Chapter 302: The Den II

On 40 minutes their wide man tried to come inside again. Robertson was there first, and slid in and took it off his left foot, thud, and came up with the ball.

"ROB-ERT-SON! clap clap clap ROB-ERT-SON!"

It was half the stand this time. Kelly’s lad was singing it as well.

"You said you were not singing for him," said the boy next to him.

"That was before he did that."

At half-time it was Millwall 0, Tilbrook 1. Margaret came along the row with her phone in her hand.

"Maureen has it on the radio," she said. "She says she has not moved off her chair since the goal."

"Tell her to stay where she is, then," said Ted.

"If we hold this," said Terry, "the drinks are on me all season."

"Do not say it out loud," said Pauline.

Kelly’s lad came along the row with his drum under his arm. "Is Charlie coming on, Mr Mercer?"

"If Craig needs him. He has been warming up since before the kick-off."

"Then we keep singing for him."

They came out after half-time with both full-backs pushed on and everything going long to their big centre-half. On 51 minutes a shot from 25 yards hit Dean Stokes on the shoulder and looped over Tom into the top corner, tock, and the Den was on its feet.

"Off Stokes," said Terry. "Off his shoulder. Oh, no."

The noise came across the pitch at us like weather. ROAAAR. Our upper tier stood in it, and for a minute none of us sang anything.

"YOU ARE NOT SINGING ANY MORE! YOU ARE NOT SINGING ANY MORE!"

Then Kelly’s lad got the drum going, boom, boom, boom.

"COME ON, TOWN! COME ON, TOWN!"

On the hour their manager took the wide man off. He walked off on the far side, past Rudd, who was still running the touchline and stopped to watch him go all the way to their bench.

"He never got past him," said Kelly’s lad. He did not say it to anybody. "Not once."

4 minutes later Robertson overlapped Aiden Reece at full speed. Reece slipped it into his path, and the boy was at the byline before their right-back had turned. He cut it back along the ground to the penalty spot, and Bailey Quinn arrived late from the hole and passed it into the corner, swish.

The drum went, boom boom boom boom, and Bald Tony’s bell from somewhere behind me, clang-a-lang. I had Terry by one arm and Pauline by the other.

"Who was it?" Pauline was shouting in Terry’s ear. "Who scored?"

"Quinn! The boy Quinn!" Terry had both hands on top of his head. "Pauline. We are winning at Millwall."

"BAI-LEY QUINN! BAI-LEY QUINN!"

"ROB-ERT-SON! ROB-ERT-SON!"

Robertson jogged back to his position without looking up, and pointed at Reece.

We had them then. For 10 minutes we had them on the floor. On 70 minutes Jamie went through by himself, and their keeper came out and smothered it with his legs, smack.

"Oh, Jamie," said Pauline. "Oh, Jamie, love."

2 minutes later Riyad went to the byline and pulled it back across the 6-yard box. Jamie was at the near post, where he always is. There was nobody at the far one, and the ball ran across the face of the goal and out for a throw.

"WHERE IS EVERYBODY?" Terry shouted. "Where is everybody, Sam?"

"Nobody, Terry," I said. "That is the centre-forward I said no to."

On the touchline Sadler turned to Joe and said something short, and Joe wrote it down.

On 78 minutes Robertson went down by himself near the halfway line, thud, and lay holding his calf. Dev was on as soon as the referee waved him.

"Cramp," said Ted. "He has run himself out in this sun."

He came off with his arm round Dev’s shoulder. Rudd was already out of his training top, and they met at the edge of the pitch. Robertson said something to him, and Rudd slapped his hand and ran on.

"What did he say to him?" said Terry.

"Does not matter," said Kelly’s lad. "Charlie is on."

"ONE CHARLIE RUDD! THERE IS ONLY ONE CHARLIE RUDD!"

Rudd’s first touch was a header out of our box from a cross on the right, thock, and the upper tier cheered it like a goal.

Then they started on the throws. Every time the ball went out anywhere near our box, their full-back dried it on his shirt and waited, and their big centre-half came up from the back, and the whole Den roared him all the way.

The first one Harry headed out. The second one Rudd got his head to on the 6-yard line.

"MILL-WALL! MILL-WALL! MILL-WALL!"

"GET IT OUT!" Ted was on his feet with his stick. "GET IT OUT OF THERE!"

"BLOW UP, REF!" Terry had both hands round his mouth. "BLOW IT UP!"

"I cannot look," said Pauline.

"Then hold my hand and do not look," said Terry.

The third one came on 88 minutes. It came in long and flat, whump off the centre-half’s head, and dropped in among 6 people, and somebody’s knee got to it before Tom did. It went in off the post.

"MIIILL-WAAALL! MIIILL-WAAALL!"

Kelly’s lad’s drum stopped dead. Ted sat down. Pauline had her hand on Terry’s arm, and he was looking at the pitch with his mouth open.

"2 minutes," he said. "We were 2 minutes off it."

"Sit down, love," said Pauline. "It is not finished."

"COME ON!" Kelly’s lad was standing on his seat. "THERE IS STILL TIME! COME ON, TOWN!"

In the third minute of stoppage time Rudd went the length of our left side with the ball and crossed it low across the 6-yard box. It went where the other one had gone, past Jamie at the near post, and there was nobody at the far post again.

peep. peep. peeeep.

Millwall 2, Tilbrook 2.

"2-2 at Millwall," said a woman behind me. "2-2 at Millwall, on the first day."

I held the rail and looked at the far post, where nobody had been, and I did not sing for a while.

The players came to the away end at the finish, all of them. Robertson walked over without help now, with Dev beside him, and Rudd was at the front. The upper tier sang both their names, one after the other, and then every name on the sheet.

"CHARLIE! ANDY! CHARLIE!" Kelly’s lad had his drum over his head. "BOTH OF YOU!"

This time Robertson looked up at us. He stood still and looked at the whole upper tier, and clapped it.

Ted clapped them off from his seat.

"I said give him till Christmas," he said, over his shoulder. "He did not need it."

I went down to the tunnel. Sadler was outside the away dressing room with his back to the wall.

"2 points," he said.

"Yes."

"We had them on the floor. In this division you get 2 chances, and you need a man who scores both. I asked you for him in June. I am not asking you for anything today. I am telling you what it cost."

"Yes. It was my rule, and I would make it again."

He looked at me for a while. Then he went in and shut the door.

Robertson came out of the treatment room with a bag of ice strapped round his calf.

"I am sorry about the leg, Mr Mercer," he said. "It just went."

"You did everything else right."

"That was Charlie."

Rudd came out of the dressing room behind him with his kit bag and stopped.

"Calf?" he said.

"Cramp," said Robertson.

"Get in the bath, then. Hot, then cold." Rudd went past us down the corridor to the coach.

Joe came out after him with his notebook. "Dev says it is cramp and nothing else," he said. "He will be right for Birmingham on Saturday."

We came home through the Blackwall Tunnel with the evening sun behind us.

"A point at Millwall, Pauline," said Terry, when the coach pulled out of the cordon.

"We were 2 minutes off 3."

"Then somebody else can have the 2. I am having the 1."

By the time we were on the A13, Kelly’s lad was asleep on his friend’s shoulder and Ted was asleep against the window. Past the Dartford turn I asked Margaret about the training ground.

"Is it inside the trust’s share?"

"No." She did not have to look it up. "The share covers Marsh Road, the ground, the way the deed draws it. The training ground came after."

"I want it inside. So that no chairman can ever sell it, or let anybody put flats on it."

"Including you."

"Including me."

She thought about it while the coach went over the joins in the road, da-dum, da-dum.

"The borrowing is in the share already, for everything the club has," she said. "The selling is not, for that field. It is a new deed and a vote of the trust. And it will not stop a council, Sam. A deed has never stopped a council. It stops us."

"Then it stops us."

"Once it is in, that field cannot be sold without the trust’s yes, and they will never give it. If the club is ever in real trouble, it is the one thing we could have sold without asking anybody. You will have handed that to them."

"Yes."

"Why tonight?"

"Because their director showed me the land round their ground today. A developer has been drawing flats on it for a year, and they lease some of it. Our training ground is a field with a fence round it. One day the wrong man is in my chair, and it is flats."

From 2 rows back Ted opened one eye. "What are you 2 plotting?"

"Deeds, Ted," said Margaret.

"Wake me up when it is a vote." He shut the eye again.

She wrote it in her diary under Monday.

TILBROOK GAZETTE · Monday 5 August 2013 · back page MILLWALL 2 TOWN 2 · The Den · att. 12,404 (Town 1,600) Town scorers: Vardy 27, Quinn 64 Town led twice. Millwall levelled from a long throw on 88 minutes. Debut: A. Robertson, aged 19, replaced by C. Rudd 78 (cramp)

On the Monday morning I was in Margaret’s office at 8 with the trust’s papers spread over her desk when Charlie Rudd came up the stairs in his training gear, with his car keys in his hand.

"Is it still in your drawer?"

"Have you read it?" said Margaret.

"No. I will read it now."

"Read the third page twice," she said. "That is the money."

She unlocked the drawer and took out the envelope. He read every page standing up at her desk, and signed all 3 copies, and printed the date under his name. Then he put his copy in his kit bag.

"Thank you, Charlie," I said.

"3 more years," he said. "I will tell my mum tonight." And he went down the stairs to his car.

Tuesday was Southend away in the first round of the cup, under the lights at Roots Hall, half an hour down the road. Priya’s 2,000 tickets had gone by Saturday teatime, and Kieran had told everybody who would listen that he was going on the bus.

Rudd was at the training ground by 9. Sadler met him in the corridor with the cup sheet folded in his hand.

"Tomorrow night," Sadler said. "Southend. Left-back."

"Yes, gaffer." Rudd looked at the sheet. "And Saturday?"

"Show me tomorrow."