Chapter 258 - 93 Days II

The coin stood at about 27 dollars that week, double what it had been at Christmas. A boy’s wages to May cost me half the coins they would have cost me in January.

In 12 days it would pass its high from June 2011. That was the price I had sold everything at that summer, to clear this club’s debts.

On the Saturday we won 2-0 at Crewe, and Vardy scored both, one with each foot.

Dev’s wall had 3 men on amber and Pett on red, and Sadler left Pett out and 2 of the others on the bench without a word to anybody. Pett sat in the stand with a face on him. On the Monday he told Dev his groin had been sore since Christmas. 35 points.

Tottenham rang back at 10 on the Monday, and the quick careful man read me their terms off a sheet.

"He starts," he said. "That is the whole point of the loan for us. We want it written into the agreement. For every league game he is fit and does not start for you, the club pays us a fee. 5,000 pounds a game."

"Agreed."

"You do not want to discuss the figure?"

"I want him registered first thing tomorrow. Send it over and I will sign it today."

The agreement came through at 11. scratch of my pen on the last page, twice.

Margaret had listened to the whole call on the speaker, with her pen in the corner of her mouth. When I had signed she took the pen out.

"That is a clause that picks the team," she said.

"It is a clause I can afford."

"Then you are paying for Craig’s team, Sam. Craig will want to know that."

"Craig will know."

chatter of the fax machine in the outer office, a little after 10 the next morning, and Margaret stood over it until the confirmation sheet came back from the League.

THE FOOTBALL LEAGUE · EMERGENCY LOAN REGISTRATION Player: KANE, Harry Edward From: Tottenham Hotspur FC To: Tilbrook Town FC Registered: 19 February 2013, 10:52 Period: 93 days Ends: 22 May 2013 (circled twice in green ink)

He came at 11, and I knew him the moment he got out of the car.

He was 6 feet 2 and pale from a winter of benches. He had a Tottenham training top on under his coat and his boots in a carrier bag. He shook my hand properly, looking at me, and then shook Kieran’s, who had not expected it.

"Mr Mercer," the boy said. "Thank you for having me."

"Thank you for coming out."

"It is not far, Mr Mercer. I grew up in Chingford."

"You will play," I said. "Craig picks the team. But you will play."

"I just want games, Mr Mercer." He held the carrier bag in both hands in front of him. "I will work. You will not have to ask me twice."

Sadler met him at the door of the canteen and looked him up and down the way he looks at a pitch before he walks it.

"Do you know where we are in the table?"

"10th, gaffer. 6 points off 6th. I looked last night."

"What do they call you?"

"Harry, gaffer."

"We have got a Harry. He is 6 foot 4 and he heads things." Sadler held the door open for him. "You are Kane. Do you know what tonight is worth, then?"

"3 points, gaffer."

"Good. You are not in it. You have not trained with us yet. Tonight you sit in the stand and watch how we play."

"Yes, gaffer."

He said it without a flicker. I heard it from the corridor, and I thought of the sheet I had signed on Monday, and I said nothing.

Vardy was at the long table taping his ankles. He looked up, looked the boy over, and nodded. "All right."

"All right," the boy said.

That was the whole of their first conversation, and Vardy went back to his tape.

"He shook my hand, boss," Kieran told me later, out by the shed. "Nobody from a proper club ever done that before."

It was a match day, so the squad trained light and went home at 1 to sleep. The boy did not go home. He asked Doyle for a bag of balls, and Doyle gave him one, and he went out to the near pitch on his own.

I was in the car park at a quarter to 5, about to drive down to the ground, when I heard it. thwack. A pause. thwack. I walked over to the fence.

He had set the balls in a line at the edge of the box. He hit them in turn, right foot, then left, then right again, low into the corners, all of them at the same height.

When the line was gone he walked into the goal, filled the bag, walked out again and set the line back up. He never once looked round to see if anybody was watching.

I stood in the cold and counted 40 shots. 38 of them went in.

At 5 Kieran came out of the shed in his coat with his keys in his hand.

"Lights, Harry," he said. "I got to get down the ground and put the nets up."

"2 minutes?"

"You said 2 minutes 20 minutes ago, mate."

"Last one."

He hit it with his left foot, into the bottom corner. clunk of the switch, and the lamps over the near pitch went out, and the ball was still rolling in the back of the net in the half dark.

He came off the pitch with the bag over his shoulder and saw me by the fence, and stopped.

"Sorry, Mr Mercer. I did not know anybody was there."

"How long were you out at Norwich?"

"3 months, near enough. The foot went in my second game." He shifted the bag to his other shoulder. "I watched a lot of football from the stand."

"You will be on the pitch here."

"Yes, Mr Mercer. Thank you."

He walked off toward the changing rooms. thud of the bag of balls against the door frame on his way in.

That night we beat Shrewsbury 3-1 at Marsh Road. Gayle scored 2 and Maguire headed the third, and the boy watched from the stand in a borrowed club coat with the hood up.

I watched him more than I watched the game. He did not follow the ball. He followed Vardy, every run, and when Vardy peeled off his man toward the far post the boy’s head went with him before the cross was even hit.

roar off the Bovril End for Gayle’s second. The boy stood and clapped with the rest of them, and nobody round him knew who he was.

38 points. 3 off 6th.

Margaret was 2 seats along from me, with her coat buttoned to the neck. When the board went up for the last minute she leaned across.

"He was fit," she said. "He did not start. That is the first 5,000."

"I know."

"It is in the book already." She sat back and watched the last minute out.

Wilf was in the car park when I came out, sitting in his old Volvo with the engine running and the window down.

"Is that him?" he said. "The tall lad in our coat?"

"That is him."

"You did not send me."

"I know, Wilf."

"There was a weekend. I spent it at home doing the crossword." He watched the boy cross the car park to Doyle’s car with his hood up. "What is he?"

"A goalscorer."

"Says who?"

"Says Millwall."

"Says a newspaper, then." He put the car in gear and kept his foot on the brake.

"I have no quarrel with the lad, Sam. But that is the first footballer you have brought into this club that I have never seen play. I will see him when Craig plays him, I suppose, the same as the rest of the town."