“There is no greater crime that a man can commit on the links than to speak to a fellow when he’s making his stroke.”
“Of course, of course,” acquiesced Peter, crushed.
Wallace turned to his ball once more. He was vaguely conscious of a discomfort to which he could not at the moment give a name. At first he thought that he was having a spasm of lumbago, and this surprised him, for he had never in his life been subject to even a suspicion of that malady. A moment later he realised that this diagnosis had been wrong.
“Good heavens!” he cried, leaping nimbly some two feet into the air. “I’m on fire!”
“Yes,” said Peter, delighted at his ready grasp of the situation. “That’s what I wanted to mention just now.”
Wallace slapped vigorously at the seat of his Plus Fours.
“It must have been when I killed that wasp,” said Peter, beginning to see clearly into the matter. “You had a match-box in your pocket.”
Wallace was in no mood to stop and discuss first causes. He was springing up and down on his pyre, beating at the flames.
“Do you know what I should do if I were you?” said Peter Willard. “I should jump into the lake.”
One of the cardinal rules of golf is that a player shall accept no advice from any one but his own caddie; but the warmth about his lower limbs had now become so generous that Wallace was prepared to stretch a point. He took three rapid strides and entered the water with a splash.