"If it's a lost ball——" said Cupid.
But it wasn't. Windy found it, half-way up the left slope, hidden in the weeds, and not a particularly bad lie except for the fact that nothing human could have taken a stance on that declivity. Having found his ball, Windy took a look at Kitts's lie and then, for the first and only time in his golfing career, Wilkins recognised the rules of the game. "You're away, sir," said he to Kitts. "Play!"
Adolphus took his niblick and attacked the octopus. His first three strokes did not even jar the ball, but they damaged the oak roots beyond repair. On his eighth attempt the ball popped out of its nest, and the next shot was a very pretty one, sailing up and out to the fair green, but there was no applause from the gallery.
"Countin' the drive," said Windy, "that makes ten, eh?"
A man may play nine strokes in a hazard, but he hates to admit it. Adolphus grunted and withdrew to the other side of the pit, from which point he watched Windy morosely. With victory in sight the latter became cheerful again; conversation bubbled out of him.
"Boy, slip me the niblick and get up yonder on the edge of the ravine where you can watch this ball. I'm goin' to knock it a mile out of here. Ten shots he's had. If it was me, I'd give up. How am I to get a footin' on this infernal side hill? Spikes won't hold in that stuff. Wish I was a goat. Aha! The very thing!"
Suddenly he delivered a powerful blow at the slope some distance below his ball and three or four feet to the left of it. Cupid gasped and opened his mouth to say something, but I nudged him and he subsided, clucking like a nervous hen.
"What's the idea?" demanded Kitts.
"To make little boys ask questions," was the calm reply. "I climbed the Alps once. Had to dig holes for my feet. Guess I haven't forgotten how, but diggin' with a blasted niblick is hard work."
"Oh!" said Kitts.