“So you have decided to go to Mossy Heath again?”
“Yes. And I’m really going to qualify this year.”
The annual Invitation Tournament at Mossy Heath was one of the most important fixtures of our local female golfing year. As is usual with these affairs, it began with a medal-play qualifying round, the thirty-two players with the lowest net scores then proceeding to fight it out during the remainder of the week by match-play. It gratified me to hear Jane speak so confidently of her chances, for this was the fourth year she had entered, and each time, though she had started out with the brightest prospects, she had failed to survive the qualifying round. Like so many golfers, she was fifty per cent. better at match-play than at medal-play. Mossy Heath, being a championship course, is full of nasty pitfalls, and on each of the three occasions on which she had tackled it one very bad hole had undone all her steady work on the other seventeen and ruined her card. I was delighted to find her so undismayed by failure.
“I am sure you will,” I said. “Just play your usual careful game.”
“It doesn’t matter what sort of a game I play this time,” said Jane, jubilantly. “I’ve just heard that there are only thirty-two entries this year, so that everybody who finishes is bound to qualify. I have simply got to get round somehow, and there I am.”
“It would seem somewhat superfluous in these circumstances to play a qualifying round at all.”
“Oh, but they must. You see, there are prizes for the best three scores, so they have to play it. But isn’t it a relief to know that, even if I come to grief on that beastly seventh, as I did last year, I shall still be all right?”
“It is, indeed. I have a feeling that once it becomes a matter of match-play you will be irresistible.”
“I do hope so. It would be lovely to win with Rodney looking on.”