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What Globetrotter Savitt and his fellow tennis tourists get is a strictly regulated millionaire's life on a ditchdigger's pay—about $12 a day (for expenses). It is not the way most people would like to travel, even though it sounds fine: all expenses paid, and nothing to do but play tennis for your supper. Even for those who don't chase tournaments around the world, the tennis season has become so long, and so unremitting, that few players today ever really seem to enjoy playing. Sedgman is dogged; Patty is deadpan; Trabert is earnest; Flam is tense.
But off the court, the majority of the players are so floppily relaxed, so full of camaraderie and good spirits that they act like a college fraternity on an outing. Good-natured ribbing (the players have their own word for it: "psyching") and horseplay up to & including hotfoots is standard behavior. Sample: Budge Patty, dressed to the nines, sits down in front of Savitt and Trabert to watch a match. Patty turns, grins, and asks rhetorically: "Am I blocking your view?"
Trabert sarcastically replies: "Not at all." Then, grabbing Patty's snappy houndstooth jacket by the shoulder pads, Trabert exclaims triumphantly: "But I can't see through all this camouflage." Savitt, with a look of horror and astonishment at the shoulder padding: "Good gosh, is your tailor mad at you?" A favorite expression, designed to display both blasé boredom and grudging applause while watching a particularly dazzling rally: "Are they kidding?" Watching, for Dick, is more fun than the sometimes agonizing strain of playing: "It's much nicer to watch; then you can't lose."
Big-time tennis players, with few exceptions, form a close little group which might be mistaken for a mutual admiration society—and Dick Savitt is a member in good standing. In the happy-go-lucky world of the tennis players, they have their consciously serious moments. Most are college men (Savitt majored in economics) and most are veterans* (Savitt's service: a year in the Navy as a seaman). But politics and world affairs are strictly a secondary topic in bull sessions. The main subjects: women, poker (and allied card games) and, naturally, tennis.
In his travels, Dick has come across things that impressed him: "The Sphinx and I got along fine." In Germany, he was particularly struck by both the devastation and the reconstruction. "Those people work like dogs. The Germans don't just work so they can get vacations like a lot of Americans. If they set their minds to something, they'll get it done ... I hope we don't have to fight them again." Did he have any trouble in Germany? "Gee, no. The crowds at Berlin were real enthusiastic . . . Oh, because I am Jewish? ... No, I never had any trouble that way. I know some clubs are prejudiced because they don't have any Jewish members ... I don't think about it much."