Presently she feels more comfortable. A long drive by her partner elicits a little shriek of astonished admiration, which flatters his manly vanity, and goes far to mitigate the handicap of her assistance. She at once begins to imitate his stance and swing, straddles well over the ball, shuts both eyes, gives a mighty swipe, and usually falls down, the necessity of "tackety shoon" being as yet unrevealed to her. On she goes, perfectly at her ease now, though a little hot and flustered, babbling incessantly during the stroke, regardless of the sinister frowns of the man who is endeavouring to play it. Should she miss the ball altogether, she is moved to unnecessary mirth; should she by any chance hit it out of sight, say over a sand-hill, she scampers up the slope after it at a run, and announces its discovery at the top of her voice, upsetting the nerves of all the old gentlemen within earshot. On the green her actions are as characteristic as ever. In running the ball up to the hole she either hits the ground behind it and sends it six inches, or plays a shot which necessitates the departure of her long-suffering partner, niblick in hand and scarlet in the face, to an adjacent bunker. Short putts she invariably holes out by an ingenious and unblushing push-stroke, which no one has the heart to question or the courage to criticise. So the game proceeds. It is not golf, but then you never expected it to be. It is another game, even older, and even better.
After a few such rounds as this the dread seriousness of the game descends upon her, and she loses some of her charm. She never speaks, for she knows now that there is a rule on the subject. Her irresponsible gaiety is gone; she is actually nervous; and after missing an easy stroke (which she does quite as frequently as before), she looks piteously at her partner, and even sighs enviously as the lady on the other side, whom she has hitherto regarded as a mere example of how clothes should not be worn, plays a perfect approach out of a bad lie. In short, she has reverted to the status of the ordinary duffer, and as such she ceases to be anything but a common nuisance—unless, of course, sir, you take a special interest in her, in which case you will find her quite as attractive, and infinitely less exhausting, over a quiet game of croquet or spilikins.
But when—or rather if—she attains to the degree of a real golfer; if she can drive off before a crowd without giggling or blushing, and can be trusted not to shut her eyes when taking a full swing,—then she is indeed a pearl of price, for she is now a congenial companion, from the golfing as well as the other point of view. She is neither childishly frivolous nor grimly determined. She looks upon golf neither as a glorified form of croquet nor as woman's one mission in life. Behold her as she walks across the links to begin her morning round. She calls up her favourite caddie with a little nod of her head, and gives you a cheery good-morning when she finds you waiting at the first tee. (A pretty girl-golfer is about as nearly perfect as a woman can be, but even that cannot make her punctual.) She is neatly turned out: she has abandoned kid boots with high heels, and wears trim shoes with plenty of nails in them. Her head is usually bare, or perhaps she wears a motor-veil tied under her chin; at any rate, the unstable edifice of former days no longer flaps in the breeze and obscures her vision. She is independent too. She does not take the first club the caddie offers: she chooses her own, and rates the boy for not having cleaned it better. No longer does she put her ball in her pocket for fear of keeping back the green; on the contrary, she drives repeatedly (and I am afraid purposely) into a steady-going foursome in front. It is useless to remind her of a by-law which says that ladies must invariably give way to gentlemen and allow them to pass.
"Real gentlemen," she remarks, "would invariably give way to ladies and allow them to pass." And her iron-shot bumps past the head of an octogenarian who is trying to hole out a long putt on the distant green.
To look at her now you would never guess that she was once a shrinking débutante, a hewer of turf, and a drawer of water from the eyes of the green-keeper. Her putting is still erratic, and she is rather helpless in heavy sand; but, given a clean lie and a fair stance, she will handle her light clubs to some purpose, and her swing is a "sicht for sair een." If you are at all off your game she will beat you; therefore it is advisable to offer her points before beginning the match, not so much because she needs them as to preserve your masculine self-respect in the event of a "regrettable incident."
Miss Elsie Innes combined all the virtues of the girl-golfer in her own graceful young body. Though she had "filled out" considerably since we last saw her, she was anything but a hobnailed, masculine woman. She was neither heavily built nor muscular; she looked almost too fragile to play at all. But she handled her light clubs with a suppleness and dexterity usually given only to a schoolboy of fourteen, and the length of her drive was amazing. She was always graceful, always cool, and, as Pip once noted to himself, "never got either hot or hairy."
After their first meeting at Raven's cottage Pip and Elsie saw each other constantly. They played a round of golf every day, usually between tea and dinner, the hour when the ardent male golfer relaxes from his noonday strenuousness and turns to thoughts of mixed foursomes. Usually Pip and Elsie played Mr. and Mrs. Raven. Raven was a far better golfer than Pip, but then Elsie was very much the superior of Mrs. Raven, which made matters even. Many were the battles that raged between the two couples. At first victory favoured the married pair. Raven, besides being a scratch golfer, was a good general, and his unruffled coolness and unerring advice made the most of his wife's limited powers. Pip and Elsie, on the other hand, did not "combine" well. Elsie, who (strictly between ourselves) fancied her golf not a little, insisted on dictating the line of action to be followed on each occasion, and more than once told Pip what club to use. Pip, though relatively her inferior, declined at first to be trampled upon by a female, even a high-spirited goddess with fair hair and a swing like an archangel. But few men in Pip's condition argue the point long: after a brief struggle to assert the predominance of man he subsided completely, and, as he thought, rather diplomatically. There he was wrong. The sage of antiquity who composed the uncomplimentary proverb about "a woman, a dog, and a walnut tree" knew something of life, and the course of Pip's true love might have run a good deal smoother if he had put down his masculine foot a little more frequently. However, there is no doubt that after his capitulation their golfing efforts reached a higher level than before. After a series of matches extending over a week, each side stood with three games to its credit, Pip and Elsie just managing to draw level by winning a match on the last green on Saturday evening.
Sunday golf is not encouraged in Scotland. Consequently next morning Elsie accompanied her relatives to one of the numerous places of worship in Port Allan, which ancient township possessed its full complement of Auld Licht, Established, United, and Wee Free kirks, and other homes of religious controversy. Pip stayed on the hotel veranda and smoked, watching them pass but lacking nerve to join them. He summoned up sufficient courage, however, to put in an appearance at Knocknaha during the afternoon. He was even more silent than usual, though he made a hearty tea.
After that meal he invited Elsie to come for a walk with him. She consented, and they set off together, followed by the amused glances of Mr. and Mrs. Raven.
It was a glorious August afternoon. The North Sea, blue and placid, lapped gently against the red cliffs, or ran with a slow hiss up the slope of yellow sand which bordered the Links of Eric. There was hardly any wind—just enough, in fact, to keep the air clear; and Pip and Elsie, as they lounged luxuriously in a hollow at the top of a sand-hill,—their walk had been strictly limited to a Sabbath day's journey,—could see the smoke of a steam-trawler on the horizon though they could not see the ship herself.