She held for 5-5. He held for 6-5. She held for 6-6.
In 1984 there was no tiebreak in the final set at Coosaw Point. It said so in the club rules, framed in the pro shop, and Mr. Langford had written it on the club stationery: final set to be played out. So they played it out. 7-6, him. 7-7. 8-7, him. 8-8.
At 8-8 she broke him.
She did it with everything she had. A high ball to the backhand. Another. Another. A slice, short, to his forehand, so he had to bend, and he hated bending. A drop shot he ran down, on one good leg and one bad one, and flicked back crosscourt, and she was there, and she passed him, and he didn't even turn his head to watch it go. That made it 9-8, and they changed ends, and she stood on the west baseline with the sun at her back, and served for the match.
It was a quarter past five. The shadow of the clubhouse had come down the hill and lay across half the court. The far fence was so quiet she could hear the halyard on the flagpole clinking, and somewhere in the bar the television, very faint, men at Flushing Meadows clapping at something that didn't matter at all.
Thirty-fifteen. Thirty-all. Forty-thirty.
Match point.
She served deep to his backhand, and he got it back, and she put it high, and he got that back, and she put it higher, and he came. He came to the net on one leg because he was Whit Langford and that was what he did, and he stood there with the Prince up and the sun dropping right into his eyes off the clubhouse roof, and she did what she'd done ten thousand times at Ebenezer and on the north beach of Hunting Island and against a plywood board behind a maintenance shed. She brushed up the back of the ball like she was polishing a car fender and sent it into the sky.
One Mississippi. Two Mississippi.
He turned. He ran. He was too late, and he knew it, and he ran anyway.
The ball came down on the baseline. There was a puff of green dust. It kicked up and over his racket and hit the back fence.
Coach Pemberton opened his mouth.
Whit was already walking to the baseline. He bent over the mark. He looked at it for a long, long time, the whole of Court One looking at him looking at it, his father on top of the bleachers with the red light of the camera burning.
Then he straightened up.