Rugby Flyer (10 page)

T
he boys were all in good form at the party, even those from the teams that were no longer in the competition. Eoin chatted with two Italian lads from Milan who told him about how their life’s dream was to play at Thomond Park for Munster. Some Welsh and English players chuckled at this, but Eoin realised that Giorgio and Luigi understood just what it was that made a side such as Munster envied throughout Europe. He wondered would he get the chance to wear that famous red shirt.

For the moment blue was his colour, however, and when he bumped into Sam and Paddy they discussed the games they had played that day. Eoin realised he didn’t know what had happened after he made his sudden exit and asked John Young to fill him in.

‘Ted sent me on but to be honest I was so shocked the way it happened that I lost my concentration,’ he
explained. ‘The first thing I did was fire out a loose pass and that fella they call “Curry” intercepted and ran all the way in to score. We panicked a bit after that and gave away a couple of bad penalties. They hit the post with one but put over the second to force us into extra time.

‘The lads were dead on their feet but lucky enough I was fresh and once I settled down we took control again. We had one of those rucks where we kept recycling and we must have gone through twenty phases when they gave away a penalty. I’m no Eoin Madden but it was in my range and we took the points.’

The party wound down after a couple of hours. The Leinster players were on their best behaviour – even Charlie didn’t pig out on the snacks for fear the coaches would spot him and leave him out for the final.

Eoin slipped away to find a few minutes on his own. He checked Ted wasn’t hiding in the shadows at the cricket pavilion and sat down on the bench. He watched a couple of swallows swooping and diving across the ground and marvelled at how they never collided at such speeds. He was so caught up in their antics that he didn’t notice Alex sitting down beside him.

‘I see your team won today, young man. And I also see that your young friend from Tipperary was taken to the hospital. I presume he was not seriously hurt?’

Eoin nodded and explained what had happened.

‘Ah, rugby can be a bruising game at times,’ said Alex. ‘I always found that the faster I ran the less I got hit, so I decided to become the fastest runner in all of rugby, a true flyer. I think it really annoyed those New Zealanders that I could run so fast away from them,’ he chuckled.

They chatted some more about rugby before Eoin asked Alex how his treasure hunt was going.

‘Ach, I am so frustrated. I have a feeling that the prize is close at hand, but it also seems so far away.’

‘Why do you want to find this treasure?’ asked Eoin.

‘A good question, because treasure is of no use to me anymore, and all my friends and family have also passed on. But this is a rare and special treasure and it has been frustrating me for many years. However I will need to tell you the story of it first. Do you have some spare time?’

Eoin nodded and checked again that no one was around.

‘Where do I start?’ mused Alex. ‘I suppose I must start with the revolution that ruined the lives of so many of my people. My father was a soldier and my mother was related to the Tsar, which is why I was once called a Prince. At first we thought we might be able to stay
in Russia, but once they killed the Tsar and his family, everyone in Russia who had any connection to the old rulers fled far and wide – to Paris, New York, Berlin, London.

‘The Obolenskys came to London but one day, when I was about four or five, a gentleman came calling at our door. My father was very disturbed at his arrival but he calmed down and made him very welcome. He stayed with us for some months until he moved away – to Ireland.

‘That, as I’m sure you have guessed, was the man I called Uncle Nick. That wasn’t the name he had when he first came and I explained to you before how we gave him his new one. His real name was Alexander, and his family name was Romanov. He was a cousin of the Tsar, and he came to call on us because he was afraid the new rulers of Russia were trying to kill him. They had discovered that he was now the only man in the world who could inherit the title of Tsar, and they were afraid that the Russians in exile would rally around him and take back our Motherland.

‘But Uncle Nick wasn’t interested. He was barely out of his teens and had no interest in becoming the figurehead in any war. He just wanted a quiet life with nice walks in the countryside and some friendly games of
chess. He had a nice house in Ireland with some lovely paintings, but very little money. Some of the Tsar’s friends used to send him cheques, but I don’t think he ever cashed them.’

Eoin was spellbound by the story, and amazed at the fact that the heir to the throne of Russia was his grandfather’s next-door neighbour.

‘Anyway, on my last visit to Ireland, Uncle Nick told me the story of his hair-raising escape from Russia, and how he and his sister had been injured jumping from a train. His sister had been carrying a great treasure in her coat, but the fall had broken it in two. She was quite badly hurt so he brought her to a hospital in France and arranged to meet her later in London. They took one piece of the treasure each and resolved to meet up to make it whole again.

‘However Nick had gone to Ireland by the time Olga arrived and they never did meet up. Olga’s injuries were worse than she thought and she passed away soon after reaching London,’ added Alex.

‘But why didn’t Nick have the piece sent to him in Tipperary?’ asked Eoin.

‘I think he wanted to forget about everything to do with Russia,’ replied Alex. ‘He rarely talked about the old country to me, and he never mentioned that he had
the other piece. Olga had left hers with my father and he gave it to me one day not long before I died. It didn’t mean very much to me, and I too didn’t have very long left…’

‘And just what is the treasure?’ asked Eoin.

‘It is one of the Imperial Easter Eggs made by the court jeweller, Peter Carl Fabergé. The Tsar had one made almost every year of his reign. They were exquisite designs and are highly prized by collectors.

‘Last year I picked up a newspaper thrown away by a rugby spectator in the stadium which told all about the collection and the handful that had been lost. It described one of the missing ones, the Empire Nephrite egg, and I knew that was the one I had part of. I found my half in a box in the attic of my old home in London, but I have been searching for the other half ever since.’

‘How valuable is it?’ asked Eoin.

‘Well,’ replied Alex, ‘according to the newspaper it could be worth around twenty million pounds.’

E
oin gulped and wished Alex luck in his quest, and offered to help him look when they got back to Tipperary.

‘Perhaps,’ said Alex. ‘That would be great. I don’t want the egg, or the money, but I do want to reunite this beautiful work of art, just as my father’s friend and his sister had planned to do so very long ago. Good luck in your own hunt for treasure tomorrow. I will be watching from the room in the grandstand that bears my name.’

Eoin raised his hand in salute as Alex walked away, disappearing as he reached the gate of the pavilion. With the sun starting to set, Eoin headed back to the dorm, kicked his trainers off and lay on top of his bed. He hadn’t planned to sleep, but was so drained by the action and excitement of the day that he was out cold in seconds. He woke again, still wearing his shirt, shorts and socks from the day before, when the sun appeared at the
windows at dawn.

‘Yuk,’ he said, as he changed out of his match kit and grabbed a shower before anyone else woke up. He skipped down the staircase in a great mood and set off on a run around the school grounds. He was particularly delighted that he had got a full night’s sleep as he had often failed to do so before a big game.

After a ten-minute jog he practised a few short burst runs, then headed in for breakfast. On their way out of the dining hall were Sam and Paddy who seemed a bit nervous about the game ahead, but they all parted on friendly terms.

Eoin joined Charlie, Killian and Seán Nolan at one bench. Charlie had kept his sausage intake to his personal minimum – three – in view of the big match, but had upped his egg count to four for extra protein. The others ribbed the big No.8 about his enormous appetite, but they were glad of his power at the back of the scrum for Leinster.

‘Right, boys, we’re going to have a run around on the school grounds today, as the sacred turf is being cut just in time for the final,’ said Ted. ‘It won’t be anything too strenuous, but I want all thirty-three members of the party togged out ready for action at half past ten. We’ll go through a few things and I’ll name the team. But we
need to be back in this room here for twelve o’clock as we have some very special guests coming to see the game.’

The players looked at each other and began speculating who the guests might be. ‘Joe Schmidt?’ ‘Johnny Sexton?’ ‘Justin Bieber?’ were just three of the names Eoin overheard as the volume in the hall rose.

He ducked outside and asked the school secretary could he make a local call, and got through immediately to the hospital. ‘Your friend had a comfortable night,’ reported the nurse, ‘and he said to wish you well in the final.’ That cheered up Eoin even more. He was glad Dylan was on the mend, and that they had made up their stupid row.

He went back upstairs and packed all his bags, keeping everything he would need for the final in his Leinster kitbag and piling the rest – mostly ready for the laundry – into the holdall. He carried them both downstairs and left them inside the main door of the school where one of the Leinster coaches was ticking them off on a list.

Charlie dropped his bags off too, and Eoin could see he was really nervous.

‘It’s alright for you, Eoin,’ said the big No.8. ‘You’ve played in Lansdowne Road and you’ll probably grow up to play rugby all over the world. World Cup finals, the
lot. But I’m not nearly as good as you and I keep thinking they’re going to drop me. I’ll probably give up rugby once the Leaving Cert is over. I can’t imagine playing for anyone else besides Castlerock. This is probably the only chance I’ll get to play in a stadium this enormous, even if it is nearly empty. I’m terrified I’ll make a mess of it.’

Eoin put his hand on Charlie’s shoulder. ‘Listen, Charlie, don’t put yourself down, and certainly don’t do it on this day of all days. You’ve played a huge part in getting us here and if you want to play for Leinster in future I’m certain that the only person who’ll stand in your way is yourself. You haven’t made a single mistake this week so there’s no need to be scared of anything. Get out there and play just as you usually play and we’ll win this game.’

Charlie brightened and clasped Eoin around the back of his neck. ‘Thanks, mate, that’s such a nice thing to say.’

‘But it’s true!’ said Eoin.

Charlie nodded and puffed out his chest. ‘Let’s roll!’ he called and charged off down to the training pitch with Eoin trotting on behind, laughing heartily.

T
ed made a couple of changes to the team that had won the semi-final, and Seán was delighted that he would now have both his brothers at his side in an all-Nolan front row. Killian, too, would be in the starting fifteen. Eoin was going to be captain, and John Young shook his hand after the team had been announced.

‘The best man for the job, no doubt,’ he smiled. ‘But if you want to dash off to the cinema at half-time I’ll be ready to take over.’

Eoin laughed and thanked John. He was so used to nasty little scraps for his position back in school that it was nice to be up against a good sportsman. The training session was short and sweet, and Eoin spent most of it practising his kicks from the touchline, with John and a couple of his friends helping collect the balls.

When it was over and they strolled into the canteen building, they found the doors closed and Ted standing
in front of them with his arms folded. He waited until everyone had arrived and then announced that he wanted them to enter the room slowly and carefully, before he threw the doors open wide.

The players walked into the room to the sound of cheers and clapping from a crowd of more than a hundred people. The boys were puzzled but soon one or two heard their names being called and recognised who had done so. ‘Mum!’ ‘Dad!’ ‘Gran!’ ‘Brud!’ were the calls as they all realised their parents and families had gathered in the canteen.

‘You’re all very welcome to Twickenham!’ shouted Ted above the racket. He waved his arms and the crowd was silenced.

‘First of all, many thanks to our airline partners for bringing you all here today as our guests. We are very grateful to you for lending us your sons, and you can be very proud of how they have played and conducted themselves this week. I’m sure your support will be crucial in the game this afternoon. Now I’m afraid you only have forty-five minutes to spend together because we have to start the preparations for the big game shortly. So enjoy yourselves, and everyone enjoy the game.’

Eoin had spotted his parents and picked his way around several hugs and handshakes to reach them. He
took several seconds to find his way around a particularly enormous group hug involving the Nolan triplets and their family.

‘Congratulations, Eoin, we’ve been following the tournament on the website,’ said his mum. ‘You’re a big star back home. It was even on the sports news on the radio this morning.’

‘We’ve been up since early morning – we had to drive to Dublin for a seven o’clock flight, imagine,’ laughed his dad. ‘And we had to pick up an extra passenger too…’

Dixie stepped out from behind the stage curtain where he had been hiding.

‘Boo!’ he chuckled. ‘You know they couldn’t keep me away from a game like this. Would you believe the Leinster official said there were only two guests allowed per player? But I brought along my Leinster cap from 1967, and the pilot was so impressed when I showed it to him that he put me in first class. He even let me sit up the front with him for a few minutes.’

Eoin smiled at his grandfather, from whom he had got his knack for getting into adventures. ‘Ah, that’s brilliant, I’m so glad you could come. We never lose when you come to watch. I’d say you’ll have your pick of the seats today.’

He chatted with his family about what had gone on
during the week, and explained about Dylan’s injury and the trip to the emergency room. His mum made note of the directions to the hospital and said they would visit him before the game.

Eoin turned to Dixie. ‘You should try to check out the museum at the stadium, Grandad, it’s really excellent. There’s photos and videos of some of those old players you’re always talking about.’

‘Oh, really? Then I must do that. I won’t go to the hospital – I try to avoid them unless I’m the patient these days,’ he chuckled.

When time was up, Eoin said his goodbyes and accepted all their good luck wishes. He always enjoyed having his family watching his big games – and this was going to be the biggest he had ever played.