Chapter 269 - 5 O’Clock, Thursday II

The session had finished at 12. Sadler was coming off the near pitch with the cones in a net bag over his shoulder.

"I need the 4 of them for 10 minutes," I said. "Vardy, Mahrez, Kanté and Maguire."

He stopped. "For what?"

"Contracts."

"Your side of the building." He swung the bag of cones down onto the grass. "I will be in the boot room. Do not keep them long. Good Friday or not, they are in at 10 tomorrow."

He did not ask me what kind of contracts. He went off to the boot room.

They came into the canteen in their training tops with their hair wet. It still smelled of the morning’s beans, and the cook was wiping down the hotplate behind the hatch. Maguire sat down first and then stood up again.

Kanté sat at the end of the table with his hands round a mug of tea he did not drink. Mahrez had his phone face down in front of him. Vardy stood with his back against the hatch, arms folded.

"Are we in trouble?" Maguire said.

"No," I said. "I want to give you 4 new contracts. 4 years each. On what a Championship club in the top half pays, from the 1st of April. And a signing fee each, paid the day it is filed."

Nobody said anything. drip of the urn in the hatch behind Vardy.

"Filed when?" Vardy said.

"Friday the 12th of April. Margaret files them the morning the money lands, and you are paid that day."

"And if we go up?" Maguire said.

"Then it is yours for 4 years instead of 1."

"And if we do not?"

"Then you are the best-paid 4 players in League One, for 4 years."

Mahrez put his phone away in his pocket. "My agent was here this morning."

"He was."

"He told you what my mother said."

"He read it to me. Word for word." I took the page out of my pocket and put it on the table in front of him. "Tell her this is my answer."

He read his mother’s handwriting. Then he folded the page up small and put it in the pocket of his training top.

"I will tell her tonight," he said. "She will make me read her every line of it."

Maguire was studying the table. "My agent will want to read it twice before I sign anything."

"He can read it as many times as he likes."

Kanté put his tea down.

"4 years," he said.

"4 years, N’Golo."

"Yes." He smiled at the table. "Oui. Yes."

"It is his birthday tomorrow," Mahrez said. "He is 22 tomorrow. He did not tell anybody but me."

"Happy birthday," Maguire said. Mahrez and Maguire laughed. Kanté put his hand over his face.

Vardy had not moved off the hatch.

"You turned down 3 million for me last summer," he said.

"I did."

"And now you want to pay me like I went."

"I want to pay you like you stayed. For 4 years, at the money you should have been on since Christmas."

He kept his eyes on me long enough that Maguire stopped laughing. Then he unfolded his arms.

"Then I will sign it," he said. "On the 12th."

On the way out to the car I passed the boot room. The door was open a crack. Sadler was on a stool inside, cleaning studs with a wire brush. scrape, scrape.

"All 4?" he said, without looking up.

"All 4."

"Good." scrape. "Then whoever has this job in August has a team. That was all I wanted to know."

Danny rang at 3. I was back at my desk by then, with the 4 offers signed and out to the agents by half past 2.

"Coventry," he said. "The League docked them 10 this afternoon. Their owners put the club’s company into administration last Thursday, and the League confirmed it today."

"10."

"10." rustle of paper at his end. "That is 3 this season, Sam. Portsmouth, Shorehaven, Coventry."

"I know."

"I have been on this paper 20 years." I heard him take a mouthful of something. "I have got a last line for the piece. You can read it in the morning with everybody else."

"Read it to me now."

"No. You can buy the paper like Ted does." A pause. "Anything I should know about Tilbrook before Easter?"

"Nothing you can print till the 12th."

"Then I will ring you on the 12th," he said, and rang off.

The afternoon went the way the last day of a window goes at a club our size. Margaret was on one phone to the League about Saturday’s squad. Priya was on another, turning down a radio station that wanted Vardy live on Easter Monday.

Kieran came up the stairs at half past 3 in his boots to ask if he could cut the pitch on Good Friday, because the forecast was dry. Margaret said yes without looking up, and he went back down.

The 4 agents’ replies came in one after another, and none of them asked for more. At 4 Maureen’s door was still shut, and the clock over mine said an hour to go.

At 20 past 4 Sadler rang from the training ground.

"Rudd," he said. "Dev put him amber at 4. He has played 8 of the last 10, and he is 19."

"And behind him?"

"The other one of Doyle’s lot, the lad who played left-back against Tranmere. He is 18, and he looked it. I want a man at left-back for the run-in, on loan, and the window shuts in 40 minutes."

"Ask Wilf," I said. "Whoever he says."

There was a pause on the line.

"You do not want to know who?"

"No."

"You always want to know who."

"Not this time. Ask Wilf. Whoever Wilf says, Margaret will have the form on my desk before 5."

"Wilf has had 2 names in his book since February," Sadler said. "He told me so on Tuesday morning, out on the pitch with the covers. He was waiting for somebody to ask him." He rang off.

At 25 to 5 Margaret’s phone went through the wall. I heard her voice, then Wilf’s name, then her printer starting up. I stayed in my chair.

For 3 seasons I had known what the best of them would become before they came through that door. I had no idea who Wilf had picked. I sat with my hands flat on the desk and let him pick.

Margaret came in at 16:50 with a form in one hand and her pen in the other, and Priya behind her holding the door.

"Day 1 today, day 93 the 28th of June," Margaret said. "It covers every game we have left and anything after it. And he does not take us past 5 loans in a matchday squad."

She put the form down in front of me. clack of the stapler as she fixed the second sheet to it.

KETTLE, Ross. 28. Left-back. Out of the side at a Championship club since Christmas. I had never heard the name, in this life or the other one.

"Who is he?" I said.

"Wilf says he has played 200 games and never once looked 18." Margaret held out the pen. "Sign it, Sam. It is 8 minutes to 5."

I signed it. scratch, and done.

She took it back down the corridor at something close to a run. At 16:58 the League’s email came in to say the registration had been received.

At 17:00 I was standing in Maureen’s doorway when the clock on her wall reached 5. Down the corridor Priya cheered on her own at her desk, then looked round to see who had heard.

THURSDAY 28 MARCH 2013 10:00 · The Coat. 7 million in June. 11:30 · 4 contracts. 3 million. Friday 12 April. 15:00 · Coventry, minus 10. 16:52 · Left-back on loan. 93 days. 17:00 · Window shut.

Maureen had stayed late. The hot cross buns were gone except for one, on a saucer on my side of the desk.

"Margaret says you signed for a left-back without asking his name," she said.

"I did."

"With 8 minutes on the clock. A man you had never heard of." She sat down behind the green book. "In 3 seasons I have never once seen you do that. You let Wilf pick him."

"Wilf picked him."

"I know." She took the fountain pen out of the drawer. "A man who still lets Wilf pick is still listening to somebody. I can put that man’s number in ink."

She opened the book at the empty page, took the cap off the pen, turned the page a little towards the lamp, and wrote.

scratch of the nib on the paper, slow.

Fri 12 April 2013 · Equity, S. Mercer · 3,000,000.

She went over the 3 once more where the ink had run thin. Then she blotted it and slid the book across so I could see. The ink was still wet on the 3.

"There," Maureen said.

buzz of my phone on the stairs on the way out. Danny.

Piece is in. Ted can wait for the paper. You should not. Last line: In all 3, the money somebody was counting on was not there on the day it was needed. Happy Easter. D.