The contestants walked off in the direction of the tee, with Windy still rubbing it in.
"A word to the wise. Keep that damn' book in your pocket, if you don't want to eat it—cover and all!"
"Suppose they do mix it?" said Cupid, mopping his brow. "Sweet little golfing scandal, eh? Can't you see the headlines in the newspapers? 'Country Club finalists in fist fight on links!' And some of these roughneck humourists will congratulate us on golf becoming one of the vital, red-blooded sports! Oh, lovely!"
"Bah!" said I. "There will be no fight. No man will fight who smiles like a coyote when he is getting a call down."
"But a coyote will fight if you put it up to him, don't make any mistake about that. And Kitts will spring the book on Windy again, I feel it in my bones, and if he does—choose your partners for the one-step! Oh, why did we ever let these rotters into the club?"
IV
I see no reason for inflicting upon you a detailed description of the next fifteen holes of golfing frightfulness. Golf is a game which requires mental calm, and the contestants were entirely out of calmness after the second hole and could not concentrate on their shots.
Windy began driving all over the shop, hooking and slicing tremendously, and Kitts manhandled his irons in a manner fit to make a hardened professional weep. Neither of them could have holed a five-foot putt in a washtub, and they staggered along side by side, silent and nervous and savage, and if Windy managed to win a hole Kitts would be sure to take the next one and square the match. But he didn't take any holes with the book. When Windy broke a rule—which he did every little while—Kitts would sneer and pretend to look the other way. He tried to convey the impression that it was pity and contempt that made him blind to Windy's lapses, but he didn't fool me for a minute. It was fear of consequences.
And so they came to the last hole, all square, and also all in.
Our eighteenth has a vicious reputation among those golfing unfortunates who slice their tee shots. The drive must carry a steep hill, the right slope of which pitches away to a deep, narrow ravine—a ravine scarred and marred by thousands of niblick shots, but otherwise as disgusted Nature left it. We call it Hell's Half Acre, though the first part of the name would be quite sufficient.