"Win!" echoed Foster. "We shall be lucky if we avoid an innings defeat."
And this supposition proved still more likely when half-an-hour later the House, having won the toss, had lost three wickets for as many runs. Jack Whitaker, now captain of Buller's, had gone on to bowl first from the end nearest the National Schools. In his first over he clean bowled Gordon, and in the next he got Foster leg before, and Bradford caught in the slips.
"I foresee," said Collins, "that we shall spend most of this game fielding. A poor way of occupying our last few days."
"That's where I score," said Gordon; "the wicket-keeper has no running to do, and, besides, I rather enjoy a game in which there is nothing to lose, no anxiety or anything. It is a peaceful end to a turgid career.... Oh, well hit!"
Bray had just lifted a length ball off the middle stump over short-leg's head.
"That's the sort of cricket I like," said Gordon; "a splendid contempt for all laws and regulations. Heavens! there he goes again!"
A lucky snick flew over the slips to the boundary.
"This is something like," said Foster, and prepared to enjoy himself.
And certainly Bray's cricket was entertaining. He treated every ball the same; he stepped straight down the pitch with his left foot, raised his bat in the direction of point and then, as the ball was bowled, he pivoted himself violently on his left foot and, going through a complete half-circle, finished, facing the wicket-keeper, with both feet outside the crease, but his bat well over the line. The chief attraction of this gymnastic feat was the unexpectedness of it all. No one knew where the ball would go if it was hit. Once when he timed his shot a little late he caught the ball just as it was passing him and drove it flying past the wicket-keeper's head to where long-stop would have been. The fielding side was always glad to see Bray's back, and it usually did not have to wait long. But to-day he bore a charmed life. He was missed at point once, twice he gave a chance of being stumped, the ball shaved his wickets times innumerable. But nearly every other ball he managed to hit somewhere. In the pavilion the School House rocked with laughter.
At the other end Davenham poked about scoring singles here and there. The score crept up. Amid cheers in which laughter was blended, the fifty went up. Then Bray, in a particularly gallant effort to steer a ball well outside the off stump round to short-leg, hit, all three wickets flying out of the ground. It was a suitable end to an unusual innings.