-the-trunk-of-your-car lifestyle of an aspiring tour pro.
    One guy on his college golf team had chosen to chase the dream, and made it happen. Shane Rockingham had been all-Ivy. He was also a case of squandered potential who would rather get drunk than go to bed the night before a big tournament, and a campus playboy who went through girlfriends the way he went through range balls. Sam had lost touch with him during Rockingham’s years of scuffling on the Asian, Hooters, and Nationwide tours, but he was in all the papers and magazines now, a muscle-bound basher with good looks, a swollen bank account, and two divorces, with a third on the way.
    Thanks to the pairings committee at Augusta National, Sam was going to reunite with Rockingham soon. They were scheduled to play their first two rounds together at the Masters.
    He put the invitation back in his jacket pocket and pulled out the two badges he was carrying with him to Augusta: the laminated Masters participant badge that had been mailed to him several weeks earlier; and the silver Minneapolis Police Department badge that he rarely carried with him anymore.
    The Masters badge had his picture on the front: short, sandy-blond hair, still kept at police trim; pale blue eyes that an old girlfriend had once described as the color of a lake on a cloudy day; a slight crook in the bridge of his nose from running into a fence in a high school baseball game; and a clean-shaven face that showed the hint of a golfer’s tan, with the cheeks, nose, and chin darker than the forehead.
    The silver-plated police badge was heavier. An eagle spread its wings above the engraved words Minneapolis Police; his badge number was engraved below the seal of the city. He was still entitled to carry it, but he didn’t know if he wanted to anymore. He’d discovered during his layoff that there was more to life than putting assholes in jail.
    Sam had spent much of the previous year filling his 60-gig iPod with thousands of songs from his CD collection. He put each track into a playlist from the month and year the song was released, going all the way back to the ’50s. He preferred older music—pure escapism into long-gone eras that seemed more innocent than they probably were—and he hated to listen to songs out of season. “Hot Fun in the Summertime” sounded as ridiculous to him in January as “The Christmas Song” did in July.
    He put in his earbuds and dialed up the playlist for April, 1969, the month and year that George Archer won the Masters. The first song was “Will You Be Staying After Sunday” by the Peppermint Rainbow. Sam’s goal this week was just to stay until Sunday.
    A coffee-colored sedan accelerated up his block, too fast for the neighborhood; Sam was about to get up and yell at the driver to slow down when the car pulled to the curb in front of his house. It was an unmarked squad car, and Sam knew the driver: deputy chief Doug Stensrud, head of the investigations bureau.
    â€œI’m glad I caught you before you left, Sam,” Stensrud said as he got out of the car.
    He was a broad-shouldered man with a dark moustache and thick, black hair that was turning white from the center of his forehead outward. He’d been Sam’s partner for a couple of years after Sam was promoted to detective. Then Stensrud made deputy chief, and became his boss. There was still a bond between them, but the relentless paperwork and pressure from the chief, the city council, and the mayor had taken a toll on Stensrud’s sociability.
    â€œWhat’s up, Doug?”
    â€œI just