I
I despise the sort of man who gloats and pokes his finger at you and
reminds you that he told you so. I hope I am not in that class, and I
would be the last to rub salt into an open wound; still I see no harm in
calling attention to the fact that I once expressed an opinion which had
to do with Englishmen in general and Major Cuthbert Eustace
Lawes--D.S.O., and a lot of other initials--in particular. What is more,
that opinion was expressed in the presence of Waddles Wilmot and one
other director of the Yavapai Golf and Country Club.
"You can't tell much about an Englishman by looking at him."
Those were my very words, and I stand by them. I point to them with
pride. If Waddles had listened to me--but Waddles never listens to
anybody. Sometimes he looks as if he might be listening, when as a
matter of fact he is only resting his voice and thinking up something
cutting and clever to say next.
Speaking of Waddles, the fault is not all his. We have indulged him with
too much authority. We have allowed him to become a sort of autocrat, a
golfing Pooh-Bah, a self-appointed committee of one with arbitrary
powers. He began looking after the club when it was in its infancy, and
now that the organisation has grown to quite respectable proportions he
does not seem to know how to let go gracefully. He still looks after us,
whether we want him to or not, and if it is only the getting out of a
new score card Waddles must attend to it, having the first word, the
last word and all the words between.
If any one presumes to disagree with him Waddles merely snorts in that
disdainful way of his and goes on talking louder and louder until
finally the opposition succumbs, blown down by sheer lung power, as it
were, gassed before reaching the trenches. Wind is all right in its
place, and in moderation, but a steady gale gets on the nerves in time.
Waddles is a human simoom, carrying dust, sand and cactus.
I say this in all kindness, for I am really fond of the old boy. He has
many admirable qualities, and frequently tells us what they are, but
consideration for others is not one of them; and when he plays golf the
things he does to an opponent are sinful. He is just as ruthless and
overbearing on the links as he is in committee meeting--but of this,
more anon--much more. I made my remark about Englishmen a month or so
after the Major became a member of the club. We understood that Lawes
was a retired infantry officer in poor health, and when he arrived in
our part of the world he brought with him a Hindu servant with his head
wrapped up in about forty yards of cheesecloth, an unquenchable thirst,
some gilt-edged letters of introduction from big people, and a hobnail
liver. He was proposed by two of our financial moguls and passed the
membership committee without a whisper of dissent.
"This old bird," said Waddles, "is probably a cracking good golfer.
Nearly all Englishmen are. We can use him to plug up that weak spot on
the team." And of course he looked straight at me when he said it.
Goodness knows, I never asked to be put on the club team, and I play my
worst golf in competition.
Some of the other men thought that the Major would lend a bit of tone to
the organisation. I presume they got the idea from the string of
initials after his name.
As to his golfing, the Major proved a disappointment. He did not seem in
any haste to avail himself of the privileges of active membership, and
when at the club he spent all his time sitting on the porch and staring
at the mountains in the distance. I don't remember ever seeing him
without a tall brandy highball at his elbow.
Personally, the Major wasn't much to look at. You could just as easily
have guessed the age of a mummy. He was long-legged and cadaverous,
with thin, sandy hair and a yellowish moustache that never seemed to be
trimmed. His mouth was always slightly ajar, his front teeth were unduly
prominent, and his chin was short and receded at an acute angle. A side
view of the Major suggested a tired, half-starved old rabbit that had
lost all interest in life. His eyes were a faded light blue in colour
and blinked constantly without a vestige of human expression. He was
freckled like a turkey egg--freckled all over, but mostly on the neck
and the forearms. When he spoke, which was seldom, it was in a thin,
hesitating treble, reminiscent of a strayed sheep, and he had an
exasperating habit of leaving a sentence half finished and beginning on
another one. He could sit for hours, staring straight in front of him
and apparently seeing nothing at all. When addressed he usually jumped
half out of his chair and said something like this:
"Eh? Oh! God-bless-me! God-bless-me! What say?"
Socially he was a very mangy-looking lion, but we understood that he was
very well connected in the old country and not so stupid as he seemed.
He couldn't have been, and lived. He was a bachelor of independent
means; he bought a bungalow on Medway Hill and a six-cylinder runabout,
which the servant learned to drive, after a fearsome fashion. This put
the Major out of the winter-visitor class--which was reassuring--but as
the weeks passed and he was never seen with a golf club in his hands
Waddles began to worry about that weak spot on the team.
Three of us were watching Lawes one afternoon through a window of the
lounging room, which commands a view of the porch. The Major was spread
out in a big wicker chair, and, save for certain mechanical movements of
the right hand and arm, was as motionless as a turtle on a log. As
usual, Waddles was doing most of the talking.
"Ain't he the study in still life, eh?... With the accent on the
still--get me? Still! Ho, ho! Not bad a bit.... Gaze upon him,
gentlemen; the world's most consistent rum hound! He hasn't moved a
muscle in the last hour except to lift that glass. Wonderful type of the
athletic Englishman, what-oh? Devoted to sports and pastimes, my word,
yes! He wouldn't qualify for putting the shot, but for putting the
highball I'll back him against all comers."
"Oh, I don't know," said Jay Gilman, who is a conservative sort of chap
and knows Waddles well enough not to believe everything he says. "I
don't know. The old boy makes a drink last a long time. He doesn't order
many in the course of an afternoon. I've never seen him the least bit
edged."
"Fellow like that never gets edged," argued Waddles. "The skin stays
just so full all the time. Can't get any fuller. Did you ever try to
talk with his royal jaglets? Sociable as an oyster! I tried to get him
opened up the other day. He's been in India and Africa and everywhere
else, they tell me, and I thought he might want to gas about his
experiences. War stuff. Nothing stirring. A frost. Kidded him about the
Boers, and the way the embattled farmers hung it on perfidious Albion.
Couldn't even get a rise out of him. All he did was stare at me with
those fishy eyes of his and make motions with his Adam's apple! Ever
notice the way he watches you when you're talking to him? It's enough to
make a man nervous! A major, eh? If he was a major, I wonder what the
shave-tail lieutenants were like! D.S.O.! They got the initials balled
up when they hitched that title to him. It should have been D.O.S.!"
"All right," said Gilman; "I'll bite. I'll be the Patsy. Why D.O.S.?"
"Dismal Old Souse, of course!" cackled Waddles. "Fits him like a glove,
eh?"
It was then that I expressed my opinion, as previously quoted: "You
can't tell much about an Englishman by looking at him."
But Waddles only laughed. He usually laughs at his own witticisms.
"D.O.S.," said he. "Impromptu, but good. I'll have to tell it to the
boys!"