Fault!

Into a Los Angeles courtroom last week shuffled gangling, 53-year-old William Tatem Tilden II, once the world's greatest tennis player. His fault: homosexuality (he had been caught in a parked car with a 14-year-old ball boy from the Los Angeles Tennis Club).

Abject and hoping for clemency, Tilden (technically charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor) listened to the castigation by Superior Court Judge A. A. Scott: "You have been an idol to thousands of youngsters and admired by millions of adults throughout the world." Murmured Big Bill: "I'm very sorry."

Near collapse, he was taken away to start a nine months' jail sentence and five years' probation, during which he must "never be in the company of either male or female juveniles unaccompanied by their parents." His friends were not surprised, just saddened. Said New York Daily News Sports Editor Jimmy Powers: "The Tilden case is a tragic one. Bill is not a criminal. He's ill."

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