Hat Trick! (7 page)

The first Test match played over five days took place in Sydney, during February 1892. This was also the first time six balls were bowled in each over. In all the Tests before 1892, overs were just four balls long.

‘
WHAT
the heck do you two think you’re playing at?’

I looked up at the librarian. ‘You won’t find anything down there on the floor. Now hop it back to the table. Don’t kids nowadays use tables to do their work on? Eh?’ He was shaking his head as he headed back inside and over to his computer.

Luckily he hadn’t seen the
Wisden
, which was lying on the floor, half underneath me. I watched him walk off, grabbed the
Wisden
, and hauled Rahul to his feet. We walked back to the oval table as calmly as we could. The man with the glasses had gone.

Rahul hadn’t said a word. I looked at him. He looked pale and worn out.

‘Rahul? Speak to me.’

He turned to me slowly, a smile beginning to take shape.

‘We have to go back again, you know. When can we go? I’ll get some things together then you can take me back, okay?’

It was as if something or someone had taken over Rahul’s thinking. He wasn’t sounding like his normal, controlled self.

‘Not yet. Not until I talk to Jim,’ I whispered and told him all about Jim and our shared gift.

‘Right. Okay. Sorry. Where is he, then?’

‘I’m not sure. Leave it with me though, okay?’

Rahul looked at me closely.

‘Toby? What on earth just happened?’ A drop of sweat fell from my forehead and landed on the table next to the
Wisden
book. ‘We’ve just been to India. It was hot, wasn’t it?’

We looked at the tiny splash of sweat on the table.

Wonderingly, Rahul touched it with a finger.

‘Sweat from India,’ he said.

We stayed for another 20 minutes or so. Rahul jotted down notes from the books in front of him, while I sat in a daze. I couldn’t believe he could have suddenly become so calm, sitting there quietly, going from book to notepad as if nothing had happened.

Just before we left, the librarian came over to see how we were getting on.

‘Where’s Jim today?’ I asked him.

‘Jim’s not very well at the moment, I’m afraid.’

‘Could you tell me where he is? I’d like to send him a get well card.’

The librarian seemed a bit surprised. ‘Well, that’s a nice thought. If you send it care of the Simpson Hospital I’m sure he’ll get it.’

‘Okay, thanks,’ I said, getting up.

‘You boys come back any time.’

‘Sure. Thanks.’

I headed across to the secret door.

‘But maybe using the normal door,’ he added, smiling at us. We paused. ‘No, no, go on. It’s our secret, okay?’ He chuckled.

Thursday—afternoon

Scott Craven was his usual self at practice the following day. Rahul was quiet, though I didn’t think he’d go rushing about, telling everyone of his encounter with an Indian policeman nearly 20 years ago!

‘Here, I’m sure Toby would have forgotten your memento of Madras, but I didn’t,’ he told Scott.

Before I could say anything, Rahul had reached into his pocket and pulled out a couple of pebbles. I stared at them, then held out a hand to take a close look.

‘You sure you didn’t take them out of your brain?’ Scott reached over, grabbed the small stones and hurled them onto the dirt road by the nets.

‘You’re weird,’ Scott said to us.

He scowled. A moment later he wandered off, cursing and muttering under his breath.

At practice I got Mr Pasquali to toss ball after ball at me as he watched me play down the line. He called it a ‘V’. I really didn’t need a helmet or gloves, because he was throwing them pitched up and making me play forward defensive shots. But he
insisted that we should duplicate real batting conditions as often as we could.

Later, a few of us went to the centre-wicket and bowled to Ally. There was no batter, just a set of stumps for us to aim at. After a while, Ally didn’t bother replacing the bails on the stumps.

She moved quickly into position and took each ball neatly. I showed her how I held the ball to get it to swing the way I wanted to.

‘So that’s why you guys work so hard at keeping one side of the ball shiny?’ she asked me.

‘Yep. We also try to keep it off the ground when it’s being thrown back to the bowler.’

Ally looked at me questioningly.

‘The more the ball stays off the ground, the longer you can keep the shine on it.’

‘Okay, so don’t roll it up to, what do you call them, middle-off or something?’

‘Mid-off and mid-on. No. Well, of course it doesn’t matter when Scott’s bowling.’

Ally laughed.

‘I guess you don’t have that problem to worry about in a softball game?’ I asked.

‘Nope—I’m sort of missing its simpleness, though, compared with cricket.’

‘But are you enjoying wicket-keeping? Oh, yeah, until Martian comes back, that is.’ I added quickly.

We worked on a little leg-side trap, where I sent a slightly quicker ball, after a few slower ones, down outside the leg stump. After a few goes, we both had it
working well. Ally called it our ‘TLT’—Toby’s leg trap. I told her that if I pointed to the covers, there would be a TLT on, next ball.

‘Okay, so if you see me point to covers, come up and stand behind the stumps. I’ll bowl two slower ones outside the off-stump, then the third one will be a bit quicker down outside his pads. If the batter is out of his crease, you whip the bails off after you’ve caught the ball. Actually, whip them off anyway, it’s good practice.’

We practised the TLT a few times and it wasn’t long before Ally was taking the ball cleanly and in one easy movement swiping the bails off the stumps.

‘All we need is a batter,’ I called to her.

‘Bring him on!’

I noticed Scott Craven wander off in the last few minutes of practice. Jay had also gone, and he wasn’t looking happy when he returned a few minutes later.

Georgie noticed that Jay wasn’t his usual cheerful self too. Maybe she’d seen them head off together.

‘Did Scott do anything?’ Georgie asked him, as we were packing up the gear.

‘Nah, didn’t even see him.’

‘Oh, it’s just that I saw the two of you heading off together and I wondered.’

Jay didn’t look up from the pads that he was putting into pairs. I wasn’t convinced about his answer. Georgie and I exchanged glances.

‘By the way,’ she said, ‘I asked Mr Pasquali about Ivo. He said that Mrs Marshall hadn’t wanted him to make a fuss, but if anyone asked, he could tell them Ivo was at
the Simpson, and we could see him. But we’ve gotta ring first.’

‘The Simpson!’ I wheeled round.

‘Yeah. Why, what’s the matter? You had some bad experience there or something?’

‘Georgie, that’s where Jim Oldfield is. You know, the guy at the library.’

‘Great. Maybe I can fetch him another glass of water.’

The highest partnership in a one-day international was made by Rahul Dravid (153) and Sachin Tendulkar (186) against New Zealand on 8 November 1999. The two added 331 runs for the second wicket. India’s score for the game was 2/376.

Thursday—evening

I
logged into the CROC room, expecting a few others to be there.

Georgie: hey, who’s here

Toby: just got on, you still here, georgie?

Rahul: thought you’d never get here, toby

Toby: hi rahul

Rahul: evening all, toby, are we on for fri?

Jay: i’m here to

Georgie: jay—thought you were out tonight?

Jay: i’m aloud to change my mind, are’nt i

Suddenly I knew it wasn’t Jay. He was the best speller in the class, by a mile. My mind jumped back to when Georgie had seen Scott following Jay near the end of practice.

Georgie: hey toby, i’ve told rahul all about jim and everything, hope that’s okay

Rahul: I can’t wait to meet him myself, toby

Toby: maybe now’s not the best time

Jay: no, tell

Georgie: go on toby, you’re dying to

Rahul: careful everyone, this is major deep, how much do you know, georgie?

Georgie: only that there’s this nice (I think) old guy at the library at the mcg who has given toby an awesome poem and is telling him weird stories about travelling through time and stuff. it’s cool

Rahul: what do you know, jay?

Toby: yeah, tell us what you think, jay. tell us what happened in the library when we first met jim

Georgie: jay—you there?

Rahul: he’s gone

Toby: no he hasn’t, he’s watching us and reading it all

Jay: your a pack of sicko loosers

Toby: get out of the room everyone, now

There was no more conversation. I rang up Georgie, then Rahul, explaining my suspicion. They both agreed that there was only one solution. We would have to dump that room and create another. The problem was, would we include Jay? Was it his fault? Or did Scott bully the information out of him?

Sometimes Georgie wrote by just putting down on paper the first things that came into her head. I tried
it myself. I took out a pen and some paper, sat down at my desk, and started writing.

• I have travelled to different parts of the world, and to different times, and only Jim knows.
  
• Except for Rahul, who went all freaky when it happened to him.
  
• And Georgie, who sort of knows something weird is going on.
  
• And I should tell Jay—after all, he is one of my best friends.
  
• Ivo is in hospital, obviously pretty sick.
  
• Jim is there too.
  
• Jimbo isn’t allowed to play cricket.
  
• Georgie, and the kiss comment.
  
• Scott is out to get me, for running him out.
  
• Scott has got to Jay, and logged into CROC and now must surely know there is something big happening that he isn’t a part of.
  

The answer never did come to me. Maybe I just needed to share this whole thing with someone—an adult. But something was holding me back.

There was a tap at the door. Mum came in.

‘Hey, kiddo, do you want a snack? Dad’s making pancakes. He needs some eaters!’

‘Sure, Mum, coming,’ I said.

I wasn’t that hungry, but I went to the kitchen anyway. Mum had got out the family videos, and there were Nat, my younger sister, and me, prancing
about, opening presents and looking cute and cuddly. It was good to forget about things for a while.

Then, suddenly I thought—if there was a game of cricket happening at the MCG that day, the day my sister and I were messing about in our little backyard pool all those years ago, I could travel back in time with the correct
Wisden
book, walk from the cricket ground, sneak up to the back fence, lean over, and watch myself, aged three, playing in the pool with my sister.

Could I?

Would I?

I knew there was no way I could answer that right now.

In 1884 the captain of an English team forced the touring Australians to show their bats. He wanted to make sure they were not too wide!

Friday—afternoon

DAD
had been fine about visiting Ivo.

‘Of course I’ll take you,’ he said. ‘Poor kid. He deserves a change of luck, doesn’t he?’

On the way there in the car he shared old cricket stories. ‘Did I ever tell you about the time a spectator ran out onto the ground and got tackled?’

‘No. Who did the tackling?’

‘Terry Alderman, a great fast bowler from Western Australia. Actually, Toby, not unlike you in terms of style. He could swing the ball both ways. There was a great bit of graffiti up during the Ashes tour, ’89 I think: “Thatcher out”. Then someone had scrawled next to that, “lbw Alderman”.’

We both had a chuckle. I had no idea who Thatcher was, but Dad thought it was funny.

‘Anyway, this guy got tackled by Terry Alderman and he ended up dislocating his shoulder.’

‘Who?’

‘Terry Alderman. Absolute disaster. He was out of the game for ages.’

‘Dad?’

‘Yes, Toby?’ Dad looked at me. ‘What’s up?’

It was the closest I’d got, so far, to telling him about the
Wisden
s and the time travel. Dad, of all people, wouldn’t freak out. But there was something holding me back.

‘Tell me about that Test match between New Zealand and the West Indies. You know, the one when the West Indies were none for 276 and—’

‘Ah, yes. Amazing game. Probably one of the greatest escapes of all time.’

I decided I would tell him my secret later, and we would go on journey after journey, visiting all the famous games that have been played. We would make a list of them.

Maybe the biggest thing stopping me was the thought of Jim, lying somewhere in a hospital bed. Did he have a family? Was he someone’s grandad? I wanted to know a bit more about him. And then, maybe with him, decide what I would do with this magical power I had.

I owed Jim that.

While we were all visiting Martian, I would duck out and try to find him, just to let him know that I
hadn’t forgotten him. But mainly I just wanted to see him again and make sure he was okay.

Hospitals are quiet and lonely. Well, the parts that most people see are. There’s probably plenty more action in the operating theatres, and more noise down in the emergency section, but I didn’t want to go and test out that theory.

I was meeting the rest of the guys in the foyer, where Dad said he would wait for me. We made our way up to Ivo’s room on the first floor. His parents were with him. Ivo lay propped up on a heap of pillows and there was a drip next to him.

‘Does it hurt?’ I asked him, looking at the place where the needle must have been passing some solution into his body. His mum smiled at us, and left with Mr Marshall, saying that she was going to buy some fruit.

Ivo looked at the drip, smiled, and shook his head.

‘Thanks for coming, guys,’ he said, tears brimming.

‘Oh, God, I knew this would happen,’ Georgie burst out, starting to cry herself. ‘What is it, Ivo?’ she asked, between sobs. ‘Why are you here?’

Ivo looked at our worried faces.

‘Nothing,’ he replied, shaking his head. There was a silence. Rahul picked up a clipboard at the end of his bed.

‘You going to tell us, Ivo, or am I going to have to find out for myself?’ he asked, adjusting his glasses.

‘Well, they’re doing a few tests and stuff and they did a bit of surgery too. I’ve just got to stay here a few days till things settle down.’

Georgie recovered, blew her nose, perched herself on the end of the bed and said, ‘Ivo, I want to tell you that you’re the number one keeper in our team, and that as soon as you’re back you’re going straight to the keeper’s spot. Okay?’

‘Sure, George. You bet.’

‘Yep. If that doesn’t happen, this team is going to lose both its female players.’

‘Both?’ I asked, looking at her.

‘Yep,’ she said. ‘Absadoodle.’

‘Well, I don’t think I’ll be pushing for selection for a few weeks yet,’ said Ivo.

We told him about the game against St Mary’s and me running Craven out.

I caught Georgie’s eye and nodded to the door. She shook her head.

‘I’m just going to duck out for a moment, okay, guys?’

I didn’t wait for a reply. I walked over to the nurses’ area and asked the man there where Jim Oldfield was. He clicked his mouse and looked at his screen.

‘Room 225. Up another floor. Are you a relative?’

‘I’m sort of his godson. My dad’s just gone to buy some fruit,’ I added, as an afterthought.

He shrugged, and went back to his work.

I tapped on the door. There was no reply. I eased it open and poked my head around the corner. There were two beds. Two old men lay asleep. Jim was by the window. There was a cricket book on his bedside table.

I walked over and looked down at him. He lay very still. For a panic-stricken moment I thought he was dead.

Then he opened his eyes.

‘It’s all right, Toby. I’m a light sleeper,’ he whispered, smiling. ‘It was good of you to come.’ He sounded as though he was expecting me.

‘That’s okay, Mr Oldfield.’

He turned his head towards me. ‘Jim,’ he said. ‘Remember?’

‘Yes. Jim. Of course. I’ve travelled again,’ I blurted out. ‘I know I shouldn’t have, but I did. And I took Rahul with me to India. It was scary. It was—’

‘Ssh,’ Jim whispered, looking over at the other person. ‘I know you did, Toby. And I hope you have learned a valuable lesson. Those you carry are prone to go against your will. Against the will of the poem. Did this boy want to stay? Did he make it hard for you?’

‘Yes,’ I whispered back, ‘he did. It was like he was destined to be there or something.’

‘What did you say his name was?’

‘Rahul.’

‘Of Indian descent?’

‘Yes,’ I replied.

‘Then he had other ties that are very hard to work
against. He is one who perhaps should not travel with you, Toby.’

I had heaps of questions to ask Jim, but now that I was here they stuck in my throat.

‘Why are you here, Jim? Are you okay?’

‘My heart is not what it used to be, and it’s playing up just at the time when a certain special boy has come into my life,’ he replied.

‘Do you mean me?’ I asked. ‘I should never have walked into that library.’

‘Ah, but you had to. Don’t you see?’

I didn’t. Not one bit.

‘Jim, are you in danger?’ I asked, fearing his answer.

‘Not while I’m here, Toby. No, not at all,’ he added, sensing my anxiety.

‘But, why did I—’

A nurse walked in and started shooing me off as if I were a dog or something.

‘Please,’ Jim protested, rising slightly from his pillows. ‘He is my only family.’ He slumped back down again.

‘And where’s your mother?’ the nurse asked me as she straightened Jim’s bedclothes.

‘Dad’s just out buying some fruit,’ I told her. I might as well have just announced the fact over the loudspeaker system. I seemed to be telling everyone what Ivo’s dad was doing.

‘Right, then. Visiting time’s over. You can come back tomorrow.’

Jim reached out a hand. It was dry and lumpy, with veins and other marks. I reached over and took it. He clasped my hands in his.

‘Re-read the poem tonight, Toby. Promise me you will do that?’

‘I’ll read it, Jim. I promise,’ I said quietly.

He lay back and sighed. He looked content. Then he mumbled something. I didn’t quite catch what he said.

‘Pardon? What was that?’

But he just smiled, and shook his head.

I stayed a moment longer, looking at his wrinkled, gentle face. Then I turned around and left.