"Odd or the like, I don't care a--that is to say, it is most extraordinary. Why, they're bandits, Harry--bandits, I tell you, and, unless Mrs. Fillimore looks out, they'll carry her off to Matlock Tor and hold her out to ransom--perhaps while we're on the links. A pretty advertisement you'd get if that came off. A Vicar's wife stolen by brigands. The Reverend Gentleman on the Q. Tee. Think of it in the evening papers! How some of them would chaff you!" The Vicar played an approach shot and said, "This is really deplorable." He would have preferred to talk golf; but the Doctor gave him no rest, and so he said presently: "I wonder what Lady Evelyn thinks of it all? She went by me in the car yesterday and Bates was driving her. Now, I've never seen that before.... God bless me, what a shocking stroke!" He shook his head as the ball went skimming over the ground into the deepest and most terrible bunker on Moretown Links--the Doctor following it with that sympathetic if hypocritical gaze we turn upon an enemy's misfortunes. Impossible not to better such a miserable exhibition, he thought. Unhappy man, game of delight, the two were playing from the bunker together before a minute had passed! "You and I would certainly do better at the mangle if this goes on," the Doctor exclaimed with honest conviction; "the third bunker I've found to-day. A man cannot be well who does that." "Rheumatism, undoubtedly," the Vicar said slyly. A boyish laugh greeted the thrust. "Shall we call it curiosity? Hang the game! What does it matter? You put a bit of india-rubber into a flower-pot and think you are a better man than I am. But you're not. I'd play you any day for the poor-box. Let's talk of something else--Lady Evelyn, for instance." "Will she marry him, Frederick?" "Him--the sandy-haired foreigner with the gypsy friends?" "Is there any other concerned?" "Oh, don't ask me. Do I keep her pocket-book?" "I wish you did, my dear fellow. From every point of view, this marriage would be deplorable." "From every point of view but that of the two people concerned, perhaps. She is a girl with a will of her own--do you think she would marry him if she didn't like him?" "She might, from spite. There are better reasons, perhaps worse. You told me at their first meeting that you believed her to be in love with him." "I was an idiot. Let's finish the round. The man will probably live to be hanged--what does it matter?" "Well, if it doesn't matter to you, it matters to nobody. I'll tell you something queer--a thing I saw last night. It's been in my head all day. I'll tell you as we go to the next green." They drove a couple of good balls and set out from the tee with lighter hearts. As they went, the Vicar unburdened himself of that secret which golf alone could have prevented him disclosing an hour ago.