by Julie Ganz
“You’re finishing strong, Mr. Mott. Go to it!”
“One under par for three holes,” shouted Mr. Mott’s dual personality to Mr. Mott. “And—how many am I to here?” To Chapman he said, “I’m trying to remember—what did I have on the tenth?”
“Six,” said Chapman.
“Why, are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“Well, I thought I remembered it was six,—I’ve been counting up,—but—”
“I can name every stroke you’ve played since you started,” said Chapman. “It gets to be second nature after a while. It’s only a knack; but sometimes it’s very valuable. I know every shot we’ve both played.”
Mr. Mott looked doubtful.
“I’d take the short end of a sizable bet on that proposition. What was my fourth shot on the fourth hole?”
“Brassey to the green,” said Chapman. “You got a six.”
“Well, I’ll be—what did I make on the seventh hole? “
“Seven.”
“Well, what was my third shot on the tenth?”
“Just a minute—why, it was a topped mashie into the trap. You were on in four and down in six.”
Mr. Mott prepared to drive.
“Do you always remember scores like that?”
“Always.”
Mr. Mott drove far down the fairway. Exalted and emboldened, he ventured to explain briefly just how he had done it. Then when Chapman had hit a long, low ball which developed a faint hook as it dipped to the hollows, Mr. Mott was constrained to offer condolence.
“If you just get that kink out of your shots you’ll play under a hundred,” he stated flatly. “Under a hundred with no trouble at all.”
His companion chuckled involuntarily.
“Well, I hope I should.”
“Nothing in the world but too much wrist action. Look! You don’t see me hooking many balls, do you? Watch how I get my wrists into this one!” He was unerring on the line, and Chapman nodded understandingly.
“You couldn’t ask anything better than that.”
“And the best of it is,” said Mr. Mott, glowing, “that I always know what’s the matter with me. I wasn’t always that way; there was a time when I was way up in the air about it, so I know just how you feel. Now go after this one! Easy—and follow through! Oh—too bad!”
Chapman, however, wasn’t overly discouraged.
“It’s safe, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it’s almost up on the brook; but if you’d gone into the woods, it would have been a lost ball. This way!” Mr. Mott illustrated once more. “Here she goes!” And he made his third consecutive shot which was without reproach.
Chapman, however, hooked a trifle even with his full mashie, which was barely off the green, and Mr. Mott sighed for him. For himself, he ran up alongside. If he could go down in two more, he would have played the last four holes in par! Mr. Mott reached for his putter, and fumbled with it. He bent over the ball, and observed that it was smaller than he had suspected; he told himself that he should have chosen a larger size. Mr. Mott’s lips formed the word “Fore!” and he tapped impotently. The ball rolled in, swerved, struck a transient leaf, and Mr. Mott, his mind erased of any conception of a partner, or of the etiquette of the links, dashed forward. Two feet to the cup, two feet for a six, and the last four holes in par! Fifty-one for the last nine—his record! Mr. Mott, gasping, clutched the putter, and struck, and heard the click of the contact, and saw a cylindrical abyss, lined with zinc, open wide to receive the Silver King. He stood up, choked with emotion.
“The—last four holes in—in par!” he faltered.
“Hold the flag, boy!” said Chapman.
Mr. Mott watched, fascinated. Inwardly he knew, before Chapman putted, that the stroke was too light; and as the lanky stranger strolled up for further trial, Mr. Mott, in his terrific success, blurted out his final charge.
“If you don’t mind my telling you,” he said, “rest your right hand on your knee, and—”
The ball rattled into the cup. From a camp-chair under the awning, a member of the Board of Governors rose and sauntered toward them.
“Mr. Chapman!” said Mr. Mott. He offered his hand across the hole.
“Thank you, Mr. Mott.” Chapman’s clasp was convincing.
“I was par for the last four holes! If I’d only got back on my game sooner! Listen! If you didn’t hook so much—”
“Yes?” The voice of the stranger was dull with weariness.
“Well, you saw what I did! I came back in fifty-one, and the last four in par! Why, if you can play an even game with me now—”
“Hello, Chap,” said the Governor at his elbow. “How are you going?”
“Fine!” said Mr. Mott, answering for him. “If he only didn’t hook so much! How did we come out? I was a hundred and fourteen, and you—”
“Eighty-one,” said Chapman. “Not bad for a starter.” His tone was utterly serious; he wasn’t jesting.
Mr. Mott’s eyes widened. His mouth sagged. A spot of color appeared above his cheek-bones.
“Why, that’s impossible. That’s—”
“Forty-one for first nine, and forty for the last.”Mr. Mott shook as though with palsy, and the putter fell from his hands. He had ignored Chapman’s medal score, but now he was recalling incident after incident which seemed to suggest that Chapman had made recoveries, and got distance, and dropped occasional putts. . . .
“Why . . . why . . . I thought we were going about even!”
“Count ’em up,” said Chapman, soberly. “6, 5, 4, 5, 5, 3, 4, 4, 5; isn’t that forty-one? 5, 4, 4, 2, 6, 5, 4, 5, 5; isn’t that forty? “
“You—you didn’t get—a two on the thirteenth!”
“Certainly I did. I holed out while you were in the pit.”
Mr. Mott now that he flogged his memory for the facts, seemed dimly to recognize that even those swerving shots of Chapman’s had gone off smoothly, and that Chapman had approached sweetly, and putted with distinction. But an eighty-one! And he had volunteered to coach this man; he had showed him in detail how various shots should be made; he had claimed the privilege of instructing a stranger who had hit hardly a straight ball, and still scored close to eighty.
“Wh—what’s your handicap?” he stammered. “You—you aren’t that Chapman—are you?”
The Governor put his arm over the shoulders of the lanky stranger.
“He had three in New England,” he said, “but in the Met. I suppose they’ll give him four. How were you going, Mr. Mott?”
“Oh, pretty fair—for me,” said Mr. Mott, feebly.
But when, bathed and ennobled by fresh linen, he left the clubhouse his heart was once more proud and high. Now and then, to be sure, he experienced a spasm of mortification at the ridiculous figure he had cut before Chapman; nevertheless he was sustained and soothed by the remembrance of the last nine holes in fifty-one and the last four in par. He felt a sturdy manhood, confident and unafraid. Today he had scored a hundred and fourteen; tomorrow it might be that he, too, should play the full round as he had played the last four holes today; upon such dreams is founded the wealth of the club-makers and the athletic outfitters. Timidity in the presence of hazards had gone from him, he believed, forever. Timidity on the greens was a thing of the past. If he could lower his average to a hundred and five by the end of the season,—and with four holes in par today he could conceivably do five in par next Saturday, or perhaps as many as six or seven,—he might get down to, say, ninety by next year. If a slim built Bostonian with no style to speak of could approximate eighty, why not Mr. Mott? If a man with a chronic hook could merit a four handicap, why not Mr. Mott? He saw roseate visions of himself at scratch; Walter Travis was already middle-aged before he took up the game.
“The last four in par!” whispered Mr. Mott as he went up the steps of his house.
“Well” said Mrs. Mott, pathetically, as she came to greet him, “was it worth a thousand dollars to you, Val, to stay
away all this lovely afternoon?”
“Every cent of it!” cried Mr. Mott, hilariously. “Say, let’s motor up the road somewhere; want to? Let’s have dinner out! Here, I know! We’ll run up to Tumble Inn. Get the Smithsons, and we’ll have a party.”
“I thought you said you couldn’t go out to-night!” She was frankly suspicious.
“Rot! I never said that, did I? Must have been a slip of the tongue. Call the Smithsons, will you?”
“It must have been worth while, your staying,” said Mrs. Mott, brightening.
“Well, it was,” said Mr. Mott. “And I got the last four holes in par! Hurry up and telephone!”
And as he waited for her report, the man who had played a hundred and fourteen stood before the long mirror in the hallway, and gripped an imaginary club, and swung it, and finished gloriously, with the body well twisted and the hands close to the neck, and grinned happily at the reflection of another champion in the making. For this is at once the faith and the hope, the Credo and the Te Deum of the golfer of all time and of whatever ability,—Thank God for tomorrow!
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THE STORY OF THE HONG-KONG MEDAL
W. G. VAN T. SUTPHEN
At the age of thirty-five but one illusion remained to Henry Alderson, rich, single, and a member in good and regular standing of the Marion County Golf Club. It is hardly necessary to add that it was only in his capacity as a golfer that he lived again in the rose-colored atmosphere of youth, for after the third decade there is no other possible form of self-deception. And it is equally superfluous to remark that he was a very poor golfer, for it is only the duffers at the royal and ancient game who have any leisure for the exercise of the imagination; the medalwinners are obliged to confine their attention to hitting the ball clean and to keeping their eye in for short putts. It was for Henry Alderson and his kind to keep trade brisk for the ball and club makers, and to win phenomenal matches against the redoubtable Col. Bogey—a game which may be magnificent, but which is certainly not golf. Still, the diversion was unquestionably a harmless one, and served to keep him in the open air and from an overclose application to business. Moreover, it was absolutely certain that the secret of success lay well within his grasp. A few more days of practice, the final acquisition of that peculiar turn of the wrist, and then!—Henry Alderson took a fresh grip on the familiar lofting-iron that had deceived him so often, and topped another ball along the turf. Of course the delusion was a hopeless one, but he was happy in its possession; and if we who look on have become wiser in our day and generation—why, so much the worse for us.
It was a bright autumn morning, and Henry Alderson stood at the tee looking at the little red flag that marked the location of the tenth hole, two hundred and thirty yards away. He had done fairly well on the outgoing course, but this hole had always been a stumbling-block to him, and that dreadful double hazard, a scant hundred yards down the course, looked particularly savage on this particular morning. On the left lurked an enormous sandpit, which was popularly known as the “Devil ”; and the “Deep Sea,” in the shape of an ice pond, was only a few yards to the right. Straight between them lay the path to glory, but for a “slice ” or a “foozle ” there remained only destruction and double figures.
Henry Alderson shuddered as he looked, and incontinently forgot all about “slow back.” Crack! and the “gutty” had disappeared beneath the treacherous waters of the “Deep Sea.” With painful deliberation he teed another ball and mentally added two to his score. The club-head swung back, and for one fatal instant his eye wandered from the ball. Bang! and it had gone to the “Devil.” Without a word Mr. Alderson took his expensive collection of seventeen clubs from the hands of his caddie and descended into the bunker to meet the Evil One.
It was just fifteen minutes after eleven when Henry Alderson entered upon his ghostly conflict with all the Powers of Darkness. At twenty minutes of twelve the caddie, tired of inaction, crept cautiously to the edge of the bunker and looked in. His master held in his hand a costly patented “driver ” that was alleged to be unbreakable. Placing one foot upon the head of the club, he kicked judiciously but with determination at the precise place where the “scare ” is whipped to the shaft, and then carefully added the fragments to the heap of broken putters, cleeks, and brasseys that lay before him. The boy, who was wise in his generation, waited for no more, but fled to the club-house.
Henry Alderson came up out of the bunker, took half a dozen new balls from the pocket of his red coat, and deliberately flung them into the “Deep Sea.” He then tore his score-card into bits, divested himself of cap and shoes, laid his watch and purse where they would be readily observed, and walked with a firm step to the border of the pond.
Suddenly a quickly moving shadow projected itself over his shoulder, and a cheerful, albeit an unfamiliar, voice hailed him. He turned and saw a stranger standing close beside him. The newcomer was an odd-looking personage, dressed in a semiclerical suit of rusty black, and carrying an old cotton umbrella and a wellstuffed carpet-bag. He had a keen-looking, smooth-shaven face, with piercing black eyes and an aggressive nose. His complexion was of a curious pallor, as though untouched by wind or sun, but there was nothing in his appearance to indicate either ill-health or decrepitude.
“Possibly a colporteur,” thought Henry Alderson. “At any rate, he’s no golfer.”
“How are you making out?” inquired the stranger, in a tone of polite interest.
It was on the tip of Henry Alderson’s tongue to answer, “Fifty-five for nine holes ” (his actual score being sixty-three), but at this awful moment, when all the solid realities of life were crumbling away beneath his feet, the lie seemed so small, so pitiful, so mean, and he replied, “Came out in forty-two, but then I lost a shot through having my ball lifted by a dog.”
The stranger did not seem to be visibly impressed. “Pooh!” he said, airily; “I should hardly call that golf.”
“Perhaps you play yourself,” returned Alderson, with what he considered to be a sarcastic inflection.
“Not as a general thing, though I do a round or so occasionally,” said the dark gentleman, placidly. Then opening his carpetbag and taking out a golf- ball, “It’s a very pretty drive from where we stand. If you will allow me.”
He teed the ball, and, with what seemed to be an almost contemptuous disregard of all rules for correct driving, swung against it the crook handle of his old cotton umbrella. Crack! and it went away like a rifle-bullet, close to the ground for one hundred and twenty yards, and then, towering upward in the manner of a rocketing pigeon, caught the full strength of the breeze for a hundred yards of further carry, and dropped dead on the putting-green. Henry Alderson gasped.
“Shall we walk on?” said the stranger. It was a long putt on the green, but the umbrella was again equal to the occasion. Henry Alderson’s eyes sparkled. This was an umbrella worth having.
“It makes no difference what kind of a club you use,” said the gentleman in black, apparently reading his thoughts. “But with this particular make of ball you can accomplish any shot at will, no matter how difficult.”
“I’d like to try that kind of ball,” said Alderson, eagerly. “Can you give me the maker’s address?”
“If you will accept this one, it is entirely at your service.”
Henry Alderson stretched out his hand, and then as quickly withdrew it. He remembered now that when the obliging stranger had opened his bag it had appeared to be filled with what looked like legal papers—contracts perhaps—and there was a dreadful significance in the fact that all the signatures were in red. Of course it might have been carmine ink, and probably was, but it looked suspicious.
“If it’s a question of signing my name to anything,” he faltered, “I don’t think that I can accept. I’ve made it a rule—er—never to go upon anybody’s paper. It’s—er—business, you know.”
The stranger smiled indulgently. “You are quite right. Nevertheless, you need have no scruples
about accepting my gift, for there is no obligation of any kind involved in the transaction.”
Henry Alderson trembled, and looked furtively at the dark gentleman’s feet, which, as he now observed, were encased in a pair of arctic galoshes some four sizes too large. Clearly there was no definite information to be gained in that quarter; and as the field that they were in was used as a pasture for cattle, the presence of hoof-marks could mean nothing either way. There was nothing to do but to chance it, and he was not long in making up his mind. He took the ball and stowed it away in his pocket.
The stranger nodded approvingly. “I think that I may congratulate you in advance upon your success in winning the club handicap this afternoon.”
“But suppose that I lose the ball?” said Alderson, with a sudden accession of doubtfulness.
“Impossible. If your caddie has been negligent, you have only to whistle, and the ball will keep on answering ‘ Here ’ until you come up with it. And, moreover, it is indestructible.”
“It makes no difference what club I use?”
“None whatever. If you care to, you can drive that ball two hundred yards with a feather bolster.”
“I shall endeavor to do so,” laughed Alderson. “You won’t—er—come and have a bite of luncheon with me?”
“Not today,” said the stranger, politely. “But we shall probably meet again. Good luck to you, and may your success end only with the winning of the Hong-Kong Medal.”
The two men bowed, and the dark gentleman walked off. He went to the edge of the “Devil” sand-bunker, marched straight into it, and disappeared. Moved by a sudden impulse, Henry Alderson followed and looked in. There was nothing to be seen, but he thought that he could detect a slight trace of sulphur in the air. However, one may be easily deceived in such matters.