The Prince was everything I expected him to be, an overweight arrogant slob. He reeked of booze and cheap perfume.
I didn’t think it would be much of a match.
As we walked to the first tee the Prince told me that we would have to have a bet. He understood I drove an Aston Martin, I confirmed it.
“I will bet my Ferrari against it.”
“How many strokes do you want?”
“None,” he replied.
I caught the eye of the Foreign Office guy, he was shaking his head NO.
“What's the matter aren’t you as good of a golfer as you are supposed to be?”
This guy was really pushing my buttons. I held out my hand and we shook on the bet.
It was a typical cloudy, windy day for St. Andrews so no course records were set. I was shooting mostly pars and the prince double bogies.
We took a break at the ninth. When we were ready to start he said something I found curious.
“Now you have saved your honor by showing how good you are now is the time you fall apart and I win.”
The FO guy had joined us during our break but hadn’t been on the course with us. Just the Prince, our caddies, and his two bodyguards.
The bodyguards had been unobtrusive all day. I even remarked upon them. The Prince let me know they didn’t work for him, they were employed by his Uncle the King.
As long as he wasn’t attacked they didn’t care what happened.
The wind had died down and I had a better feel for the greens so my score was much better on the back nine, still no record but respectable.
The Prince if anything got worse. You could see him physically tire as we went. His shots were terrible. At the same time, every time we went to tee off he asked me if this was the hole I was going to collapse on.
I didn’t collapse, when we got to eighteen I had a twenty-five stroke lead on him. As we teed off he told me this was going to be a disgrace the way I played this. No one would believe that he had beat me.
“I’m thinking we have a bet and I don’t want to lose my Aston Martin.”
I birdied the last hole, my first of the day. The Prince quit after ten strokes.
The FO guy was waiting for us. The Prince stormed past him trailed by his guards. One of the guards winked at me as he went by.
“Good job,” he whispered.
The FO guy asked me how much I lost by. I looked at him like he was crazy. I beat him by over thirty strokes.
I swear the guy got pale.
“But you were supposed to lose.”
“There was no way I would lose to that clown.”
“But we promised him you would!”
“No one told me that, I wouldn’t have played.”
“Oh lord, I don’t know what I’m going to tell the Minister.”
“Just tell him I was my usual uncooperative self. And that next time ask me upfront, better yet, tell him there will be no next time.”
The FO guy took off, I ended up having to hire a car to take me back to the airport. I was going to offer him a plane ride back to London, but he could sod off.
On Thursday the Prince’s Ferrari was delivered. It looked like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it. Every metal surface and window glass was damaged. The interior was cut up with all the seat stuffing pulled out.
The control panel had been hammered in. To say it was a mess was an understatement. My first impulse was to junk it, then had a better idea. A couple of phone calls and I talked to a Ferrari dealer in London.
They agreed to pick it up and restore it completely. It would cost almost as much as a new one but it would be worth it. I intended to have pictures taken with me in it and send them to the jerk. Petty I know, but sometimes it is fun to be petty.
On Friday morning I had just finished breakfast after my morning routine when Mr. Hamilton informed me I had a visitor waiting in the front hall.
The young man, maybe twenty-five, was dressed in suit and tie. He had a satchel which he made a big deal of opening and giving me an envelope.
I had now been hand-delivered an official missive from the Foreign Secretary. I knew it was official from all the seals hanging from the large red envelope. That and the fact it was hand-delivered.
The messenger, a different FO flunky than the last one turned to leave. I asked him to wait one moment as I might have a reply.
He impatiently nodded his head, he obviously had better things to do. He did wince when I ripped the end off the envelope instead of using a letter opener like any civilized person.
The letter, when you took all the bumf out of it, boiled down to; somethings do not need to be said, you should just know.
I told him there would be a brief reply. Mr. Hamilton, who was hovering nearby retrieved a sheet of paper and an envelope both with The Meadows letterhead, and pen from a drawer in the table. This table had a bowl to receive calling cards, which probably hadn’t happened in fifty years. I noted a letter opener in the drawer, good to know if I wanted to fake civilized.
My reply was since I have no idea what you are talking about maybe it should be said. Of course, I knew he was
