Chapter OneA Large BucketIt was a dump.
The best thing you could say about the driving range was that it had a nice view of the commuter trains as they caromed back and forth from Chicago on the Union Pacific West Line. And that only three of the fifteen ancient and threadbare artificial grass mats had been stolen in the past month.
But it was Max “Hard Way” Mitchell’s dump—or it would be in 109 more monthly payments. Located near an industrial park about twelve minutes west of his hometown of Wheaton, Illinois, the driving range covered seventeen acres. He had bought it on a whim after the commercial real estate agent convinced him that it would be a smart investment property. Back then, Hard Way was making solid money on the PGA Tour as a caddie. He could afford to take a financial flyer. Of course, that was before “The Incident.”
Now he was eating cold Beefaroni out of the can for lunch and living in a converted storage room in the driving range office shack. He had a TV, a bed, a hot plate, and a toaster oven. He did his dishes in the office’s bathroom sink. Even after giving up his apartment, he was struggling to pay his utilities, his grocery bills, and the monthly nut on the driving range. His checking account needed CPR, his savings account was a myth, and his pickup truck was approaching beater status. Marching bands made less noise.
Hard Way had purchased the property in the dead of winter, when snow masked the width and breadth of the landfill, and the hawk wind blew the smell of the methane gases away from the former cornfield. But it was summer now, and there was no mistaking that ever-growing garbage pile as it sat like a raised mole on the flat skin of western DuPage County. No amount of technology or venting pipes could eliminate the stench. And yet, Hard Way had grown to love his scruffy property.
It was late Tuesday afternoon. Other than the adjunct professor from the DePaul extension campus who had snuck over before his first class that morning, and the elderly couple who had split a small bucket during lunchtime, nobody had been there all day. A new SmashGolf facility only three miles away had stabbed his business in the heart. Everyone wanted to be entertained: electronic scoring, circle targets, animation, data monitors, a waitstaff, queso and chips. Whatever happened to finding your swing in the dirt, like Hogan did?
Hard Way’s place, whimsically named To the Linksland (in honor of one of his favorite golf books), did have one thing that SmashGolf didn’t: real grass. It wasn’t much, but it was actual bentgrass, which was lovingly cared for by Hard Way and was the exact same variety found on Chicago Golf Club’s fairways. He had seeded the area at the far end of the artificial mats, where there was enough room to rotate the hitting areas so the grass could recover from use—not that To the Linksland got much use these days. But the bentgrass was his baby, which he push-mowed and hand-watered on a regular schedule.
Hard Way was laboring through the
New York Times crossword puzzle when he heard the screen door to the range shack open and close. He didn’t bother looking up.
“How much for a bucket?” said the man’s voice.
“Eight bucks for a large, five for a small,” Hard Way said. “An extra two bucks for either if you hit off the grass patch instead of the mats.”
“Thanks,” the voice said. “Left you a ten.”
Hard Way was only half listening as he scrolled down the row of crossword clues. As the door banged shut, he looked up just in time to see the back of the man through the screen, the green plastic bucket in his right hand, a Sunday bag slung over his left shoulder. “Hey! What’s a ten-letter golf saying that dates back to 1681?” Hard Way shouted.
In the distance, Hard Way heard the voice.
“Try ‘Far and Sure’!”
Hard Way filled out 31-Across.
“I’ll be damned.”
Hard Way spent the next hour finishing the puzzle (with some help from Google) and then worked his way through his monthly bills. As usual, more was going out than coming in. No amount of cooking the books was going to save this balance sheet.
At 6:30 p.m., Hard Way turned off the green neon Open sign in the shack’s window and then fired up the ancient John Deere tractor equipped with an even older range ball picker. Gathering up three buckets of balls—that was the extent of the day’s business—would take five minutes, tops.
Hard Way immediately spotted what he assumed to be the elderly couple’s shots, most of them well short of the 100-yard marker. The picker scooped up the black-striped yellow balls in no time at all. Next, he weaved back and forth to pick up the professor’s drives, some of which had almost reached the 225-yard sign. Hard Way had worked with him on his swing that morning. The professor was getting better.
But where were the other balls? He was still missing a large bucket’s worth.
Hard Way steered the Deere toward the right edge of the range to check for banana slices, and then to the left edge to look for snap hooks. Nothing.
He put the tractor in neutral and scanned the acreage with his range finder. That’s when he saw something in the distance.
“Nah,” he said as he jammed the shifter into gear. “Can’t be.”
Hard Way drove past the 250-yard sign and then the 275-yard marker. When he bought the place, he had added a 300-yard sign that read hit it here, get a free bucket. Nobody ever came close. And just for fun, he had erected a 400-yard marker with a painted bull’s-eye and message on it: hit it here, get a masters invitation. You needed binoculars to read it from the range mats.
But there, at the 400-yard sign, were what looked to be seventy-five or so golf balls: the approximate number that fit into a large bucket. Hard Way turned off the engine, opened the pockmarked metal mesh door to the tractor cage, and walked toward the marker.
The balls were in three areas, as if they were separate herds grazing on the weeds and grass of the range. There were about twenty-five balls just beyond and to the left of the marker. Hard Way walked it off: 413 yards. Another twenty-five or so balls were a yard or two in front and slightly to the left of the sign. The remaining balls were gathered to the right and just past the sign—404 yards, in this case. If Hard Way hadn’t known better, he’d have sworn someone had been working on their draw, baby draw, and power fade. The last time he’d seen a player do something like this, it was Tiger Woods. Nobody shaped shots like he did. But this was farther than Tiger ever hit his driver. It looked like a precision bombing exercise. Rory McIlroy and Ludvig Åberg could bomb it. So could Bryson DeChambeau, especially during his distended-stomach experiment phase, when he treated every day as if he were Joey Chestnut at Nathan’s, but not like this. This was supernatural.
Hard Way checked the trees lining the right side of the fairway. The branches were barely stirring, and what wind there was had a hurty feel to it. As for roll, forget it; it had rained a day earlier. The ground was soft, the grass high and unmowed.
This was impossible. Nobody could hit a ball this far, especially not one of Hard Way’s battered one-piece, rubber-core, Surlyn-covered range balls bought thirdhand. It was like hitting a walnut shell.
Hard Way made another sweep of the rear of the range. Maybe some of his buddies were having a laugh at his expense. But no, nothing.
Then Hard Way remembered.
“Far and Sure, my ass,” he muttered. “Who the hell
was that guy?”
Copyright © 2026 by Gene Wojciechowski. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
