A grandstand had been set up behind the tee, looking down the first fairway. It was filled by around three hundred seated spectators. Skinner tried to banish all thoughts of the gallery from his mind.
`Right chaps, we'll play this as a medal round, but just for interest, let's make a match of it.
Norton and I'll take on you guys. Let's give Norton and Hideo a shot at each hole. Bob, there are ten par fours. I'll give you a shot at each of them. OK?' The three nodded agreement.
'Right, Hideo,' said Atkinson, 'you're up first.' The Japanese stepped forward and asked his caddy for a number three wood. He wasted no time, teeing his ball up and clipping it carefully and sensibly down the middle of the fairway.
`May I have my driver, please, Susan?' said Skinner. The tall blonde looked at his clubs, found the longest in the bag, pulled off its woollen head cover, and handed it to him. He teed his ball and stepped back, looking down the fairway. The hole was a slight dogleg easing right around the slope of the Witches' Hill towards the green which was, according to the sign, a good drive and a long second shot distant. There was a wide bunker on the left, two hundred yards away; the reason, Skinner guessed, why his Japanese partner had played deliberately short. He gave the club a swish to loosen his shoulders, then lined up his drive.
'No chances here, boy,' he muttered to himself. 'You've got one of your shots at this hole, and you'll need to make use of them all.' He addressed the ball and swung, slowly and smoothly.
There was a gasp from the gallery as the ball headed straight for the sand-trap, then an exhalation of relief as it carried easily over the hazard, took a hard high bounce and careered for another thirty yards down the left-hand side of the fairway. Behind him, there was a smattering of applause. Skinner stepped back to stand beside Murano.
Norton Wales stepped up to the mark, clowning and waving to the gallery. Atkinson spoke to his caddy, who handed his client a five-iron. The singer took the club with a nod to his team captain, who mouthed the words, 'Swing slow.' Wales followed the instructions and was rewarded with a satisfactorily straight shot, shorter than Murano's or Skinner's, but like theirs safely in the playing area.
Darren Atkinson took the tee to a round of sustained applause from the gallery in the stands, and from the crowds lining the fairway on the left, swelled in number by his appearance on the course. He acknowledged them with a smile and a wave, then turned to begin his day's work. As he flexed the golden shaft of his metal-headed driver, rehearsing his swing section by section, Skinner was aware that this was no longer the amiable coach of the previous evening. This was a warrior readying himself for battle, not against another man but against the course itself, against its challenge to his supremacy, to his mastery of his craft. He looked down the fairway, selecting the point to which he would strike his first blow, and Skinner recognised in his eyes an expression which, in his earlier years as a karate player, he had seen often in the eyes of opponents out to attack his black belt status. He had been able, invariably to face them down, and now, he sensed, Atkinson's challenger was in for a pounding.
The US Open champion teed up and addressed the ball. The crowd, with traditional Scottish courtesy and discipline, was totally silent. Across on the Truth Loch, a goose cried out, but Atkinson's concentration was unbroken. Without seeming to exert overpowering physical force, he smashed the ball away into the distance, its left-to-right flight following the curve of the dogleg. Its first bounce was beyond Skinner's drive, satisfactory by his standards, and it ran on and on, so far into the distance that it was almost out of sight. The gallery's cheers, which had begun almost at the moment the ball left the club-head, echoed around the teeing ground. Atkinson grinned and, waving to the crowd in the stand to follow, led his team off down the fairway.
`See what I mean about the course, Bob?' he said as he and Skinner walked, side by side towards Norton Wales's drive, around 160 yards from the tee. 'It doesn't have sharp enough teeth for a championship venue. The hill isn't really in play, and that bunker isn't a hazard at all for a pro, or for you, for that matter. There's nothing to stop me using all my length off the tee, and with a short iron for my second shot, it's a birdie there for the taking.'
`Shall I tell Hector to do something about it?' asked Susan Kinture, earnestly. Atkinson looked over his shoulder in surprise.
‘I’m sorry, Lady Kinture. That was very rude of me. You and the Marquis are my hosts this week, and here I am criticising your course.' He paused as Norton Wales duffed his second shot, impossibly, into the bunker. 'Don't take it to heart, though. Witches' Hill is in the finest condition I've ever seen in a brand-new course, and your visitors will enjoy it as it stands. It's quite natural for adjustments to be made to a new venue as it matures.'
Susan Kinture's eyes shone like those of a schoolgirl. `Could you suggest any? If you could, Darren, it would be wonderful.'
Atkinson smiled at her, as Hideo Murano hit his second shot, a conservative three-wood, which he tugged into light rough, eighty yards short and left of the green. 'I probably could make one or two suggestions, but I'm not sure that the Marquis would welcome them. It's his course, and he has his own architect. He and O'Malley may well have long-term development plans.' He took her hand for a second, as Norton Wales picked up, after his third unsuccessful attempt to extricate himself from the sand-trap. 'Tell you what, I'll give it some thought on the way round, and perhaps you and I could have a chat about it over a nightcap tonight, after the dinner.'
`That would be great!'
`Right, it's a date. Now I must concentrate on my game. I could have a battle on my hands with these two guys.' They had reached Skinner's ball. 'Right Bob. Show us your stuff.' The kidney-shaped green, two hundred yards away, was guarded front left by a bunker, and a second lay to its rear on the right. The big policeman looked at the lie of his ball, thought for a moment, then took a three-iron from his bag. `Slow,' he said, aloud and fired in a high shot which bounced on the front edge of the green, bit hard, and trickled to a stop just short of the right-hand bunker.
`Bugger,' said Atkinson, forgetful of Lady Kinture's presence. 'That's you there for nett one, counting your shot.' Bravo was waiting by his ball when they reached it, sixty yards beyond Skinner's drive. Eight-iron, please, Bray.' He approached the shot as carefully and as methodically as he had prepared his tee-shot, seeming to ease, rather than force, the ball towards the green. It pitched six feet past the hole, but spun back sharply to stop inches away.
The gallery, now numbered in thousands, roared its applause behind the rope barrier.
Hideo Murano took two shots to free himself from the rough, then hit his fifth into the bunker behind the green. He signalled that his caddy should retrieve his ball, and stood beside Norton Wales on the edge of the green as Skinner surveyed a putt which was all of thirty feet long. 'What d'you think, caddy?' he asked Susan Kinture.
Obviously pleased to be asked, she stood beside him and looked down the line. 'It looks as if it'll come in from the right, about two inches. But it's slightly downhill, so be careful not to hit it too far past.' He nodded and lined up the putt. Remembering Darren Atkinson's advice, he kept the Zebra's head clear of the grass and stroked the ball delicately. For a moment, he thought that it would fall into the hole, but at the last moment it ran out of pace and stopped on the lip. Unable to suppress a smile, he tapped in for a four, nett three, leaving Atkinson to confirm the half with his tiny putt.
`Well played, partner,' said Hideo Murano, with his first grin of the day, as they walked towards the second tee.
Enjoy it,' said Skinner. 'I think that's as good as it's going to get.'