Orme sent me to the score first, with the purpose, as I knew, of studying his man.
I loaded at the open bowls, and adjusted the caps as I stepped to the score.

I was perhaps a bit too tense and eager, although my health and youth had never allowed me to be a victim of what is known as nervousness.

Our birds were to be flown by hand from behind a screen, and my first bird started off a trifle low, but fast, and I knew I was not on with the first barrel, the hang of Stevenson's gun being not quite the same as my own.

I killed it with the second, but it struggled over the tape.
"Lost bird!" called out Judge Reeves sharply and distinctly; and it was evident that now he would be as decisive as he had hitherto been deliberate.
Under the etiquette of the game no comment was made on my mishap, and my second, Stevenson, did not make the mistake of commiserating me.

No one spoke a word as Orme stepped to the score.