March, 1916 Golfers Magazine
honor. He was a good driver, and he got a ball 220 yards down the center. Mr. Jellie teed up and took his driver from the caddie.
It is amazing the number of extraneous and impertinent thoughts that can occupy a man’s mind when he is trying to hit a golf ball. Though skies tumble and the earth shakes on its foundations he is supposed to keep his eye and mind directed on the ball and nothing but the ball; but such is the perversity and levity of the human brain that at the most critical instant it is apt to be concerning itself with mere trifles, such as the latest quotation on C., A. & Q. or the price of your wife’s last hat. Mr. Jellie found himself considering the curious feel of the new grip on his driver. An inexplicable sensation seemed to communicate itself from the shaft into every part of his body, even to the tips of his toes; a sense of confidence, elation, mastery. Always before, when preparing to make a shot, he had been nervous, stiff, uncomfortable, and painfully doubtful of his ability to hit the ball at all; now he felt as though he could walk up carelessly and knock the thing a million miles.
“It’s because I haven’t played for so long,” he was saying to himself. “It’s because—but I must keep my eye on the ball—I haven't played—but I must—for so long—”
He swung savagely. To Fraser’s eye it appeared to be the same old Jellie swing, stiff, ungraceful, jerky, ill-timed; and his astonishment was therefore the greater when he saw the ball sailing true and straight far down the course. Midway in its flight it appeared to gain new momentum, lifting gently upward, and in direction it was absolutely dead.
“Some drive,” said Fraser, encouragingly, as the two men started down the fairway.
“Yes,” agreed Mr. Jellie, who was intensely surprised. But what he was surprised at was the fact that he was not surprised. It was unquestionably the longest and straightest drive he had ever made. Two weeks ago that shot would have left him electrified with astonishment, and now he actually seemed inclined to take it as a matter of course.
“Well,” he thought, “it’s been ten days since I’ve played. Wait till I flub a couple.”
The first hole at Grassview is 475 yards. The fairway is narrow, with hazards on one side and out of bounds on the other, and just in front of the green is a deep sand pit. On his second Fraser took a driving mashie and played a little short of the sand pit. Mr. Jellie, who had outdriven him by thirty yards, used a brassie and carried over the hazard to the green.
“By Jove, you’re putting it up to me,” said Fraser, in some surprise.
Mr. Jellie nodded. His face was a little flushed. Never before had he been on that green in two; more often he had made the sand pit on his third or fourth. He felt vaguely that something was the matter, and the curious thing about it was that he experienced no surprise. He had taken the brassie for the purpose of making the green, and as he addressed the ball he had felt absurdly confident that it would go there.
Fraser, who had played short, had only an easy mashie pitch left. He played it perfectly; the ball dropped on the edge of the green, rolled over the smooth turf straight for the pin and stopped six inches away, dead for a four. Mr. Jellie was twenty feet from the hole. He took his putter from the caddie, walked up to the ball and tapped it. It started straight, seemed to waver for an instant, then went on and dropped in the cup with a gentle thud.
“Three,” said Mr. Jellie in a voice that trembled.
“Your hole,” observed Fraser. “Good Lord, Jellie, what’s the matter with you? Two under par! Some three! I got one under myself.”
“Oh, I’ve sunk twenty-footers before,” replied Mr. Jellie, with an effort at calmness. But the flush on his face deepened and there was a queer look in his eye.
On the second, a hole for a long and short shot, they got good drives and
