Chapter 9

"You think to steal my golf instructor from me," she declared. "That is just like a man; they are the meanest, most selfish things ever created."

"Listen to me--"

"I did listen to you," declared that young lady with a triumphant laugh. "I did listen to you, and I have sharp ears. You are to have your first exclusive lesson to-morrow evening. I make the discovery that Mr. Wallace knows more of golf than all of you Woodvale boys together, and then you seek to monopolise his skill. That's what he did, girls, and he dare not deny it! What do you think of him?"

"Monster!" laughed Miss Harding, our fair chauffeuse on this return trip, raising her eyes for an instant to mine.

"Ingrate!" hissed Miss Ross, leaning forward from the tonneau.

"What shall we do with him?" demanded Miss Lawrence.

"Make him take us with him!" they chorused, and I assured them that nothing would give me more pleasure.

And thus it happened that Wallace acquired four pupils instead of one, and for three successive evenings we had a jolly time in the old sheep pasture taking our lessons from this most remarkable "hired man." We had to let Mr. Harding into the secret the second evening, but he promised not to "butt in" to our class, so he and Bishop sat on a side hill and smoked and laughed and seemed to enjoy the exhibition hugely.

These little excursions to the old sheep pasture excited increasing curiosity in the club. I enjoyed them immensely, since it gave me a chance to walk slowly home with Miss Harding.

After the first visit we discarded the auto, since its use threatened too much publicity. There was no real reason for keeping the affair a secret, except that it is a pleasure to hold an interest in a mystery, and I think most of us will confess to this harmless weakness. In addition I was steadily improving my short game, which has been my great handicap when pitted against Carter.

And besides, as I have noted, I enjoyed the companionship of Miss Harding--and, of course, that of the others of our little group.

I am of the opinion that LaHume followed and spied upon us on the occasion of our second trip, and very likely on the succeeding one. I am sure I saw someone raise his head above a scrubby knoll to the south, and am reasonably certain I recognised LaHume's gray cap. He was not about the club that evening until after our return, and the same thing happened on the following evening. His manner led me to believe he knew more than he cared to tell. He was sullen almost to the point of insolence.

After having been ignored once or twice by Miss Lawrence, LaHume left our little group on the veranda and pulled a chair to the side of Carter, who was reading his evening paper. It is not safe to interrupt Carter while thus engaged, but after LaHume said a few words the other laid aside the paper and listened intently. They talked for some time, and in view of what happened later I have an idea of the subject of their conversation.

Carter called me aside the next evening.

"I understand," he said, "that you have retained the services of a private golf tutor."

"Who told you that?" I was thunderstruck.

"Never mind who told me," laughed Carter. "Trying to steal a march on the rest of us, eh? Foxy old Smith; foxy old Smith!"

There was nothing I cared to say, and I said it.

"Is he any good?" Carter asked.

"Is who any good?" I parried.

"Wallace, of course. Oh, I know all about it. You, Miss Lawrence, Miss Ross, and Miss Harding have been taking lessons from Wallace for several evenings over in Bishop's sheep pasture. What I wish to know is this: does this Scotch chap of Bishop's really know anything about the game, or are the girls carried away with him because he is a handsome dog who has seen better days and is now playing in bad luck?"

"I cannot speak for the young ladies," I replied realising that I might as well tell the truth, "but I am smitten with the way he hits a ball, and also with his genius in explaining it to me. Carter, I tell you this fellow Wallace is a wonder!"

Carter was silent a moment.

"I wonder if he would like a job as golf professional?" he said.

"Golf professional?" I repeated. "Where?"

"Right here in Woodvale," declared Carter.

"To take Kirkaldy's place?"

"Yes, to take Kirkaldy's place. Kirkaldy handed me his resignation to-night to take effect on Saturday. A rich uncle has died in Scotland, and our young friend will buy his own golf balls in future, instead of winning them from you and me. Now you and I constitute the majority of the house committee, and if this Wallace is as good as you say, and I do not doubt your judgment in the least, what's the matter with offering him Kirkaldy's place? A man who can drive a dozen balls two hundred yards and tell how he does it is squandering his time and cheating humanity by serving as hired man."

I told him what Wallace said when I offered him money.

"That's all nonsense," declared Carter. "He can be a professional and return to the amateur ranks after he has gone into some other avocation. That is the rule not only here but in Great Britain. Kirkaldy can now become an amateur, and doubtless will. Get your hat and we'll go over and talk to this chap right now."

"How about LaHume?" I asked. LaHume is the third member of the house committee.

"Never mind about LaHume," laughed Carter. "I imagine there are reasons why LaHume might oppose the selection of Wallace, but if we are satisfied LaHume will have to be."

The Bishops had retired when we reached the old house, but Wallace came to the door, book in hand. Naturally he was surprised to see us at that hour, and he was even more surprised when Carter told him the object of our visit.

"We are not authorised to make you a definite offer to-night," said Carter. "I am chairman of the committee, and if you care to consider the matter seriously we suggest that you play a round with our present professional, Kirkaldy, to-morrow afternoon. If your work is satisfactory, as I have no doubt it will be from what Smith has said of you, the place is yours at the same salary and the same perquisites received by Kirkaldy."

"And what are these?" asked Wallace, a twinkle in his eye which I had noticed on several occasions. It was a peculiar combination of shrewdness, curiosity, and amusement, but one could not take offence at it. He certainly is an odd fish, and I like him even if I do not understand him.

"One hundred dollars a month with room and board, and all you can earn giving lessons," said Carter. "Kirkaldy averages three hundred dollars a month, and could have made more had he not been lazy."

"That certainly is a tempting chance for one who is getting twenty dollars a month," observed Wallace, after a long pause. "I like it here, and will not leave Mr. Bishop without due notice, but if you can obtain my release and can positively assure me that my amateur standing will not be impaired I will try to qualify for the position you offer. I don't mind telling you," he added, and I noticed the same odd twinkle in his eyes, "that there was a time, and I hope it will recur, when I thought much of playing the game in a non-professional capacity. That, however, is amongst ourselves, and if I become your professional I shall attend strictly to my business."

The following morning I saw Mr. Bishop, who informed me that Wallace had already related the purport of our visit the preceding evening.

"I'll tell you how I look at it, Jack," the old man said. "He's not an awful good hired man, but he's willin' and eager to learn, and has the makings of the best one in the county, but mor'n that he is a real gentleman, and good company for mother and me, and I hate like the mischief to lose him. But Lord bless ye, if he can make three hundred dollars a month teaching you fools how to hit a ball with a stick, why I ain't got no call to keep him here. That's as much money as I make out of this whole blamed farm, and I have to work and not play for a livin'. If Wallace is the man you want, take him, and I won't put a straw in his way. Only I hope you'll sorter hint to him that we'd take it kindly if he'd make it a point to drop over here once in a while and take supper with mother and me, and stay all night, if he'd care to. Will you do that, Jack?"

I heartily promised I would, and felt as guilty as if I had stolen some of Bishop's prize sheep. I went down the fields and told Wallace the old man had consented to release him, and that Kirkaldy would be on hand at the club to play a trial round at two o'clock.

I will describe that game and some other happenings in my next entry.

ENTRY NO. XIII

OUR NEW PROFESSIONAL

LaHume was furious when Carter and I told him Wallace was a candidate for Kirkaldy's place.

"What do you mean by taking this step without consulting me?" he blustered.

"We have not employed this chap yet," Carter calmly responded. "Don't get excited, Percy, Wallace may not make good."

"But who knows who he is?" demanded LaHume. "He may be the rankest kind of an impostor."

"A golf impostor?" smiled Carter. "I never heard of one. We can get a line on him before he has played five holes."

"I don't mean that," growled LaHume. "What I mean is that we don't know anything about this fellow. He comes with no recommendations, and all that sort of thing."

"If he can play within five strokes of Kirkaldy, and teach Smith how to keep from slicing, that's recommendation enough," remarked Carter. "What have you against him, Percy?"

"I'll vote against him in the committee," hotly declared LaHume, "and if I'm over-ruled I will appeal the matter to the club."

"Go as far as you like, my boy," drawled Carter, slowly adjusting his monocle and turning on his heel.

The news Kirkaldy had resigned and that "Bishop's hired man, Wallace," was to have a try out for his place spread rapidly, and created no end of comment and excitement. When it was rumoured that the Misses Harding, Ross, and Lawrence--the three acknowledged beauties of the club--were his sponsors the interest was vastly increased.

Wallace appeared half an hour ahead of the appointed time, and I introduced him to Kirkaldy. The latter studied him intently as they chatted, but asked no questions concerning his identity with their native Scotland. Wallace looked over an array of clubs, selected some which suited him, but retained my cleek and mashie. It was agreed I should act as caddy for Wallace, Chilvers for Kirkaldy, and that Carter should referee. LaHume declined to act in any capacity.

All games were postponed to watch this strange contest, and the "gallery" clustered at the first tee numbered fully one hundred. It was agreed that the contest should be at medal play, the match score also to be taken into consideration.

Mr. Harding called me aside before the match started.

"What do you think about this game, Smith?" he asked. "You've seen both of them play, and I hav'n't. This young fellow, LaHume, is bluffing around offering to bet any part of five hundred dollars Kirkaldy will beat this Wallace seven strokes. I don't mind losing the money, but I hate to make a foolish bet and be laughed at."

"Take LaHume up, and I'll stand half the bet," I said, after considering the matter for a moment. "Wallace is a stranger to the course, but I doubt if Kirkaldy or anyone living can beat him seven strokes."

Harding covered LaHume's money, and the latter placed several hundred dollars more at the same odds. Miss Lawrence heard he was betting against Wallace, and her eyes blazed with indignation.

"You go to Mr. LaHume," she said to Marshall, "and ask him what odds he will give that Mr. Wallace does not win the game. Do not tell him who wishes to know."

"What odds Wallace does not win the game?" sneered LaHume, when Marshall sounded him. "Five to one, up to a thousand dollars!"

Just before they teed off, Marshall put a crisp one-hundred-dollar note belonging to Miss Lawrence in Harding's hands as stakeholder, and LaHume promptly covered it with five bills of the same denomination. There were scores of smaller wagers with no such animus back of them.

Wallace won the toss and took the honour. I doubt if there be any greater mental or nervous strain than that of making the initial stroke in an important golf contest. The player realises that all eyes are on him, and unless he has nerves of steel and an absolute mental poise he is likely to fall the victim of a wave which surges against him as he grasps the shaft of his club.

Wallace's first shot was the poorest I had seen him execute. It went high and to the left, and for a moment I was sure it would not clear the fence, but it did, dropping in as thick a clump of swamp grass as can be found in Woodvale. It left him fully one hundred and fifty yards from the cup. It-was a most disappointing shot, and I instinctively turned and looked at LaHume.

That young gentleman was satisfied beyond measure. There was something vindictive and repellent in the satisfied expression of his face. I turned and watched Kirkaldy drive a beautiful ball within fifty yards of the cup. The first hole is two hundred and eighty-five yards from the tee.

I found Wallace's ball. It was on a soggy spot of ground, with tall slush grass in front of it, but luckily there was room to swing a club back of it. He studied it a moment intently. It was a villainous lie. I did not wish to give advice, but could not restrain myself.

"Better play safe," I said. "It will cost you only one stroke."

"I think I can take it out," he said, reaching in the bag for a heavy, old-fashioned lofting iron.

He took one glance at the green, and then came down on that ball as if he intended to drive it into the bowels of the earth. I saw nothing but a shower of mud and a huge divot hurled up by the club-head as the wrists relaxed to save breaking the shaft.

Others saw the ball as it flicked the tips of the menacing grass and soared high in the air. It struck on the near edge of the green.

"A bonny shot, mon; a guede clean shot as ere were made out thot muck!" exclaimed Kirkaldy, his face mantled with a grin of frank admiration.

It was a glorious recovery! Miss Lawrence was fairly dancing for joy. Kirkaldy laid his ball within a foot of the hole, and won it with a three against four for Wallace, the latter making bogy. Wallace is unable to explain how he made a fluke of that first shot, and I am sure I have no idea.

On the second hole both drove perfect balls over the old graveyard, but Wallace had a shade the best of it in distance and direction. Both were nicely on the green in two, and Wallace missed a putt for a three by a hair, while his opponent was lucky, running down in a long lag for four, halving it in bogy.

Timid players drive short on the third so as to avoid dropping in the brook, but both drove smashing balls far over it.

"I don't know much about this game," chuckled Harding, overtaking me at the foot-bridge, "but so far as I can see, this man of Bishop's isn't exactly what you folks call a duffer."

Both took this hole in bogy fours, and both drove the duck pond on the next hole, and we found their balls fair on the green, 220 yards away and slightly up hill. Wallace rimmed the cup for a two, and both made threes, one stroke better than bogy. It was lightning golf. LaHume's face was a study.

The fifth hole is 470 yards, and both were within easy chopping approach of the green on their second. Wallace had the worst of a bad kick, and Kirkaldy holed a thirty-foot putt for a par four, making him two up. LaHume smiled once again. The next four holes were made in bogy by both players, leaving Kirkaldy two up on both medal and match scores. Here is the out card:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 KIRKALDY-- 3 4 4 3 4 5 5 5 4--37 WALLACE--- 4 4 4 3 5 5 5 5 4--39

This was three under bogy for Kirkaldy, and one under for Wallace.

"I think this Scotchman of yours will do," Carter said in an undertone, as we neared the tenth tee. "He is executing fairly well for a man playing a course for the first time, fixed up with a strange set of clubs, and getting all the worst of the luck on putts. He is actually outdriving Kirkaldy, but I'm afraid our friend Miss Lawrence will lose that hundred to Percy."

"So am I," I said, "but it is the only bet he will win."

It was at the tenth hole that Miss Lawrence sliced her ball over the fence, and Wallace deftly returned it, as I have mentioned. As he looked over the ground he identified it, and for the first time during the game he took a sweeping glance at the "gallery."

His eyes met those of Miss Lawrence, and I saw him make a gesture with his hand as if to remind her that this was the spot where he first had seen her. She answered with a smile and a nod, and then said something to Miss Harding and Miss Rose, at which the three of them laughed.

Then the machine-like Kirkaldy drove his usual accurate long ball.

It is a dangerous hole, this tenth, with a deep cut through which the country road runs to the right, and dense woods and rock-strewn underbrush to the left. The cautious player does not hazard making the narrow opening, but Wallace smashed that ball a full 250 yards as straight as a rifle shot. It is a 450-yard hole, and it has been the ambition of every player in the club to reach it in two. Kirkaldy had never done it, but Wallace had made a record-breaking drive. Could he reach the green?

Kirkaldy brassied and was short, but in good position. Wallace did not have a good lie, but I told him it was a full 200 yards, and the fore caddy gave him the direction. It was uphill almost all the way to the hole. He used a full brassie, going well into the turf, and I knew when the ball started it would reach the green.

We climbed the hill breathless with curiosity. I came in sight of the green. A new, white ball lay within a foot of the cup! All records on "Mount Terrible" had been shattered!

Kirkaldy smiled grimly and was short on his approach, but got down in two more, losing the hole with a five against that phenomenal three. Five is bogy and par for this hole, and sevens more common than fives. The medal score was even.

They halved the eleventh, Wallace won the twelfth and lost the fourteenth, both making threes on the tricky thirteenth. Wallace took the medal lead by winning the fifteenth in another perfect three, and the sixteenth produced fours for both of them. It was Kirkaldy's turn to register a three on the next, this bringing them to the last hole all square on medal score, with Kirkaldy one up on match play. It was intensely exciting!

The eighteenth hole is 610 yards. By wonderful long work both were on the green in three, but Kirkaldy was on the extreme far edge and away. His approach putt was too strong, overrunning the cup by twelve feet. Wallace laid his ball dead within six inches of the cup, and putted down in five, one under bogy. This insured him at least a tie for the medal score, but the match honours would go to Kirkaldy if he could hole that long putt. We held our breaths! He went to the left by a slight margin, halving the match by holes. Here is the card coming in:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 KIRKALDY-- 5 4 6 3 4 4 4 3 6--39 WALLACE--- 3 4 5 3 5 3 4 4 5-36

Wallace therefore won the medal round by a score of 75 against 76 for Kirkaldy, and honours were even on holes. It was a match to make one's blood tingle; a clean, honest contest between two clear-headed and muscle-trained athletes.

Kirkaldy was the first to grasp Wallace's hand, and in the blue eyes of our tried and popular golf mentor there was naught but sincere goodwill and unaffected admiration.

"Ye'll do, my laddy, ye'll do!" Kirkaldy exclaimed. "I dinna ken who taught ye, but he was a guede mon; a guede mon!"

As Kirkaldy's ball stopped rolling, and it was known Wallace had won the medal score, the breathless gallery found their voices and gave vent to their feelings. The silent and motionless circle came to life, and, as it were, exploded toward its centre. We found ourselves in the vortex of cheering men, laughing girls, fluttering 'kerchiefs, and the excited clatter of a hundred voices.

I looked for LaHume and saw him stalking toward the club house. Someone clutched me by the sleeve, and I looked into the beautiful and happy eyes of Miss Lawrence.

"Wasn't it glorious!" she said. "Isn't he a splendid player! Did you ever see anything like that tenth hole? And I won! I just thought I should scream when Mr. Wallace lay dead for a five on this hole!"

"Say, he's all right, eh, Smith!" said Mr. Harding, handing me a roll of money. "Here's your share of the plunder. It was like picking it up in the street after a cyclone has hit a national bank. I'm going to blow mine in giving a dinner to Wallace and Kirkaldy, and everybody is invited."

We had that dinner, and right royally did we welcome the new and speed the parting professional. And this is how Tom Wallace, "Bishop's hired man," came to Woodvale as its golf professional.

After the dinner in honour of our professionals Kirkaldy made me a present of his famous driver. It is a beauty, and I confidently expect to lengthen my drive by at least ten yards with it. For the first time in my life I am now reasonably sure with my cleek shots. I do not know when I have been so well satisfied with my prospects.

My apparent stock losses to date foot up to $202,000.

ENTRY NO. XIV

MYSELF AND I

For an hour I have looked at the unsullied page of this diary. It amused me to turn back over its pages, but when I started to write the words would not come.

A liar is one who by direction or indirection seeks to deceive. The man who lies to an enemy is a diplomat; the man who lies to give harmless play to his imagination is an artist; the man who lies to his friends for the purpose of taking advantage of them is a scoundrel, and the man who lies to himself is a fool.

After re-reading this diary I am convinced that I belong in the last class.

I have been lying to myself for the past three weeks. With a smile on my lips I have looked myself in the eye and told the one falsehood over and over again. I have been the ass fondly to believe I told it with such detail and verisimilitude as to carry conviction to myself. I told it for the last time a few minutes ago.

My alter ego laughed in my face. I dislike to be jeered at, even by myself. I humbly apologised. I promised to reform and confess, and here is the confession:

I am in love. I have been in love for three weeks. It is not necessary to say with whom, since I and myself both know, but in order that the crimes of evasion and equivocation may no longer be charged against me, I frankly record that I am in love with Grace Harding!

There you have it, John Henry Smith! Head it over carefully. Does that suit you? With it goes my humble apology. Does not this constitute the amende honorable? What did you say? Ah, it does! Good Shake hands, old fellow! Now let's sit quietly down and talk this matter over, and see how we stand. I wish you to help me.

The situation is slightly less complicated. It is settled that I am in love with Grace Harding. What's that? "_We_ are in love with Grace Harding," you say. Very well, old fellow, have it your own way. You are the only one in the world with whom I shall refuse to become jealous. They say that two heads are better than one, even if one is a blockhead--meaning me, of course.

_We_ are in love with Grace Harding. Well, what if I did say it before? I like to keep on saying it. It's the best thing I have written since I started this stupid diary. _We_ are in love with Grace Harding.