BLAYDS. Mr. Royce will hold the stakes. A shilling.
[214]ISOBEL. You will be ruined. (She takes out her purse.)
BLAYDS (childishly). Have you got one for me too?
ISOBEL (taking out two). One for you and one for me. Here you are, Mr. Royce.
ROYCE. Thank you. Both good ones? Right.
BLAYDS. George Meredith told me this. Are you fond of cricket, Mr. Royce?
ROYCE. Yes, very.
BLAYDS. So was Meredith, so was I.... A young boy playing for his school. The important match of the year; he gets his colours only if he plays—you understand? Just before the game began, he was sitting in one of those—what do they call them?—deck chairs, when it collapsed, his hand between the hinges. Three crushed fingers; no chance of playing; no colours. At that age a tragedy; it seems that one’s whole life is over. You understand?
ROYCE. Yes. Oh, very well.
BLAYDS. But if once the match begins with him, he has his colours, whatever happens afterwards. So he decides to say nothing about the fingers. He keeps his hand in his pocket; nobody has seen the accident, nobody guesses. His side is in first. He watches—his hand is in his pocket. When his turn comes to bat, he forces a glove over the crushed fingers and goes to the wickets. He makes nothing—well, that doesn’t matter; he is the wicket-keeper and has gone in last. But he knows now that he can never take his place in the field; and he knows, too, what an unfair thing he has done to his school to let them start their game with a cripple. It is impossible now to confess.... So, in between the innings, he arranges another accident with his chair, and falls back on it, with his fingers—his already crushed fingers this time—in the hinges. [215]So nobody ever knew. Not until he was a man, and it all seemed very little and far away.