A silence that could be felt brooded over the pavilion.
The voice of the scorer, addressing from his little wooden hut the melancholy youth who was working the telegraph-board, broke it.
“One for two. Last man duck.”
Ellerby echoed the remark. He got up, and took off his blazer.
“This is all right,” he said, “isn’t it! I wonder if the man at the other end is a sort of young Rhodes too!”
Fortunately he was not. The star of the Ripton attack was evidently de Freece. The bowler at the other end looked fairly plain. He sent them down medium-pace, and on a good wicket would probably have been simple. But to-day there was danger in the most guileless-looking deliveries.
Berridge relieved the tension a little by playing safely through the over, and scoring a couple of twos off it. And when Ellerby not only survived the destructive de Freece’s second over, but actually lifted a loose ball on to the roof of the scoring-hut, the cloud began perceptibly to lift. A no-ball in the same over sent up the first ten. Ten for two was not good; but it was considerably better than one for two.
With the score at thirty, Ellerby was missed in the slips off de Freece. He had been playing with slowly increasing confidence till then, but this seemed to throw him out of his stride. He played inside the next ball, and was all but bowled: and then, jumping out to drive, he was smartly stumped. The cloud began to settle again.
Bob was the next man in.
Ellerby took off his pads, and dropped into the chair next to Mike’s. Mike was silent and thoughtful. He was in after Bob, and to be on the eve of batting does not make one conversational.
“You in next?” asked Ellerby.
Mike nodded.
“It’s getting trickier every minute,” said Ellerby. “The only thing is, if we can only stay in, we might have a chance. The wicket’ll get better, and I don’t believe they’ve any bowling at all bar de Freece. By George, Bob’s out!… No, he isn’t.”
Bob had jumped out at one of de Freece’s slows, as Ellerby had done, and had nearly met the same fate. The wicket-keeper, however, had fumbled the ball.
“That’s the way I was had,” said Ellerby. “That man’s keeping such a jolly good length that you don’t know whether to stay in your ground or go out at them. If only somebody would knock him off his length, I believe we might win yet.”
The same idea apparently occurred to Burgess. He came to where Mike was sitting.
“I’m going to shove you down one, Jackson,” he said. “I shall go in next myself and swipe, and try and knock that man de Freece off.”
“All right,” said Mike. He was not quite sure whether he was glad or sorry at the respite.
“It’s a pity old Wyatt isn’t here,” said Ellerby. “This is just the sort of time when he might have come off.”
“Bob’s broken his egg,” said Mike.
“Good man. Every little helps…. Oh, you silly ass, get back!”
Berridge had called Bob for a short run that was obviously no run. Third man was returning the ball as the batsmen crossed. The next moment the wicket-keeper had the bails off. Berridge was out by a yard.
“Forty-one for four,” said Ellerby. “Help!”
Burgess began his campaign against de Freece by skying his first ball over cover’s head to the boundary. A howl of delight went up from the school, which was repeated, fortissimo, when, more by accident than by accurate timing, the captain put on two more fours past extra-cover. The bowler’s cheerful smile never varied.
Whether Burgess would have knocked de Freece off his length or not was a question that was destined to remain unsolved, for in the middle of the other bowler’s over Bob hit a single; the batsmen crossed; and Burgess had his leg-stump uprooted while trying a gigantic pull-stroke.
The melancholy youth put up the figures, 54, 5, 12, on the board.
Mike, as he walked out of the pavilion to join Bob, was not conscious of any particular nervousness. It had been an ordeal having to wait and look on while wickets fell, but now that the time of inaction was at an end he felt curiously composed. When he had gone out to bat against the M.C.C. on the occasion of his first appearance for the school, he experienced a quaint sensation of unreality. He seemed to be watching his body walking to the wickets, as if it were some one else’s. There was no sense of individuality.
But now his feelings were different. He was cool. He noticed small things—mid-off chewing bits of grass, the bowler re-tying the scarf round his waist, little patches of brown where the turf had been worn away. He took guard with a clear picture of the positions of the fieldsmen photographed on his brain.
Fitness, which in a batsman exhibits itself mainly in an increased power of seeing the ball, is one of the most inexplicable things connected with cricket. It has nothing, or very little, to do with actual health. A man may come out of a sick-room with just that extra quickness in sighting the ball that makes all the difference; or he may be in perfect training and play inside straight half-volleys. Mike would not have said that he felt more than ordinarily well that day. Indeed, he was rather painfully conscious of having bolted his food at lunch. But something seemed to whisper to him, as he settled himself to face the bowler, that he was at the top of his batting form. A difficult wicket always brought out his latent powers as a bat. It was a standing mystery with the sporting Press how Joe Jackson managed to collect fifties and sixties on wickets that completely upset men who were, apparently, finer players. On days when the Olympians of the cricket world were bringing their averages down with ducks and singles, Joe would be in his element, watching the ball and pushing it through the slips as if there were no such thing as a tricky wicket. And Mike took after Joe.
A single off the fifth ball of the over opened his score and brought him to the opposite end. Bob played ball number six back to the bowler, and Mike took guard preparatory to facing de Freece.
The Ripton slow bowler took a long run, considering his pace. In the early part of an innings he often trapped the batsmen in this way, by leading them to expect a faster ball than he actually sent down. A queer little jump in the middle of the run increased the difficulty of watching him.
The smiting he had received from Burgess in the previous over had not had the effect of knocking de Freece off his length. The ball was too short to reach with comfort, and not short enough to take liberties with. It pitched slightly to leg, and whipped in quickly. Mike had faced half-left, and stepped back. The increased speed of the ball after it had touched the ground beat him. The ball hit his right pad.
“‘S that?” shouted mid-on. Mid-on has a habit of appealing for l.-b.-w. in school matches.
De Freece said nothing. The Ripton bowler was as conscientious in the matter of appeals as a good bowler should be. He had seen that the ball had pitched off the leg-stump.
The umpire shook his head. Mid-on tried to look as if he had not spoken.
Mike prepared himself for the next ball with a glow of confidence. He felt that he knew where he was now. Till then he had not thought the wicket was so fast. The two balls he had played at the other end had told him nothing. They had been well pitched up, and he had smothered them. He knew what to do now. He had played on wickets of this pace at home against Saunders’s bowling, and Saunders had shown him the right way to cope with them.
The next ball was of the same length, but this time off the off-stump. Mike jumped out, and hit it before it had time to break. It flew along the ground through the gap between cover and extra-cover, a comfortable three.