John Henry Smith Part 4

I should judge him to be a man of about fifty-five, or perhaps a year of two older. He stands more than six feet, is broad of shoulder and equally broad of waist, ruddy of complexion, clear of eye and quick of motion. He is of the breezy, independent type peculiar to those who have risen to fortune with the wonderful development of our western country, and it is difficult to realise that he is a real live magnate.

His close-cropped beard shows few gray hairs, and does not entirely hide the lines of a resolute chin. He looks like a prosperous farmer who has been forced to become familiar with metropolitan conventionalities, but whose rough edges have withstood the friction. His voice is heavy but not unpleasant, and his laugh jovial but defiant. He reminds me of no one I have seen, and I shall study him with much interest.

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. 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 G.o.ds in their play have topped their drives. The spin around its axis causes it to slice about the sun. This strikes me as rather poetic, and when I write a golf epic I shall elaborate on this fancy.

Harding has no such conception of this whirling earth of ours. He is fully convinced that it was created for the purpose of being cross-hatched with railroads, and that it never had any real utility until he gridironed the western prairies with ten thousand miles of rust and grease. I thought of that as I watched him standing by the side of Carter, his huge hands thrust deep in his pockets, his bushy head thrown back, and a tolerant grin on his bearded lips.

I was practising putting on a green set aside for that purpose, and Carter saw me and motioned me to come to him. He introduced Harding, who shook hands and then glanced curiously at my putter.

"What do you call that?" he asked, taking it from my hand. It was an aluminum putter of my own design, and I have won many a game with it. I told him what it was.

"Looks like a brake shoe on the new-model hand-cars," he said, swinging it viciously with one hand. "How far can you knock one of those little pills with it?"

"I see that you do not play golf," I said, rather offended at his manner.

"No, there are a lot of things I do not do, and this is one of them," he replied, and then he laughed. "But let me tell you," he added, "I used to be a wonder at s.h.i.+nny."

I would have wagered he would make some such remark.

"Do you see that scar on the bridge of my nose?" he asked. "That came from a crack with a s.h.i.+nny club when I was not more than ten years old.

s.h.i.+nny 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, s.h.i.+nny 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 s.h.i.+nny is capable of contrasting Venice with a drainage ca.n.a.l, and I came near telling him so. Golf and s.h.i.+nny! 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. "It certainly isn't much of a trick to hit one of those b.a.l.l.s with a mallet like that. When I was your age," turning to Carter, "I could swing a maul and send a railroad spike into five inches of seasoned oak, and never miss once a week, and I'll bet that if I had to I could do it again. That was what your father used to do for a living, and if he hadn't worked up from a section boss to the presidency of a railroad you would have something else to do besides batting b.a.l.l.s around a farm and then hunting for 'em. But I suppose you must like it or you wouldn't do it."

"I think you would find the game interesting if you took it up,"

suggested Carter, whose father is nearly as rich as Harding. "Smith and I will initiate you into the mysteries of the game."

"Oh, I suppose I'll have to play now that I'm here," he said, with the most exasperating complacency. "My daughter plays some, and she is as crazy about it as the rest of them. I don't see where the fascination comes in. I called the other day on a man who was once in the Cabinet.

He is rich and famous, and can have anything or do anything he likes, but he spends most of his time playing golf. I went to him and attempted to induce him to represent us in a big railway lawsuit, but he said it would prevent his playing in some tournament where he expected to win five dollars' worth of plated pewter. What do you think of that?

Wouldn't take the case, and there was fifty thousand in it for him! I roasted the life out of him."

"'If you would drop this fool game and pay the same amount of attention to your political fortunes,' I said to him, 'you would have a right to aspire to the Presidency of the United States.' And what do you suppose he said to me?"

I a.s.sured him that I had not the slightest idea.

"'Mr. Harding,' he said to me in perfect seriousness, when I attempted to put this presidential bee in his bonnet, 'Mr. Harding, I would rather be able to drive a golf ball two hundred and fifty feet than be President of the United States for life.' That's what he said, and I told him he was crazy, and he is so mad at me that I don't dare go near him."

"Didn't he say two hundred and fifty yards?" asked Carter, who had been listening intently. "Two hundred and fifty feet is no drive."

"Mebbe it was yards," admitted Harding, disgusted that Carter ignored the point of his story, "but let me tell you that I'd rather be President of the United States for one minute than to be able to drive one of those little pellets two hundred and fifty miles! I'll tell you what I'll do!" he exclaimed, turning fiercely on both of us. "I never tried to play this idiotic game in my life, but I'll bet the Scotch and soda for the three of us that I can drive a ball further than either of you."

"That would hardly be fair," I protested, though I was delighted at the chance to take some of the conceit out of him. I have seen many of his type before, and it is a pleasure to witness their downfall.

"Why wouldn't it be fair?" he demanded.

"Because you know nothing of the swing of a club or of the follow through," I attempted to explain.

"The follow what?" he asked.

"The follow through," I repeated.

"What the devil is the follow through?" he asked, reaching for Carter's bag. "Let me take yours and I'll try it anyhow."

"The 'follow through' is not a club," I explained when we had ceased laughing, "but it is the trick of sending the face of the club after the ball when you have hit it. It is the end of the stroke, and by it you get both distance and direction. Without a good follow through it is impossible to drive a ball any considerable distance, no matter how great the strength with which you hit it. This knack can only be acquired after much practise."

"You don't say?" he laughed. "Let me tell you that when I used to play baseball I had a 'follow through' which made the fielders get out so far when I came to bat that the spectators had to use fieldgla.s.ses to see where they were. If I hit that golf ball good and fair it will 'follow through' into the next county, and don't you forget that I told you so!

Come on, boys!"

Carter looked at me and winked. There was no one waiting on the first tee, and a clear field ahead. It was agreed that Carter should have the honour, I to follow, and that Harding should drive last.

Harding stripped off his coat and waistcoat, removed his collar and rolled up his sleeves. I was impressed with his magnificent physique, and do not recall when I have seen so ma.s.sive and well-formed a forearm.

From my bag he selected a driver which I seldom use on account of its excessive weight, and looked at it critically.

"Pretty fair sort of a stick," he observed, swinging it clumsily and viciously, "but I'd rather have one of those hickory roots we used to cut for s.h.i.+nny when I was a boy. Go ahead and soak it, Carter, so that I may know what I've got to beat."

I mentally resolved to press even at the chance of flubbing. Carter hit the ball too low, and it sailed into the air barely clearing the lane, stopping not more than one hundred and fifty yards away.

"That's not so much," said Harding, grimly. "Bat her out, Smith, and then watch your Uncle Dudley!"

I carefully teed a new ball and took a practise swing or two. I felt morally certain that Harding could not beat Carter's drive, poor as it was, but I was anxious to show him how a golf ball will fly when properly struck.

I fell on that ball for one of the longest and cleanest drives I ever made, and it did not stop rolling until it was twenty yards past the two-hundred-yard post. I was properly proud of that shot, and despite his loud talk I felt a sort of pity for Harding.

"Is that considered a fairly good shot?" he asked.

"It was a good one for Smith, or for that matter for anyone," replied Carter, who was a bit sore that he had fallen down.

"It looks easy for me," calmly declared Harding stepping up to the tee.

"Can you make as high a pile of sand as you want to?"

"Yes, but it is better to tee it close to the ground," advised Carter.

"If you tee it high you are apt to go under it."

Ignoring Carter's advice he reached into the box, scooped out a double-handful of sand and piled it in a pyramid at least four inches high. On the apex of this he placed a new ball I had taken from my bag, and which I felt reasonably certain would be cut in two in the improbable event that he hit it. He stood back and surveyed his preparations with evident satisfaction.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "... but there was blood in his eye"]

It was impossible for Carter and me to keep our faces straight, but Harding paid no attention to us.

"I ought to be able to hit that, all right," he said, walking around the sand pile and viewing it from all sides. Then he stood back and took a practise swing.

He stood square on both feet, his legs spread as far apart as he could extend them. He grasped the shaft of the club with both hands, holding the left one underneath. His practise swing was the typical baseball stroke used by all novices, and I saw at a glance that in all probability he would go under his ball.