Bags had been sitting by him, thoughtfully eating cherries, after David had refused them, but it was long since he had had any clear consciousness of Bags or of any one else except those white figures in the field. But at this awful moment Bags proved himself a friend in need.
“Oh, David, how ripping it will be,” he said, in a voice of complete conviction, “that you and Maddox win cock-house match for us.”
Up till that moment the possibility had literally not entered David’s head: he had been entirely absorbed in the prospect of losing it for them. But this suggestion put a little bit of heart into him, instead of the cold fear.
“By Gad,” he said, and, drawing a long breath, went down the steps on to the level field.
The moment he got moving, even though he was only moving to the place of execution, he found that it was not so impossible as it had appeared in anticipation. It had seemed out of the question at this crucially critical period in the history of cricket, which was more important than the history of the world, to face this. But now there he was, going out all alone, bat in hand, and he did not sink into the earth or fall down with a few hollow groans. And then two other things encouraged him further, neither of which he had contemplated. As his tall, slight figure detached itself from the crowd in front of the pavilion a real cheer went up, not from the boys of his house only, but from the school in general. He told himself that they were not cheering him, David Blaize, but only the last actor in this enthralling piece of drama, in spite of which he felt much the healthier for it. And the second thing that encouraged him was far better, for Maddox, leaving the wicket, had come half-way across the ground to meet him and walk back with him.
“David, old chap, isn’t it ripping,” he said (even as Bags had said), “that it’s you and me? Just the jolliest thing that could happen. Don’t bother about runs; they’ll come all right. Just keep your end up, and don’t take any risks. The bowling’s absolute piffle, so long as you don’t try to hit it.”
Then they had to part company, each going to his wicket.
There were, so David remembered with hideous distinctness, two more balls of the over, and after taking middle and leg he had a look round. The two points that struck him most were that the other wicket seemed nightmarishly close to be bowled at from, and that there were apparently about thirty fielders. But then as Crawley walked away to get his run, the rest of David’s nerve, now that the time for action had come, was completely restored to him. He had never felt cooler nor clearer of eye in his life.