The Golf Omnibus (32 page)

“No, I'll tell him myself,” said Bradbury. He strode to the telephone. “Hullo!” he said, curtly.

He was not fond of this Bott. There are certain men who seem fated to go through
life as rivals. It was so with Bradbury Fisher and J. Gladstone Bott. Born in the same town within a few days of one another, they had come to New York in the same week, and from that moment their careers had run side by side. Fisher had made his first million two days before Bott, but Bott's first divorce had got half a column and two sticks more publicity than Fisher's.

At Sing-Sing, where each had spent several happy years of early manhood, they had run neck and neck for the prizes which that institution has to offer. Fisher secured the position of catcher on the baseball nine in preference to Bott, but Bott just nosed Fisher out when it came to the choice of a tenor for the glee club. Bott was selected for the debating contest against Auburn, but Fisher got the last place on the crossword puzzle team, with Bott merely first reserve.

They had taken up golf simultaneously, and their handicaps had remained level ever since. Between such men it is not surprising that there was little love lost.

“Hullo!” said Gladstone Bott. “So you're back? Say, listen. Fisher. I think I've got something that'll interest you. Something you'll be glad to have in your golf collection.”

Bradbury Fisher's mood softened. He disliked Bott, but that was no reason for not doing business with him. And though he had little faith in the man's judgment it might be that he had stumbled upon some valuable antique. There crossed his mind the comforting thought that his wife was three thousand miles away and that he was no longer under her penetrating eye—that eye which, so to speak, was always “about his bath and about his bed and spying out all his ways”.

“I've just returned from a trip down South,” proceeded Bott, “and I have secured the authentic baffy used by Bobby Jones in his first important contest—the Infants' All-In Championship of Atlanta, Georgia, open to those of both sexes not yet having finished teething.”

Bradbury gasped. He had heard rumours that this treasure was in existence, but he had never credited them.

“You're sure?” he cried. “You're positive it's genuine?”

“I have a written guarantee from Mr. Jones, Mrs. Jones, and the nurse.”

“How much, Bott, old man?” stammered Bradbury. “How much do you want for it, Gladstone, old top? I'll give you a hundred thousand dollars.”

“Ha!”

“Five hundred thousand.”

“Ha, ha!”

“A million.”

“Ha, ha, ha!”

“Two million.”

“Ha, ha, ha, ha!”

Bradbury Fisher's strong face twisted like that of a tortured fiend. He registered in quick succession rage, despair, hate, fury, anguish, pique, and resentment. But when he spoke again his voice was soft and gentle.

“Gladdy, old socks,” he said, “we have been friends for years.”

“No, we haven't,” said Gladstone Bott.

“Yes, we have.”

“No, we haven't.”

“Well, anyway, what about two million five hundred?”

“Nothing doing. Say, listen. Do you really want that baffy?”

“I do, Botty, old egg, I do indeed.”

“Then listen. I'll exchange it for Blizzard.”

“For Blizzard?” quavered Fisher.

“For Blizzard.”

It occurs to me that, when describing the closeness of the rivalry between these two men, I may have conveyed the impression that in no department of life could either claim a definite advantage over the other. If that is so, I erred. It is true that in a general way, whatever one had, the other had something equally good to counterbalance it; but in just one matter Bradbury Fisher had triumphed completely over Gladstone Bott. Bradbury Fisher had the finest English butler on Long Island.

Blizzard stood alone. There is a regrettable tendency on the part of English butlers today to deviate more and more from the type which made their species famous. The modem butler has a nasty knack of being a lissom young man in perfect condition who looks like the son of the house. But Blizzard was of the fine old school. Before coming to the Fisher home he had been for fifteen years in the service of an earl, and his appearance suggested that throughout those fifteen years he had not let a day pass without its pint of port. He radiated port and popeyed dignity. He had splay feet and three chins, and when he walked his curving waistcoat preceded him like the advance guard of some royal procession.

From the first, Bradbury had been perfectly aware that Bott coveted Blizzard, and the knowledge had sweetened his life. But this was the first time he had come out into the open and admitted it.

“Blizzard?” whispered Fisher.

“Blizzard,” said Bott firmly. “It's my wife's birthday next week, and I've been wondering what to give her.”

Bradbury Fisher shuddered from head to foot, and his legs wobbled like asparagus stalks. Beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead. The serpent was tempting him—tempting him grievously.

“You're sure you won't take three million—or four—or something like that?”

“No; I want Blizzard.”

Bradbury Fisher passed his handkerchief over his streaming brow.

“So be it,” he said in a low voice.

The Jones baffy arrived that night, and for some hours Bradbury Fisher gloated over it with the unmixed joy of a collector who has secured the prize of a lifetime. Then, stealing gradually over him, came the realization of what he had done.

He was thinking of his wife and what she would say when she heard of this. Blizzard was Mrs. Fisher's pride and joy. She had never, like the poet, rear'd a young gazelle, but, had she done so, her attitude towards it would have been identical with her attitude towards Blizzard. Although so far away, it was plain that her thoughts still lingered with the pleasure she had left at home, for on his arrival Bradbury had found three cables awaiting him.

The first ran:

“How is Blizzard? Reply.”

The second:

“How is Blizzard's sciatica? Reply.”

The third:

“Blizzard's hiccups. How are they? Suggest Doctor Murphy's Tonic Swamp-Juice. Highly spoken of. Three times a day after meals. Try for week and cable result.”

It did not require a clairvoyant to tell Bradbury that, if on her return she found that he had disposed of Blizzard in exchange for a child's cut-down baffy, she would certainly sue for for divorce. And there was not a jury in America that would not give their verdict in her favour without a dissentient voice. His first wife, he recalled, had divorced him on far flimsier grounds. So had his second, third, and fourth. And Bradbury loved his wife. There had been a time in his life when, if he lost a wife, he had felt philosophically that there would be another along in a minute; but, as a man grows older, he tends to become set in his habits, and he could not contemplate existence without the company of the present incumbent.

What, therefore, to do? What, when you came right down to it, to do?

There seemed no way out of the dilemma. If he kept the Jones baffy, no other price would satisfy Bott's jealous greed. And to part with the baffy, now that it was actually in his possession, was unthinkable.

And then, in the small hours of the morning, as he tossed sleeplessly on his Louis Quinze bed, his giant brain conceived a plan.

*    *    *    *    *

On the following afternoon he made his way to the club-house, and was informed that Bott was out playing around with another millionaire of his acquaintance. Bradbury waited, and presently his rival appeared.

“Hey!” said Gladstone Bott, in his abrupt uncouth way. “When are you going to deliver that butler?”

“I will make the shipment at the earliest date,” said Bradbury.

“I was expecting him last night.”

“You shall have him shortly.”

“What do you feed him on?” asked Gladstone Bott.

“Oh, anything you have yourselves. Put sulphur in his port in the hot weather. Tell me, how did your match go?”

“He beat me. I had rotten luck.”

Bradbury Fisher's eyes gleamed. His moment had come.

“Luck?” he said. “What do you mean, luck? Luck has nothing to do with it. You're always beefing about your luck. The trouble with you is that you play rottenly.”

“What!”

“It is no use trying to play golf unless you learn the first principles and do it properly. Look at the way you drive.”

“What's wrong with my driving?”

“Nothing, except that you don't do anything right. In driving, as the club comes back in the swing, the weight should be shifted by degrees, quietly and gradually, until, when the club has reached its topmost point, the whole weight of the body is supported by the right leg, the left foot being turned at the time and the left knee bent in towards the right leg. But, regardless of how much you perfect your style, you cannot develop any method which will not require you to keep your head still so that you can see your ball clearly.”

“Hey!”

“It is obvious that it is impossible to introduce a jerk or a sudden violent effort into any part of the swing without disturbing the balance or moving the head. I want to drive home the fact that it is absolutely essential to⎯”

“Hey!” cried Gladstone Bott.

The man was shaken to the core. From the local pro., and from scratch men of his acquaintance, he would gladly have listened to this sort of thing by the hour, but to hear these words from Bradbury Fisher, whose handicap was the same as his own, and out of whom it was his imperishable conviction that he could hammer the tar any time he got him out on the links, was too much.

“Where do you get off,” he demanded, heatedly, “trying to teach me golf?”

Bradbury Fisher chuckled to himself. Everything was working out as his subtle mind had foreseen.

“My dear fellow,” he said, “I was only speaking for your good.”

“I like your nerve! I can lick you any time we start.”

“It's easy enough to talk.”

“I trimmed you twice the week before you sailed to England.”

“Naturally,” said Bradbury Fisher, “in a friendly round, with only a few thousand dollars on the match, a man does not extend himself. You wouldn't dare to play me for anything that really mattered.”

“I'll play you when you like for anything you like.”

“Very well. I'll play you for Blizzard.”

“Against what?”

“Oh, anything you please. How about a couple of railroads?”

“Make it three.”

“Very well.”

“Next Friday suit you?”

“Sure,” said Bradbury Fisher.

It seemed to him that his troubles were over. Like all twenty-four-handicap men, he had the most perfect confidence in his ability to beat all other twenty-four-handicap men. As for Gladstone Bott, he knew that he could disembowel him at any time he was able to lure him out of the club-house.

Nevertheless, as he breakfasted on the morning of the fateful match, Bradbury Fisher was conscious of an unwonted nervousness. He was no weakling. In Wall Street his phlegm in moments of stress was a byword. On the famous occasion when the B. and G. crowd had attacked C. and D., and in order to keep control of L. and M. he had been compelled to buy so largely of S. and T., he had not turned a hair. And yet this morning, in endeavouring to prong up segments of bacon, he twice missed the plate altogther and on a third occasion speared himself in the cheek with his fork. The spectacle of Blizzard, so calm, so competent, so supremely the perfect butler, unnerved him.

“I am jumpy today, Blizzard,” he said, forcing a laugh.

“Yes, sir. You do, indeed, appear to have the willies.”

“Yes. I am playing a very important golf-match this morning.”

“Indeed, sir?”

“I must pull myself together, Blizzard.”

“Yes, sir. And, if I may respectfully make the suggestion, you should endeavour, when in action, to keep the head down and the eye rigidly upon the ball.”

“I will, Blizzard, I will,” said Bradbury Fisher, his keen eyes clouding under a sudden mist of tears. “Thank you, Blizzard, for the advice.”

“Not at all, sir.”

“How is your sciatica, Blizzard?”

“A trifle improved, I thank you, sir.”

“And your hiccups?”

“I am conscious of a slight though possibly only a temporary relief, sir.”

“Good,” said Bradbury Fisher.

He left the room with a firm step and, proceeding to his library, read for a while portions of that grand chapter in James Braid's
Advanced Golf
which deals with driving into the wind. It was a fair and cloudless morning, but it was as well to be prepared for emergencies. Then, feeling that he had done all that could be done, he ordered the car and was taken to the links.

Gladstone Bott was awaiting him on the first tee, in company with two caddies. A curt greeting, a spin of the coin, and Gladstone Bott, securing the honour, stepped
out to begin the contest.

Although there are, of course, endless sub-species in their ranks, not all of which have yet been classified by scicnce, twenty-four-handicap golfers may be stated broadly to fall into two classes, the dashing and the cautious—those, that is to say, who endeavour to do every hole in a brilliant one and those who are content to win with a steady nine. Gladstone Bott was one of the cautious brigade. He fussed about for a few moments like a hen scratching gravel, then with a stiff quarter-swing sent his ball straight down the fairway for a matter of seventy yards, and it was Bradbury Fisher's turn to drive.

Now, normally, Bradbury Fisher was essentially a dasher. It was his habit, as a rule, to raise his left foot some six inches from the ground and, having swayed forcefully back on to his right leg, to sway sharply forward again and lash out with sickening violence in the general direction of the ball. It was a method which at times produced excellent results, though it had the flaw that it was somewhat uncertain. Bradbury Fisher was the only member of the club, with the exception of the club champion, who had ever carried the second green with his drive; but, on the other hand, he was also the only member who had ever laid his drive on the eleventh dead to the pin of the sixteenth.