The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [5841]
True, she accompanied him to his golf games and sailed with him or rode in his big car almost as often as he asked her. And she thoroughly enjoyed these things. But what she did not enjoy was the rather too jovial comradeship that followed on the part of the men and women her father associated with. He was a good liver and a good spender, and he liked to have about him such persons-men "sleek and fat," who if they did not "sleep o' nights," at least had the happy faculty of turning night into day for their own amusement.
So, in a measure, Viola and her father were out of sympathy, as had been husband and wife before her; though there had never been a whisper of real incompatibility; nor was there now, between father and daughter.
"Fore!"
It was the warning cry from the first tee to clear the course for the start of the cup-winners' match. In anticipation of some remarkable playing, an unusually large gallery would follow the contestants around. The best caddies had been selected, clubs had been looked to with care and tested, new balls were got out, and there was much subdued excitement, as befitted the occasion.
Mr. Carwell, his always flushed face perhaps a trifle more like a mild sunset than ever, strolled to the first tee. He swung his driver with freedom and ease to make sure it was the one that best suited him, and then turned to Major Wardell, his chief rival. "Do you want to take any more?" he asked meaningly.
"No, thank you," was the laughing response. "I've got all I can carry. Not that I'm going to let you beat me, but I'm always a stroke or two off in my play when the sun's too bright, as it is now. However, I'm not crawling."
"You'd better not !" declared his rival. As for me, the brighter the sun the better I like it. Well, are we all ready?"
The officials held a last consultation and announced that play might start. Mr. Carwell was to lead.
The first hole was not the longest in the course,but to place one's ball on fair ground meant driving very surely, and for a longer distance than most players liked to think about. Also a short distance from the tee was a deep ravine, and unless one cleared that it was a handicap hard to overcome.
Mr. Carwell made his little tee of sand with care, and placed the ball on the apex. Then he took his place and glanced back for a moment to where Viola stood between Captain Poland and Harry Bartlett. Something like a little frown gathered on the face of Horace Carwell as he noted the presence of Bartlett, but it passed almost at once.
"Well, here goes, ladies and gentlemen!" exclaimed Mr. Carwell in rather loud tones and with a free and easy manner he did not often assume. "Here's where I bring home the bacon and make my friend, the major, eat humble pie."
Viola flushed. It was not like her father to thus boast. On the contrary he was usually what the Scotch call a "canny" player. He never predicted that he was going to win, except, perhaps, to his close friends. But he was now boasting like the veriest schoolboy.
"Here I go!" he exclaimed again, and then he swung at the ball with his well-known skill.
It was a marvelous drive, and the murmurs of approbation that greeted it seemed to please Mr. Carwell.
"Let's see anybody beat that!" he cried as he stepped off the tee to give place to Major Wardell.
Mr. Carwell's white ball had sailed well up on the putting green of the first hole, a shot seldom made at Maraposa.
"A few more strokes like that and he'll win the match," murmured Bartlett.
"And when he does, don't forget what I told you," whispered Viola to him.
He found her hand, hidden at her side in the folds of her dress, and pressed it. She smiled up at him, and then they watched the major swing at his ball.
"It's going to be a corking match," murmured more than one member of the gallery, as they followed the players down the field.
"If any one asked me, I should say that Carwell had taken just a little too much