"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. Miss Harding insisted in trying to drive over the pond on the fourth hole, and said she would gladly pay for all the balls that went into it, but of course I would not listen to that. The pond is very shallow at this season of the year, and in fact is a mud hole in most places, and it is therefore impossible to recover a ball which fails to carry less than eighty yards. She barely touched the ball on her first attempt, and I got it after wading in the mud to my shoe tops. Then she hit it nicely, but it failed to carry the pond by a few yards, and disappeared in the ooze. "I thought I could do it, but I give it up," she said, and I could see that she was disappointed. "Try it again," I insisted, teeing up a new one. "Keep your eye on the ball when your club comes down, and don't press." She made a brave effort, but hit the ball a trifle on top. It struck the water, ricochetted and eventually poised itself on a mud bank. I recall how white it looked against the black slime with lily pads in the background, but I saw at a glance that it would remain there, so far as we were concerned. [Illustration: "We rested on top of the hill"] Against her protest I teed another ball, but she went under it and it met the fate of its predecessors. It took all my eloquence to induce her to make the five attempts which followed, and then I made the discovery that I had brought only eight new balls with me. So I excused myself and went back to the club house and bought a box of a dozen, but nothing would change her determination not to try it again. I am firmly convinced that with a little luck she could have done it, but it was the first time Miss Harding had played this course, and that makes lots of difference.