'What I meant was that the time has come when one of us must leave.'
'Oh, only one of you?' It was something, of course, but I confess I was
disappointed, and I think my disappointment must have shown in my
voice; for he looked at me, surprised.
'Surely you wouldn't mind Jukes going?' he said.
'Why, certainly not. He really is going, is he?'
A look of saturnine determination came into Ralph's face.
'He is. He thinks he isn't, but he is.'
I failed to understand him, and said so. He looked cautiously about the
room, as if to reassure himself that he could not be overheard.
'I suppose you've noticed,' he said, 'the disgusting way that man Jukes
has been hanging round Miss Trivett, boring her to death?'
'I have seen them together sometimes.'
'I love Amanda Trivett!' said Ralph.
'Poor girl!' I sighed.
'I beg your pardon?'
'Poor girl!' I said. 'I mean, to have Arthur Jukes hanging round her.'
'That's just what I think,' said Ralph Bingham. 'And that's why we're
going to play this match.'
'What match?'
'This match we've decided to play. I want you to act as one of the
judges, to go along with Jukes and see that he doesn't play any of his
tricks. You know what he is! And in a vital match like this----'
'How much are you playing for?'
'The whole world!'
'I beg your pardon?'
'The whole world. It amounts to that. The loser is to leave Leigh for
good, and the winner stays on and marries Amanda Trivett. We have
arranged all the details. Rupert Bailey will accompany me, acting as
the other judge.'
'And you want me to go round with Jukes?'
'Not round,' said Ralph Bingham. 'Along.'
'What is the distinction?'
'We are not going to play a round. Only one hole.'
'Sudden death, eh?'
'Not so very sudden. It's a longish hole. We start on the first tee
here and hole out in the town in the doorway of the Majestic Hotel in
Royal Square. A distance, I imagine, of about sixteen miles.'
I was revolted. About that time a perfect epidemic of freak matches had
broken out in the club, and I had strongly opposed them from the start.
George Willis had begun it by playing a medal round with the pro.,
George's first nine against the pro.'s complete eighteen. After that
came the contest between Herbert Widgeon and Montague Brown, the
latter, a twenty-four handicap man, being entitled to shout 'Boo!'
three times during the round at moments selected by himself. There had
been many more of these degrading travesties on the sacred game, and I
had writhed to see them. Playing freak golf-matches is to my mind like
ragging a great classical melody. But of the whole collection this one,
considering the sentimental interest and the magnitude of the stakes,
seemed to me the most terrible. My face, I imagine, betrayed my
