Brora Wald. “Bellefonte, Pa, March 14th, 1930. RELIANCE Not to the swift, the race; Not to the strong, the fight; Not to the righteous, perfect grace; Not to the wise, the light. But often faltering feet Comes surest to the goal; And they who walk in darkness meet The sunrise of the soul. A thousand times by night The Syrian hosts have died; A thousand times the vanquished right Hath risen glorified. The truth the wise men sought Was spoken by a child; The alabaster box was brought In trembling hands defiled. Not from my torch, the gleam, But from the stars above; Not from my heart life’s crystal stream But from the depths of love. SO MUCH DEPENDS ON THE APPROACH It was going to be another hot day, probably, but the morning that had just begun was still cool and fresh and sweet. It had rained in the night, and the sun wasn’t high enough yet to have dried out the Renclair course. Except for Steve Cruger only the birds, busy with their own affairs, seemed to be about; that suited him to perfection. He hadn't seen the Renclair links, until this week late in June, for six gloomy and depressing years: he hadn’t, for that matter, played any golf in those six years, either. With any luck he would, now, for a month or two; he didn’t see why he shouldn’t come out like this every morning be- fore breakfast. Unless the habits of Renclair folk had changed a good deal in six years, he’d have no com- pany. He'd been worried, a few minutes before; he'd thought a flash of yellow against the green background of the woods that bordered the eighth fair- way came from a girl's skirt or sweater. He hadn't seen it again, though; probably he’d been mistak- en. He hoped so. He drove from the sixth tee; two hundred and forty yards, straight out; very nice. All carry, practical- ly; there was no roll worth speaking of on the soaked turf. Still, had you been curious about his game, that drive would not have told you much; the veriest dub poles a good drive occasionally. Steve's second shot, though, would have told you everything, He walk- ed up to his ball, dropped his bag; sighted the line of the shot; swung back, shoulder high; took turf clean- ly and dropped the ball dead to the pin. Only a real golfer can approach So. He smiled as he holed this tiny putt; for the first time in six years he had played a hole perfectly. He had some reason to be pleased. He was frowning, though, as he stood on the seventh tee. Not be- cause of the accumulated horrors of that short hole, which had ruined so many promising medal rounds. He wasn’t afraid of it, for one thing; for another, nothing hung upon his score. No. What bothered him was an old white Dutch-colonial house and an old-fashioned garden full of holly- hocks, of ‘tall blue delphinium, of roses just coming into full bloom, that straggled down to the corner where the course turned sharply to the left. Steve Cruger, you see, had been born in that house. More than two hundred years before, a Cruger had cleared the land on which it stood and built the house, and Steve was the first Cruger since that time, in the direct line, who had not owned land and house. It was through no folly or fault of his own, to be sure, that Steve had to see it now in the hands of stran- gers; it had gone, with all else to which he had believed himself heir, in the smash that had killed his father. Yet that didn’t lessen the bitterness the sight of it brought into his eyes. He shook his head doggedly after a moment; dropped his ball; drove the green cleanly, hole high, leaving himself a- tricky twelve-foot putt. This time, however, he didn’t smile as he holed out for his two; a birdie here, he knew, was always pretty much a matter of luck. He replac- ed the flag, picked up his bag, turn- ed toward the eighth tee, and stop- ped dead. He hadn't been mistaken about that flash of yellow. There was a girl. She was sitting on the bench beside the sand box on the tee, hands clasped about her silken knees, laughing at him, full of mischief and of mirth. She was ridiculous, incon- gruous, for she wore a yellow even- ing gown and gold slippers that the wet grass had stained, and yet, even in that costume at that hour, she was very lovely. “Liar!” she said.. ‘Pig! me you didn’t play golf!” “I hadn't for six years, when you asked me,” he protested. “This is only the third time I've been out. I wanted to see if I could still hit a ball.” “I'll say you can!” she said. “I've been watching. I saw someone—we were coming back from a dance at Crooked Brook. I thought it was you. The boy friend was all for hav- ing me change and go for a swim, but I wouldn’t. And I sneaked across when he’d gone, and caught you in the act.” “Yes,” said Steve, scowling a lit- tle. He scowled too much, this young man; it was a habit with him. “You're so dumb,” the girl com- plained. “Why didn’t you ask me to get you a guest card? I could, you know. They'd have loved to black- ball us, but they didn’t dare.” “Good Lord!” Steve's scowl! deep- ened, “Did you suppose—? T've be- longed here all my life. Ikept up a non-resident membership when I—I went away.” He laughed shortly. “Hanged if I know why!” You told “Fate!” she said, making her voice deep and throaty. “So you could play with me this afternoon, after I've had some sleep. You know you're going to, now.” “I'd rather not, Miss Wilder—" She turned her back on him, elabor- ately. “All right—Joan!” he said. Then, flatly: “I don’t want to.” “Spurned again!” she said cheer- fully. “If it were only a line you'd be marvelous, Steve. You mean it, though, hang you! I've been throw- ing myself at you for months, and I'm all black and blue from bounc- ing back. I did think when I got you out here—” “Chuck it, Joan, won't you?” he said. “Look here, you know why I can’t play around with you and your crowd. I'm onlya clerk in your fath- er’'s office, even if he does have me live with you because it's handier for him.” “That's so silly!” she said. “I don’t see why you can’t be human. Oh, well, go ahead and drive. I suppose you'll let me walk around with you and watch you?” He was a little flushed as he drove. An odd picture they made. The boy —he was little more, for all the lines six years had etched in his face—in linen knickers and loose white shirt; the girl in an evening dress that clung to her slim golden legs, her wrap slipping from her tawny shoul- ders. She was exquisitely made: tall and slender, with long, graceful hands; with hair touched with a faint hint of chestnut; with blue eyes full of smouldering fires. There was some- thing untamed, undisciplined, about her; something about the way she looked at Steve Cruger as he went on soberly about his golf that might have made a man a little older, a little wiser, thoughtful to the point of caution. They didn’t talk much, and when they did, it was about the game. Un- til he turned from the fifteenth green mot toward the next tee, but to a gate in a stone wall. “Oh, Steve, play it out!” said Joan. “You only need even fours now to break seventy—and that’s the course record, isn't it?” “Is it still?” he said, and smiled. “It used to be. I made it.” He stop- ped short and flushed. “I haven't time. I've an hour's work to do to get a report ready for your father that he wanted done when he got back from this trip he’s been on.” He held the gate open for her. “Com- ing ?” he asked. She bit her lip, and they walked across the lawn together to the big stone house the Wilders had taken for that summer. Birds of passage, they were, for all John Wilders’ mil- lions; that was something Steve couldn’t understand. But there were people, of course, who never put out roots. Joan's eyes were mocking him as she turned toward her room at the head of the stairs. “Goodnight, sweet prince!” she said. “That's in ‘Ham- let.” Better look it up!” He, grinned when she had gone, and went up to his own quarters to bathe and change. You had better learn, as briefly as may be, how Steve Cruger came to be in that house. You are not, you see, to harbor any illusions about him. That sullen look of his needs explaining; it testified to something that was wrong with him. And yet, as most people look at things, there was nothing wrong; he cut a wholly admirable figure; he was a young man to be looked upon as a pattern, a model, a very paragon. He hadn’t been sullen as a boy. He had grown up as the sons of most well-to-do men with position and family background do grow up. There had been nothing singular about him except his golf, which had been good enough to lead the experts to hail him as a coming Bobby Jones. As most normal youngsters do, he had one or two deathless passions, and got over them, Then, when he was nineteen, there was a flurry on the Stock Exchange one day. The papers said it repre- sented a healthy correction, in that it tended to eliminate some weak speculative accounts. Quite so. One of them happened to be that of Steve's father, who had been trying to see what could be done about ad- justing an inherited income to the shrunken purchasing power of the dollar since the war. That flurry not only eliminated Mr. Cruger’s account, and his income, but Mr. Cruger as well; his heart had not been good for some years. Lawyers and other well-meaning people tried to make Steve see that he had no responsibility for the debts that were left after the house and everything else that remained had been sold. Luckily for him, they pointed out, he had the income of the trust fund his mother had left him; enough, with economy, to en- able him to go through college. That was when he began to scowl as a fixed habit. He wanted to use the principal of the trust fund to pay off the debts at once; the law, though, forbade that. So he got himself a job in a bank, budgeted his living expenses, and settled down to paying off his father’s obligations out of his income and his salary. Very creditable, you will say. Of course. And all the success stories agree that it is by just such acts of self-denial that men lay the founda- tions of future greatness. Probably. But it depends upon the man, Sacrifice is a tricky thing. Some- times it turns people into martyrs. Some men make sacrifices, as Steve did, as a matter of duty, and then they nurse their pride and begin to enjoy a rankling sense of the injus- tice of life. Steve’s bad times had been over for a year and more. The debts were all paid. He had come into his in- heritance; the bonds a trust com- pany had held were in his own safe- deposit box, and he had some thous- ands of dollars in the bank. All this had happened the sooner because of John Wilder. Wilder, a depositor in the bank in which Steve had got his first job, had been attracted by Steve. Wilder was an operator in the market. He offered ve a job, and Steve, who had a natural talent for getting at the facts that lay behind | him, but gave no other sign of recog- statistics, soon had become his right- hand ‘mgn. The only thing Steve really: didn’t like about the job was that after a while Wilder. had trans- ferred him from the office -to his home; he wanted Steve within reach at odd hours. Most young men in Steve's case would have been well pleased, and So was he, in a way. But the habit of thinking of himself as a martyr persisted. And—there was Joan. He could be stiff and distant with her, but it wasn’t always easy. He wasn’t blind to her loveliness; sometimes she tempted him almost beyond endur- ance. Yet he distrusted her deeply; feared her power to hurt him, He didn't want to be hurt. He had no chance with her, he knew; he was a fool to let himself even so much as think of loving her. But he needn’t be so great a fool as ever to lay himself open to what she could do to him if she knew the truth. An hour or so after breakfast Wilder came into the room where Steve worked. A small dried-up man, this Wilder; only his eyes were like Joan's; blue, with smoldering fires and with cold mockery in them, too. Her beauty, her slender grace, must have come from her mother. “Good morning, sir,” said Steve. “Here's that report.” He handed ov- er a sheaf of pages, bristling with figures. Wilder went through them silently. : “Good!” he said, when he had fin- ished. “Very good. You might get after the stuff about that Kastner- ! Brent motors merger now. And’— the blue eyes were cold as ice now— “TI happened to look out of my win- dow early this morning. You're not here for the sort of thing I saw. That clear ?” The rank injustice of it made Steve flush hotly. As if he—! The girl had pursued him, thrown herself at him, as she herself had said jest- ingly. But: “Quite clear, sir,” was all he said. “Good. Don’t want to have to speak of it again, In fact, I won't. That clear, too?” “Perfectly.” John Wilder went off about his own affairs. Steve rose from his desk twice to find his employer and throw up his job. But habit is strong. Steve was still at work, calmer and even inclined to be amused, when the door opened and Joan came in. She wore one of those sleeveless, short dresses that girls wear nowadays for golf and tennis. “Hello, grouch!” she said. “Come on. I want to shoot some golf.” “Go ahead. The telephone’s in or- der, and you've got plenty of boy friends.” “I'm asking you.” “Can't, I'm too busy.” She came over and pulled herself up on the desk. Calmly she picked up the sheet of paper that lay be- fore him. She saw a picture—not very good—of a dog, and some de- signs for a monogram. “You're the rottenest liar!” . she said pleasantly. “What are you afraid of?” . “You, if you must know,” he said. “Then you'd better come. A net- tle never stings if you grab it hard enough.” “Or if you don’t touch it at all!” “Steve, please.” “Oh, Joan, don’t! I tell you I can't!” He got up, and she slid down from the desk and stood facing him. “Why won't you let me alone?” She laughed at him. She was very close. And suddenly something in him snapped, and he caught her to him and kissed her. Then, with a groan, he let her go. She was still laughing. “Yes?” she said. “And then?” “You got what you were asking for!” he said harshly. “I hope you're satisfied!” “What do you mean?” ‘were blazing, Her eyes his shoulders. “You wanted to find out if you could—oh, you know! Well, you could—and you did. That's all, isn't it?” “You—oh, you beast!” she “You cad!” said. Probably neither of them knew | that she’d left the door open. Neither of them had heard John Wilder come | in. “Thought I'd made this morning,” he said to Steve. “Berry knows about trains. He'll bring you a check. That's all.” Steve paid no attention to him. His eyes were on Joan. But she on- ly shrugged and moved away. He sighed. There was nothing, after all, for him to say if she chose to be si- lent. “Very well,” he said, and left the room. myself clear, er’s confidential secretary, found him in his room packing up. “Sorry, Cruger,” he said. “Don’t know what's up—don’t want to. I've a check for a thousand for you. I ordered a car to take you to the four-fifty-five. That all right?” Steve took the check. “Thanks,” he said. Slowly, dispas- sionately, he tore it into fragments. Then he laughed. “That's the first luxury I’ve indulged in for six years,” he said. “The funny thing is that I can afford to blow in a thousand. I shan’t want the car, thanks. I can afford a cab, too.” You can dam a stream and create a placid pool, or, if you prefer, with your dam you can so divert its course that instead of tumbling tur- bulently down among rocks it will cut a new, smooth course for itself through soft, level meadow ground. But always, if a break comes in the dam, the stream will go back to its old channel. Steves’ cab didn’t take him to the station, but to the club. By good luck he found a vacant room, shot a seventy-one before dinner, and was welcomed in the grill that night like a prodigal come home. - He did go to town in the morning in the club car, as the guest of a man who had been his father’s friend. John Wilder, sit- ting behind his paper, scowled at “You know!” he said. He shrugged | nition. - - «It wasn't in search of a new job that Steve went to town. The dam had .gone out with a vengeance.” In a sense those six" years were as if they had never been. He went to his bank first and open- ed his safe-deposit box, and taking certain bonds, went upstairs and gave them to the proper man, after whicn they ceased to be his, and his checking account was increased by a deposit of something - more than twenty-two thousand dollars. Then he went downtown to see Jerry Tracy, of Tracy and Wardman. This time the last six years, and especial- ly the last two, counted a good deal. It wasn’t in Steve's mind to turn to his own account any knowledge he had gained in time paid for by John Wilder; any specific knowledge, that is. But so far as he could see, there was no good reason why he should not profit by the general things he had learned. Jerry, listening to what Steve told him he wanted done, whis- ed. “A hair of the dog that bit you isn’t a good prescription downtown, Steve,” he said. “We'll execute your order—sure. We make our living out of commissions. But if you want something really good—and safe—" “I don’t,” said Steve. “I want five hundred shares of Minchin A. You ought to get them for around thir- ty-one. Ten thousand enough mar- gin?” “Oh, plenty—sure!” said Jerry. “H'mm. You're with John Wilder, aren't you?” “Not any more. show of my own.’ ’ Steve’s day in town was nearly ov- er then. Not quite, though. Steve had a wish to drive out to Renclair; he'd always hated trains, anyway. Now the market, for weeks, had been a falling one—which means, among other things, that a number of costly foreign cars, bought during boom days, might be had for a song, if you knew where to do your sing- ing. Steve did. He spent an amus- ing hour bargaining, and drove away finally in a low-hung, close-coupled Rivorsi. It was a little shabby as to paint but its motor purred sweetly. .Now, for the first time in six years, Steve Cruger began to live. He play- ed golf to his heart’s content. Un- This is a little he roamed half-forgotten the Rivorsi. Often some sat beside him, but was alone. roads in slim girl quite as often he in homes he had missed more than he had ever let himself quite realize; joined gay, impromptu parties that went rushing into town to dinner and a theater and to dance afterward until it was time to drive home through the morning mist. All the time Minchim A climbed steadily. Not sensationally at all, at first, but steadily. At thirty-eight Steve bought five hundred shares more, with his profit on the first five hundred shares . for. margin; picked up another thousand at forty-three. Still, point by point, Minchim climb- ed; Steve bought twenty-five hundred shares more the day the tape showed a sale at fifty. Then the fireworks began; ten days later Minchim A was quoted at sev- enty, and Steve's paper profits were more than a hundred thousand. Jer- ry urged caution; Steve only grin- ned and bought fifteen hundred shares. But now he did give a selling or- der. “Start letting go at ninety,” he said. “That’ll be about all, this trip.” “I hope you know what you're do- ing!” said Jerry. “So do I,” said Steve. “We'll soon know.” A dozen times, perhaps, during this interlude, Steve had seen Joan Wild- er. On the links once or twice; at a dance at the club; in town. She nod- her eyes were quietly scornful. John Wilder, though, he hadn’t s€en since that morning on the train. On the day he drove out from town after bringing his holdings of Minchim A up to six thousand shares he found a message waiting for him at the club; he was to call up Mr. Wilder. Berry talked to him: would he come around after dinner? “Why not?” said Steve, amused, Though he saw nothing of Joan she seemed, somehow, to pervade the house. The faint sweet scent of her perfume hovered in the air. “Came, did you?” Wilder grunted. “Think you're raising Cain with Min- { chim, eh?” | “Oh, in a small way, of course!” said Steve. “Got some pickings here before A few minutes later, Berry, Wild- | you left, did you?” i “No!” | “Don’t waste time lying. You knew | I was | stoc planning an operation in that { Kk. ” “You're wrong. You never turned me loose on it.” “No matter. You could have . found out, letters, papers about. You ‘had access to them.” “Suppose you go to the devil!” said Steve quietly, getting up. “This is the first I've known of your being i interested. I figured out what was ‘due to happen to Minchim by myself. As it happens I don’t lie, and I don’t read other people’s letters. I supposed | you wanted to see me on business. Good night.” “Wait. I'm giving you a chance. Close out your line by noon tomor- row. I've certain plans for that stock—but I can change them. Un- less you get out I'll start selling. You can figure out what that would mean. That's all.” “All right,” said Steve. “Going to close out?” Wilder ask- ed. “That’s my business. I dare say you can find out.” “Yes. IT can. All right. You've had your warning.” “Thanks. Good night.” Steve went out. On the terrace in the moonlight he came face to face with Joan—Joan lovelier than he had ever seen her in a shining silver dress. “Joan,” he said. “Yes?” she sald, after a moment. “There's a tournament day after der the warm summer skies at night ; He picked up old friendships; dined ded to him always, cool and remote; | tomorrow—mixed . foursomes. Will you play with me?” She looked at him. “Yes,” she said. “Thanks. Shall I drive over for you?” °; “If you like,” she said indifferent- ly. “All right. I'll be here at half past pine. Thirty-six holes—morning and afternoon. I'll make the entry.” That was all. As he drove home he wondered why he had asked her, why she had said yes, Then he laughed. He might well have gone back to scowling that night, but he didn’t. He could heed John Wilder's warning, sell in the morning and bank some- thing like a hundred and fifteen thou. sand dollars—a fair profit, in all con- science, on an original stake of ten thousand. If he didn’t sell John Wilder might be able to smash him, wipe him out; he would, if he could. But Steve didn’t think he could. He had told Jerry to sell at nine- ty; he liked this gambling chance of adding another eighty thousand dol- lars to his capital. Two hundred thousand wouldn't make him rich, as people like the Wilders reckoned riches, but it meant, for Steve, the sort of life he wanted to live. He went to sleep only about half an hour after his usual time. He played golf in the morning; ‘loafed around, though, after lunch- eon. Tracy called him at a quarter to two. “I don’t like the look of the mar- ket, Steve,” he said. “Someone's selling short—heavily. There's a ru- mor that it’s Wilder. Minchim’s off five points.” : “O. K.,” said Steve, “Don’t worry yet, Jerry. What's my danger line ?” “About fifty, I should say—with this last fifteen hundred to carry.” {| “All right. Let's see what hap- pens.” ’ Minchim A closed at sixty-three. But at that time Steve was deeply concerned with more pressing trou- bles, being at the bottom of a yawn- ing sand pit. That was a Thurs- day in August. ! On Friday morning after break- fast Steve drove over for Joan. She was on the terrace waiting for him. John Wilder sat smoking a cigar. He nodded to Steve, but had nothing to say. Joan climbed into the Rivorsi, and they went off. “Nice car,” she know the breed.” | “Only about five of them over here, Want to drive it?” “No, thanks. I might smash us up. And I could care for this cup , we're going to win.” I “All right, Know how it works out? Aggregate handicaps—aggre- i gate scores, too—not best ball.” { “Meaning I'll have to pull my | weight. T'll try not to disgrace you, | Steve.” “You won't. Medal play this morn- ing; two leading couples go on at match play this afternoon. What's | your handicap?” “Six.” “That's what we get, then; I'm at scratch. We'll have to beat the Croz- ders, I should say. They’ll have two i strokes on us to start with.” | Tracy caught him on the telephone | just before they started. He was i worried. - Minchim A had opened at { sixty; had sold off three points more in the first half-hour’s trading. “It looks like Wilder, all right,” Tracy said gloomily, “Oh, it is!” said Steve, and laugh- ed. “Carry on, Jerry.” Steve blew himself to a dazzling 70 for the morning round; Joan's sound 85 gave them a medal score of 149, allowing for her handicap. Tom Crozier turned in a workman- like 75; his wife had an 86; their joint handicap was 8, so that they were second to Steve and Joan with an aggregate net score of 153. { “They'll keep us busy,” said Steve. “They're both good at match play.” He and Joan were standing by the {score board. A boy came up to Steve with a sheaf of telephone mes- sage slips; he glanced at them and smiled as he stuffed them in his pocket. “What's Minchim A now?” asked Joan, a glint in her blue eyes. “Fifty-four—or it was fifteen min- j utes ago,” said Steve. He grinned at i her. “So you know, do you?” She nodded. ‘TI always said you were dumb. Steve, why did you try to buck Father? It can’t be done. Not on a shoe string, an 3 “I'm not bucking him,” said Steve. “He thinks you found out some- thing before you left him. He's fur- ious.” |" “He thinks so? Do you, Joan?” “No,” she said. “I don’t.” “You told me I was a cad.” “So you were. But you're not a sneak.” “I see,” said Steve. {about a spot of lunch?” They walked over to the porch. { John Wilder was sitting at a table. | “Ho! said Steve, and looked at | Joan. “Does the plot thicken?” { “I never saw him so furious as he i was when I told him I was going to | play with you,” said Joan. | “Going to have lunch with me—or | with him ?” | “With you. Laugh that off!” | “Oh, I'm holding out enough to i pay my house account—if it comes to that!” said Steve. “Go as faras i you like.” | They lunched under John Wilder's | baleful blue eyes. Just before it was time to start Tracy called again. said. “I don’t i { “Well, how ' “Hell's popping,” he said. “She slid down to fifty-one. Then some real buying started, and she went back to fifty-five —slipping back to | fifty-three again-—moving back and ‘forth now so fast you can’t keep track.” ! “Ah!” said Steve. “Wish I could buy another thousand or so. Get | aboard if you've got any spare ' change, Jerry.” | “You're nuts!” said Jerry. “Listen, {stay near the wire till the close. I'll have to be able to get hold of ou.” ¥ “Not a chance! I'm playing a match. Listen yourself. Either she'll crack wide open and you'll {have to sell me out, or she'll climb fast. Either way, there’s nothing I can do. Exeept—if she hits sev- enty, buy another thousand. Get that?” : He hung up . and turned. to = see Wilder's small dried-up figure be- fore him, : ; “Afternoon, sir,” he said. “Still getting information any way you can? You're welcome.” ‘I'm waiting to use the tele- phone,” said Wilder impassively. “You can listen, if you like. I'm going to tell my brokers to sell an- other ten thousand shares of Min. chim A at the market.” “Ye-es?” said Steve. “I'll take your word for it, sir. Joan and I have to get started. Better follow us around; she plays a nice game. And—it’s impertinent for me tg offer you advice, sir, but I'd be care- ful about going short.” Wilder went into the booth, say- ing nothing. Steve went back to join Joan; found the Croziers at their table. The four of them went out to the first tee. It was not . quite half past one. Betty Crozier took the honor and drove first. A nice ball; Joan sliced badly. She and Steve lost the hole, in spite of Steve's par four tc Crozier's five; Joan took seven tc Betty's excellent five. One down. The dropped another hole wher Joan missed a short putt on the fourth; their first handicap stroke on the long fifth, cost them a third A fair-sized gallery followed them at the seventh tee it was augment. ed by John Wilder, watching, prob. ably, the first golf match he hac ever seen. Steve glanced at him before (it was his turn to drive. Crozie was on the green; Betty just shor but in’ a playable lie; Joan was trap ped. A messenger came up to Wild er, who took the slip of paper he held out, and smiled evily. Stevi dropped his ball; using a mashi niblick, he laid it dead to the pin He was sure of his two; It ga them the hole, for Joan got out o her trouble nicely to get her four and Crozier missed his fifteen-foot er and took a par three. | “I've got the shivers. I'm sorry! Joan said, as they walked to th eighth tee. “Father looks like : ghoul. I wonder what—" “Forget the market,” said Steve , “Play more off your left foot, an slow down your back swing. You ' honor.” | A boy came up to Steve as th four of them left the tee. Wilde watched him, smiling. Steve wave him off. “The man said it was a very im portant message, Mr, Cruger, ' said the boy. | “He was mistaken, son,” sai | Steve. “Keep it till I get back t ‘the clubhouse. Guess you're away i Betty. Let's see what you can d with your brassie.” Steve was the last to play hi {second shot. The Croziers each ha safe five. Joan, though, had messe ‘up her second. Rather grimly, Stev i considered lie and distance. i . Ordinarily he would have playe |safe with an iron; his drive ha | been superb. Now, however, he too {a spoon, and with a stroke tha { was beyond ordinary praise, reache | the green, hole high, leaving hin jself a ten-foot putt for an eag] | three. Applause broke out behind an jaround him; Wilder smiled sourly. { Steve sank his putt; it served t {halve the hole, for Joan went ui | terly to pieces and needed seven. ! nr terribly ashamed,” she ai 1 4 ’'S Father, I think, and—ol Steve, how could you be so dumb- always—always ?” { The ninth was halved, too; Joa land Steve turned for home still tw down and lost the tenth, on whic {the Croziers received the second « | their handicap strokes. Nor wel heir prospects bright, for the lon ‘half of the course was before the: and Joan’s long game was ti weakest part of her golf. Again and again, now, messag: came to John Wilder. He read ther his eyes inscrutable, tore up ti slips and let the wind carry the: iaway. Steve was human; new { think he wasn’t. He would hay given much to know what nev those scraps of paper bore. Jos | rallied, did better. But the burde lay on Steve. He was playing like a champic now; fighting like one. = At tI thirteenth, the dog leg, he saw chance and seized it: He drove la and snatched a stroke by shootin deliberately over the trees th masked the fairway as it turne His eagle three won the hole; | and Joan were two down, with fi to play. On the next hole a bad bow sent his ball into the rough; he 1 jected the iron his caddie held ot risked a spoon and reached t green from a tangle of long gra: His four was good; but Joan's sin ing of a twenty-foot putt won t hole. One down—four to play! The fifteenth and sixteenth we halved. Joan still had the honor the seveenth; tears were in h eyes as her sliced drive was carri out of bounds. Her second w good, but she lay three; bad bu ness, on that shot hole, Steve, wh he drove, pressed deliberately. The was half a gasp, half a cheer, his ball rolled on and on, after tremendous carry, until it trick] halfway across the green—th: hundred and thirty yards away. “Hey!” said Crozier. ‘“ Have heart!” Steve sank his putt; anott eagle. Joan got her five; the Crozi each had a four. The match w squared, going to the home hole. “Three o'clock!” said Joan, a caught her breath. She looked her father, but there was no re: ing his face. So the four of them stood on f{ eighteenth tee, with the green hundred yards away, and the wh clubhouse with its gay awnings ° hind it. Four good drives; thet girls’ close together; Steve's thi yards, perhaps, beyond Tom’s. Be Crozier outdid herself with her br sie, but would need wood ag? Joan was short. Tom sent of screamer; Steve's brassie left I (Continued on page 3, Col. 4.)
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