It has been my aim in the course of this narrative to extenuate
nothing, nor set down aught in malice. Like the gentleman who played
euchre with the heathen Chinee, I state but the facts. I do not,
therefore, slur over my scheme for disturbing the professor's peace of
mind. I am not always good and noble. I am the hero of this story, but
I have my off moments.
I felt ruthless toward the professor. I cannot plead ignorance of the
golfer's point of view as an excuse for my plottings. I knew that to
one whose soul is in the game, as the professor's was, the agony of
being just beaten in an important match exceeds in bitterness all
other agonies. I knew that if I scraped through by the smallest
possible margin, his appetite would be destroyed, his sleep o' nights
broken. He would wake from fitful slumber moaning that if he had only
used his iron at the tenth hole all would have been well; that if he
had aimed more carefully on the seventh green, life would not be drear
and blank; that a more judicious manipulation of his brassy
throughout might have given him something to live for. All these
things I knew.
|