The Golf Course Mystery | Page 6

the car around to the garage.
"Yes, you win !" agreed Captain Poland, as he pushed his goggles back
on his cap. He held out a bill.
"What's it for?" asked Bartlett, drawing back.
"Why, I put up a ten spot that I'd beat you. I didn't, and you win."
"Buy drinks with your money!" laughed Bartlett. "The race was to be
for a finish, not a dead heat. We'll try it again, sometime."
"All right-any time you like!" said the captain crisply, as he sat down at
a table after greeting some friends. "But you won't refuse to split a
quart with me?"
"No. My throat is as dusty as a vacuum cleaner. Have any of the
matches started yet, Bruce?" he asked, turning to the Human
Encyclopedia.
"Only some of the novices. And, speaking of novices, do you know that
in Scotland there are fourteen thousand, seven hundred - "
"Cut it, Bruce! Cut it !" begged the captain. "Sit in - you and Tom - and
we'll make it two bottles. Anything to choke off your flow of useless
statistics!" and he laughed good-naturedly.
"When does the cup-winners' match start?" asked Bartlett, as the four

young men sat about the table under the veranda. "That's the one I'm
interested in."
"In about an hour," announced Sharwell, as he consulted a card.
"Hardly any of the veterans are here yet."
"Has Mr. Carwell arrived?" asked Captain Poland, as he raised his glass
and seemed to be studying the bubbles that spiraled upward from the
hollow stem.
"You'll know when he gets here," answered Bruce Garrigan.
"How so?" asked the captain. "Does he have an official announcer?"
"No, but you'll hear his car before you see it."
"New horn?"
"No, new car-new color-new everything!" said Garrigan. "He's just
bought a new ten thousand dollar French car, and it's painted red, white
and blue, and-"
"Red, white and blue?" chorused the other three men.
"Yes. Very patriotic. His friends don't know whether he's honoring
Uncle Sam or the French Republic. However, it's all the same. His car
is a wonder."
"I must have a brush with him !" murmured Captain Poland.
"Don't. You'll lose out," advised Garrigan. "It can do eighty on fourth
speed, and Carwell is sporty enough to slip it into that gear if he needed
to."
"Um! Guess I'll wait until I get my new machine, then," decided the
captain.
There was more talk, but Bartlett gradually dropped out of the
conversation and went to walk about the club grounds.

Maraposa was a social, as well as a golfing, club, and the scene of
many dances and other affairs. It lay a few miles back from the shore
near Lakeside, in New Jersey. The clubhouse was large and elaborate,
and the grounds around it were spacious and well laid out.
Not far away was Loch Harbor, where the yachts of the club of which
Captain Gerry Poland was president anchored, and a mile or so in the
opposite direction was Lake Tacoma, on the shore of which was
Lakeside. A rather exclusive colony summered there, the hotel
numbering many wealthy persons among its patrons.
Harry Bartlett, rather wishing he had gone in for golf more devotedly,
was wandering about, casually greeting friends and acquaintances,
when he heard his name called from the cool and shady depths of a
summer-house on the edge of the golf links.
"Oh, Minnie! How are you ?" he cordially greeted a rather tall and dark
girl who extended her slim hand to him. "I didn't expect to see you
today."
"Oh, I take in all the big matches, though I don't play much myself,"
answered Minnie Webb. "I'm surprised to find you without a caddy,
though, Harry."
"Too lazy, I'm afraid. I'm going to join the gallery to-day. Meanwhile,
if you don't mind, I'll sit in here and help you keep cool."
"It isn't very hard to do that to-day," and she moved over to make room
for him. "Isn't it just perfect weather!"
At one time Minnie Webb and Harry Bartlett had been very close
friends - engaged some rumors had it. But now they were jolly good
companions, that was all.
"Seen the Carwells' new machine?" asked Bartlett.
"No, but I've heard about it. I presume they'll drive up in it to-day."

"Does Viola run it?"
"I haven't heard. It's a powerful machine, some one said-more of a racer
than a touring car, Mr. Blossom was remarking."
"Well, he ought to know. I understand he's soon to be taken into
partnership with Mr. Carwell."
"I don't know," murmured Minnie, and she seemed suddenly very much
interested in the vein structure of a leaf she pulled from a vine that
covered the summer-house.
Bartlett smiled. Gossip had it that Minnie Webb and Le Grand