Sample

JUNE 1934, Munich

It was a proud day for Germany and for cricket when Adolf Hitler, padded and boxed, took the crease to face the first delivery. Earlier that morning the covers had been rolled back by a hand-picked contingent of Hitler Youth. The pitch was rolled and, in the outfield, interlocking Swastikas had been cut in the swathe.

In the refreshment tents, high ranking Gestapo officers were trimming the crusts off the cucumber sandwiches. The brown shirts of the SA were in charge of cream teas. The NSDAP covered scoring and admissions. While the SD were in charge of the pitch and kit.

Despite his passionate commitment to the game from his early youth, Himmler's onslaught was just too much for the Fuhrer. Hitler was out with one ball.

AUGUST 1953, Baltimore

Pier 11 was thronging with gaily dressed holiday makers. The labels on the holiday makers' steamer trunks showed that they were heading for South America. But among the Hawaiian shirts, blue rinses, the big bellies and the Bermuda shorts was a dourly dressed thin young Jewish man in a raincoat. Oyster Gullowitz was being given a final quayside briefing by his superiors in the militant Zionist movement, the Hamagshimim. They had been receiving telegrams reporting the persecution of Jews under the Peronist regime and Oyster was being sent to Buenos Aires to help get the threatened Jews out of Argentina.

Oyster's superiors ran through his departure checklist. Had he got the names and addresses of his contacts? Had he got the money and papers needed to get the threatened Jews out of the country and back to Israel? Had he got his muffler and the bucket of chicken soup his mother had made him? Enough already. Oyster went aboard. But halfway up the gangplank he realised that he's forgotten his matzo balls. The Hamaghimites threw up them to him and Oyster made the catch cleanly.

Two middle-aged Englishmen in blazers and flannels, Norman Wisden and Binky Leather, turned up on the quayside. They were laden with sports gear - tennis rackets, golf clubs and a full cricket kit. They hurried aboard the boat.

Then the ship's French chef came strolling down the pier. He wore a straw boater and was swinging a cane. He stopped on the quayside to examine the produce that was being loaded aboard. One of tomatoes was rotten. He pointed this out to the supplier with the tip of his cane.

The supplier was stroppy and he started to argue with the chef. But the chef refused to accept inferior produce under any circumstances. So the supplier picked up one of the tomatoes and threw it at him. But the chef defended himself with his cane and hooked the tomato clear over the side of the ship.

On the outskirts of town a gleaming Packard hurtled through the traffic. It was driven by a steel-nerved chauffeur. In the back, beautiful Jewish heiress Yaffah Baytsimstein was imploring him to go faster. In her hand she was clutching a telegram.

Back on the quayside, baseball star Babe Miller was being seen off by his coach. After his winningest season of home runs, Miller had strained his pitching arm and was taking a sea cruise to rest up for the World Series. The coach explains that he got a special discount for travelling on this particular boat from the nice German officer in the booking office, seeing as how he was such a star. They both agreed that this was jolly sporting.

On the bridge, handsome Captain Franz Schlagermann was poring over his charts. He was studying placing - not only of the ship on its course, but of the passengers in their staterooms and the guests around his table. He was wearing his best white dress uniform.

Surly first officer Heinrich Stumpf entered the bridge. He had the cargo manifest to sign. But when he held them out to the captain, he kept his thumb over one item.

The next passenger to turn up on the quayside was a rather serious young Englishman, Winston Willow. He was wearing a tweed suit and was sucking on a meerschaum. Older than his years, he marched through the crowd, pushing aside those of Russian, French, Polish, Czech, Greek and Hungarian extraction. He swaggered with the arrogance of an Englishman of the Imperial breed. In his hand, instead of a walking stick, he carried an ornate cricket bat. And he led his column of porters through the swirl of holiday-makers like an intrepid explorer assaulting Kilimanjaro.

From the labels on his luggage - Egypt, Africa (Darkest), Persia, Pompeii, New Guinea, China (Great Wall) - he was obviously a well-travelled man. But at the foot of the gangplank he hesitated for a moment and steeled himself. Then - with a pained expression - he put his weight on his cricket bat and limped up the companion way, clutching his hip.

The Packard continued its frantic journey through the downtown traffic. It jumped lights on Gay Street and ignored one-way sign on Pratt. Screeching round the corners, it relentlessly followed the signposts for the harbour.

On the quayside the Polish bar steward was supervising the loading of the booze. A pssst came from behind a stack of wooden crates. After a furtive glance over his shoulder, the bar steward moved over to the boxes.

\"Polska brother,\" said a voice from behind the crates. \"You want some wery special Polish wodka?\"

The hands of the unseen vintner slid out a crate of vodka bottles. These special Polish vodka bottles were flat like small cricket bats.

\"Just the thing for Molotov cocktails,\" said the mysterious wine merchant.

The crate was load with the rest of the consignment. Meanwhile, round the other side of the crates, a thickset Russian was making notes on his score card.

Lieutenant Stumpf was now overseeing the loading of the last of the cargo. The Packard screeched to a halt on the wharf. Yaffah Baytsimstein leapt out and, in a flurry of hatboxes, dashed for the gangplank.

But as she rushed across the key she does not notice the crane swinging the cargo high above her. Suddenly a hawser snapped and a large, coffin-shaped crate slipped from the netting.

On the wharf an old, world-weary Jewish gentleman had been watching Yaffah's arrival. He was flipping a nickel. He spotted that the crate was about to tumble and crush Yaffah. But he's old and frail, unable to take any action to save her.

As the deadly scene unfolded before him, he missed his catch and let the coin tinkle to the ground. Yaffah was distracted. She looked down at her feet, tripped - and the falling crate missed her by an inch.

As it hit the deck, the crate split open, revealing several polished wooden stocks protruding from the straw packing. But they weren't the stocks of guns. They were the polished willow stocks of freshly made cricket bats!

While the old Jewish gentleman helped Yaffah to her feet Lieutenant Stumpf and his henchman, seaman Willie Werfen, quickly repacked the crate and nailed the lid back firmly.

Yaffah watched as they carried aboard the crate that so nearly cost her her life.

\"Perhaps it is a sign. Maybe I should not go on this voyage,\" she said. But the old man shook his head and stooped to retrieve the coin.

\"There comes a time in everybody's life ven you haf to choose between heads and tails,\" he said, holding up the nickel. \"Heads, and you haf merely to go out and field.\" He turned the coin over. \"Or tails, and you haf to stand up and take your innings, as the English vould say.\" And he took her by the arm and escorted her up the gangplank.

Slowly, with a farewell blast on its foghorn, the SS Cricketteam steamed off into Chesapeake Bay. The game had now begun.

Norman Wisden and Binky Leather were learning against the rail, waving goodbye to Baltimore when Yaffah Baytsimstein came down the deck taking the air.

\"I say,\" said Binky. \"That was a bit of a close call on the dock there, what? 'Nough to put you off sailing all together.\" Yaffah smiled. \"But I can see you're a plucky young gal. Game for anything. That's the spirit.\"

\"We saw you arrive that that shiny new Packard,\" said Norman narrowing his eyes. \"And from the look of your luggage I'd say you're not short of a bob or two. So what's a rich girl like you doing on an old rust bucket like the SS Cricketteam?\"

\"'Cuse my chum's unpardonable inquisitiveness,\" said Binky. \"He's a bit of an amateur sleuth. He's Norman Wisden, grandson of the great JP. He compiles the famous almanac of the same name - not JP, Wisden's, don't you know. Damn inquisitive lot these writer chappies.\"

\"No, that's quite all right,\" said Yaffah. \"I suppose it is a bit mysterious.\" She looked out over the sea. \"But I received this cryptic telegram from Solomon Spielmeister, the famous Nazi-hunter.\" She handed it over her shoulder to them. \"It tells me to take a stateroom on board the SS Cricketteam bound for Buenos Aires where I may learn something to my advantage.\"

After examining the telegram, Norman handed it back.

\"Rum coincidence that,\" said Binky. \"We had a mysterious telegram too, didn't we, old boy?\"

Norman confirmed this. But their telegram had been anonymous. He explained that was revising the volume of Wisden's on the war years and was researching stories that the great gentleman's game had been played in Nazi Germany with the ultimate aim of taking on the MCC and crushing British morale.

He related the tale of the first cricket match on German soil - and how the Fuhrer had been caught in the slips first ball. And he explained that it was really Himmler who was responsible for cricket's position in the Reich's mythology. It was he who had first identified cricket as the only true game of the Aryan race. Its roots were surrounded in Nordic legend and he was determined that the blonde, blue-eyed supermen of the SS should be the masters of the game.

View Synopsis View Information Purchase Options