THE MAN IN WHITE
It was at the sixth hole that they passed the man ahead who was playing all alone—a courteous young fellow in white flannels, who smiled and bowed them “through” in silence.
They thanked him, drove from the tee, and left the polite and reticent young man still apparently hunting for a lost ball.
Like other things which depended upon dexterity and precision, Tressa had taken most naturally to golf. Her supple muscles helped.
At the ninth hole they looked back but did not see the young man in white flannels.
Hammock, set with pine and palmetto, and intervals of evil-looking swamp, flanked the course. Rank wire-grass, bayberry and scrub palmetto bounded the fairgreen.
On every blossoming bush hung butterflies—Palomedes swallowtails—drugged with sparkle-berry honey, their gold and black velvet wings conspicuous in the sunny mist.
“Like the ceremonial vestments of a Yezidee executioner,” murmured the girl. “The Tchortchas wear red when they robe to do a man to death.”
“I wish you could forget those things,” said Cleves.
“I am trying.... I wonder where that young man in white went.”