"If you play the way I saw you doing the other day, there's not a man in the club has anything on you," asserted Chilvers, winking at me.
"Stranger things have happened," declared Peabody, his face illuminated by a hopeful grin. "I made the last hole yesterday in five, and that is as good as Carter or Smith have done it in this year."
Now, as a matter of fact, there was not one chance in five hundred that Peabody would qualify, and he didn't, but that did not prevent his starting out with a hope and a sort of a faith that by some bewildering combination of circumstances he would qualify, and later on bowl over all of his competitors and carry off the prize with the sweeter honours of victory.
If there be any soil where hope absolutely runs riot it is in the breast of a golfer. The fond mother who cozens herself into the faith that her boy will some day be President of the United States builds on the same foundation as the duffer who enters a competition in which he is outclassed.
Personally I can see no reason why I shall not some day win the international golf championship, and I have strong expectations of doing so, but know perfectly well that I will not. It is a peculiar but delightful complication of mind.
Carter had the best qualifying score, making the round in a consistent eighty. Marshall was second with an eighty-two, Boyd and LaHume were tied with eighty-four each, and I came in fifth with one more. Chilvers, Pepper, and Thomas also qualified, but the cup should lie among the first five.
Candour compels me to admit that on form it should come to a struggle between Carter and Marshall; but if I get into the finals with either of these gentlemen I shall play with confidence of winning.
A most astounding thing has happened! If I were incorporating these events in a narrative or a novel I presume I would reserve the statement I am about to make until the finish, so as to form an effective climax—and on reflection I have decided to do so in these notes. So I will begin at the beginning.
The second day after our visit to Bishop's, Miss Lawrence called me aside on the veranda, and I could see that some great secret had possession of her.
"I wish to ask a favour of you, Mr. Smith," she said, after beating about the brush for a minute.