As for the conversationalist, he had made thirty or more, and wanted all the bowling he could get.
“It’s a very curious thing,” he said to Reece, as he faced Gosling, after his partner had scored a three off the first ball of the over, “but some fellows simply detest fast bowling. Now I—” He never finished the sentence. When he spoke again it was to begin a new one.
“How on earth did that happen?” he asked.
“I think it bowled you,” said Reece stolidly, picking up the two stumps which had been uprooted by Gosling’s express.
“Yes. But how? Dash it! What? I can’t underst—. Most curious thing I ever—dash it all, you know.”
He drifted off in the direction of the Pavilion, stopping on the way to ask short leg his opinion of the matter.
“Bowled, Sammy,” said Reece, putting on the bails.
“Well bowled, Gosling,” growled Norris from the slips.
“Sammy the marvel, by Jove,” said Marriott. “Switch it on, Samuel, more and more.”
“I wish Norris would give me a rest. Where on earth is that man Gethryn?”
“Rum, isn’t it? There’s going to be something of a row about it. Norris seems to be getting rather shirty. Hullo! here comes the Deathless Author.”
The author referred to was the new batsman, a distinguished novelist, who played a good deal for the M.C.C. He broke his journey to the wicket to speak to the conversationalist, who was still engaged with short leg.
“Bates, old man,” he said, “if you’re going to the Pavilion you might wait for me. I shall be out in an hour or two.”
Upon which Bates, awaking suddenly to the position of affairs, went on his way.
With the arrival of the Deathless Author an unwelcome change came over the game. His cricket style resembled his literary style. Both were straightforward and vigorous. The first two balls he received from Gosling he drove hard past cover point to the ropes. Gosling, who had been bowling unchanged since the innings began, was naturally feeling a little tired. He was losing his length, and bowling more slowly than was his wont. Norris now gave him a rest for a few overs, Bruce going on with rather innocuous medium left-hand bowling. The professional continued to jog along slowly. The novelist hit. Everything seemed to come alike to him. Gosling resumed, but without effect, while at the other end bowler after bowler was tried. From a hundred and ten the score rose and rose, and still the two remained together. A hundred and ninety went up, and Norris in despair threw the ball to Marriott.
“Here you are, Marriott,” he said, “I’m afraid we shall have to try you.”
“That’s what I call really nicely expressed,” said Marriott to the umpire. “Yes, over the wicket.”
Marriott was a slow, “House-match” sort of bowler. That is to say, in a House match he was quite likely to get wickets, but in a First Eleven match such an event was highly improbable. His bowling looked very subtle, and if the ball was allowed to touch the ground it occasionally broke quite a remarkable distance.
The forlorn hope succeeded. The professional for the first time in his innings took a risk. He slashed at a very mild ball almost a wide on the off side. The ball touched the corner of the bat, and soared up in the direction of cover-point, where Pringle held it comfortably.
“There you are,” said Marriott, “when you put a really scientific bowler on you’re bound to get a wicket. Why on earth didn’t I go on before, Norris?”
“You wait,” said Norris, “there are five more balls of the over to come.”
“Bad job for the batsman,” said Marriott.
There had been time for a run before the ball reached Pringle, so that the novelist was now at the batting end. Marriott’s next ball was not unlike his first, but it was straighter, and consequently easier to get at. The novelist hit it into the road. When it had been brought back he hit it into the road again. Marriott suggested that he had better have a man there.
The fourth ball of the over was too wide to hit with any comfort, and the batsman let it alone. The fifth went for four to square leg, almost killing the umpire on its way, and the sixth soared in the old familiar manner into the road again. Marriott’s over had yielded exactly twenty-two runs. Four to win and two wickets to fall.
“I’ll never read another of that man’s books as long as I live,” said Marriott to Gosling, giving him the ball. “You’re our only hope, Sammy. Do go in and win.”
The new batsman had the bowling. He snicked his first ball for a single, bringing the novelist to the fore again, and Samuel Wilberforce Gosling vowed a vow that he would dismiss that distinguished novelist.
But the best intentions go for nothing when one’s arm is feeling like lead. Of all the miserable balls sent down that afternoon that one of Gosling’s was the worst. It was worse than anything of Marriott’s. It flew sluggishly down the pitch well outside the leg stump. The novelist watched it come, and his eye gleamed. It was about to bounce for the second time when, with a pleased smile, the batsman stepped out. There was a loud, musical report, the note of a bat when it strikes the ball fairly on the driving spot.
The man of letters shaded his eyes with his hand, and watched the ball diminish in the distance.
“I rather think,” said he cheerfully, as a crash of glass told of its arrival at the Pavilion, “that that does it.”
He was perfectly right. It did.
