11.00 a.m.

M Hawker (9)

P Simpson (11)

P Hill (12)
If the playing of 'I Don't Give a Toss' and the arrival of Constables Fearon and James had been influential in spoiling Mr Captain's day to some degree the arrival of Martin Hawker, Peter Simpson and Phyllis Hill at the first tee had the potential to completely ruin it. Until six months ago Phyllis Hill had been Philip Hill, at which point in his life he had undertaken a sex-change operation. (Armitage, with a possible penis transplant in mind, had enquired as to the size of the unwanted genitalia, but Philip had told him that Phyllis would be holding on to it, figuratively speaking, for sentimental reasons.)

Up until the time of the operation Philip had been a transvestite and when playing golf had dressed as do most lady golfers, in pastel shades and tweedy things, and well-cut trousers, rather than a skirt. Thus attired he could quite easily have been taken for one of the lady members at Sunnymere, not because he looked particularly feminine but because quite a few of the more heftily built lady members could easily be taken for transvestites.

The officials of the club didn't much care for the idea of Philip Hill dressing as a woman but there was very little they could do about it, though it was not for want of trying. The club secretary had scoured the Rules of Golf, and whilst he had found many rules that were complete news to him none of them related to the rights or otherwise of transvestites on the course. And in the politically correct times prevalent in Great Britain in the early years of the third millennium it was of course unthinkable that Philip Hill should be barred from playing his chosen sport just because he chose to dress like a woman. It didn’t however stop most of the members from thinking he should. In fact the majority of them would have willingly shot and buried him in the golf course’s deepest bunker if they’d thought for one moment they would get away with it.

However the problems posed by having a transvestite on the course were as nothing once Philip had gone through the operation that transformed him into, if not a whole woman, then minus a set of male genitalia a whole woman. For it was then that Philip Hill, now Phyllis Hill, sought to play in the ladies’ competitions rather than the men's. Not surprisingly the Sunnymere ladies’ section would not even contemplate the proposition. As far as they were concerned Phyllis Hill was still very much a man. That he was a man now minus a penis and testicles, in addition to being the proud owner, thanks to hormone treatment, of a pair of small but blossoming breasts, didn’t even enter into the argument. The way the ladies saw it was that although Philip Hill may very well no longer have male genitalia he certainly still did have the same muscular six feet two inch frame he’d had before, as well as the two strong arms of the plasterer’s mate he had been (and still was) for the last fifteen years, and therefore had an unfair advantage when it came to propelling a golf ball round the course, and especially so off the ladies’ tees.

In an effort to reach some sort of compromise Phyllis had offered to play in the ladies’ competitions but off the men's tees, but to no avail. The ladies would not allow her to play in their competitions full stop, and that was the end of the matter. The club chairman George Grover had pointed out to the ladies’ committee, as delicately as he could, that Phyllis now had a vagina, and bigger breasts than his wife, in fact bigger breasts than quite a number of the lady members, but the ladies had been adamant in their rejection of the new member without a member.

Letters had been sent to the R & A and the Ladies Golf Union asking if one or other of those ruling bodies could clarify the situation. Both letters had received no response whatsoever, despite two further letters asking if the original letters had been received, save for a letter postmarked ‘St Andrews’ from someone with a GSOH requesting a photograph of Phyllis, who he WLTM with a view to a dinner date and possible fun afterwards, non-smoker. Consequently the male membership had no alternative but to allow Phyllis to continue playing in the men's competitions. For her part Phyllis didn't mind which competitions she played in just so long as she could play.

So it should have been business as usual. However now that Phyllis was a woman, in her eyes if in no one else's, she began to dress more in the manner of what her idea of a woman should dress like. Out went the pastel shades and tweedy things and well-cut trousers; in came much brighter colours and clingy things and skirts. This in itself wouldn't have been too bad, as quite a number of the more adventurous lady members also wore brighter colours, a few of them even wearing clingy things and skirts, but unlike Phyllis they didn't wear a huge pair of falsies under their jumpers - which she had affected until such time as her new breasts reached maturity - and miniskirts, nor the long platinum blonde wig and full make-up Phyllis had now taken to wearing on the course.

Mr Captain now regarded Phyllis, dressed in her purple mini skirt and pink Lycra top, a matching pink, purple and lilac polka-dotted bandana round her tumbling blonde locks, her long muscular legs freshly waxed, her tattooed arms, her whole body reeking of cheap perfume, and visibly shuddered. He was only grateful that her teeing off time was 11 a.m. and not 11.10. as the Mayor was due to arrive at 11.20. and 11.10. was a time far too close for comfort. If the Mayor were to see the monstrosity it would be the end! The end now proceeded to get a little nearer.

“Blooming heck I've forgotten my driver,” Phyllis suddenly said to her partners. “The pro's been re-gripping it for me and I was supposed to pick it up.”

“Well you haven’t got time to go back, Phyllis” said Simpson, checking his watch. “We’re due off in less than two minutes.”

“Can't you drive with your two wood?” suggested Hawker, helpfully.

Phyllis shook her head. “No, a girl needs her driver.”

Alfred Jacobson, who was in the following threesome and had arrived at the tee early, now spoke up. “Why not go back and get it Phyllis? I'll take your place and you can take mine.”

Mr Captain was onto Jacobson’s suggestion faster than a politician at the opening of a new pig trough. “Over my dead body he will!” he barked tendentiously. “He stays in the threesome he is already in!” (When Phyllis had first become a woman she had requested everyone at the club to not only call her by her new name but to think of her as a woman as well. Mr Captain hadn't even tried to do either, and had steadfastly continued to call her Philip and refer to her as 'he'. Indeed he delighted in doing so.)

“What’s wrong with me swapping with him?” demanded Phyllis.

Mr Captain didn't beat about the bush. In his opinion all transvestites and transsexuals should be put down, preferably painfully, along with all homosexuals of both sexes, and their remains thrown in a lime pit, and he didn't mind who knew it. “Because the Lord Mayor will be arriving soon,” he said imperiously. “And I don't want him setting eyes on you. And I'm quite sure the Mayor himself wouldn’t want to set eyes on you either if he knew the state of you.”

“Oh I don't know about that, Mr Captain,” said Simpson. “From what I've heard of the Mayor he likes a bit of skirt.”

“Phyllis isn't a bit of skirt,” grinned Hawker. “She's a lot of skirt. A great big joyous bundle of skirt.”

“Why thank you, Martin,” said Phyllis, fluttering her false eyelashes, “I didn’t know you cared.”

Mr Captain cringed at Phyllis’s overt display of feminism, which only made him stick even more firmly to his guns. “So for the sake of the Mayor I insist you stick to your official starting time,” he commanded.

“The Mayor,” said Phyllis, with a flamboyant toss of her curls, “can kiss my bottom.”

Hawker gave a lewd smile. “You can put me down for that too, Phyllis.”

“Get in the queue,” said Simpson, joining in the fun.

“Down boys,” said Phyllis. She turned to Jacobson. “Thanks for swapping with me, Alf,” she said, and set off for the pro's shop without further ado, leaving Mr Captain utterly distraught.

*

“Hello hello hello, what's all this then?” said Harris, on the walk from the tee to the thirteenth green.

“What's all what?” said Garland.

Harris pointed at the adjoining twelfth fairway. “Plod.”

Garland and Ifield looked across to see Constable Fearon, Constable James and Jason some hundred yards away making their way down the fairway in the opposite direction. Ifield recognised Jason immediately. “It's that kid you took prisoner, Mr Vice!”

“You're right,” said Harris. “He said his dad was a policeman. The little bugger must have been telling the truth.”

“Christ I can do without this,” said Garland, annoyed. “I've got a good round going.”

“I don't think they'll bother too much about that, if I know coppers,” said Ifield. “They can be mean bastards when they want to be.”

“They're walking away from us anyway,” observed Harris. “Perhaps they'll miss us.”

“Let's just hope so,” said Garland uncomfortably.

*

On the eleventh green Armitage settled over his putt, if the verb settled can be ascribed to someone whose current state of mind was about as stable as a ping pong ball going over Niagara Falls. Thankfully the double vision which had plagued him for the last couple of holes had completely disappeared. When it had been restored to normal Armitage had breathed a huge sigh of relief. Taking an apprehensive sharp intake of breath would have been more appropriate, for the brief spell of normal vision had quickly been replaced by what can only be described as phallus vision. And accompanying the phallus vision came the suspicion that what Grover had said to him earlier, that he had dicks on the brain, might somehow be true. In fact he knew it to be true, he had seen evidence of it with his own eyes.

He now saw evidence of it again as the head of his Ping putter struck the ball, and, as the ball set off for the hole some twelve feet away, proceeded to elongate itself into a six inch long, golf ball-wide, penis. As Armitage watched its journey to the hole, mouth agape, eyes stuck out like chapel hat pegs, the penis sprouted a couple of golf ball-sized testicles. Then, as the hole got nearer the penis got bigger, until at the moment it entered the hole it was the same diameter, and a perfect fit, the shaft of the penis disappearing up to the hilt, leaving the testicles above ground.

“Oh well holed,” said Stock, as the penis disappeared. He approached the hole, flagstick in hand. “Stay there, I'll throw it back to you.”

With that Stock retrieved the penis and tossed it back to Armitage. By now it was fully eighteen inches long. Armitage instinctively dropped his putter and held out his hands wide enough to enable him to catch something of this size. However by the time it arrived it was a normal-sized golf ball again. Passing through his outstretched hands it hit him on the chest and dropped harmlessly to the ground.

*

In the beer tent Mr Harkness, Mr Oldknow and Mr Wormald were already well into their third double whisky with pint of bitter chaser and things were livening up. The Lady Captain, who was matching them with double gins but eschewing the pints of bitter in favour of more double gins, had just succeeded in bringing the gentlemen’s conversation on the subject of crown green bowls round to the subject of sex, a quantum leap by any stretch of the imagination, but nothing to a woman who has taken a shine to someone.

“Taller men make the best lovers,” she said, looking fondly at Harkness, then added, modestly, “Or so I have been told.”

“Really?” said Harkness, genuinely surprised.

“So I’m led to believe.” The Lady Captain looked him up and down appreciatively. “You're quite a tall man, aren't you Mr Harkness.”

“Quite tall, yes.”

“I'm not, but I'm prepared to stand on a box,” said Oldknow.

“Me too,” said Wormald.

“Of course that isn't to say that shorter men can't be excellent lovers too,” said the Lady Captain to Oldknow and Wormald, aware that Harkness might not feel the same way about her as she felt about him, and hedging her bets.

At almost sixty years of age the Lady Captain was still a very attractive woman so Oldknow and Wormald wasted no time in encouraging her further.

“It's not the size of the gun....” said Oldknow.

“....It's the force of the bullet,” said Wormald.

“Quite,” said the Lady Captain. She re-crossed her legs, making sure the three old men seated opposite her got a good view of a generous expanse of creamy white thigh and hopefully a glimpse of her pink silk French knickers. “Of course my husband Bobby was a tall man. He was an excellent lover.”

“I wouldn't expect a man who said a pint of bitter always went down better when it was accompanied by a chaser to be anything else,” said Oldknow, sagely.

“Me neither,” said Wormald.

“But of course he's sadly passed on, and....” the Lady Captain said sadly, leaving the rest of the sentence unspoken.

Oldknow filled it in as “I'm going short.”

Wormald, a coarser man, filled it in as “I'm gasping for the leg over.”

Harkness, a less worldly man and more of a gentleman than his companions, didn't fill it in at all. His late wife had kept him just as short of sex as she had of alcohol and it had been so long since he’d had it he had almost forgotten it existed. Certainly any play for his affections would have to be couched in more obvious terms than “But of course he's sadly passed on, and....”

The Lady Captain now sensed that her words, while bringing more than a twinkle to the eye of Oldknow, and nothing short of a lascivious grin and the beginnings of an erection from Wormald, had had no effect at all on Harkness. She decided to adopt a less oblique approach. She got up, walked over to him, sat on his knee, put her arms round his neck, and said, “How about a fuck?”

Mr Captain had just about recovered from the upset of Phyllis Hill when the fire engine drove onto the course. It wasn't the first time Mr Captain had seen a fire engine on the course; a few years previously during a period of drought the local fire service had been good enough to pump thousands of gallons of water over the greens and fairways in an effort to stop them burning up. However there was no drought at the moment, and even if there had been and the course had been drier than the Sahara Desert nobody would have sent for the fire service to pump water over it today, not on Captain's Day.

He quickly headed for the fire engine, waving his arms about in an effort to make it stop. It would have stopped anyway, as the driver of the fire engine, Leading Fireman Jeffers, needed directions. After pulling up and waiting for Mr Captain to walk round to his side of the cab the fire officer wound down the window and said, “Excuse me, which is the way to the thirteenth green?”

Not for the first time that day, nor the last, Mr Captain couldn't believe his ears. “What?"

“The thirteenth green. Apparently you have a woman stuck up a tree.”

“A woman?”

“The Lady Captain-Erect, I believe. Nine nine nine call. Usually it’s cats stuck up trees, a woman will make a nice change, give me the chance to practice my fireman's lift. That's difficult on cats.”

Mr Captain was apoplectic. “You can't go onto the golf course with a fire engine just to get a woman down from a tree!”

Blakey, the other fireman in the cab, leaned over. “Just how long do you think our ladder is, mate?”

“What?”

“Well we can't reach her from here, can we? So stop messing about and tell us where the thirteenth green is, we’ve got a job to do.” In view of the imminent arrival of the Mayor Mr Captain considered refusing point blank to tell the firemen the whereabouts of the thirteenth green in the hope they would turn round and go away, then dismissed the idea, realising that if he didn’t tell them someone else was sure to. He glanced at his watch. Almost ten past eleven. The thirteenth green was quite some distance away. By the time the fire engine had made its way there and rescued the Lady Captain-Elect the Mayor could very well have made his visit and departed for his next appointment. In addition he was mindful that public services didn't seem to have much sense of direction when it came to golf courses, if the policemen who had recently arrived back at the first tee twenty minutes after leaving it were anything to go by, and that there was an excellent chance the fire engine would be out on the golf course and out of sight for quite some time, so all things considered he decided to be helpful. “It's over there,” he said, pointing in the approximate direction of the thirteenth green. “No hurry.”

*

On regaining consciousness Millicent wondered what on earth she was doing lying stretched out on the ground behind the beer tent with a couple of cans of lager, thoughtfully placed there by Oldknow, supporting her head as a sort of alcoholic pillow. She searched her mind for some clue. The last thing she could remember was being in the beer tent when she had introduced her father and his two friends to the Lady Captain and had asked what they would like to drink. She suddenly sat bolt upright as she recalled what had happened next. That revolting song had been played! And at such a deafening volume that the whole golf course must have heard it! She glanced at her watch. Good Lord, it must have been over twenty minutes ago. She leapt to her feet. Daddy Rhythm would have to be dealt with forthwith! He would have to go! She would bring her record player and allow that to provide the music for the dance that evening, or employ her next-door neighbour's seven-year-old to provide it on his toy trumpet, anything rather than risk that detestable Daddy Rhythm degenerate playing his horrible music again.

She rolled up her sleeves and set off for the clubhouse, so intent on dealing with the Daddy Rhythm situation that she failed to notice the sounds of merriment emanating from within the beer tent. If she had heard Wormald's cry of “Get 'em off!” she might have made dealing with the awful Daddy Rhythm her second priority. But unfortunately she didn't.



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