I raised the curtain so as to let in the cool air. The links were bathed in a flood of moonlight. Half a mile away were Bishop's cornfields in which the dreamland fiends had tortured me. It was not yet midnight, and down the lane I made out the forms of Chilvers, Marshall, Lawson, and other nighthawks. Chilvers was singing, the others coming in the chorus of the last line, drawing it out to the full length and strength of a parody of the old negro song:
"Where, oh where are the long, long drivers?
Where, oh where are the long, long drivers?;
Where, oh where are the long, long drivers?
'Way down yander in the corn field."
[Illustration: The dream]
ENTRY NO. X
THE TWO GLADIATORS
There was little doing in N.O. & G. stock on Monday or Tuesday. It dropped off a point and then recovered. I told my brokers to pick up 10,000 shares at or below 65. I am confident it will strike that figure before the end of the week.
It was nearly five o'clock before we started up the lane toward Bishop's. We were delayed half an hour waiting for Marshall, but, knowing his weakness, we fixed the time of departure half an hour sooner than necessary.
If Marshall's hope for eternal salvation depended on applying at the pearly gates at a specified time, he would spend eternity in the other place on account of being thirty minutes late. Knowing this to be his habit, we always provide against it. If the club house ever catches on fire, we shall lose Marshall, and he is a splendid good fellow.
Marshall's wife informs me it took him thirty weeks to propose after he had made up his mind to do so, and that after the wedding day was set it was necessary to postpone the ceremony thirty days in order to permit him to attend to some trifling business affairs. We call him "Thirty" Marshall, and it takes him thirty seconds to smile in appreciation of the jest. But he plays a good game of golf, with at least four deliberate practise swings before each stroke at the ball.
Chilvers wanted to have a team hitched up and ride over in the club bus. He said it tired him to walk. We vetoed that proposition, and Chilvers stopped twice to rest on the half-mile jaunt to Bishop's.