Spinner

by Ron Elliott

  ‘He bowls. It’s the skidder.’

  Jess barked.

  David made the crowd cheer as he moved to the next sprinkler.

  David and his grandfather had been working on strategies to bowl at all the great batsmen in the world, especially the English. David’s grandfather said there were few quality spinners in the world today and so batsmen were not practised at playing them. David wondered if the war had killed all the old spinners as it had his father.

  David bowled out Proctor and continued spinning his way across the paddocks, bowling out batting line-ups from around the world to the adoring barks of Jess. Breakfast was at six and usually quiet, as Grandad thought through his own chores for the day. Today though, he was more talkative, as he swallowed bread and egg with a gulp of strong tea.

  ‘You got the linchpin all right then.’ Grandad nodded at the bolt lying on the kitchen table.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘No trouble?’

  ‘No, sir,’ said David, thinking that maybe his grandfather didn’t need to know about Mrs Pringle. It was likely to upset him too. His grandfather was studying David hard, and so David smiled to let him know he was fine about it all and knew he’d deserved what happened and there were no grumbles from him.

  ‘You didn’t do your bowling practice last night.’

  ‘But I couldn’t, sir, because I had to get the bolt.’

  ‘If you’re ready for school, we can do five minutes now.’

  ‘Can we? Oh, I’m right. Ready as rain. Beauty, Grandad.’

  The old man followed his grandson out to where they practised. There was a concrete pad exactly the size of a wicket set along the side of the work shed across the yard from the house. There was matting laid across the top of half the slab, just like they did on non-grassed wickets down in Perth and in India.

  When his grandad was The George Baker, he had built it to practise on in the off-season. David practised on it now. At the far end was a metal contraption resembling the three stumps, but which would not fall over when hit by the ball. Three yards behind the wickets was half a corrugated rain tank, set in a semi-circle to stop any balls from rolling too far away.

  David went to a box of old cricket balls at the bowler’s end, grabbed one and started spinning it up into the air, to catch it and start it spinning again.

  ‘Show me your new one,’ said Grandad, taking a position halfway down and next to the pitch so he was looking back at David.

  ‘The skidder?’

  His grandad nodded.

  David could feel him watching closely as David concentrated on getting the grip right. He extended his forefinger and index finger across the seam, with his thumb bent under. The thumb was the key to this one.

  David moved in normally and bowled with his usual loop. But, as he was about to let it go, he ripped his thumb backwards rather than spinning his fingers forwards. It was like clicking his fingers to make a noise, as he squeezed out the ball. The ball hit the mat and instead of turning away from the wicket like normal leg spin or towards the wicket like a googly or wrong-un, it went straight, skidding forwards and low. When the ball hit the metal wickets it clanged and David leapt into the air. ‘Yes.’

  ‘No.’

  David thought through everything. Good grip. Same flight and action. It was a good straight ball. Might have got an lbw if the batsman was defensive. And it did go lower for the backspin. David didn’t know what he’d done wrong.

  ‘Show me your grip again.’

  David got another ball from the box, and extended his three longest fingers across the seam once again. He bent his thumb under and checked his other fingers.

  ‘Now show me your grip for the googly.’

  David moved his thumb up toward the other fingers just a little.

  His grandfather pointed to his hand. ‘Your thumb’s come up closer to your other fingers.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said David, turning his hand to see. ‘It lets me spin it more.’

  ‘No problem with the googly or your leggie, but when you’re running in to bowl your skidder, what’s the batsman doing?’

  ‘Taking guard?’

  ‘After that?’

  ‘Deciding on the shot?’

  ‘Before that.’

  ‘Watching the flight?’

  ‘Before that?’

  ‘Looking at the ball in my hand!’

  ‘Yes.’

  David moved his thumb backwards and forwards. ‘He might see I’m going to bowl the skidder, because I’ve moved my thumb.’

  ‘Find a way to get your hand positions closer to your other deliveries.’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  ‘Fifty or so, then get off to school.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  His grandfather nodded before leaving. David looked down at his hand around the ball moving his thumb backwards and forwards while feeling it push into the leather. Happy that he had a similar grip to his leggie, he stepped in to bowl. The ball was straight but it didn’t back spin at all. In fact, it simply bounced up and would have been hit into the grandstand. ‘Maybe even out of the ground,’ said David as he grabbed another old ball out of the box. He practised for another ten minutes before having to hurry for school.

  David wasn’t much interested in school and it didn’t seem to have much interest in him. When confronted with pen and chalk, his long fingers behaved with the sureness of the legs of a newborn calf. He wasn’t bad at ’rithmatic but just couldn’t make the spelling of words stick at all. His reading was awful. Even in a farming school, where most kids would be working at thirteen, David was a poor scholar. His dreaming didn’t help, said his teacher Mr Wallace.

  At lunchtime, Mr Wallace came up to where David was sitting on the edge of the oval watching the other kids play cricket. ‘Not good news, I’m afraid, David.’

  ‘Worse than this morning sir?’

  ‘All out for one hundred and twenty-three. And four for forty-nine.’

  ‘Us or them?’

  ‘They enforced the follow-on.’

  ‘We’re getting killed sir.’

  ‘They haven’t beaten us since 1912.’

  ‘Until now.’

  ‘You never know. Read on,’ said Mr Wallace with a half smile. He was offering the paper. It wouldn’t have today’s figures but the back pages were full of the first two days play. It was Mr Wallace’s way of getting David to read.

  David tried to read the story down the bottom because the word ‘Spinner’ had caught his eye. ‘Spinner Cause?’

  Mr Wallace must have already read it all because he nodded. ‘Spinner Curse. There’s a sports reporter named O’Toole who believes there is a curse on Australian spin bowlers. Hobbs fell off a horse and broke his arm.’

  ‘Hobbs! He had a sore foot. He was nearly better wasn’t he?’

  ‘Read the story and find out.’

  David sighed and pretended to read the news report while he considered Hobbs’ accident. Hobbs was past his prime but a clever and talented spin bowler. Australia could sure use him now as England seemed to fancy the fast bowlers.

  ‘If you didn’t try so hard they’d let you play, you know?’

  When David looked up confused, his teacher pointed out to his classmates, including Nell, who were playing cricket during their lunch break. ‘It’s no fun for any of them if you just get them out with every ball.’

  ‘Don’t try, sir?’

  ‘Not so hard. Just with them. For the fun of the game.’

  ‘I can’t, sir.’

  ‘Of course you can. Toss some up so they can hit them.’

  ‘Even if I want to, Mr Wallace, my fingers won’t let me. I’ve tried. When I come in to bowl my fingers take over and bowl properly no matter what I tell them.’

  David watched Mr Wallace looking at him with the kind of look he gave when he thought someone was lying about the spit ball on the blackboard. ‘Then you can’t blame them if they won’t let you play.’

  ‘No, sir.’ David di
dn’t blame them, certainly not for the ban on him bowling and probably not for any lack of friendship either.

  ‘You can keep that,’ said Mr Wallace, pointing at the newspaper. ‘Practise your reading. You might want to look at the falling wheat prices too.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Wallace,’ said David, watching his teacher mop the back of his neck under his hat as he went back inside. Mr Wallace was one of the people who David made especially irritable, like hot muggy weather or a fly that won’t stop going at your eyes. David would like not to annoy Mr Wallace. He quite liked him. But David did not know how to get people to like him.

  School ended at two p.m., which was four p.m. in Brisbane because it was across the other side of the country. Even so there should have been some hours of cricket play to listen to from the wireless in the window of the Railway Hotel. By the time David got there, it was already over.

  ‘In what has been one of the most comprehensive victories from a touring side, England has given Australia a lesson in all aspects of the game. It is a lesson that Australia needs to take to heart forthwith if they are to have any hope in the remaining four Tests. It’s very difficult to see any possibility of improvement by the next Test in Melbourne.’

  Australia had been bowled out for just eighty-four in the second innings. They’d been beaten by an innings and four hundred and sixteen runs. It seemed they needed batsmen as well as bowlers. They’d been thrashed in all areas of the game.

  Mr Pringle’s motor car was parked in the yard when David got home. The engine ticked slowly like a one-winged cicada. Even though his grandfather never said a word, David was pretty sure that the Pringles rarely visited without taking some of the farm with them when they left.

  Two of the Mr Pringles were in the kitchen with Grandad when David went in. The oldest Mr Pringle, who owned the Westralian and the bank and the dancing Mrs Pringle, was standing. The youngest Mr Pringle, who ran the silos, was sitting at the table with papers out in front of Grandad.

  ‘I told Mrs Pringle to put the shaft bolt on the account,’ said David quickly.

  ‘That’s good, David,’ said Mr Pringle without looking at him.

  ‘Good afternoon, young Donald. School, eh?’ said the youngest Mr Pringle with a grimace.

  It was as if David had come across a painting of the kitchen. His grandfather never looked up from the papers and the other two men stayed frozen where they’d been when he came in, looking at the papers as though they might try to fly away.

  David felt like he had to rescue his grandfather from something. ‘Did you hear the result? It’s over already.’

  ‘Not now David. Get some food and do your jobs.’

  David went to the meat safe for apricot preserve and bread. He didn’t get butter because he could feel the men waiting for him to leave. His grandfather just kept reading one of the papers, his forefinger tracing the numbers on the page, with his lips moving ever so slightly as if in prayer.

  David did his afternoon chores. He put the chooks back in the coop and fed them. He raked out the stockyard, wiped down the horses and topped up their trough. He dug the horse manure into the vegetable patch and watered. Each chore entailed a trip to the well where he’d wind up the bucket. It wasn’t a deep well because they were so close to the river, but Grandad had always said all that winding was strengthening his bowling shoulder.

  David chopped some wood and some kindling but he didn’t take it in because the Pringles were still in the kitchen. David thought of the way his grandfather had told him to get his food and do his chores. He thought of it in different ways, trying to find if there were some reproach, but he could not find any. It was simply a matter not for children David finally decided, and he was glad of it.

  It was nearly sunset so he went down to the dam. The dam was about a hundred and fifty yards from the yard and down towards the river, overlooked by a small hill. His grandfather had hired a special kind of road-making tractor during the war, and had the tractor push the dirt and gravel up and out, to make the hole for the dam and the sides. It was topped up by the rains each winter, catching run-off down the hill, so the sheep could water all summer. It had never been empty since David could remember, but he’d never seen it as low as it was now. His mother had drowned in the dam when David was little.

  David sat a little way up the hill above the dam. He closed his eyes a moment and felt the warmth coming from the ground. He watched the light become gentle then golden and turn the midgies into dancers. He watched the water in the dam turn silver then black. He thought about what Mrs Pringle had told him about his mother being a laugher and listener and mostly a dancer. He wondered why no one ever said things about what kind of person his father was.

  When the Pringles had driven away, David came in and served out rabbit stew and cut bread while his grandfather read the newspaper Mr Wallace had given him. David knew not to ask after the Pringles or the important papers.

  ‘The English batsmen had a particular appetite for Turner’s bowling. If ever a player were misnamed, it’s Frederick Turner.’

  ‘What do they mean?’ asked David.

  ‘He’s a spin bowler, a turner of the ball.’

  ‘That’s unfair.’

  ‘But accurate. He took one wicket for a hundred and fifty-three. Did you hear about Hobbs?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Lawrence with consumption. Moffit drowning. And Brand with malaria.’

  ‘From the India tour.’

  ‘And now Hobbs to a horse riding accident. Strange times.’

  David pushed his grandfather’s plate across the table and sat down. ‘So how did our fast bowlers go?’

  As they ate their dinner, Grandad and David checked the scores and dissected the game as they guessed at what might have gone on behind the cold facts of the newspaper report. After they’d washed up, David was sent to practise his bowling alone because his grandfather said he had more bookkeeping to do.

  David lit the lantern by the tool shed so it lit his practice wicket. He carefully got the old plough horse halter out of the hay shed, and placed it on a good length, right in front of the wickets. The hole, in the centre of the halter, where it fitted around the horse’s neck, faced forward, so there was a gap of about one foot high by four inches wide.

  Moths dashed themselves against the lantern, some so hard that their wings shattered to drift away in pieces as they fell to the ground. There was a goanna who lived in a small burrow under the cricket pitch; in the morning, when the sun warmed things, the goanna feasted on the dead and dying moths of the night before.

  David got the box of cricket balls and began to practise. First he bowled some off spin, around the left edge of the halter and into the stumps. Then some more off breaks that held their line a little more so they clattered noisily into the corrugated iron behind the stumps. Then he switched to leg spin. He bowled some balls to the right of the halter, spinning them in towards the wicket. He really let his fingers rip on these balls, making a humming sound he liked, spinning them back around and into the stumps from a long way out. He bowled some more leggies towards the halter, but spinning away to the left and an imaginary slips line. Next David bowled a loopy. This had his usual leg-spinner grip, but used more of his third finger and a lot of overspin so that the ball dipped a little in the air and then bounced higher over the halter and the stumps beyond. Then, still checking his grip, he started to work on bowling the skidder, so the ball would go through the gap in the halter and into the stumps.

  And all the while, he kept up an imaginary commentary. ‘O’Malley, the English opener, is well set. His tight defence and patient attacks have thwarted Australia. He’s on forty-eight. David Donald comes in to bowl.’ David bowled, and the ball skidded through the hole to hit the wickets in the middle stump. David leaped in the air. ‘Yes, he’s bowled him.’

  There was clapping. David turned.

  A man’s voice came from the darkness, ‘Well bowled, but I don’t think you would have
bowled O’Malley with that ball. He’s defensive. He would have played back. Leg before wicket, I would have said, low on his back pad.’

  The man stepped into the light by the edge of the shed. He smiled a big, open smile with lots of teeth. He had good teeth and bright eyes that seemed to sparkle with his smile. David found himself smiling too, but stopped.

  ‘We haven’t got any work. Not that we could pay for.’

  ‘Glad to hear that. I can’t say I like work much.’ The man kept smiling. He looked down the wicket.

  ‘Are you here to see Grandad?’

  ‘Directly. I got caught up watching you bowl. Neat trick with the halter.’

  ‘My skidder.’

  The man nodded seriously. It was a proper conversation.

  ‘They call that ball a flipper, over in Melbourne.’

  ‘Oh,’ said David, disappointed that he hadn’t invented it.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said the man, ‘you get it right, you’re still going to surprise most batsmen in the world whatever you call it.’ The man smiled again, and so did David, knowing straight away this must be right.

  ‘I’ve got one that doesn’t hold up so much. It goes straight on, but faster than the skidder.’

  ‘Do you call it a “shooter”?’

  David nodded, pleased that the man knew the right things about cricket. He got shy then, and looked down, but he could feel the man still looking at him.

  ‘Your thumb’s more under than with the other balls.’

  David looked up, surprised. ‘You know a lot of bowling?’

  ‘A bit. I was a batsman. Once. I used to know enough about bowling to stay in sometimes.’

  David looked at the man. He had a jacket and good shirt and hat but wore no tie. Now that he looked more closely he thought he was dressed too well to be a swagman. His shoes were good, but dusty. His hat was pushed forward in a cheeky way. He started to roll a cigarette as he talked, holding the paper easily in one hand, as he dropped in the tobacco without wasting any.

  ‘My grandfather was a spin bowler down in Perth.’

  ‘The inimitable George Baker. Yes,’ said the man, taking his eye off the cigarette making for a moment to look straight into David’s eyes. ‘That’s where I met him. He was a coach. Hard but fair, they always said of him.’