As I said before, and I think you will agree with me when I have told you what happened subsequently, it was probably a case of auto-hypnosis. There is no other sphere in which a belief in oneself has such immediate effects as it has in golf. And Wallace, having acquired self-confidence, went on from strength to strength. In under a week he had ploughed his way through the Unfortunate Incidents--of which class Peter Willard was the best example--and was challenging the fellows who kept three shots in five somewhere on the fairway. A month later he was holding his own with ten-handicap men. And by the middle of the summer he was so far advanced that his name occasionally cropped up in speculative talks on the subject of the July medal. One might have been excused for supposing that, as far as Wallace Chesney was concerned, all was for the best in the best of all possible worlds. And yet-- The first inkling I received that anything was wrong came through a chance meeting with Raymond Gandle, who happened to pass my gate on his way back from the links just as I drove up in my taxi; for I had been away from home for many weeks on a protracted business tour. I welcomed Gandle’s advent and invited him in to smoke a pipe and put me abreast of local gossip. He came readily enough--and seemed, indeed, to have something on his mind and to be glad of the opportunity of revealing it to a sympathetic auditor. “And how,” I asked him, when we were comfortably settled, “did your game this afternoon come out?” “Oh, he beat me,” said Gandle, and it seemed to me that there was a note of bitterness in his voice. “Then He, whoever he was, must have been an extremely competent performer?” I replied, courteously, for Gandle was one of the finest players in the club. “Unless, of course, you were giving him some impossible handicap.” “No; we played level.” “Indeed! Who was your opponent?” “Chesney.” “Wallace Chesney! And he beat you, playing level! This is the most amazing thing I have ever heard.” “He’s improved out of all knowledge.” “He must have done. Do you think he would ever beat you again?” “No. Because he won’t have the chance.” “You surely do not mean that you will not play him because you are afraid of being beaten?” “It isn’t being beaten I mind--”