The Clicking of Cuthbert

shame to the cheek of modesty; nevertheless, she felt vaguely that

Ramsden Waters had exceeded the limits. She had been prepared for a

gurgling Ramsden Waters, a Ramsden Waters who fell over his large feet

and perspired; but here was a Ramsden Waters who addressed her not

merely as an equal, but with more than a touch of superiority. She eyed

him coldly, but he had turned to speak to little Wilberforce, who was

to accompany them on the round.

"And you, my lad," said Ramsden curtly, "you kindly remember that this

is a competition, and keep your merry flow of conversation as much as

possible to yourself. You've got a bad habit of breaking into small

talk when a man's addressing the ball."

"If you think that my brother will be in the way----" began Eunice

coldly.

"Oh, I don't mind him coming round," said Ramsden, "if he keeps quiet."

Eunice gasped. She had not played enough golf to understand how that

noblest of games changes a man's whole nature when on the links. She

was thinking of something crushing to say to him, when he advanced to

the tee to drive off.

He drove a perfect ball, hard and low with a lot of roll. Even Eunice

was impressed.

"Good shot, partner!" she said.

Ramsden was apparently unaware that she had spoken. He was gazing down

the fairway with his club over his left shoulder in an attitude almost

identical with that of Sandy McBean in the plate labelled "The

Drive--Correct Finish", to face page twenty-four of his monumental

work, "How to Become a Scratch Player Your First Season by Studying

Photographs". Eunice bit her lip. She was piqued. She felt as if she

had patted the head of a pet lamb, and the lamb had turned and bitten

her in the finger.

"I said, 'Good shot, partner!'" she repeated coldly.

"Yes," said Ramsden, "but don't talk. It prevents one concentrating."

He turned to Wilberforce. "And don't let me have to tell you that

again!" he said.

"Wilberforce has been like a mouse!"

"That is what I complain of," said Ramsden. "Mice make a beastly

scratching sound, and that's what he was doing when I drove that ball."

"He was only playing with the sand in the tee box."

"Well, if he does it again, I shall be reluctantly compelled to take

steps."

They walked in silence to where the ball had stopped. It was nicely

perched up on the grass, and to have plunked it on to the green with an

iron should have been for any reasonable golfer the work of a moment.

Eunice, however, only succeeded in slicing it feebly into the rough.

Ramsden reached for his niblick and plunged into the bushes. And,

presently, as if it had been shot up by some convulsion of nature, the

ball, accompanied on the early stages of its journey by about a pound

of mixed mud, grass, and pebbles, soared through the air and fell on

the green. But the mischief had been done. Miss Bingley, putting

forcefully, put the opposition ball down for a four and won the hole.

Eunice now began to play better, and, as Ramsden was on the top of his

game, a ding-dong race ensued for the remainder of the first nine

holes. The Bingley-Perkins combination, owing to some inspired work by

the female of the species, managed to keep their lead up to the tricky

ravine hole, but there George Perkins, as might have been expected of

him, deposited the ball right in among the rocks, and Ramsden and

Eunice drew level. The next four holes were halved and they reached the

club-house with no advantage to either side. Here there was a pause

while Miss Bingley went to the professional's shop to have a tack put

into the leather of her mashie, which had worked loose. George Perkins

and little Wilberforce, who believed in keeping up their strength,

melted silently away in the direction of the refreshment bar, and

Ramsden and Eunice were alone.

       *       *       *       *       *

The pique which Eunice had felt at the beginning of the game had

vanished by now. She was feeling extremely pleased with her performance

on the last few holes, and would have been glad to go into the matter

fully. Also, she was conscious of a feeling not perhaps of respect so

much as condescending tolerance towards Ramsden. He might be a pretty

minus quantity in a drawing-room or at a dance, but in a bunker or out

in the open with a cleek, Eunice felt, you'd be surprised. She was just

about to address him in a spirit of kindliness, when he spoke.

"Better keep your brassey in the bag on the next nine," he said. "Stick

to the iron. The great thing is to keep 'em straight!"

Eunice gasped. Indeed, had she been of a less remarkable beauty one

would have said that she snorted. The sky turned black, and all her

amiability was swept away in a flood of fury. The blood left her face

and surged back in a rush of crimson. You are engaged to be married and

I take it that there exists between you and your fiancee the

utmost love and trust and understanding; but would you have the nerve,

could you summon up the cold, callous gall to tell your Genevieve that

she wasn't capable of using her wooden clubs? I think not. Yet this was