The little lady, as the Squire affectionately termed her, arrived at
Pomfret Court a few days later. She brought with her many wonderful
frocks, a habit (if the breeches and apron of the modern Amazon may be
so called), and the shoes fashioned by the “One and Only” in Paris. Thus
armed, cap-à-pie, she sparkled into view. Urban she was, and urbane. Her
delight in the quiet countryside had no taint of insincerity. She was
tired of Mayfair and said so unaffectedly. And she met Lionel, for the
first time, as he came across the lawn after a ride through the Forest.
Instantly she decided that he surpassed expectation. His tall, slender
figure lent itself admirably to riding kit; his cheeks were flushed by
exercise; he looked, every inch of him, what he was—the son of an
ancient house, and a gallant soldier. Nor was it possible to suspect
from his manner any prejudice, instinctive or otherwise. Lady Margot was
his guest. Indeed, the mere fact that he did feel a certain prejudice
against “dashers” who had “affairs” made him the more courteous and
pleasant outwardly.
At tea Lionel said little. He listened attentively to Lady Margot’s
London gossip, nicely spiced to the Squire’s taste. She chattered to Sir
Geoffrey, but at his son. Lionel expected some “swanking” from a young
lady whose portrait appeared constantly in the illustrated papers. But
Lady Margot didn’t “swank.” Her methods of attracting attention were
more subtle. She imposed herself as a personage indirectly. Lady Pomfret
may have divined this, because her methods were not dissimilar. Lionel
admitted frankly to himself that the visitor had charm. The word “chic”
had been used so often by reporters that Lionel tried to find a better
label, and failed with “mondaine.” He knew that she drove her own motor
and could ride hard to hounds. Beaumanoir Chase, where she had been
brought up, was in the Belvoir country. The Squire, you may be sure,
wanted first-hand information about that stately pile. Lady Margot was
outspoken about her kinsman, now in possession of her former home.
“Poor Beau ought to have married me. He wished it, and so did I, till I
noticed that he was prematurely bald, a long three-storied head, full of
Victorian furniture. He is very hard up, and several thousands ought to
be spent upon the house alone. Unhappily, father and he hated each
other.”
From her soft voice and candid glances you might infer that here was the
most guileless creature in the world. She continued gently, as she
nibbled at a sandwich:
“It is heart-breaking to go there and see things falling to pieces.”
“Horrible!” the Squire agreed.
“Your fences and gates are in apple-pie order.” She smiled at the
Squire, who beamed back at her.
“You notice these trifles, my dear?”
His tone was almost paternal.
“At once,” she answered crisply. Then she turned to Lady Pomfret. That
shrewd observer detected a subtle change in her manner, a caressing
deference slightly feline.
“Don’t you think, Lady Pomfret, that we are sharper than men in noticing
significant trifles?”
“You are, I am sure.”
“A lone orphan has to be. Perhaps you disregard things and focus your
attention upon persons?”
“Yes; I think I do.”
Lady Margot turned to Lionel, addressing him quite easily, as if she had
known him for years.
“Have you a cigarette? My case is in the motor.”
“If you like Turkish.”
She lay back, puffing contentedly, surveying the Pomfrets through
half-closed eyes. They were sitting under a big walnut tree, said to be
a sanctuary from gnats and midges. The great lawn, bordered by beeches,
stretched far away into the distance till it melted into the park.
Beyond the undulating park and below it lay the Avon valley now
embellished by a soft haze—the finest view in Wiltshire, according to
the Squire. Visitors praised this view. Lady Margot, guessing as much,
said nothing. However, her attitude, her air of being contentedly at
home, might be considered better than any compliment. She murmured
lazily:
“How delicious it is here!”
She blew a tiny circle of smoke, and watched it melt away, smiling like
a child. The Squire said heartily:
“We shall measure your approval by the length of your visit. A
fortnight, at least.”
Presently Fishpingle and Alfred approached to take away the tea. Lady
Margot greeted the butler by name.
“How do you do, Mr. Fishpingle?”
“I am quite well, my lady, thank you.”
She smiled pleasantly at Alfred, who knew his place and remained
impassive. Her cleverness in speaking to an old retainer delighted Sir
Geoffrey. He glanced at his son, as if saying, “She’s the right sort,
you see—a pleasant word for everybody.”
As the men-servants moved away, she said to Lionel:
“Your butler is a dear.”
“You remembered his name,” chuckled the Squire. “That pleased him. I
could hear the old boy purring.”
“But who could forget his name? Where did he get it? Is it a local
name?”
The Squire stiffened. Lady Margot perceived that she had been
indiscreet. He answered formally:
“It is not a local name. How he came by it I can’t tell you.”
She wondered vaguely if her host could tell, but wouldn’t. Swiftly she
changed the conversation, with a glance at Lionel’s trim gaiters and
breeches.
“I have brought a habit.”
“We can _mount_ you,” said Lionel. “If you were staying on till August,
we could give you a day with our buckhounds.”
“Oh, why, why didn’t I come to you in August? I have never been out with
buckhounds. Tell me all about it.”
Lionel obeyed. The Squire slipped away, followed by Lady Pomfret. As
soon as they were out of hearing, he whispered to his wife:
“A good start, my dear. And, mark me, she’ll make the running.”
“I think she will, Geoffrey.”
“Just as clever as they make ’em, Mary. Was it mere luck her pickin’ out
a subject which the boy can talk really well about?”
“Oh, no.”
“Do you think she likes him?”
“Ask me that the day after to-morrow.”
* * * * *
Alone with Lionel, Lady Margot kept him talking, upon the sound
principle that young men, as a rule, do not use speech to disguise
thought and action. Also, she was interested in his theme. The chase, in
its many phases, excited her. Half an hour passed swiftly. At the end of
an hour she thought that she had his measure. She summed him up,
temporarily, as “the nicest boy I’ve ever met.” Of her many instincts
the maternal was probably the least developed, and yet, at this first
meeting, she did feel motherly towards Lionel Pomfret. She owned as much
to herself, and was much amused and indeed tickled by a new sensation.
Lionel, she made sure, was plastic clay to the hand of a potter. His
modesty and sincerity made a deep impression upon a young lady who, for
some years, had carefully picked her cavaliers from men who were neither
modest nor quite sincere. More unerringly she judged him to be no fool.
He exhibited alertness and vitality—an excellent combination. He might,
under discreet guidance, go far—as far as the Upper Chamber, for
example. To be the wife of a peer may be a paltry ambition, but it must
be remembered that Lady Margot was the only child of a great country
magnate. Much that pertains to such a position had passed to her
kinsman. Secretly she resented this. Her solicitors told her that a
barony in abeyance might be terminated in her favour. No steps had been
taken in such a direction. She made up her mind to wait till she was
married.
It is not so easy to describe Lionel’s judgment of her. Humbled after
his experience with Moxon, he was willing to admit that his prejudice
against an unknown girl had been absurd. Tom Challoner was big enough
and stupid enough to shoulder the blame of that. The little lady, whose
notoriety frightened him, was delightfully approachable. Already, he had
slid into an easy intimacy. But did he like her? Would he get to like
her? That question remained unanswered.
They were alone together for a few minutes before dinner. He had noted
the perfection of her motoring kit; he was not quite prepared for the
fresh frock which she wore that first evening. When she sailed into the
Long Saloon, he blinked. She came towards him laughing.
“Tell me! Am I too smart?”
Her quickness of wit disarmed him. She had seen him blink. And she knew
that the frock was a thought too smart for a family party.
He lied like a gentleman.
“Too smart? Of course not.”
She displayed it, making a pirouette. She might have been an ingénue
gowned for her first ball, an artless nymph of seventeen. No nymph,
however, of tender years could have thought out her next sentence—
“I wanted my frock to be worthy of this lovely room.”
“By George! it is.”
“Very many thanks. Is that a Reisener cabinet?”
“I don’t know. It’s French, I believe.”
“Oh, dear! Oh, dear! And you don’t know?”
Her sprightliness infected him.
“Perhaps, like my mother, I prefer persons to things.”
“Thanks again. But, frankly, I’m amazed. This room is full of beautiful
furniture—all of different periods, too. But that doesn’t matter.
Really good bits, if they have age to them, never bark at each other.
Those pastels are adorable.”
Lionel flushed a little.
“I know nothing of them, either.”
She shrugged her shoulders. In her hand was a fan, for the night was
hot. She tapped his arm with the fan, and then opened it deftly,
glancing at him over the edge of it.
“But, positively, I must teach you. It will be great fun. We’ll play
‘swaps.’ I could write an article on ‘tufting’ and ‘slots’ and ‘laying
on the pack.’ But I don’t know growing wheat from barley.” (She did.)
“I’ll go to school with you, if you’ll go to school with me?”
“Done,” said Lionel. “My hand on it.”
They were shaking hands, as Sir Geoffrey came in. Lady Pomfret followed
with a murmured apology:
“My dear, forgive me! The Squire and I are seldom late for dinner.”
The Squire added a few words.
“You see we don’t treat you too ceremoniously.”
Fishpingle’s sonorous tones were heard.
“Dinner is served, Sir Geoffrey.”
* * * * *
During dinner, and afterwards, Lady Margot made herself vastly agreeable
to the three Pomfrets. If effort underlay her sprightly civilities, it
was not visible. Her enemies—and she had some—affirmed that her
consistent good temper and wish to please were indications of
selfishness. Any deviation from the broad and easy path which she trod
so gaily meant personal discomfort. But if her tact in avoiding
conversational brambles provoked gibes from cynics, her _joie de vivre_
disarmed them. And coming, as she did, to Pomfret Court at a moment when
Lionel was feeling exasperatingly hipped and bored with himself she
served alike as tonic and narcotic. She lulled to sleep nervous
introspections; she stimulated energies which found expression in sport
and games. He had wanted some one to “play about with.” Lady Margot
presented herself.
He soon decided that she was not flirtatious, as that word is
interpreted in India. Physically, she kept men at a respectful distance,
disdaining furtive pressures of the hand, languishing glances—all the
cheap wiles of the provincial beauty. Mentally, so to speak, she
“nestled up.” Lionel felt more and more at his ease with her. She
laughed derisively when he touched hesitatingly upon his perplexties.
Such worries, she assured him lightly, were the common heritage of
eldest sons of magnates. She propounded her own easy philosophy, so
practical in its way, so alluring. Position had its responsibilities. It
existed, if you like, on sufferance. But authorty—for which by birth
and training she was a stickler—would be disastrously weakened and in
the end wrecked, if it indulged too freely in sentimental vagabondage.
Their caste repudiated sentiment, scrapped it ruthlessly.
For the masses—“panem et Circenses.”
She touched airily upon marriage, citing the “affair” with the present
head of her family, setting forth her case and his with incisive
finality.
“We realised that we couldn’t pull together. I think it was a real grief
to both of us. Physically, he repelled me; intellectually, I repelled
him. A sad pity! Of course he will find somebody else, because
Beaumanoir must be saved. Poor dear Beau knows that he is not
attractive, and a title, nowadays, fetches much less in the open
market.”
Lionel felt sorry for poor Beau. He said slowly: “You can pick and
choose, if he can’t.”
She accepted the challenge calmly and candidly.
“My choice is limited, I can assure you. When I came into my tiny
kingdom I thought otherwise. And some odd spirit of contrariety to which
all women fall victims whirled me into misadventures with the wrong men.
Most young girls set an inordinate value on brains, especially their
own, if they have any. I tried to establish a sort of ‘salon’ in
Grosvenor Square. The cheek of it! I used to admire Madame Recamier. All
that is _vieux jeu_. My brains are not of the most solid order, but,
such as they are, they will constrain me to marry a man of my own class.
So you see I am fairly up against it.”
But he didn’t see.
“Up against what?” he asked.
She laughed joyously.
“Up against the stupidity of our class. I bar stupid gentlemen and
clever bounders. Some of the cleverest bound like kangaroos. Now you
see, Mr. Lionel Pomfret, that my choice is very much limited. Probably I
shall die an old maid, and leave my money to found an Institution for
brightening Aristocratic Wits.”
They were riding together when this talk took place. They rode out each
day, making for the moors of the New Forest, where a horseman can gallop
for miles and not leave heather or grass. Upon this occasion they had
strayed further afield than usual, and were likely to be late for
luncheon. Lionel glanced at his watch, and said so, adding “I can show
you a short cut through the woods.”
They turned their horses’ heads homewards and passed through a Forest
Enclosure, where Lionel pointed out some fallow-bucks. Crossing a
“gutter,” where the clayey soil was soft, he found deer-tracks, and
taught her the difference between the slot of a buck and a doe.
Information of any sort, she assimilated quickly and gratefully. But a
little more time was wasted over this object lesson. Beyond the
enclosure was some open ground and another enclosure. After that the
forest was left behind, and the riders were on private property. A line
of gates led to the high-road to Nether-Applewhite. Unfortunately the
last gate was padlocked. Lionel glanced at the fence, a stiff but not
very formidable obstacle.
“Can my horse jump?” asked Lady Margot.
“I don’t know,” he replied, doubtfully.
“We’ll soon find out.”
Before he could stop her, she put her mare at the fence, and popped
over. Lionel joined her, delighted with her pluck. Without a lead, in
cold blood, on a strange mount, she had negotiated triumphantly a rather
nasty place. When he complimented her, she said carelessly:
“I love excitements.”
For the first time he beheld her as the “dasher.”
* * * * *
A meeting between Joyce and the little lady duly took place. Joyce, of
course, was at a slight disadvantage. In Lady Margot she beheld Lionel’s
probable wife. In Joyce Lady Margot beheld a pretty, intelligent girl,
the parson’s daughter, more or less cut to approved pattern. She was
perfectly charming to Joyce, and came to the instant conclusion that she
must be reckoned with seriously. Joyce’s first talk alone with her
confirmed this. Lady Margot said chaffingly:
“I hear you are the ministering angel, carrying soup and tea and
sympathy to the villagers. Do tell me all about it. I have never been
able to do that. At Beaumanoir, when I was seventeen, I made the effort.
I remember reading the Bible to an old woman. She went to sleep, poor
old dear. I discovered later that she was very deaf. She listened to the
Bible when she was awake in the hope of getting something more
material.”
Joyce laughed and nodded; she knew the type. But she said quietly:
“I don’t carry soup and tea to them. Father is dead against that, except
in emergency cases.”
“Please tell me what you do.”
“I have been through a simple course of village cookery. I try to teach
the mothers how to make their own soup, a _pot-au-feu_, how to cook
vegetables, and grow them. All the little dodges which save time and
fuel and money. Very poor people are astoundingly extravagant and
thriftless. It’s uphill work. I move about as fast as the hour hand of a
clock.”
“What else?”
“Oh, other little dodges to secure ventilation and hygiene. Anything
which makes them learn to help themselves, to rely upon themselves
rather than upon charity. Father has worked steadily along those lines.
We have started one or two tiny industries, basket-weaving, mat-making.”
“You like all that?”
“I love it, when one gets a glimpse of—results.”
“Will you take me round with you?”
“With pleasure.”
That evening, Lady Margot wrote to a friend, describing Joyce:
“The parson’s daughter here is a striking combination of the useful and
ornamental, as clear as her skin. She has an abundance of brown wavy
hair with golden threads in it, and eyes to match, features good
enough— everything about her well-proportioned, including, so far as I
can judge, the mind. She is healthy, but not aggressively bouncing. I am
told that a Cambridge Don is much enamoured. Everybody likes her, and so
do I, perhaps because she is my antithesis in every way. Happy blood
ebbs and flows in her cheeks. I envied a brace of dimples. . . .”
The two girls met at tennis and golf. Apart from the discussion of
games. Lionel was amused to notice that their visitor pursued Joyce with
eagerness, “pumping” her dry about work in the parish, insatiable in her
thirst for information. Joyce slaked this thirst, wondering what lay
behind such questionings: merely curiosity, or a desire upon the part of
a future châtelaine of Pomfret Court to acquaint herself with the
internal condition of the small kingdom over which, some day, she might
reign. Lady Pomfret, listening placidly, inclined to the latter
hypothesis. Several days had passed, nearly a week, and she had duly
informed her lord that Lady Margot did “like” Lionel. She was not of the
generation that uses lightly the word “love.” And she guessed that
“liking” might be enough for their visitor, who openly disdained intense
emotions. She dashed at experiences and from them when they threatened
to disturb her peace of mind. But she told Lady Pomfret, perhaps
designedly, that she got on “swimmingly” with her son. And, apparently,
Lionel got on swimmingly with her. The Squire, summing up the situation
to his wife, said, with a jolly laugh:
“No complaints, my dear Mary, no complaints.”
He took for granted that she shared his complacency and prayed night and
morning that his desires should be accomplished.
Let us admit candidly that Lionel was drifting down-stream. The current
of circumstances swirled too strongly for him. He told himself, with
futile reiteration, that he must “do his bit.” And the easiest way to do
that “bit” was to marry Margot, _if she would have him_, which he
thought was most unlikely. He had been asked to call her Margot, and did
so. But she remained singularly aloof from the point of view of a
prospective lover. This aloofness might be reckoned her “Excalibur,” a
naked blade which she deliberately interposed between herself and her
cavaliers. Even the clever bounders, with rare exceptions, had not
bounded over that. Being human, Lionel felt piqued, recalling Tom
Challoner’s words. Was she really cold as Greenland’s icy mountains?
But—what a companion!
At the end of the first week, Lady Margot learnt through her maid that
Mr. Moxon had been refused by Joyce Hamlin. She had heard much of Moxon
from Lionel, rather too much, for she had no sympathy with his views,
and dismissed them contemptuously as academic and Utopian. Finally, she
had silenced Lionel by saying:
“I dislike schoolmasters. I regard them as necessary evils, like
inspectors of nuisances. They ought never to be seen in society. I
always behold them cane in hand, hectoring and lecturing. Enough of your
Professor Moxon.”
Nevertheless, she knew that he was well-to-do and clever, clever enough
to have turned Lionel, neck and crop, out of a snug groove, leaving him
hung up to dry amongst windy theories and problems yet unsolved. She had
no notion that Moxon’s doctrines had been filtered through Joyce.
Why had Joyce refused Moxon?
She dashed at the only conclusion possible to an enlightened student of
life.
Joyce was in love with Lionel.
Poor Joyce!
She surveyed her tranquilly with sincere pity. Why were girls such
hopeless, helpless fools? According to Mrs. Poyser, God Almighty had
made the women fools to match the men. Was Lionel a fool, too?
Obviously, as yet he could not read Joyce, but such transparent
documents might be read at any moment. What then? Love bred love. She
reflected, quite dispassionately, that Joyce and Lionel were a pretty
pair, romantically considered. Passion slumbered in each. A word, a
glance, a touch, and it would burst into flame.
Her maid had left the room. Lady Margot was alone in the virginal,
chintz-calendered blue and white bower which had been assigned to her.
She lay in bed, with an electric light above her. A book, not a novel,
was beside her. Memoirs were her favourite reading, not faked memoirs
written by ingenious compilers, but the genuine article.
She laid the book upon a table, turned out the electric light, and
engaged in her particular form of prayer—rigorous self-examination and
analysis.
If she wanted Lionel, she must act.
Did she want him?
He had most engaging qualities. His manner with his mother was
illuminating; such a devoted son might be reckoned sure to make a loyal
and attentive husband. He had a sweet, sunny temper. He was intelligent,
enthusiastic, and pleasant to look at. Greatest of assets, he was an
agreeable companion.
And she wished to marry. She regarded marriage as an adventure, a
tremendous experience. No unmarried woman could boast that she had lived
fully. Again and again, lying wide-awake in the darkness, she had
visualised herself as the wife of a successful barrister, or painter, or
novelist. Such men, she knew, made indifferent husbands if they were at
the top of their several trees. Success imposed intolerable burdens.
Goethe had been wise in marrying a simple hausfrau. And brilliant men
were so subject to moods, such slaves to temperament. Life with Lionel
would be a delightful pilgrimage through sunny places. . . .
She thrilled.
An enchanting languor crept upon her. Perhaps at that moment she was
almost in love. Her busy little brain stopped working. She beheld
herself, as in a dream, alone with her lover. His lips were on hers. His
arms were about her. She yielded joyously to his embrace. As if in a
trance, she murmured his name—Lionel. And she hardly recognised her own
voice. She moved, and the spell was broken. But her heart throbbed;
every pulse had quickened; her cheeks burned. . . .
Then her brain began to calm and control the senses. She felt
half-ashamed, half-proud of her emotions. Often she had wondered if she
were quite normal. Many women, and some men, had told her that she
wasn’t. Never in her twenty-five years of life had she been so
physically thrilled and excited.
Yes—she wanted him.
It will be noted that different causes had brought about the same effect
in two young women. Joyce realised her love for Lionel at the moment
when she knew that he had need of her; Lady Margot was thrilled into
what she believed to be love because she felt the need of him. Let
psychologists determine whether or not this differentiates true love
from its counterfeit presentment.
She awoke, next day, quite herself, and capable of smiling mockingly at
the momentary triumph of body over mind. But her resolution to marry
Lionel remained fixed—a positive determination. Cool, matutinal
reflection made her reconsider the over-night conviction that Joyce must
necessarily be in love with Lionel merely because she had refused
another man. The first thing to do was to put this conclusion to the
test. Sooner or later an unsophisticated parson’s daughter would “give
herself away.” To her credit, let it be recorded, she resisted the
temptation to “pump” her maid. Gossip with servants was a violation of
her code. And, invariably, it led to familiarity, which she abhorred.
Moxon’s love story was told to her incidentally and inadvertently. Happy
Chance had given her a clue.
At breakfast Lady Pomfret became sensible of a subtle change in her
guest. She sparkled as usual, but with a more vital scintillation. That
might be the effect of country air upon a Mayfair maiden. Allowing for
this, Lady Pomfret decided that Margot was “tuned up”—fully charged
with electricity, ready to take the road to a definite destination. She
proposed golf, a foursome—Sir Geoffrey, Lionel, Joyce and herself. With
all her cleverness she was unable to speak Joyce’s name without an
inflection of pity. Lady Pomfret caught that inflection and drew certain
inferences. She said tentatively:
“Yes, yes, dear Joyce has rather a dull time of it. Pray ask her, and
bring her back to luncheon.”
Sir Geoffrey seconded this. In his mind comparisons between Joyce and
Margot (they all called her Margot) were inevitable, and much in favour
of the little lady. Let Lionel see them together, the oftener the
better!
Accordingly, the four motored to Bramshaw, a New Forest course,
fascinatingly pretty, set in the heart of the deep woods, where William
of Orange planted the oaks which he designed in the fulness of time to
become ships of the line. Sir Geoffrey being the best player, Lady
Margot chose him as her partner. She wanted to watch Joyce with Lionel!
The course was in excellent condition, and the fairway not too hard
after July rains. The Squire remarked upon this, because it meant August
hunting. Indeed, the first meet of the buckhounds had been fixed, and
Lady Margot, without much pressure, had consented to prolong her visit.
To Sir Geoffrey’s great satisfaction she cancelled a Scotch engagement,
observing candidly:
“I should be bored to tears up there.”
The Squire asked jovially: “Does that mean, Margot, that you are not too
bored with us?”
“Bored?” she echoed. “Do I look bored? I’m perfectly happy. It is dear
of you to keep me on.”
Sir Geoffrey took the honour, and drove his ball well down the course.
Lionel fluffed his shot. The Squire chuckled. At golf the mistakes of
our nearest and dearest are not altogether displeasing to us.
“We shall down em,” he predicted.
They did at first. Lionel happened to be badly off his game. Joyce
played well and steadily. The young man’s mortification deepened as he
hit ball after ball into the rough, which, of course, made Joyce’s
following stroke all the more difficult. A couple of balls were lost in
the heather and whins. On each occasion Lady Margot left the Squire to
help her opponents to find their ball. Lionel’s ever-increasing
depression amused and pleased her. She liked men to be “keen”—up to a
point. That point must not be a “vanishing point.” For instance, the
keenness of clever novelists kept them locked up, inaccessible,
invisible. She rallied Lionel gaily:
“What does it matter?”
He answered irritably:
“Nothing to you, Margot. But I’m wrecking Joyce’s game, spoiling her
morning, confound it!”
Joyce looked at him. Lady Margot’s eyes twinkled. What she had
confidently expected came to pass. The parson’s daughter “gave herself
away.” Her fleeting glance at a worried and apologetic partner was
unmistakable. It flashed its message upon the ambient air, and was gone!
Her voice, however, remained under control.
“You are not wrecking my game, Lionel. I like difficult shots.”
“Do you?” murmured Margot. “And perhaps you regard golf as a sort of
epitome of life?”
Joyce flashed another glance at her.
“I suppose I do.”
“If you found yourself ‘bunkered,’ you would not lose heart?”
At last Joyce had a glimpse of claws, but she answered quietly:
“I should take my niblick and try to get out.”
Lionel’s voice interrupted them.
“Here’s the beastly ball, and quite unplayable.”
“What will you do?” asked Margot of Joyce.
“Play it out.”
Her caddy presented a niblick. Joyce concentrated her attention upon the
ball, deeply imbedded in heather. The ball was _almost_ unplayable. The
Squire sauntered up, slightly impatient of the delay, thinking of his
luncheon.
“Chuck this hole,” he suggested. “We’ll walk to the next tee.”
“Shall we chuck the game?” said Lionel to his partner. “This is not my
day out.”
“We’re four up and six to go,” added the Squire.
“Chuck the game?” repeated Joyce. “Never!”
Lionel pulled himself together. All trace of irritation vanished. He
laughed, squaring his shoulders, sticking out his chin.
“Joyce is a stayer and so am I. Father, I’ll take four to one in
half-crowns?”
“Done!” said the Squire.
“I’ll give the same odds,” remarked Margot.
“Right,” replied Lionel. “Go it, Joyce! Smite and spare not! Get on to
the fairway, if you can.”
“Get on to the green,” exclaimed the Squire derisively.
Margot frowned. An absurd thought harassed her, clawing savagely at
something she despised, a rigorously suppressed sense of the
superstitious. Had a mocking speech been taken seriously? Was this game,
so much in her favour already, to be regarded as an epitome of the
greater game to be played to a finish between herself and Joyce? By
something of a coincidence, the Squire, who shared her desires, was her
partner——!
Joyce planted her feet firmly in the heather—and smote.
“Bravo!” exclaimed Lionel. “The luck has turned. This puts ginger into
me.”
Sir Geoffrey and Margot applauded generously. The ball pitched in the
fairway, and lay, nicely teed up, upon a tuft of grass. Lionel took his
brassey.
“That ball,” he declared solemnly, “is going on to the green. I know
it.”
He made a beautiful shot.
“Dead, b’ Jove!” growled the Squire.
“Not quite,” said Joyce.
Lionel and his partner had played “two more.” When they reached the
thirteenth green, each side had played three strokes. Margot had to play
her ball from the edge of the green. Joyce had a six foot putt. If
Margot could lie “dead,” the hole would be halved. It was not very
likely that Joyce would hole her putt over a roughish green. Margot took
her time, playing with extraordinary care. Her ball trickled within a
foot of the hole.
“Down ours,” enjoined Lionel to his partner. “You’ll do it, Joyce. It’s
a sitter.”
Joyce played as carefully as Margot, scrutinising the lie of the ground.
Lionel did the same, adding a last word:
“Bang for the back of the hole!”
“I think so,” said Joyce.
She holed out with a smile.
“Three up and five to go,” proclaimed the Squire.
“Want to double the bet?” asked Lionel.
“No, boy, no.”
“I will, Lionel,” said Margot.
“Right again. Your drive, Joyce.”
The fourteenth at Bramshaw is a short hole, an easy mashie shot, if
properly played. A topped shot rolls into thick whins. Joyce, still
smiling, pitched her ball on the green and overran it. Margot got too
much under her ball, which fell short of the green into the bunker
guarding it.
“Two and four,” said Lionel. “We’re getting on, Joyce. I love playing
with you.”
The Squire stared at his ball, and then failed to get it out of the
bunker. He picked it up, looking sadly at a deep cut in its surface.
“My drive,” he said gloomily, fishing a new ball out of his pocket.
The fifteenth was halved. The Squire smiled again. Joyce had the honour.
She drove steadily, keeping well to the left. Margot felt disagreeably
nervous, as she addressed the ball. Going back too quickly, she stabbed
down, topping it badly. The Squire whistled.
“We’re in trouble, my dear.”
They were. The luck had changed. Margot had to play two more after the
Squire’s shot. She achieved a fine stroke too late to save the hole. One
up and two to play.
“Close finish,” said Lionel cheerily.
The seventeenth hole is only easy for an accomplished golfer. If you
take a driver for the tee shot you go too far; unless you are a fine
“iron” player you fall lamentably short. Lionel took his cleek, and was
short, but well in the fairway. The Squire selected that old and trusty
servant—a spoon.
“This does the trick,” he observed to his partner. “There you are,
Margot—a possible two, my dear.”
He chuckled complacently, taking Margot’s arm. He believed the match was
over. The ball he had just driven lay some three yards from the hole.
Lionel said to Joyce: “If you want to wipe your shoes on me, Joyce, I’ll
lie down and let you do it.”
Joyce asked her caddie for a mashie.
The shot presented no great difficulties, except that it was necessary
to lay the ball dead at a distance of forty yards. To Lionel’s delight
she succeeded famously, leaving her partner a putt of three feet upon a
level green.
At this crisis, Margot failed lamentably. She ought, of course, to have
laid her ball within a foot of the hole. Joyce, with the same shot,
bearing in mind the score, would have played for safety. Instead, Margot
putted boldly for the hole and overran it six feet. The Squire made
light of this misdemeanor, for it was quite obvious that the little lady
had lost her temper.
“I shall down it,” he assured her. But his ball lipped the hole and ran
round it. Lionel holed out in three.
“All square,” said the Squire. “Now, Margot, we’ll give ’em a taste of
our real quality.”
She smiled faintly, irritated with herself, irritated with Lionel, who
was much too cock-a-whoop. In silence she followed her partner to the
eighteenth tee. Joyce drove off as steadily as ever, no pressing, a nice
full swing. Margot followed with a fair shot, but many yards short of
Joyce’s ball. This left the Squire a very dangerous stroke. If he played
for the “pin,” he might land in a ditch. If he “skrimshanked,” Margot
would have to play a difficult approach on to the most tricky green on
the course.
“What shall I do?” he asked.
“Go for it,” replied Margot, curtly.
Sir Geoffrey took out his brassey, shaking his head, as he noted a
“cuppy” lie. But he knew himself to be a good and steady player, and
this was “a corking good match.”
To his immense satisfaction he played the shot of the day, carrying the
ditch and running on to the green. Lionel congratulated him heartily:
“You’re a marvel, father. That shot has cost me seven and sixpence.”
“Not yet,” said Joyce. “Play well to the left.”
Fired by his father’s example, Lionel made an excellent shot. When they
reached the green the Squire’s ball lay below the hole. Lionel’s was
above. The odds, therefore, were at least two to one against Lionel and
his partner. Joyce had to putt downhill upon a slippery surface.
Lionel wondered whether her nerve would fail her. A fairy’s touch was
needed. If the ball overran the hole it must trickle on down the slope.
Joyce, however, did exactly the right thing at the right time.
“It’s a halved match,” said the Squire, “and one of the best I’ve ever
played.”
Margot had the easiest of approach putts, but her blunder at the
seventeenth lay heavy on her mind. She was terrified of overrunning the
mark. She putted feebly; the ball quivered upon the crest of the slope,
and rolled back. When it stopped it was further from the hole than
before.
“Um!” said the Squire. “An inch more and you’d have done it. Cheer up!”
She was biting her lip with vexation.
The Squire putted for the hole and missed it.
“I’ve this for the match,” said Lionel.
The ball lay some twenty inches from the hole. Lionel popped it in, and
turned to Joyce.
“I could hug you, Joyce,” he said gaily.
Lady Margot shrugged her shoulders.
“I must give up golf,” she said tartly. “It exasperates me.”
The Squire laughed at her, as he handed his son half a sovereign.
“We can’t always win, my dear.”
* * * * *