“Ah?” said Wilmot. “A cigar?”
“Thanks,” said Poskitt.
“Nice doggie,” said Wilmot, pursuing his advantage by administering a hearty buffet to Edward’s aching torso before the shrinking animal could side-step.
“Ah,” said Poskitt.
That afternoon, for the first time for weeks, Wilmot Byng took twice of steak and kidney pudding at lunch and followed it up with treacle tart and a spot of Stilton.
And so matters stood when the day arrived for the annual contest for the President’s Cup.
The President’s Cup, for all its high-sounding name, was one of the lowliest and most humble trophies offered for competition to the members of our club, ranking in the eyes of good judges somewhere between the Grandmothers’ Umbrella and the Children’s All-Day Sucker (open to boys and girls not yet having celebrated their seventh birthday). It has been instituted by a kindly committee for the benefit of the canaille of our little golfing world, those retired military, naval and business men who withdraw to the country and take up golf in their fifties. The contest was decided by medal play, if you could call it that, and no exponent with a handicap of under twenty-four was allowed to compete.
Nevertheless, there was no event on the fixture list which aroused among those involved a tenser enthusiasm. Centenarians sprang from their bathchairs to try their skill, and I have seen men with waist lines of sixty doing bending and stretching exercises for weeks in advance in order to limber themselves up for the big day. Form was eagerly discussed in the smoking room, and this year public opinion wavered between two men: Joseph Poskitt, the First Grave Digger, and Wadsworth Hemmingway, better known in sporting circles as Palsied Percy.
The betting, as I say, hovered uncertainly between these two, but there was no question as to which was the people’s choice. Everybody was fond of Poskitt. You might wince as you saw his iron plough through the turf, but you could not help liking him, whereas Hemmingway was definitely unpopular. He was a retired solicitor, one of those dark, subtle, sinister men who carry the book of rules in their bag, and make it their best club. He was a confirmed hole-claimer, and such are never greatly esteemed by the more easy-going. He had, moreover, a way of suddenly clearing his throat on the greens which alone would have been sufficient to ensure dislike.
The President’s Cup was an event which I always made a point of watching, if I could, considering it a spectacle that purged the soul with pity and terror: but on this occasion business in London unfortunately claimed me and I was compelled to deprive myself of my annual treat. I had a few words with Wilmot before leaving to catch my train. I was pleased with the lad.
“You’ve done splendidly, my boy,” I said. “I notice distinct signs of softening on our friend’s part.”
“Me too,” agreed Wilmot jubilantly. “He thanks me now when I give him a cigar.”
“So I observed. Well, continue to spare no effort. Did you wish him success for this afternoon?”
“Yes. He seemed pleased.”
“It might be a good idea if you were to offer to caddie for him. He would appreciate your skilled advice.”
“I thought of that, but I’m playing myself.”
“Today?”
I was surprised, for President’s Cup day is usually looked on as a sort of Walpurgis Night, when fearful things are abroad and the prudent golfer stays at home.
“I promised a fellow a game, and I can’t get out of it.”
“You will be held up a good deal, I am afraid.”
“I suppose so.”
“Well, don’t go forgetting yourself and driving into Poskitt.”
“I should say not, ha, ha! Not likely, ho, ho! One doesn’t do that sort of thing twice, does one? But excuse me now, if you don’t mind. I have an appointment to wander in the woods with Gwendoline.”
It was late in the evening when I returned home. I was about to ring up Poskitt to ask how the contest had come out, when the telephone rang and I was surprised to hear Hemmingway’s voice.
“Hullo,” said Hemmingway. “Are you doing anything tomorrow morning?”
“Nothing,” I replied. “How did things come out this afternoon?”
“That is what I rang up about. Poskitt and I tied for a low score at a hundred and fifteen. I put the matter up to the Committee and they decided that there must be a play off—match play.”
“You mean stroke play?”
“No, match play. It was my suggestion. I pointed out to Poskitt that by this method he would only have to play the first ten holes, thus saving wear and tear on his niblick.”
“I see. But why was it necessary to refer the thing to the Committee?”
“Oh, there was some sort of foolish dispute. It turned on a question of rubs of the green. Well, if you aren’t doing anything tomorrow, will you referee the play off?”
“Delighted.”
“Thanks. I want somebody who knows the rules. Poskitt does not seem to realize that there are any.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Well, he appears to think that when you’re playing in a medal competition you can pick and choose which strokes you are going to count and which you aren’t. Somebody drove into him when he was addressing his ball at the eleventh and he claims that that is what made him send it at right angles into a bush. As I told him, and the Committee supported me . . .”
A nameless fear caused the receiver to shake in my hand.
“Who drove into him?”
“I forget his name. Tall, good-looking young fellow with red hair⎯”
I had heard enough. Five minutes later, I was at Wilmot’s door, beating upon it. As he opened it, I noticed that his face was flushed, his eye wild.
“Wilmot!” I cried.
“Yes, I know,” he said impatiently, leading the way to the sitting-room. “I suppose you’ve been talking to Poskitt.”
“To Hemmingway. He told me⎯”
“I know, I know. You were surprised?”
“I was shocked. Shocked to the core. I thought there was better stuff in you, young Byng. Why, when the desire to drive into people grips you, do you not fight against it and conquer it like a man? Have you no will power? Cannot you shake off this frightful craving?”
“It wasn’t that at all.”
“What wasn’t what at all?”
“All that stuff about having no will power. I was in full possession of my faculties when I tickled up old Poskitt this afternoon. I acted by the light of pure reason. Seeing that I had nothing to lose⎯”
“Nothing to lose?”
“Not a thing. Gwendoline broke off the engagement this morning.”
“What?”
“Yes. As you are aware, we went to wander in the woods. Well, you know how you feel when you are wandering in the woods with a girl you adore. The sunlight streamed through the overhanging branches, forming a golden pattern on the green below: the air was heavy with fragrant scents and murmurous with the drone of fleeting insects, and what with one thing and another I was led to remark that I loved her as no one had ever loved before. Upon which, she said that I did not love her as much as she loved me. I said yes, I did, because my love stood alone. She said no, it didn’t, because hers did. I said it couldn’t because mine did.
“Hot words ensued, and a few moments later she was saying that she never wanted to see or speak to me again, because I was an obstinate, fatheaded son of an Army mule. She then handed back my letters, which she was carrying in a bundle tied round with lilac ribbon somewhere in the interior of her costume, and left me. Naturally, then, when Poskitt and his accomplice held us up for five minutes on the eleventh, I saw no reason to hesitate. My life’s happiness was wrecked, and I found a sort of melancholy consolation in letting him have it on the seat of the pants with a wristy spoon shot.”
In the face of the profounder human tragedies there is little that one can say. I was pondering in gloomy silence on this ruin of two young lives, when the door bell rang. Wilmot
went to answer it and came back carrying a letter in his hand. There was a look upon his face which I had not seen since the occasion when he missed the short putt on the eighteenth which would have given him the Spring medal.
“Listen,” said Wilmot. “Cyanide. Do you happen to have any cyanide on you?”
“Cyanide?”
“Or arsenic would do. Read this. On second thoughts, I’ll give you the gist. There is some rather fruity stuff in Para. One which I feel was intended for my eye alone. The nub is that Gwendoline says she’s sorry and it’s all on again.”
The drama of the situation hit me like a stuffed eelskin.
“She loves you as of yore?”
“Rather more than of yore, if anything, I gather.”
“And you⎯”
“And I⎯”
“Have driven⎯”
“Have driven⎯”
“Into⎯”
“Into old Poskitt, catching him bending⎯”
“Causing him to lose a stroke and thereby tie for the President’s Cup instead of winning it.”
I had not thought that the young fellow’s jaw could drop any farther, but at these words it fell another inch.
“You don’t mean that?”
“Hemmingway rang me up just now to tell me that he and Poskitt turned in the same score and are playing it off tomorrow.”
“Gosh!”
“Quite.”
“What shall I do?”
I laid my hand upon his shoulder.
“Pray, my boy, that Poskitt will win tomorrow.”
“But even then⎯”
“No. You have not studied the psychology of the long-handicap golfer as I have. It would not be possible for a twenty-four handicap man who had just won his first cup to continue to harbour resentment against his bitterest foe. In the hour of triumph Poskitt must inevitably melt. So pray, my boy.”
A quick gleam lit up Wilmot Byng’s blue eyes.
“You bet I’ll pray,” he said. “The way I’ll pray will be nobody’s business. Push off, and I’ll start now.”
At eleven o’clock the following morning I joined Poskitt and Hemmingway on the first tee, and a few minutes later the play off for the President’s Cup had begun. From the very outset it was evident that this was to be a battle of styles. Two men of more sharply contrasted methods can seldom have come together on a golf course.
Poskitt, the d’Artagnan of the links, was a man who brought to the tee the tactics which in his youth had won him such fame as a hammer thrower. His plan was to clench his teeth, shut his eyes, whirl the club round his head and bring it down with sickening violence in the general direction of the sphere. Usually, the only result would be a ball topped along the ground or—as had been known to happen when he used his niblick—cut in half. But there would come times when by some mysterious dispensation of Providence he managed to connect, in which event the gallery would be stunned by the spectacle of a three-hundred-yarder down the middle. The whole thing, as he himself recognized, was a clean, sporting venture. He just let go and hoped for the best.
In direct antithesis to these methods were those of Wadsworth Hemmingway. It was his practice before playing a shot to stand over the ball for an appreciable time, shaking gently in every limb and eyeing it closely as if it were some difficult point of law. When eventually he began his back swing, it was with a slowness which reminded those who had travelled in Switzerland of moving glaciers. A cautious pause at the top, and the clubhead would descend to strike the ball squarely and dispatch it fifty yards down the course in a perfectly straight line.
The contest, in short, between a man who—on, say, the long fifteenth—oscillated between a three and a forty-two and one who on the same hole always got his twelve—never more, never less. The Salt of Golf, as you might say.
And yet, as I took my stand beside the first tee, I had no feeling of pleasurable anticipation. To ensure the enjoyment of the spectator of a golf match, one thing is essential. He must feel that the mimic warfare is being conducted in the gallant spirit of a medieval tourney, not in the mood of a Corsican vendetta. And today it was only too plain from the start that bitterness and hostility were rampant.
The dullest mind would have been convinced of this by the manner in which, when Hemmingway had spun a half-crown and won the honour, Poskitt picked up the coin and examined it on both sides with a hard stare. Reluctantly convinced by his inspection that there was no funny business afoot, he drew back and allowed his opponent to drive. And presently Hemmingway had completed his customary fifty-yarder, and it was Poskitt’s turn to play.
A curious thing I have noticed about golf is that a festering grievance sometimes does wonders for a man’s drive. It is as if pent-up emotion added zip to his swing. It was so on the present occasion. Assailing his ball with hideous violence, Poskitt sent it to within ten yards of the green, and a few moments later, despite the fact that Hemmingway cleared his throat both before and during the first, second and third putts, he was one up.
But this pent-up emotion is a thing that cuts both ways. It had helped Poskitt on the first. On the second, the short lake hole, it undid him. With all this generous wrath surging about inside him, he never looked like accomplishing the restrained mashie shot which would have left him by the pin. Outdriving the green by some hundred and seventy yards, he reached the woods that lay beyond it, and before he could extricate himself Hemmingway was on the green and he was obliged to concede. They went to the third all square.
Here Poskitt did one of his celebrated right-angle drives, and took seven to get out of the rough. Hemmingway, reaching the green with a steady eight, had six for it and won without difficulty.
The fourth is a dog-leg. Hemmingway drove short of the bunker. Poskitt followed with a stroke which I have never seen executed on the links before or since, a combination hook and slice. The ball, starting off as if impelled by dynamite, sailed well out to the left, then, after travelling one hundred and fifty yards, seemed to catch sight of the hole round the bend, paused in mid-air and, turning sharply to the right, soared on to the green.
All square once more, a ding-dong struggle brought them to the seventh, which Poskitt won. Hemmingway, recovering, secured the eighth.
The ninth brings you back to the water again, though to a narrower part of it, and when Poskitt, with another of his colossal drives, finished within fifty yards of the pin, it seemed as if the hole must be his. Allowing him four approach shots and three putts, he would be down in eight, a feat far beyond the scope of his opponent. He watched Hemmingway’s drive just clear the water, and with a grunt of satisfaction started to leave the tee.
“One moment,” said Hemmingway.
“Eh?”
“Are you not going to drive?”
“Don’t you call that a drive?”
“I do not. A nice practice shot, but not a drive. You took the honour when it was not yours. I, if you recollect, won the last hole. I am afraid I must ask you to play again.”
“What?”
“The rules are quite definite on this point,” said Hemmingway, producing a well-thumbed volume.
There was an embarrassing silence.
“And what do the rules say about clearing your throat on the green when your opponent is putting?”
“There is no rule against that.”
“Oh, no?”
“It is recognized that a tendency to bronchial catarrh is a misfortune for which the sufferer should be sympathized with rather than penalized.”
“Oh yes?”
“Quite.” Hemmingway glanced at his watch. “I notice that three minutes have elapsed since I made my drive. I must point out to you that if you delay more than five minutes, you automatically lose the hole.”
Poskitt returned to the tee and put down another ball. There was a splash.
“Playing three,” said Hemmingway.
Poskitt drove again.
“Playing five,” said Hemmingway.
“Must y
ou recite?” said Poskitt.
“There is no rule against calling the score.”
“I concede the hole,” said Poskitt.
Wadsworth Hemmingway was one up at the turn.
There is nothing (said the Oldest Member) which, as a rule, I enjoy more than recounting stroke by stroke the course of a golf match. Indeed I have been told that I am sometimes almost too meticulous in my attention to detail. But there is one match which I have never been able to bring myself to report in this manner, and that is the play off for the President’s Cup between Wadsworth Hemmingway and Joseph Poskitt.
The memory is too painful. As I said earlier, really bad golf is a thing which purges the soul, and a man becomes a better and broader man from watching it. But this contest, from the tenth hole—where Poskitt became all square—onwards, was so poisoned by the mental attitude of the principals that to recall it even today makes me shudder. It resolved itself into a struggle between a great-souled slosher, playing far above his form, and a subtle Machiavellian schemer who, outdriven on every hole, held his own by constant reference to the book of rules.
I need merely say that Poskitt, after a two hundred and sixty yard drive at the eleventh, lost the hole through dropping his club in a bunker, that, having accomplished an equally stupendous stroke at the twelfth, he became two down owing to a careless inquiry as to whether I did not think he could get on from there with a mashie (“seeking advice of one who was not his caddie”) and that, when he had won the thirteenth, he became two down once more at the short fourteenth when a piece of well-timed throat-clearing on the part of his opponent caused him to miss the putt which should have given him a half.
But there was good stuff in Joseph Poskitt. He stuck to it manfully. The long fifteenth I had expected him to win, and he did, but I had not been prepared for his clever seven on the sixteenth. And when he obtained a half on the seventeenth by holing out from a bunker a hundred and fifty yards short of the green, I felt that all might yet be well. I could see that Hemmingway, confident that he would be dormy one, was a good deal shaken at coming to the eighteenth all square.
The Golf Omnibus Page 45
