At my suggestion we were playing without caddies.  There are times when these little terrors take all of the romance out of a situation, and I did not wish to be bothered with them.

On her fourth shot Miss Harding landed her ball in the brook, and it took quite a time to find it.  While we were looking for it Boyd and LaHume arrived on the tee, and I motioned them to drive ahead.

I have seen this brook a thousand times.  It was my greatest source of amusement and mischief when a boy, but never until this afternoon did I observe its perfect beauty.  Heretofore it has been no more nor less than a ribbon of water with weed-lined banks and tall rushes, into which a poor player is likely to drive a ball and lose one or more strokes.  It is one of our “natural hazards,” and I have thought no more of it than I would of the cushion on a billiard table.

I shall never cross that brook again without thinking of her face as I saw it mirrored in the shadows of the old stone bridge.  The reflection was framed with delicate interfacings of water cress, while in the bed of the stream the smooth pebbles gleamed like pearls.  The pointed reeds nodded and waved in the gentle breeze.

Now that I think of it, I have cursed those reeds many, many times while hunting for a lost ball.

“Is it not beautiful?” I exclaimed to Miss Harding.

“That drive of Mr. Boyd’s?” she asked in reply.  Boyd had made a ripper, which went sailing over our heads.  “It was a lovely drive!  He has beaten you by several yards.”

“I meant the brook,” I said.

“The brook?” she exclaimed.  “I am surprised, Mr. Smith!  I had no idea that a confirmed golfer could find beauty in anything outside of a drive, brassie, approach or putt.”

“You malign us, Miss Harding,” I declared, looking first in her eyes and then in her mirrored image in the water.  “From where I stand that brook is the most lovely thing in the world, except—­except——­”

“Mr. LaHume has put his ball square on the green on his second shot!” interrupted Miss Harding, clapping her hands in excitement.

I do not know whether she knew what I was going to say or not.  I wish I had the nerve to finish some of the fine speeches and compliments I plan and begin, but as a rule I end them without a climax.

We found the ball and I dropped it a few yards back of the brook.  She promptly drove it into the brook a second time, and what became of it will always remain a mystery to me.  It did not go more than fifteen feet, and we looked and looked but could not find it, so I smiled and dropped another one, and this time she made a really good shot.

Counting all of the strokes and penalties it took Miss Harding fifteen to make that hole, the bogy for which is four, but I assured her that I have known men to do worse, and I believe the statement a fact, though I cannot recall at this moment who did it in such woeful figures.