Part 3

I made the first hole in 26, and felt that there was nothing more to live for.

Clara Jane could have made it in 84, but she used up her nerve watching a cow in the lot about two miles away.

My lady friend is a quitter when it comes to cows.

Then we decided to stop playing and walk around the links just so we could say that we had seen most of the United States of America.

Out near the Fifth hole we met young Mil Roberts and Frank Jenvey.

They were playing a match for 60 cents a side and they were two busy boys, all right, all right.

Mil had his sleeves rolled up to show the mosquito bites on his muscles, and Frank was telling himself how he missed the last bunker.

I asked Mil what time it was and he told me, "Three up and four to play!"

I suppose that was Central time.

I handed Frank a few bars of polite conversation but he gave me the Frostburg face.

Did you ever have one of those real players pass you out the golfish glare?

You for the snowstorm when you get it--believe me!

Then Mil and Frank dove in the mudcan, cooked a pill, placed the ball on it, slapped it in the slats, gave us the dreary day-day and were on their way.

It must be awful to play for money.

At the Seventh hole we found Jake Roberts ploughing the side of a hill with his niblick.

He said he lost a ball there one day last summer and he wanted it back because it belonged to a set.

Jake said he went to Three in four with that ball once, but the folks wouldn't believe him till he showed them the ball.

When I introduced him to Clara Jane he invited her to join the hunting party, and intimated that I'd enjoy the new mown scenery further down the line.

I whip-sawed him with a whistling specialty entitled, "Why Don't You Get a Lady of Your Own?" and he promised to be good.

After we trailed over the mountains, through seven farms, across three rivers, up the valley and down the railroad, we finally reached the end of the links and took the steamer back to mother.

Clara Jane says golf would be a great game if it wasn't so far from home.

Yours till the bench breaks--believe me!

JOHN HENRY