you touched that door.'
Arthur's jaw dropped.
'What! Then how the deuce am I to get it out?'
'That,' I said, gravely, 'is a question between you and your Maker.'
It was here that Arthur Jukes forfeited the sympathy which I had begun
to feel for him. A crafty, sinister look came into his eyes.
'Listen!' he said. 'It'll take them an hour to catch up with us.
Suppose, during that time, that door happened to open accidentally, as
it were, and close again? You wouldn't think it necessary to mention
the fact, eh? You would be a good fellow and keep your mouth shut, yes?
You might even see your way to go so far as to back me up in a
statement to the effect that I hooked it out with my----?'
I was revolted.
'I am a golfer,' I said, coldly, 'and I obey the rules.'
'Yes, but----'
'Those rules were drawn up by----'--I bared my head reverently--'by the
Committee of the Royal and Ancient at St. Andrews. I have always
respected them, and I shall not deviate on this occasion from the
policy of a lifetime.'
Arthur Jukes relapsed into a moody silence. He broke it once, crossing
the West Street Bridge, to observe that he would like to know if I
called myself a friend of his--a question which I was able to answer
with a whole-hearted negative. After that he did not speak till the car
drew up in front of the Majestic Hotel in Royal Square.
Early as the hour was, a certain bustle and animation already prevailed
in that centre of the city, and the spectacle of a man in a golf-coat
and plus-four knickerbockers hacking with a niblick at the floor of a
car was not long in collecting a crowd of some dimensions. Three
messenger-boys, four typists, and a gentleman in full evening-dress,
who obviously possessed or was friendly with someone who possessed a
large cellar, formed the nucleus of it; and they were joined about the
time when Arthur addressed the ball in order to play his nine hundred
and fifteenth by six news-boys, eleven charladies, and perhaps a dozen
assorted loafers, all speculating with the liveliest interest as to
which particular asylum had had the honour of sheltering Arthur before
he had contrived to elude the vigilance of his custodians.
Arthur had prepared for some such contingency. He suspended his
activities with the niblick, and drew from his pocket a large poster,
which he proceeded to hang over the side of the car. It read:
COME
TO
McCLURG AND MACDONALD,
18,
FOR
ALL GOLFING SUPPLIES.
His knowledge of psychology had not misled him. Directly they gathered
that he was advertising something, the crowd declined to look at it;
they melted away, and Arthur returned to his work in solitude.
He was taking a well-earned rest after playing his eleven hundred and
fifth, a nice niblick shot with lots of wrist behind it, when out of
