Frederick Upham Adams

“ Think of sitting with a golf club in your hand, resting a few rods from a tee where a clean shot will carry the railway tracks a hundred feet below and land your ball on a green two hundred and eighty yards from the tee—it is one of the finest holes in the country—think of idling an hour away on the most perfect golf afternoon you ever saw, and repeating line after line of verse descriptive of "meadows green and sylvan shades," and all that sort of thing! ”

“ We have wandered from our subject. The question is this: what shall we do in order to ascertain if Miss Harding entertains toward us any sentiment stronger than friendship? Ask her, you say. Suppose you ask her. No, my dear John Henry, that is not the proper step at this time.
I do not set myself up as an authority in matters of love, but I do hold that no wise man ever proposed to a good and true woman without knowing in advance that she would accept him. Love has its secret code, and Nature gives the key to its discerning votaries. I have that key, John Henry Smith. ”

“ Smith and I will be partners," said Miss Harding, and it was the happiest moment of my life.
"I don't care who are partners," said Harding, stepping up to the tee.
"I'll shoot first, and you keep your eye on your Uncle Dudley!"
He piled up a hill of sand, gripped his club like grim death, drew back, swung with all his might—and missed the ball by three inches.
"One stroke!" laughed Miss Harding.
"That don't count!" he declared. "I didn't hit the blamed thing at all!
Look at it! It's just where I fixed it a minute ago. Don't cheat, Kid!"
"A missed ball counts a stroke," laughed Carter. ”

“ It is one of our "natural hazards," and I have thought no more of it than I would of the cushion on a billiard table.
I shall never cross that brook again without thinking of her face as I saw it mirrored in the shadows of the old stone bridge. The reflection was framed with delicate interfacings of water cress, while in the bed of the stream the smooth pebbles gleamed like pearls. The pointed reeds nodded and waved in the gentle breeze.
Now that I think of it, I have cursed those reeds many, many times while hunting for a lost ball.
"Is it not beautiful?" I exclaimed to Miss Harding. ”

“ A pretty woman is a most glorious creature, and I yield to no one in my admiration of the fair sex, but a woman is out of her proper environment when she persists in frequenting a golf course designed for men who are experts at the game.
When I see women on the broad verandas of the Woodvale Club, or when I see them strolling along the shaded paths or indulging in tennis, croquet, and other games to which they are physically fitted, I know that they possess tact and discrimination, but when I see them ahead of me on the golf links—well, it is different. ”

“ Those who are familiar with the game know that no man living can ever hope to approach its possibilities, and they also know that it is the grandest sport designed since man has inhabited this globe.
I have sometimes thought that this old globe of ours is nothing more nor less than a golf ball, brambled with mountains and valleys, and scarred with ravines where the gods in their play have topped their drives. The spin around its axis causes it to slice about the sun. ”

“ Shinny is a great game; a great game! It requires quickness of eye and limb, and more than that it demands a high degree of courage. It teaches a boy to stand a hard knock without whimpering. Yes, sir, shinny is a great game, and all boys should play it," and he rubbed the scar on his nose tenderly.
A man who would compare golf with shinny is capable of contrasting Venice with a drainage canal, and I came near telling him so. Golf and shinny! Whist and old maid! Pink lemonade and champagne!
"No, sir, I never could see much in this golf game," said Harding, handing back my putter. ”

“ He was with Carter, who seemed well acquainted with him, and he greeted each drive whether it was good or bad with a sneering smile. This told me that he had never played the game, and that he had all of the outsider's contempt for it. I knew exactly what he thought, for I was once as ignorant and unappreciative as he is now.
A mutual contempt exists between those who play golf and those who do not. Those who have not played are sure they could become expert in a week, if they had so little sense as to waste time on so simple and objectless a game. ”

“ I went right at him.
"When you have played as many games of golf as you have of billiards," I said, and I play a fair billiard game myself, "you will not mention them in the same breath. Let me assure you, Mr. Harding, that golf is the most difficult game in the world, and you have only the slightest conception of what you must master before you can play more than an indifferent sort of a game." ”

“ At last when it appeared as if our quest were interminable we surmounted a rail fence and found ourselves in a road.
"Pine Top half a mile," was the cheering announcement made by Peterson as he held the lantern so that Miss Harding could examine the extent of a rent just made in her gown.
Ten minutes later we stood on the platform of the little red station in Pine Top, and the spasmodic clatter of a telegraph instrument was music in our ears.
Down came the rain, but what cared we! The steel rails which gleamed and glistened in the signal lights led to Woodvale. ”

“ It was the ball which we less-favoured golfers dream shall some day be ours to command; the ball which starts low, rises in a concave curve, and ends its trajectory in a slight slant to the left—the low, hooked ball. It was not a phenomenally long drive; about two hundred yards, I should say, but for the apparent effort expended I have never seen a more perfect shot.
"Why in thunder don't you hit it hard, Wallace?" demanded Bishop. "Soak it, man, soak it! That was only a love tap." ”

“ She is not the woman to weigh a man in the same scales with his money, his miles of railroad track, and such material assets. I would love her if her father were still a section boss.
And I am going to do something in this world. I propose to show you, John Henry Smith, that I can do something beside play golf. Am I not doing something now? Am I not risking practically every dollar I have in the world on my business judgment? Call it gambling if you will; if so, it is big gambling. The man who wins must take chances. Mr. Harding did not become a railway magnate by remaining a section boss. ”

“ They are great friends and always play together, and they go through the same performance every time they reach the grounds.
The moment Monahan left the train he headed for the club house as if it were on fire and all of his money in its lockers. Duff says Monahan is perfectly quiet and sane until he catches the first glimpse of the links, but that his blood then begins to boil, and that he burns in a fever of haste to get a club in his hands. ”

“ I am not indifferent in the matter of money. I am ambitious to possess it for the prestige it gives and the power it grants, but it is the simple truth to say that in those triumphant moments and in the subsequent hours the thought which held possession of me and which made me superlatively happy was the consciousness that so far as material assets were concerned I had a right to aspire to the hand of Grace Harding! ”

“ I said, "there is one confession you have not made to me."
"What is it, Jack?"
"Why did you play so wretchedly that first game in Woodvale?"
Old Tom Morris looked back and smiled in sympathy with her joyous laugh.
"They told me that you were a confirmed woman hater, and that nothing so
exasperated you as to be compelled to play with a girl who was a novice.
I wished to see if it were true. You are not a woman hater; are you,
Jacques Henri?" ”

“ Miss Dangerfield was so taken with this idea that she speedily forgot that brute Pepper.
Coming in we were passed by Marshall, Chilvers, Carter, and Boyd. How I envied them! We stood and silently watched while each made ripping long drives. There is nothing which contributes more to a man's good opinion of himself than to line a ball straight out two hundred yards when a bevy of pretty girls is watching him.
The tendency of the woman golfer to frankly express her admiration for the strength and skill of a man who can drive a clean and long ball is her great redeeming trait when on the links. ”

“ To see a woman raise a golf club with a jerky, uneven stroke, and come down on the helpless turf with the head of it, as if beating a carpet, has always given me a chill and a sensation of wild rage, but there is something about the way Miss Harding does this which is actually artistic. ”

“ LaHume wandered away in search of the ladies, whose laughter and chatter from the near-by veranda proved they were cheerfully enduring his absence. I caught a glimpse of Wallace as he drove the cows into the old barn, and wondered if LaHume seriously considered the "hired man" as a rival.
We filled our pipes and lay back in the comfortable seats, content to listen to the music of the birds overhead, and follow aimlessly the conversation between Bishop and Harding. The cider from the sacred cask had bridged the years which separated them from boyhood days back in Buckfield, Maine. ”

“ While we were there, Marshall, Chilvers and Lawson passed and asked me to make up a foursome. For the first time in my life I refused, and the way those idiots looked back at me and grinned tempted me to break a club over their heads. There is no law to compel a man to play golf if he does not wish to. I figured that a rest for half a day would improve my game. The fact is, and the best golfers are coming to realise it, that a man can play so much that he goes stale. ”

“ Percy heads for the richest heiress of each season with that same mighty instinct which leads a boy to cast wistful glances at the largest cut of pie. He thought the heiresses had quit coming, and now this happens; but he has gone so far in his campaign for the hand and cheque-book of Miss Lawrence, that he cannot stop quick without dislocating his spine. I doubt if that poor little Lawrence girl will ever have more than five millions."
"Never mind Percy and his prospects," said Marshall. "Who told you that
Miss Grace Harding is coming to Woodvale?"
"Carter told me," replied Chilvers. ”

“ I know a gentleman who owns outright 25,000 shares. He is one of the heads of which you term "the conspiracy". It is not a conspiracy, Smith; it is business. He tried to sell me out and has failed as he will learn in a few minutes. He will then sell out the men who implicitly trust him, as they would sell him out if they could see a chance to make money out of it. Do not talk of conspiracies, Smith! These honourable business gentlemen down here are extremely sensitive, and you should be careful not to hurt their feelings." ”

“ I am going to buy another block of ten thousand shares if it continues to decline, and then await developments. If it goes to zero I shall still have a little money left, and I shall have the income from the old farm—but I shall not have the hardihood to ask for the hand of Grace Harding.
You may talk as much as you please but money is a commanding factor in love and marriage. It is all very well for a wealthy man to fall in love and marry a poor girl, but it is an entirely different thing for a poor man to aspire to the hand and heart of a wealthy woman. ”

“ Even a plain woman looks pretty when with eyes and chin lifted she gazes at the star-studded heavens, her face profiled against the gleaming orb of a full moon, but no words of mine can describe the splendid beauty of Miss Harding in that attitude. ”

“ I gave a dinner in honour of my victory, and at its conclusion Miss Harding presented the "Bronze Gent," as Chilvers calls this beautiful statuette. She made a graceful speech and we cheered her wildly. How charming she looked as she stood beside the huge bulk of her proud father! I tried to say something in reply, but the light in her eyes seemed to hypnotise me, and after a few incoherent sentences Chilvers came to my relief by striking up our club song, to the tune of a familiar hymn:
"Oh, why can't I drive like other men do?
How on earth can you drive if you don't follow through?" ”

“ So I excused myself and went back to the club house and bought a box of a dozen, but nothing would change her determination not to try it again.
I am firmly convinced that with a little luck she could have done it, but it was the first time Miss Harding had played this course, and that makes lots of difference.
Of the various incidents in this most delightful game nothing gave me more keen enjoyment than when Miss Harding played Carter's ball. It was by mistake, of course. Nature has implanted in woman an instinct which leads her to play any ball rather than her own. ”

“ Of Wallace we know nothing except that he comports himself like a gentleman in reduced circumstances."
"I should imagine that would be the most difficult time to play such a role," Miss Harding said. "We know those who cannot be gentlemen even under the most encouraging circumstances. The greatest happiness which can come to a good woman is to marry the man she loves, and if she allows wealth, position or any other selfish consideration to stand in the way she does not deserve happiness." ”

“ A woman never is so tenacious of her rights as when she is in the wrong.
I wonder if that is original?
I know of no agony more acute than to be condemned to play golf with women when there is a chance to get in a foursome with good scratch men. The dyspeptic compelled to fast while watching the progress of a banquet, must suffer similar torture.
"What's the use of sitting here and talking?" demanded Chilvers. "It has cooled off; let's have a foursome. Marshall and I will play you and Boyd, Smith. ”

“ Miss Harding gave a glad cry and a quarter of an hour later when the red monster stood coughing in the muddy roadway those dry shoes were where they belonged.
With light hearts we waved farewell to the kindly old culvert and set our pace toward Woodvale. It was our plan to take the first crossroad leading from the path of the tornado, and if possible make our way to Oak Cliff. We passed a small hut which nestled in the shelter of the rocks. In our mad rush I had not noticed it, but it seemed vacant.
A little farther on the road turns sharply to the right and re-enters the forest. ”