Captain's Day Read Free Page B

Captain that commands the respect of the membership and not the person holding that position. From then on he had treated Mr Captain with the same respect accorded him by all the other members. Thus it was that on arriving at the first tee Arbuthnott, Chapman and Bagley all greeted the captain with a dutiful chorus of “Good morning, Mr Captain.” Arbuthnott felt so chipper about his chances that he followed up the salutation with a pleasantry he wouldn’t normally have wasted on the present Mr Captain. “Nice day for it.”
    “ Isn't it just,” beamed Mr Captain, then, with no little pride, disclosed the secret he had been keeping on the back burner up until now. “Incidentally, I'm having the day filmed, so be sure to keep a sharp lookout for the cameras.”
    Arbuthnott was impressed. “Filmed?”
    “ It is a proud day in my life, Andrew. A very proud day. To be Mr Captain on Captain's Day is something that only happens to a man maybe once in his lifetime, consequently I decided to have the occasion recorded on video for posterity. “
    “ What an excellent idea.”
    “ I thought so,” said Mr Captain, and went on, “Now be sure not to forget the Nearest the Pin competition on the thirteenth. Three of the ladies have kindly agreed to do the measuring this year.”
    Bagley expressed surprise on hearing this. Traditionally boys from the junior section had always been entrusted with this task on Captain’s Day. “The ladies, Mr Captain?” he said, raising an eyebrow.
    “ Yes, nice to get the ladies involved, isn't it.”
    “ I mean the juniors usually do it.”
    “ I decided to ring the changes; and it is my wish that the ladies do the honours this time round.”
    “ Wonderful,” said Chapman.
    “ Isn't it,” said Mr Captain, fully aware that Chapman was being facetious but not caring a fig about it. If bigots like Gerry Chapman didn't like it then it was just too bad. He checked his watch. “Eight thirty precisely gentlemen, best be getting your round underway, you don't want to be holding up the rest of the field.”
    Bagley tipped his cap politely and the three golfers stepped onto the first tee.
    The first at Sunnymere, as is the case with the opening holes on many golf courses, is a relatively easy par four. The reason for most opening holes being fairly straightforward is that there is less chance of the golfer, not yet fully into the swing of things, making a pig’s ear of the job and ruining his round before he has hardly begun it, which in all probability is what might very well happen if the opening hole presented any sort of challenge. Quite simply an easy opening hole gives the golfer the opportunity to ‘play himself in’, and although most golfers, having played themselves in on the first hole, somehow contrive to play themselves out and ruin their card on the second hole, or one of the subsequent holes, an easy opening hole is still regarded as a good thing.
    “ Your honour I believe, Baggers,” said Arbuthnott, in recognition of the fact that Bagley had the lowest handicap of the three and was thus entitled to tee off first.
    Bagley strode confidently onto the tee and drove off, hitting his usual high fade of two hundred and twenty yards or so.
    “ Shot,” said Mr Captain generously.
    “ I ought to be,” said Bagley, forlornly. “Twenty years I've been playing this game and I still can't hit the ball much over two hundred yards.”
    “ You've always had an excellent short game though, Des,” said Arbuthnott, offering encouragement to his playing partner whilst at the same time taking out a little insurance against Bagley moaning all the time if things weren’t quite going his way, as he was wont to do, and possibly spoiling his own chances by putting him off his game.
    Next to tee off was Chapman, who hit a poor shot off the toe of his driver. He followed the flight of the ball as it bounced once on the fairway before scuttling into the right-hand rough, then said, in honest