As a matter of fact, this friend of ours is a mighty golfer. He's the sort of player that spends a bad night every time he takes more than eighty-five to go around in. And when he plays he drags around with him a leather barrel—or rather, the caddy drags it—containing enough carnal weapons to arm a division of the Bolshevik army. To see him coming to a decision between a jigger and a driving mashie, to see him taking his stance and addressing the ball, would fill the breast of the least reverent with awe. Napoleon playing his famous approach-shot with the Old Guard at Waterloo had nothing on our friend Bjones dropping one dead on the eighteenth green. But, alas, it was only later on that we discovered all this.
"Hope I can give you a game," said he.
We knew not the irony that lurked in his suave tones. It ran right off the umbrella of our self-satisfaction. We could see in it nothing but deference to our huge natural genius for the game. Besides, we were delighted at this chance to give free rein to our golfing abilities. We felt that to refuse the invitation would be flying in the face of Providence, which had obviously designed us for a champion. We did not accept too eagerly, however. We felt a certain reluctance about taking a fellow out to his own club and making a holy show of him. But finally we allowed ourself to be persuaded. The hour was named and the car.
Next day at the appointed time we were on the job. It was a lovely day, not too warm and not too cold—just the right temperature to call out the best that was in us. We felt that we would make our previous driving record look like something that had been done in the palæozoic age. When we caught sight of Bjones, however, we felt twinges of regret. Bjones seemed to look older than usual. And his stoop was more apparent than ever. We thought we could see lines of anxiety on his face.
When we made that famous first drive we were, of course, in our ordinary street-clothes—not that they are so ordinary, you know, not at all—but still the garb of convention. This time, however, we removed our civilized habiliments and got into a curious assortment of garments that Bjones dug out of his locker for us. They must have been in his family a long time. There was an old khaki shirt, and a pair of lavender trousers with a tendency to open-work effects. The boots had evidently been worn for years by a gigantic policeman, till a blacksmith came along and filled the soles full of horse-shoe nails. Bjones said they were fine for side-hills. Perhaps they were, but they made us feel like a touring-car travelling in chains.
After Bjones had succeeded in making us look like a tramp that had just been run off a farm by a couple of bull-dogs, he led us out to the first tee—right in front of the verandah where a number of ladies were sitting. They smiled at us and seemed to wonder if our escape had been noticed, or if we had been discharged as cured. It was a mortifying position. We found consolation, however, in the thought that our first stroke would show them that a champ' is a champ' for a' that.
A couple of men who were ahead of us drove off and hurried down after their balls into the valley below. After a suitable pause Bjones teed his ball up and whacked it into space in the general direction of a little white flag on the other side of the valley. But we waited. We could see the pair ahead of us putting on the first green, and we weren't taking any chances of slaughtering a fellow-creature, even if he did take four to the hole—mentally we allowed ourself about two.
Finally they holed out and disappeared on their way to the next tee. Carelessly we jabbed down a little lump of wet sand, set the ball on it, took a good look at the flag in the distance, waggled the club a few times in a business-like manner, and swung. There was no joyous crack. We gazed off over the landscape, but could see no ball wildly careering.
"Ahem, you were a little too hurried, old man," said Bjones.
We retrieved the ball. It had rolled about six inches under the impulse of the wind raised by the club. It was a painful moment, and we murmured a few words which we hope will not be remembered against us in the day of final reckoning. Then we erected a slender column of moist sand, somewhat on the model of the tower of Babel. It was a miniature campanile. On the top we carefully set the ball.