~ CHAPTER IX. ~

The new putter—Golfton in the year 2000—We have a round—And win the match—The electric shoot—Another talk with Miss Adams—She proves too many for me

“Ah, here we are!” said Adams, rising. “I wonder if White has arrived!”

We ascended by the lift into a large hall, much the same as that at St. Andrews, and on crossing it found ourselves in a smaller one, where a crowd of men were standing round a window. One of them, whom I recognised as the Mr. White we had met on the previous day, came forward.

“Good morning,” he said, “this is a splendid morning for a round. We don’t start for half an hour yet. Allow me to introduce you to your partner,” he went on, turning to a youngish-looking man standing beside him—“Mr. Nelson, Mr. Gibson.”

We both bowed.

“I’m afraid you are getting rather a poor partner, Mr. Nelson; I haven’t been playing for some time, except a round yesterday (“hope he won’t ask when I last played before that,” I thought), and am rather out of form in consequence.”

“Oh, Nelson will pull you through,” put in White “he’s a very strong player, and it ought to make a match. Adams and I are only kind of fairish. By the by, have you seen the new putter?” he said, turning to Adams.

“No,” replied Adams, “but I have heard plenty about it. Have you got one?”

“Yes,” answered White, “here it is.” And, crossing the room, he came back with a club in his hands.

I must describe this club if you will have patience, reader.

The head was an oblong block, with the shaft coming up from the neck as usual. There was nothing very particular about that, barring the shaft. The grip was all right, but below it was a spring, which joined it to the shaft. The slightest motion of your hands on the grip made the club oscillate backwards and forwards, like a pendulum, the grip, however, remaining steady in your hands. On the back of the grip were a row of figures, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8,10,12, 15, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, with a hand which you could push along to indicate any of them. If you put it at 1, the club would only waggle with strength enough to send the ball one foot. Whatever figure you put it at, the club would only send the ball the corresponding number of feet. Of course, if the ground was extra heavy or on a slope you had to allow for that. The way in which you played the shot may be described thus: you put the hand at the figure corresponding to the distance you were from the hole (and, of course, one soon got pretty good at judging that), held the club over the ball, and with a slight motion of your hands set it in motion. When you had got the right line to the hole, you just put it down behind the ball, and thereupon it would send it the prescribed number of feet. Success was then a simple matter of judging the right line; if you were on that, you would hole out, or at the very least lie dead. Such was the latest thing in putters. We each got one, determined to give it a trial. When I had finished examining the weapon, I went forward to the window to have a look at the home of my boyhood. Was this, indeed, Golfton? Or was Adams playing a joke at my expense? Yes, there were some of the old landmarks, and there were the four islands dotted along the shore, as I so well remember them. Yet, when I looked more closely at one, it seemed to be altered. The top was more even, and there appeared to be some sort of building on it. I afterwards discovered they had a sort of electric shoot as a means of crossing the water to this island. You sat in a flat-bottomed machine, shaped something like a boat, and were shot out of a steep slide across the strait on to the island, which was laid out in terraces cut out of the solid rock—an arrangement which must be rather a surprise, I should think, for the rabbits and Tommy Norries, the only inhabitants there were in my days. A similar means of communication was used on the island in order to shoot you back again. Of course if the sea was rough it couldn’t be done; it seemed a very risky kind of game, anyway; I don’t think I’d like it. There’s no use running needless risk, you know; good men are scarce—at least I suppose they are now, they used to be a hundred years ago.

The green at Golfton was completely altered. We began to play at what was in my day the eighth hole. A plantation which used to run alongside of the sixth, seventh, and eighth holes had disappeared—in fact, the club-house in which I was standing seemed to occupy its former site.

The old part of the green—that is to say, the first seven holes we had formerly played over—was now used only by boys, who, I may mention, were under as strict supervision as the men, the records of all their scores being kept. They were not allowed on the long round till they were fifteen years of age, and not even then unless they could do their round in a certain number of strokes. I think it was an average for a week that counted; but I forget what the figures were.

It was now our turn to start, and, seeing my companions hurrying out, I followed. We had each, of course, to pay the customary five shillings; but as we were playing a foursome we did not participate in the prize money. Adams, I may mention, had sent my clubs down below to be supplied with a caddie, who—(if I must use the name)—but I can hardly call that patent mechanical contrivance who. However, we were all met by our several caddies.

“You will drive here,” said Nelson, coming up to me; “Adams will drive against you, and White and I will drive together.”

I selected my driver and proceeded to address the ball. I felt in good form, and put my back into it.

“Fore!” Confound the thing! I had forgotten all about that jacket. But it was a good drive, none the less—it was perhaps just as well I had forgotten. If I had been thinking about what was to come, I might have—if I may be allowed to use slang—“funked” it. I may mention that on looking at the dial on the sole of the club, I found 195 yards was registered as the length of “carry”—so there evidently was something in their patents after all. Moreover the wind—at least all there was of it—was against us. Adams drove, and we all moved on. It was a funny sight to see four men stalking along followed by what looked like toy tricycles or something of that sort. The first hole was what was in my day the eleventh hole in; a steep bunker ran round two sides of it. White put his second in the bunker, while my partner carried everything and got on the green. Here the patent putter came into use. I put it at 25 feet, but it stopped about five feet short. Evidently I had been wrong in my calculation. However, my partner holed it, and we won the hole. The next was over a burn, which was carried in your second. We both managed it, and the hole was halved.

I now hardly noticed the jacket—so keen was I on the game, that I forgot all about it. Adams was right after all, therefore, in saying I would get used to it.

Going to the third hole, my partner put me in a bunker, in getting out of which I was nearly blinded with the revolving niblick. We also won that hole, and after we had played the first nine we were leading by five. I was playing quite a good game, better than even Adams or White—much to their disgust. At the ninth hole we came to a large pavilion, where Adams said we would stop for lunch. It occupied the same site as a cottage stood on in my days. It commanded a magnificent view. As you sat at lunch you saw spread out before you—not a table, of course, I’m not referring to the edibles—a long line of rocky shore with several islands dotted along it. The links we had been playing over stretched away from our very feet, and on the rising ground to the south of the course were numerous large villas scattered about, which were of course new to me. To the left of the first teeing ground—in what had formerly been a field where you lost two strokes if you drove into, not to mention the ball—stood a large hotel. The view from it must have been very fine, looking along what we used to call the “broad sands.” That was a solitary place enough in my day, but now it seemed alive with bands, bathers, and children. Often on a quiet summer’s evening I have watched the sun set behind the picturesque island of “Ardif.” It was a view I remember well—and I don’t suppose the sun sets anyway different in the twenty-first century!

But for the present I wasn’t watching sunsets; I was at lunch—that’s more to the point, eh? No, no, don’t be frightened, I’m not going to give you another lecture on food. I’m going to practise now what I preached before, and, entre nous, dear reader, that’s a thing I would like to see done more often by the genus preacher.

During the meal I noticed that both Adams and White were rather silent. I suspected that when they arranged the match they thought they would have somewhat the best of it. They did not count on me coming away with a good game. But Nelson and I were of course in great form, chaffing them about their game, and we finished up by offering them a stroke a hole going home—which they did not accept. After a good lunch and a smoke we started to play back. You see the course was so long now that one required a rest in the middle of it. The teeing ground at the ninth hole was in fact a second starting place. You just got your old place. Some couples went right round without stopping; but they were so few that it didn’t matter, the other couples just falling in behind them. On the way home matters did not improve for Adams and his partner, and we ultimately won by six up and five to play, winning the bye also by two holes.

“Look here,” said Adams, when we had finished, turning to me, “you’re a fraud! You’ve no business to play a game like that after lying—Ahem! achew! ahem!” Here he took a fit of coughing to cover his mistake. He had nearly let out the secret.

“Yes,” I said, “I seem to have got into my game all right again; but I don’t think you were playing your game.”

“Humph,” he rejoined, “never had such hard lines in my life. If we’d had half the luck you had, the game would have ended very differently.”

The same old excuses, I thought. Among all those inventions, surely they might have got something new in that line. However, I said nothing. It is no use trying to argue with a man in that frame of mind. You may mildly hint that bad luck generally goes with bad play; but it very seldom does any good. Your opponent will perhaps rejoin that it must be seldom indeed you win a match, you’re swaggering so much about that one. The best thing is to leave him alone, stand him a whisky and soda, and light your pipe. Under this treatment he will gradually come round.

I know that kind of man well, and if he wants you to play to-morrow, why play him, and see that you give him another licking.

“What do you say to a shoot across to the ‘Craig’?” said Nelson, my partner, as we were sitting in the club; “we have plenty of time.”

“Capital,” said White, “the very thing; I’ve been across several times, and the sensation is splendid. Come along.”

“It doesn’t look a very safe affair,” I put in, mildly; “I think we would be better on dry land.”

“Safe? It’s as safe as going to church,” said Nelson, “and it’s a splendidly calm day. I’ve seen several boats shooting over.”

“All right,” I said, “I’m game; but at the same time, if there’s an insurance office handy, I think we should each take out a policy.”

We had to walk some little distance in an easterly direction, till we came to a high steel erection. Here we each put a shilling in that fail-me-never slot, and ascended in a lift. On leaving the lift we found ourselves on a narrow platform running round three sides of a small room. In the centre was the boat—for I suppose it was a boat—that was to convey us over the water. It was about twelve feet long by seven feet broad, rounded off at the corners, with the gunwale turned in all round, higher in front than at the back. It was seated for four, who were accommodated on seats all looking the same way—two in front and two behind—and set very low, not more than a few inches off the bottom. We took our seats, and Adams asked us if we were all ready. I gripped my seat tight. I did not like it at all. I sat looking down a long tube—it looked very steep, and the water very far away.

When we had all answered in the affirmative, Adams turned round to a man in a small box behind, whom I had not previously noticed, and said “right.”

In an instant we were on the water. As soon as we had touched its surface we bounded about five hundred yards, I should say, and then about three hundred, getting shorter every time, just as a stone does when you skiff it along the surface of the water. On nearing the island the bounds got much shorter, and we ended by gliding into a small harbour, where we disembarked. The sensation on the whole was very pleasant, and the trip altogether did not last much more than a minute.

“Well, how did you like it?” asked Adams.

“I liked it very well,” I answered, “though I must say at first I was rather frightened.”

We strolled about the island for some time. It was not at all like the place that I remembered as the haunt of seabirds and rabbits. It was now all laid out in terraces cut out of the rock, with one or two places for refreshment. After we had seen all there was to be seen, we took our places for the return trip—I think I said before there was an erection on the island for shooting you back. The return journey was much the same as the first, and we arrived all safe, very pleased with the novel trip, as it was to me.

When Adams and I got home again we made our way to the morning-room, and there found Miss Adams busy writing. She was evidently deeply engrossed in her task, as she did not look up immediately.

“You are back before us to-day,” said her brother, crossing the room.

“Yes,” she answered, looking up, and laying down her pen, “I’ve been in some little time. Allow me to congratulate you on winning your match, Mr. Gibson.”

“Thank you, Miss Adams,” I said. “But how were you aware that I did win the match?”

“That’s easily answered,” she replied. “If I had not seen it by your face, I need only have looked at my brother’s to see that he had lost.”

“Do we indeed show it so plainly as that?” I said. “I had no idea that any one by merely looking at us could tell which had won the match.”

“Undoubtedly you do,” she went on. “When you lose a golf match you look as if you had lost a kingdom. Look at my brother there. Defeat is written on every line of his countenance. We women don’t know what defeat means. When we lose what we are aiming at one time it only excites us to greater efforts the next. To be defeated is to be crushed, subdued. Did you ever see a subdued woman, even in your days?”

“Well—no—I-don’t—think—I—ever—did,” I had hesitatingly to admit, after consideration.

“And you have seen plenty of subdued men. If you lose a golf match you think life is not worth living; but fill you with meat and drink, and you are quite content. Ah! You men, you turn at every puff of wind. You are like the weathercocks, perched high on a pillar of your own conceit, imagining yourselves the lords of creation, yet obedient in turn to every breeze that blows. We women are made of different stuff.”

“You’re right,” put in her brother; “it would never do to go by a female weathercock—weatherhen I suppose I should call it. If the wind were east, it would point due west; and if south, it would point due north, out of sheer contradictoriness. I expect that was kept in mind when people chose the male bird.”

“You do not understand the sex,” she said; “in fact, you do not even understand your own sex. But I am glad we occupy our right position in the world at last. I sometimes pity the women of bygone ages. What poor, weak creatures they were!”

“Allow me to differ from you,” I put in. “If you will pardon the seeming rudeness, I think they were superior in every way to the women of to-day, to judge from what I have seen.”

(That’s a slap on the face for her, I thought.) But she only smiled.

“Quite right to stick up for your own age,” she said; “but that does not alter facts.”

I made some excuse, and left the room. I really couldn’t bear it; and if I had stayed there much longer we should have come to blows, I know. Poor Adams! I feel sorry for him. No wonder he looks subdued sometimes.

And I had had a day at Golfton! Golfton in the year 2000! How different it was from the Golfton of 1892! The same; yet not the same. Many a match I’ve won—aye, faith, and lost too, too many of them—on that old green, without the aid of patent caddies, self-registering clubs, and shouting “fore” jackets. Those good old days! They seem to have nothing in common with this age of new inventions. I think I like the old days best after all. And yet I don’t know, they manage everything so well now, that I think I should get on all right if I just steer clear of the ladies.

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