About six weeks ago a Canadian gentleman named Smith arrived in the Old
Country (England). He knew a man who knew a man who knew a man ... and
so on for a bit ... who know a man who knew a man who knew me. Letters
passed; negotiations ensued; and about a week after he had first set
foot in the Mother City (London) Smith and I met at my Club for lunch.
I may confess now that I was nervous. I think I expected a man in a
brown shirt and leggings, who would ask me to put it "right there," and
tell me I was "some Englishman." However, he turned out to be exactly
like anybody else in London. Whether he found me exactly like anybody
else in Canada, I don't know. Anyway, we had a very pleasant lunch, and
arranged to play golf together on the next day.
Whatever else is true of Canada there can be no doubt that it turns out
delightful golfers. Smith proved to be just the best golfer I had ever
met, being, in fact, when at the top of his form, almost exactly as good
as I was. Hole after hole we halved in a mechanical eight. If by means
of a raking drive and four perfect brassies at the sixth he managed to
get one up for a moment, then at the short seventh a screaming iron and
three consummate approaches would make me square again. Occasionally he
would, by superhuman play, do a hole in bogey; but only to crack at the
next, and leave me, at the edge of the green, to play "one off eleven."
It was, in fact, a ding-dong struggle all the way; and for his one-hole
victory in the morning I had my revenge with a one-hole victory in the
afternoon.
By the end of a month we must have played a dozen rounds of this nature.
I always had a feeling that I was really a better golfer than he, and
this made me friendly towards his game. I would concede him short putts
which I should have had no difficulty in missing myself; if he lost his
ball I would beg him to drop another and go on with the hole; if he got
into a bad place in a bunker I would assure him it was ground under
repair. He was just as friendly in refusing to take these advantages,
just as pleasant in offering similar indulgences to me. I thought at
first it was part of his sporting way, but it turned out that (absurdly
enough) he also was convinced that he was really the better golfer of
the two, and could afford these amenities.
One day he announced that he was going back to Canada.
"We must have a last game," he said, "and this one must be decisive."
"For the championship of the Empire," I agreed. "Let's buy a little cup
and play for it. I've never won anything at golf yet, and I should love
to see a little cup on the dinner-table every night."
"You can't come to dinner in Canada _every_ night," he pointed out. "It
would be so expensive for you."
Well, the cup was bought, engraved "The Empire Challenge Cup," and
played for last Monday.
"This," said Smith, "is a serious game, and we must play all out. No
giving away anything, no waiving the rules. The Empire is at stake. The
effeteness of the Mother Country is about to be put to the proof.
Proceed."
It wasn't the most pleasant of our games. The spirit of the Cup hung
over it and depressed us. At the third hole I had an eighteen-inch putt
for a half. "That's all right," said Smith forgetfully, and then added,
"perhaps you'd better put it in, though." Of course I missed. On the
fifth green he bent down to brush away a leaf. "That's illegal," I said
sharply, "you must pick it up; you mayn't brush it away," and after a
fierce argument on the point he putted hastily--and badly. At the
eighteenth tee we were all square and hardly on speaking terms. The fate
of the Mother Country depended upon the result of this hole.