He was not kept long in suspense. De Freece’s first ball made a hideous wreck of his wicket.
“Over,” said the umpire.
Mike felt that the school’s one chance now lay in his keeping the bowling. But how was he to do this? It suddenly occurred to him that it was a delicate position that he was in. It was not often that he was troubled by an inconvenient modesty, but this happened now. Grant was a fellow he hardly knew, and a school prefect to boot. Could he go up to him and explain that he, Jackson, did not consider him competent to bat in this crisis? Would not this get about and be accounted to him for side? He had made forty, but even so....
Fortunately Grant solved the problem on his own account. He came up to Mike and spoke with an earnestness born of nerves. “For goodness sake,” he whispered, “collar the bowling all you know, or we’re done. I shall get outed first ball.”
“All right,” said Mike, and set his teeth. Forty to win! A large order. But it was going to be done. His whole existence seemed to concentrate itself on those forty runs.
The fast bowler, who was the last of several changes that had been tried at the other end, was well-meaning but erratic. The wicket was almost true again now, and it was possible to take liberties.
Mike took them.
A distant clapping from the pavilion, taken up a moment later all round the ground, and echoed by the Ripton fieldsmen, announced that he had reached his fifty.
The last ball of the over he mishit. It rolled in the direction of third man.
“Come on,” shouted Grant.