"Were there any witnesses?" I demanded, for I had little faith in Munchausen"s regard for the eternal verities, among which a golf-card must be numbered if the game is to survive.
"Yes, a hundred," said Boswell. "There was only one trouble with "em."
Here the great biographer laughed. "They were all imaginary, like the colonel."
"And Munchausen"s score?" I queried.
"The same, naturally. But it makes him king-pin in golf circles just the same, because n.o.body can go back on his logic," said Boswell.
"Munchausen reasoned it out very logically indeed, and largely, he said, to protect his own reputation. Here is an imaginary warrior, said he, who makes a bully, but wholly imaginary, score at golf. He sends me an imaginary challenge to play him forty-seven holes. I accept, not so much because I consider myself a golfer as because I am an imaginer--if there is such a word."
"Ask Dr. Johnson," said I, a little sarcastically. I always grow sarcastic when golf is mentioned.
"Dr. Johnson be--" began Boswell.
"Boswell!" I remonstrated.
"Dr. Johnson be it, I was about to say," clicked the type-writer, suavely; but the ink was thick and inclined to spread. "Munchausen felt that Bogey was encroaching on his preserve as a man with an imagination."
"I have always considered Colonel Bogey a liar," said I. "He joins all the clubs and puts up an ideal score before he has played over the links."
"That isn"t the point at all," said Boswell. "Golfers don"t lie.
Realists don"t lie. n.o.body in polite--or say, rather, accepted--society lies. They all imagine. Munchausen realizes that he has only one claim to recognition, and that is based entirely upon his imagination. So when the imaginary Colonel Bogey sent him an imaginary challenge to play him forty-seven holes at golf--"
"Why forty-seven?" I asked.
"An imaginary number," explained Boswell. "Don"t interrupt. As I say, when the imaginary colonel--"
"I must interrupt," said I. "What was he colonel of?"
"A regiment of perfect caddies," said Boswell.
"Ah, I see," I replied. "Imaginary in his command. There isn"t one perfect caddy, much less a regiment of the little reprobates."
"You are wrong there," said Boswell. "You don"t know how to produce a good caddy--but good caddies can be made."
"How?" I cried, for I have suffered. "I"ll have the plan patented."
"Take a flexible bra.s.sey, and at the ninth hole, if they deserve it, give them eighteen strokes across the legs with all your strength," said Boswell. "But, as I said before, don"t interrupt. I haven"t much time left to talk with you."
"But I must ask one more question," I put in, for I was growing excited over a new idea. "You say give them eighteen strokes across the legs.
Across whose legs?"
"Yours," replied Boswell. "Just take your caddy up, place him across your knees, and spank him with your bra.s.sey. Spank isn"t a good golf term, but it is good enough for the average caddy; in fact, it will do him good."
"Go on," said I, with a mental resolve to adopt his prescription.
"Well," said Boswell, "Munchausen, having received an imaginary challenge from an imaginary opponent, accepted. He went out to the links with an imaginary ball, an imaginary bagful of fanciful clubs, and licked the imaginary life out of the colonel."
"Still, I don"t see," said I, somewhat jealously, perhaps, "how that makes him king-pin in golf circles. Where did he play?"
"On imaginary links," said Boswell.
"Poh!" I e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.
"Don"t sneer," said Boswell. "You know yourself that the links you imagine are far better than any others."
"What is Munchausen"s strongest point?" I asked, seeing that there was no arguing with the man--"driving, approaching, or putting?"
"None of the three. He cannot put, he foozles every drive, and at approaching he"s a consummate a.s.s," said Boswell.
"Then what can he do?" I cried.
"Count," said Boswell. "Haven"t you learned that yet? You can spend hours learning how to drive, weeks to approach, and months to put. But if you want to win you must know how to count."
I was silent, and for the first time in my life I realized that Munchausen was not so very different from certain golfers I have met in my short day as a golfiac, and then Boswell put in:
"You see, it isn"t lofting or driving that wins," he continued. "Cups aren"t won on putting or approaching. It"s the man who puts in the best card who becomes the champion."
"I am afraid you are right," I said, sadly, "but I am sorry to find that Hades is as badly off as we mortals in that matter."
"Golf, sir," retorted Boswell, sententiously, "is the same everywhere, and that which is dome in our world is directly in line with what is developed in yours."
"I"m sorry for Hades," said I; "but to continue about golf--do the ladies play much on your links?"
"Well, rather," returned Boswell, "and it"s rather amusing to watch them at it, too. Xanthippe with her Greek clothes finds it rather difficult; but for rare sport you ought to see Queen Elizabeth trying to keep her eye on the ball over her ruff! It really is one of the finest spectacles you ever saw."
"But why don"t they dress properly?"
"Ah," sighed Boswell, "that is one of the things about Hades that destroys all the charm of life there. We are but shades."
"Granted," said I, "but your garments can--"
"Our garments can"t," said Boswell. "Through all eternity we shades of our former selves are doomed to wear the shadows of our former clothes."
"Then what the devil does a poor dress-maker do who goes to Hades?" I cried.
"She makes over the things she made before," said Boswell. "That"s why, my dear fellow," the biographer added, becoming confidential--"that"s why some people confound Hades with--ah--the other place, don"t you know."
"Still, there"s golf!" I said; "and that"s a panacea for all ills. YOU enjoy it, don"t you?"
"Me?" cried Boswell. "Me enjoy it? Not on all the lives in Christendom.
It is the direst drudgery for me."
"Drudgery?" I said. "Bah! Nonsense, Boswell!"
"You forget--" he began.
"Forget? It must be you who forget, if you call golf drudgery."
"No," sighed the genial spirit. "No, _I_ don"t forget. I remember."