Hat Trick! (3 page)

The first catch taken by a substitute in Test cricket was an odd affair. In 1884, the Australian captain, Billy Murdoch, came on to field for England as a substitute. He caught his own team-mate, who had top scored with 75. The injured English player was W.G. Grace.

FOR
the rest of the excursion I was in a daze.

‘You’re quiet, Toby,’ someone was saying to me.

‘Huh?’

It was Georgie. ‘I said…’

‘Yeah, I know.’

‘He’s been freaked out by an old guy in that library,’ said Jay.

‘Well?’ she was looking at me, expectantly. Georgie never missed out on anything.

‘I’ll tell you later,’ I said.

‘Before he dies. Promise?’ she chuckled.

I must have looked a bit shocked.

‘Just joking!’

The sheets of paper on my clipboard stayed blank. It wasn’t till I was on the bus, sitting next to Jay, who had three or four pages of notes and sketches, that I reached into my pocket and pulled out the piece of paper that Jim had given me.

When Jay looked over and asked me what I was reading, I filled him in.

‘Why don’t you just chuck it away and forget about it?’ he said, watching me scan the words in front of me.

I didn’t answer. It was as if the words were talking to me. There was no washy effect with these words. They were clear and still on the paper.

What wonders abound, dear boy, don’t fear
These shimmering pages, never clear.
Choose your year, the
Wisden
name,
Find the page, your destined game,
Then find yourself a quiet place
Where shadows lurk, to hide your trace.

Whisper clear date, place or score
While staring, smitten; then before
(You hope) the close of play,
Be careful now, you’ve found the way.
So hide your home, your age, your soul
To roam this place and seek your goal.

Be aware that time moves on—
Your time, this time; none short, or long.
So say aloud two lines from here
Just loud enough for you to hear.
From a quiet spot, alone, unknown,
Back through time, now come—alone.

And never speak and never boast,
And never taunt, nor ever toast
This knowledge from your time you bring.
To woo the rest, their praises sing:
They wonder, and your star shines bright…
Just this once, this one short night?

But every word that boasts ahead
Means lives unhinged, broken, dead.
Don’t meddle, talk, nor interfere
With the lives of those you venture near.
Respect this gift. Stay calm, stay clever,
And let the years live on forever.

Dear Jim,

’Tis all, perhaps, for another time…

Your loving father,

Ernest James Oldfield

For a few minutes I stared at the words, trying to work out their meaning. I was a bit spooked by the unhinged, broken, dead part. I thought of showing Jay, but he was talking to Martian across the aisle. Somehow, these old words from another time didn’t seem right. I was also afraid that Jay would convince me that all this time travel stuff was stupid. I didn’t want that. There was something exciting happening here. I wanted to explore it further. Maybe I’d show Georgie. She was really smart. She’d know what it all meant.

The most exciting thing about the last two days of the school week was the announcement of the cricket team for our first match of the season.

Jimbo hadn’t been selected. None of us could work out why, because he was probably the best batsman in the school.

‘There’s a reason for everything,’ Georgie said, shaking her head as she looked at the team sheet outside the gym. ‘But I sure would like to know the reason for Jimbo not playing tomorrow.’

‘He’s lazy, that’s why.’ Scott Craven had come over to add his thoughts to the conversation. ‘He’s not a team player. I reckon Mr Pasquali’s giving him an ultimatum. Play for the team or you’re not gonna be a part of it.’

I wasn’t about to start arguing with Scott—even if his reasons were wrong. That’s what he was waiting for. Scott Craven was forever looking for a reason to start an argument.

I looked again at the team sheet. All the familiar names were there. Cameron and Jono, our openers. Rahul, Jay, Scott, myself and Gavin and Georgie. Then Martian, our keeper, and finally Minh and Ahmazru. I didn’t think it was the batting order, but it wouldn’t be a bad one if it were.

Saturday—morning

I pulled my hands out of my pockets, rubbed them together, then turned to watch Scott Craven run in to bowl the first ball of our first game of the season.
We were playing Motherwell State School. There were six teams in our competition for this season. Our team was Riverwall. The other teams were St Mary’s, TCC, Benchley Park and the Scorpions. Everyone was talking about the Scorpions and their players. They were new to the competition and not much was known about them. But their name was different, and the rumours were that they were a tough, strong and talented group of cricketers.

The ball thudded into the batsman’s pads. The batter buckled over, and amid the shouts looked up at the umpire. Slowly the umpire raised his finger.

‘Yeah!’ shouted Scott, and he pumped both fists in the air.

The cricket season had started.

Scott Craven was awesome. In many ways it wasn’t fair that he was playing school cricket. He was so good he probably should have been playing with older kids. We had two amazing cricketers—Scott Craven, our fast bowler, and Jono Reilly, one of the opening batsmen. Without them, we would have been an average team, winning only some of our games. With them, I reckon we were pretty well unbeatable. There was a third great player—Jimbo. I just hoped that I’d get to see him play in a real game.

It was lucky for the opposition that you could only bowl five overs and had to retire at 40 runs.

None of us really liked Scott Craven or, for that matter, Gavin Bourke, his best friend. But we were glad
to have him on our team. Scott was loud, confident and extremely short-tempered. He could be quite mean with his comments to us, and we usually got a spray from him if one of us dropped a catch from his bowling.

Scott took another wicket in his next over, clean-bowling the batsman and sending the off-stump cartwheeling back towards Martian, our wicket keeper.

I was used as a first-change bowler. Sometimes I opened, but I think Mr Pasquali liked to give the opposition a break from having to face two fast bowlers first up.

I wasn’t as quick as Scott, though I didn’t try for flat-out pace. I was working on swinging the ball through the air and trying to perfect a slower delivery.

My first ball was a full-length delivery outside off-stump. The batsman took a swing at it and missed. I repeated the delivery with my next ball, but this time put it out a fraction wider. Again the batter went for the ball, and this time it caught the edge of his bat and flew through to Martian. He took a neat catch in front of Jono at first slip.

My other wicket came in my third over. It was an attempted slower ball that would have been called a wide. But the batter reached out for it and flat-batted it out to cover. Scott Craven took the catch.

Scott picked up another two wickets himself to add to his earlier two.

Cameron, Georgie and Jono each got one wicket. The last wicket was a run-out. We ended up having to score 109 runs to win. Mr Pasquali must have been
confident because he changed the batting line-up. Martian was pushed down to number seven, my normal spot, and I went up to number four.

Jono and Cameron put on 47 runs before Cameron was bowled. I got my first bat of the season after Rahul was run out for only five. He had lost his glasses halfway up the pitch and for a moment it looked as if he was going to stop and pick them up.

Jono and I put on another 30 runs before Jono was caught on the boundary for 33. By then we had scored 88 and the game was as good as over. Jay strode out to the wicket. He normally batted further down the order too.

Mr Pasquali retired me on 25 not out. Gavin came in and left almost as quickly, clean-bowled for a duck. Then Scott Craven blasted two sixes to win the game for us.

We batted on until we’d faced the same number of overs we had bowled. You got bonus points for batting and for bowling—a point for every 30 runs and for every two wickets. We ended up making 164. I couldn’t wait to check the paper to see how the other teams had gone.

It was a good first-up win. Nothing spectacular, as Mr Pasquali said, just a solid all-round team performance.

After the game I asked Georgie what she was doing that afternoon, and when she said nothing, I said I’d get online at about four o’clock, as I had some news
for her. I wanted to tell her about my conversation with Jim at the Melbourne Cricket Club library, and I particularly wanted to show her the poem that Jim had given me. She’d take that seriously, even if she didn’t believe anything else I said.

We liked to chat online and had made a chatroom for ourselves last year, when we’d first started playing together in the same team. We called it CROC—Cricketer’s Room of Chat. It was a bit like a secret club, I suppose, but cricket was the general theme. I suppose we could have just used the phone, but somehow it was more fun chatting over the Internet. The other bonus was that suddenly Jay or Rahul or Martian could jump in and join the conversation.

I logged on just before four o’clock. Georgie was the only other person logged into the room.

Georgie: so, what’s news?

Toby: maybe i sh have told you earlier…you rem. the old guy in the lib at the mcg?

Georgie: yeah.

Toby: well, this’ll sound v stupid but i think i have this gift that makes me able to travel in time. georgie, you there?

Toby: hey! georgie…

Georgie: yeah, i’m here. toby?

Toby: yeah.

Georgie: you’re an idiot!

Toby: i know. but it’s true.

Georgie: are we going to keep on with this, cos i’ve got better things to do.

Toby: wait. i’ve got a poem for you.

Georgie: that sounds better. when did you write it?

Toby: i didn’t. but you’ll like it. scanning now.

I pulled the piece of paper out of my desk drawer, and, keeping it in its plastic pocket, placed it on the scanner. A moment later I was waiting for Georgie to accept the file I was about to send.

Toby: what do you think? georgie?

But that was the last I heard from her. She was either totally sick of the whole idea of time travel, or else of reading the poem and trying to work out just what the heck it meant. I guessed I’d find out. Eventually.

I caught up with Georgie at recess the following Monday.

‘Interesting poem, Toby. Where’d you get it?’

I explained everything to her, not leaving out any details. It was actually good to say it all out loud. She listened carefully, without interrupting.

‘That’s it?’ she said, when I had finished.

‘So far, yes.’

She looked at me for a moment. Slowly a smile spread across her face.

‘Like I said, great poem. Can I keep it?’

‘Of course. But what about the rest? You know, the
Wisden
cricket book stuff? The wishy-washy writing?’

‘Well, go back to the MCG and do it. That’s the only way to prove anything.’

‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ I asked her.

‘I believe
you
, Toby, but I sure don’t believe anything else.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning that I don’t think you would make up all this to trick me, but I think someone else has made it all up to trick you.’

Georgie sure had good logic. You could never argue with her. About anything.

‘Okay, maybe you’re right,’ I said. ‘Will you come with me next time I go?’

‘What, to the library?’

‘Yeah. You can meet Jim yourself.’

‘Okay, but I won’t hold my breath or anything.’

‘Cool. Hey, did you book the gym for lunchtime tomorrow?’

‘Yep. And I’m bringing a friend too.’

‘Who?’ I asked.

‘You’ll see,’ she said mysteriously, and then turned and headed off towards a group of kids near the playground.

Monday—afternoon

The great thing about having Mr Pasquali as our teacher was that he let you do a sport project of your
choice. For this one we could just concentrate on cricket. Later in the year we could do another cricket project, but that one would have to have a history and culture theme.

After school that day, Rahul and Jay came around so we could work on our projects together.

Rahul was doing the Tied Test that happened way back in 1986 between India and Australia. Being Indian himself, Rahul was pumped to be working on something so close to his heart. It was close to his family too. They came from Madras (now called Chennai), the place where the match was played, and migrated to Australia not long after it took place.

I was doing my assignment on the 1999 cricket World Cup. Jay had finally decided to study Don Bradman. He had changed his mind about four times.

Even Craven was putting in a huge effort. He was doing the Bodyline series, and was using a computer program to put together a whole lot of pictures, and even some film (so he said). I didn’t tell him, but I was actually looking forward to when we would all present our assignments. He’d chosen an awesome topic.

Dad came in at one stage and asked whether we had other homework to do. ‘Yeah, sure, Dad,’ I replied. ‘I’ll get on with it after the others leave.’

As Dad was rummaging through some of my books, a little card fell out. I hadn’t even noticed it myself.

‘Hey, this sounds good,’ he said. ‘You never told me about the MCG excursion. How was it?’

‘Bit weird,’ Jay said before I had a chance to speak.

‘Nah, it was okay, Dad. There was this nice old guy…’

‘Strange, more like it.’

I glared at Jay.

‘This nice old guy who was looking after the library there. He must have slipped that card into one of my books when they were on the table.’

‘Well,’ said Dad, ‘it sounds interesting enough. “Slip through the ages of time. A journey of discovery for all your cricket research. Get lost in another world.” Well, well. Rather a full-on advertisement for a library of old books, eh, boys?’

Dad loved his cricket as much as anyone.

‘Let’s all go down sometime soon, hey? I’d love to see this place. Maybe Georgie would like to come, as well? You could all do some more work on your projects.’