“Yes, Tom’s going,” said his father. “He’s going to field if anyone is hurt or has to leave early. But if he’s not wanted he will look after you.”
“Hurray!” said Roderick. “I know what I shall do. I shall score every run and keep the bowling analysis too.”
The train left St. Pancras on the Sunday afternoon, and that in itself was an excitement, for Roderick had never travelled on Sunday before; but before that had come the rapture of packing his bag, which on this occasion was not an ordinary one, but an old cricket-bag of his father’s, which he begged for, in which were not only his sponge and collars and other necessary things, but his flannels and his bat and pads.
This bag he insisted upon carrying himself all along the platform, and, as several of the Middlesex team were also on their way to the train at the same moment, the presence of so small a cricketer in their midst made a great sensation among the porters.
“My word!” said one, “Yorkshire will have to look out this time.”
“Who’s the giant,” asked another, “walking just behind Albert Trott? I shouldn’t like to be in when he bowled his fastest.”
But Roderick was unconscious of any laughter. He was the proudest boy in London, although his arm, it is true, was beginning to ache horribly. But when, as he was climbing into the carriage, the guard lifted him up and called him “Prince Run-get-simply,” he joined in the fun.
THE PRESENCE OF SO SMALL A CRICKETER MADE A GREAT SENSATION AMONG THE PORTERS.
It was a deliriously happy journey, for all the cricketers were very nice to him, and Mr. Warner talked about Australia, and Mr. Bosanquet showed him how he held the ball to make it break from the leg when the batsman thought it was going to break from the off, and at Nottingham Mr. Douglas bought him a bun and a banana. They got to Sheffield just before eight, and Roderick went to bed very soon after, in a little bed in his father’s room in the hotel.