to argument. I was staying at an hotel in Switzerland, and the
second evening a pleasant-spoken young fellow, who said he had read
all my books--later, he appeared surprised on learning I had written
more than two--asked me if I would care to play a hundred up. We
played even, and I paid for the table. The next evening he said he
thought it would make a better game if he gave me forty and I broke.
It was a fairly close finish, and afterwards he suggested that I
should put down my name for the handicap they were arranging.

"I am afraid," I answered, "that I hardly play well enough. Just a
quiet game with you is one thing; but in a handicap with a crowd
looking on--"

"I should not let that trouble you," he said; "there are some here
who play worse than you--just one or two. It passes the evening."

It was merely a friendly affair. I paid my twenty marks, and was
given plus a hundred. I drew for my first game a chatty type of man,
who started minus twenty. We neither of us did much for the first
five minutes, and then I made a break of forty-four.

There was not a fluke in it from beginning to end. I was never more
astonished in my life. It seemed to me it was the cue was doing it.

Minus Twenty was even more astonished. I heard him as I passed:

"Who handicapped this man?" he asked.

"I did," said the pleasant-spoken youngster.