Chapter 285 - 107 Steps II

In the Royal Box I sat with Margaret on one side, her bag on her knee. On the other side was Brentford’s backer, a quiet man in an open-necked shirt with his phone face down on his knee. He had made his money from numbers that bet on football.

"I have been looking forward to meeting you," he said, and shook my hand. "Your club has done things this spring my numbers said it should not."

"Your numbers had us right in February."

"They had you 15th." He smiled. "I price uncertainty for a living. You look like a man who has never been uncertain in his life."

"I have been uncertain every Saturday for 3 years."

"What do your numbers say about today?" said Margaret.

"54 in 100, us."

The teams came out of the tunnel below us into the noise. ROAR from both ends, a wall of it. Maguire led ours out with the armband on. Marsh was in the seats behind our bench in his club suit, his crutches across his knees.

The Brentford end stood up and sang Hey Jude, the long part of it, every one of them swaying. They had been singing it at their ground since the 1970s, and they sang it at Wembley as if Wembley were theirs.

Our end answered.

"OH, THE TIDE IS COMING IN!"

"I have never heard it so loud," Margaret said.

"Neither have I. Not at Marsh Road. Not anywhere."

"Is that your song?" said the Brentford man.

"One of ours wrote it this spring."

"Are you frightened?" Margaret said, quieter.

"Yes."

"Good. So am I. Breathe."

peep.

Brentford were the better side for the first half hour, quicker to everything. On 12 minutes their number 9 got above Stokes at the back post. thump of the header, and Pett, on the line, took it on his chest and smashed it away.

"COME ON YOU BEES!" from their end, on its feet.

"PETT! PETT! PETT!" from ours.

On 25 their winger got away down our left, and Stokes went to ground on the edge of the box and took the ball off his toes. thwack, ball and man and grass all at once, and the ball out for a throw.

"Is that allowed?" said Margaret.

"He got the ball. Every bit of it."

"STOKES-Y! STOKES-Y!"

peep, peep. 0-0 at half-time. Margaret stood up.

"I am getting you a tea."

"I do not want a tea."

"You are going to hold it anyway."

She came back as the teams came out again, and put it in my hands.

"Ted has got his scarf over his head for the sun," she said. "Raj fetched him a hat off a stall on Wembley Way. He will not put it on."

"You went all the way down?"

"I went to see he had a drink. He has a drink. Now drink yours."

We came into it in the second half. Kanté started winning it in their half and would not stop. Mahrez went past 2 on the right and hit the side netting, swish, and half our end thought it had gone in.

"IN!" a man shouted in the row behind. "IT WAS IN!"

"KAN-Té! KAN-Té! KAN-Té!"

"Your number 4," said the Brentford man, looking at his phone. "3 tackles in 4 minutes. I have never seen that number for anybody."

"He does it every week."

On 65 Maguire got his head to a Mahrez corner at the near post, and their keeper flung himself and tipped it over. slap of the glove, and the whole of our end groaning at once.

"That was going in," said Margaret. "Sam, that was going in."

"It was. Their keeper is good."

"I do not want him to be good. Not today."

Gray went on for Reece on 75. On 80 Vardy got in behind, and the keeper came out and took it off his toe. Vardy lay on the grass with his face in his hands before he got up and ran back.

peep, peep, peep. 0-0. Sadler sent Rowe on for Murphy at the whistle. 30 more minutes.

On 104 minutes they scored. A run down their right, a cutback, and a shot from the edge of the box that hit Pett’s heel and looped up over Braithwaite and dropped under the bar. thud of it into the net.

The Brentford man was on his feet with both fists up. Our end went quiet, all 12,000 of it, and Hey Jude came across the halfway line at us.

I looked down the steps for Ted. He was sitting very still on the end of his row with his scarf in both hands, and Raj had an arm along the back of his seat.

"Is Ted all right?" Margaret said.

"Raj has him."

When the Brentford man sat down he looked at his phone and then at me.

"86 in 100," he said.

"There is a quarter of an hour," said Margaret.

"There is."

"Then sit up, Sam. Our end can see this box from where they are, and half of them are looking at you."

I sat up.

For 10 minutes Brentford kept us outside their box and put the ball into the crowd whenever they could.

"TILBROOK! TILBROOK! TILBROOK!"

On 118 minutes Mahrez took a corner from the left. Their big man headed it out to the edge of the box. It came down 20 yards out, bouncing, toward Bailey Quinn.

He was 17, and he had come up through our academy. He let it bounce once and hit it on the half-volley.

crack.

It went over every head in the box and dipped, and their keeper was still going up when it went in under the bar.

1-1.

"Sam!" Margaret had hold of me. "Sam, he is a child!"

Margaret had my wrist in both hands. Her bag was on the floor, with the deed sliding half out of it. On the touchline Doyle, who runs our academy, was on his knees on the grass with both arms in the air.

"QUINN-Y’S IN THE HOLE AND THE TIDE IS COMING IN!"

"Who is that?" said the Brentford man. "Where did he come from?"

"Our academy. Robbie Doyle has had him since he was small."

He typed it into his phone with his thumb, and looked at it for a while after.

Quinn ran to our end and disappeared under the whole side. When they got up off him, both his calves had gone. He stood on halfway with his hands on his hips and his heels off the grass.

Sadler looked at him, and then down his bench. Gayle was there. Big Pete was there. He pointed past both of them.

Harry Kane stood up out of the dugout and pulled off his tracksuit top.

"Kane?" said Margaret. "Not Pete?"

"Craig’s call."

Quinn came off on Dev’s shoulder, and our end sang his verse all the way to the bench. Kane went on, touched the ball once, and the referee blew for the end of extra time.

1-1. Penalties.

The players came to the centre circle and stood in a line with their arms round each other. Sadler walked out to them with a piece of paper, and Doyle went with him.

"Are you going down?" Margaret said.

"No."

"You could. Nobody would stop you."

"They are Craig’s 5," I said. "I picked once this season, in March, and it cost us. He picks them."

Then Col Hartley came out of the dugout.

He walked to Braithwaite in front of the goal at our end with a water bottle in his hand, gave it to him, and held on to it until Braithwaite was looking at him and nobody else.

He spoke to him, close, for 5 seconds. He pointed at the bottle once, and walked back to the bench.

Braithwaite turned the bottle round in his hands and read it.

"What is he doing?" said Margaret.

"Reading."

"Reading what?"

"Whatever Hartley wrote on it."

I had seen it before. 5 years from now, at a World Cup in Moscow, the keeper on the bench would hand a bottle very like that one to England’s number 1 just before a shoot-out, with the other side’s takers written down the side.

England’s number 1 that night would be the boy I had passed on last summer, when I kept Tom.

"He has not played a minute for us," Margaret said.

"He has played over 400 for Shorehaven. In February he was their second keeper, 33, at a club in administration, and nobody else rang for him."

"I did his registration," she said. "You paid them more than the administrator asked."

"A fair fee. They needed it."

I found out afterwards what was on the bottle. He had faced 3 of their 5 from the spot in his time, and he had spent a fortnight in his old notebooks on the other 2.

"Penalties," said the Brentford man, and held out his hand. "Good luck, Mr Mercer."

"And to you."