"Do you know anything about golf?" I asked Pottlebury by way of making
conversation with a comparative stranger, and immediately afterwards
knew I had made a mistake. I should have inquired, "Do you golf?" or
"Are you a golfer?" and no evasion would have been possible.
"I should think I do," he replied. "I suppose there's hardly a course
between here and Strathpeffer that I haven't visited. English and
Scottish, I know them all."
"And which is your favourite course?"
"That is a difficult question," he remarked judicially. "Only last
night I was arguing about the comparative merits of Westward Ho! and
St. Andrews. Both are easily accessible from the railway, but if you
take your car the latter is to be preferred. You get your life bumped
out of you on those North Devon roads."
"I wasn't thinking of the travelling facilities," I observed coldly.
"No, of course. It's what you find at the other end that counts. Well
then, travelling aside, there is much to be said for Sandwich. The
members' quarters are comfortable--very comfortable."
I must have made a disparaging gesture, for he immediately
continued:--
"But, if it's only lunch you want, I advise those Lancashire clubs
round Southport. They know how to lunch in those parts--Tweed salmon,
Welsh mutton and Whitstable oysters."
"No doubt your judgment is correct," I replied, "but I----"
"And at one of them they keep a real French _chef_ who knows his
business. I wouldn't wish for a better cuisine anywhere."
"There are other things," I remarked loftily, "besides those you
mention."
"Exactly; that's why I like to see a good bridge-room attached and
enough tables to accommodate all comers. They have that at Spotworth.
You can often get a game of poker as well."
"But don't you see," I exclaimed, "that all these things, are mere
accessories and circumstances?"
"That is true," he murmured; "they are but frames as it were of the
human interest. After all there's nothing to equal a crowd of jolly
good fellows in the smoking-room. I've had some excellent times down
at Bambury--stayed yarning away to all hours. Some of the best fellows
I ever met belonged to that club."
"You don't talk at all like a golfer," said I.
Pottlebury laughed. "I was forgetting. If it's whisky you want you
can't beat Dornoch and Islay. We've nothing in England to touch them.
Why, I've met some of the keenest golfers of the day at Islay--nothing
less than a bottle a day apiece."
"Sir," said I severely, "it is clear that you have never struggled
like grim death with an opponent who was three up at the turn until
you were all square at the seventeenth, and then found yourself after
a straight drive with an easy baffy shot to----"
"One moment," said Pottlebury; "what exactly _is_ a baffy?"
* * * * *
Asking For It.
"----'s have dozens of other cars available; L65 to L1,700;
call and insult us."
_Motoring Paper._
* * * * *
[Illustration: HIS FIRST PATIENT.