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Page 3
At lunch that day Mike sat next to Mr Smith, and improved his
acquaintance with him; and by the end of the week they were on
excellent terms. Psmith's father had Psmith's gift of getting on well
with people.
On this Saturday, as Mike buckled on his pads, Mr Smith bounded up,
full of advice and encouragement.
'My boy,' he said, 'we rely on you. These others'--he indicated with a
disparaging wave of the hand the rest of the team, who were visible
through the window of the changing-room--'are all very well. Decent
club bats. Good for a few on a billiard-table. But you're our hope on a
wicket like this. I have studied cricket all my life'--till that summer
it is improbable that Mr Smith had ever handled a bat--'and I know a
first-class batsman when I see one. I've seen your brothers play. Pooh,
you're better than any of them. That century of yours against the Green
Jackets was a wonderful innings, wonderful. Now look here, my boy. I
want you to be careful. We've a lot of runs to make, so we mustn't take
any risks. Hit plenty of boundaries, of course, but be careful.
Careful. Dash it, there's a youngster trying to climb up the elm. He'll
break his neck. It's young Giles, my keeper's boy. Hi! Hi, there!'
He scudded out to avert the tragedy, leaving Mike to digest his expert
advice on the art of batting on bad wickets.
Possibly it was the excellence of this advice which induced Mike to
play what was, to date, the best innings of his life. There are moments
when the batsman feels an almost super-human fitness. This came to Mike
now. The sun had begun to shine strongly. It made the wicket more
difficult, but it added a cheerful touch to the scene. Mike felt calm
and masterful. The bowling had no terrors for him. He scored nine off
his first over and seven off his second, half-way through which he lost
his partner. He was to undergo a similar bereavement several times that
afternoon, and at frequent intervals. However simple the bowling might
seem to him, it had enough sting in it to worry the rest of the team
considerably. Batsmen came and went at the other end with such rapidity
that it seemed hardly worth while their troubling to come in at all.
Every now and then one would give promise of better things by lifting
the slow bowler into the pavilion or over the boundary, but it always
happened that a similar stroke, a few balls later, ended in an easy
catch. At five o'clock the Ilsworth score was eighty-one for seven
wickets, last man nought, Mike not out fifty-nine. As most of the house
team, including Mike, were dispersing to their homes or were due for
visits at other houses that night, stumps were to be drawn at six. It
was obvious that they could not hope to win. Number nine on the list,
who was Bagley, the ground-man, went in with instructions to play for a
draw, and minute advice from Mr Smith as to how he was to do it. Mike
had now begun to score rapidly, and it was not to be expected that he
could change his game; but Bagley, a dried-up little man of the type
which bowls for five hours on a hot August day without exhibiting any
symptoms of fatigue, put a much-bound bat stolidly in front of every
ball he received; and the Hall's prospects of saving the game grew
brighter.
At a quarter to six the professional left, caught at very silly point
for eight. The score was a hundred and fifteen, of which Mike had made
eighty-five.
A lengthy young man with yellow hair, who had done some good fast
bowling for the Hall during the week, was the next man in. In previous
matches he had hit furiously at everything, and against the Green
Jackets had knocked up forty in twenty minutes while Mike was putting
the finishing touches to his century. Now, however, with his host's
warning ringing in his ears, he adopted the unspectacular, or Bagley,
style of play. His manner of dealing with the ball was that of one
playing croquet. He patted it gingerly back to the bowler when it was
straight, and left it icily alone when it was off the wicket. Mike,
still in the brilliant vein, clumped a half-volley past point to the
boundary, and with highly scientific late cuts and glides brought his
score to ninety-eight. With Mike's score at this, the total at a
hundred and thirty, and the hands of the clock at five minutes to six,
the yellow-haired croquet exponent fell, as Bagley had fallen, a victim
to silly point, the ball being the last of the over.
Mr Smith, who always went in last for his side, and who so far had not
received a single ball during the week, was down the pavilion steps and
half-way to the wicket before the retiring batsman had taken half a
dozen steps.
'Last over,' said the wicket-keeper to Mike. 'Any idea how many you've
got? You must be near your century, I should think.'
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