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voice and Fritz's in question and answer. Then heavy footsteps drowning out Fritz's, and there appeared on the threshold a young man who looked like a football player bearing on his shoulder an enormous bundle about three feet long and as big around as Wolfe himself. Breathing, he said, "From Corliss Holmes."
    At Wolfe's nod I went to help. We got the bundle onto the floor and the young man knelt and began untying the cord, but he fumbled so long that I got impatient and reached in my pocket for my knife. Wolfe's murmur sounded from his chair, "No, Archie, few knots deserve that," and I put my knife back. Finally he got it loose and the cord pulled off, and I helped him unroll the paper and burlap, and then stood up and stared. I looked at Wolfe and back again at the pile on the floor. It was nothing but golf clubs, there must have been a hundred of them, enough I thought to kill a million snakes, for it had never seemed to me that they were much good for anything else.
    I said to Wolfe, "The exercise will do you good."
    Still in his chair, Wolfe told us to put them on the desk, and the young man and I each grabbed an armload. I began spreading them in a long row on the desk; there were long and short, heavy and light, iron, wood, steel, chromium, anything you might think of. Wolfe was looking at them, each one as I put it down, and after about a dozen he said, "Not these with iron ends. Remove them. Only those with wooden ends." To the young man, "You do not call this the end?"
    The young man looked amazed and superior. "That's the head."
    "Accept my apologies--your name?"
    "My name? Townsend."
    "Accept my apologies, Mr. Townsend. I once saw golf clubs through a shop window while my car was having a flat tire, but the ends were not labeled. And these are in fact all varieties of a single species?"
    "Huh? They're all different."
    "Indeed. Indeed, indeed. Plain wooden faces, inset faces, bone, composition, ivory--since this is the head I presume that is the face?"
    "Sure, that's the face."
    "Of course. And the purpose of the inset? Since everything in life must have a purpose except the culture of Orchidacese."
    "Purpose?"
    "Exactly. Purpose."
    "Well--" The young man hesitated. "Of course it's for the impact. That means hitting the ball, it's the inset that hits the ball, and that's the impact."
    "I see. Go no further. That will do nicely. And the handles, some wood, really fine and sensitive, and steel--I presume the steel handles are hollow."
    "Hollow steel shaft, yes, sir. It's a matter of taste. That one's a driver. This is a brassie. See the brass on the bottom? Brassie."
    "Faultless sequitur," Wolfe murmured. "That, I think, will be all, the lesson is complete. You know, Mr. Townsend, it is our good fortune that the exigencies of birth and training furnish all of us with opportunities for snobbery. My ignorance of this special nomenclature provided yours; your innocence of the elementary mental processes provides mine. As to the object of your visit, you can sell me nothing; these things will forever remain completely useless to me. You can reassemble your bundle and take it with you, but let us assume that I should purchase three of these clubs and that the profit on each should be one dollar. Three dollars? If I give you that amount will it be satisfactory?"
    The young man had, if not his own dignity, at least that of Corliss Holmes. "There is no obligation to purchase, sir."
    "No, but I haven't finished. I have to ask a favor of you. Will you take one of these clubs--here, this one--and stand there, beyond that chair, and whirl it about you in the orthodox manner?"
    "Whirl it?"
    "Yes; club, strike, hit, whatever you call it. Pretend that you are impacting a ball."
    Beyond snobbery, the young man was now having difficulty to conceal his contempt. He took the driver from Wolfe, backed away from the desk, shoved a chair aside, glanced around, behind, and up, then brought the driver up over his shoulder and down and