You can't get him out. You try patience, you try funk, you try desperation, you try mimicking birdcalls from nearby reeds. Nothing works.

Finally, after all this time, you get something that might do the job instead. You have your fastest bowler hit him with a short ball, shake him up and knock him down.

Not something you would aim for specifically, or would admit to being happy about. But it spares you from facing him, at least for a minute. You get a break. A breather. You wipe your brow.

Then, in his place, another arises. Not Steve Smith, but a good enough analogue. Another player who thwarts victory pushes. Another player who defuses tricky situations. Another player who can't be got out without a half-century to his name

So now you're Mickey Mouse, cleaving a magic broom in half to stop it carrying pails of water. What does that leave? Two magic brooms. Four pails.

Now Smith is back, except Marnus Labuschagne who replaced him is still there. Now both of them are coming at you at the same time, trudging relentlessly up that spiral staircase to continue the slow flood.

After day one of the fourth Ashes Test in Manchester, Smith and Labuschagne have combined for more runs this series than every other batsman Australia has used in the top seven. And Smith will resume the second day on 60 not out.

When they came together on a gloomy and sporadically rainy first morning, the score was 2-28 and the situation was tricky. The two right-handers smiled and set to work.

For Labuschagne, his three innings in Smith's absence have been about patience and simplicity. Dodging short balls, defending good ones. He has left alone more deliveries by percentage than any player in the series, while still attacking those full enough to drive and working runs off his pads.

This is often the way that Smith starts, too: circumspection and leg-side nudges. But with Labuschagne taking the role at Old Trafford, Smith upped the ante.

There was a sense of proving a point in that. All through the week, various England voices had been asking how Smith would cope on return from being hit by Jofra Archer. Whether he would be rattled, lose his nerve.

Instead Smith immediately walked across to get in line with Archer's deliveries, calmly ducked the first short ones, then smoked a wide ball through cover for four. There was a particular flourish of the bat as he was happy to carve it away with no attempt to keep it down.

The open expanse of cover, with the short leg and the leg slip in place, suddenly looked just a bit silly.

Smith carried on, driving Ben Stokes to the fence before twice pulling him through fine leg. He went past 20 at nearly a run a ball. Then he settled, while Labsuchagne started finding runs a bit more easily.

The early storm of bowling from Stuart Broad that had knocked out both Australian openers blew over. Squalls from the sky became the main concern.

After lunch and a long rain delay, both players returned to go past 50. The landmarks had already seemed inevitable. Passing 50 is what they do.

Smith in this series has now added his unbeaten 60 to previous 92, his 142, and his 144. Go back to the Ashes series before this and you'll find 83, 102 not out, 76 and 239 before you reach the last time he didn't pass a milestone, back in Adelaide in 2017.

As for Labuschagne, his Ashes scores counting back go 67, 80, 74, and 59.

Mike Hussey holds a record for passing 50 in his first five Ashes knocks. Labuschagne will have a chance in the second innings to match it.

The real bonus for Australia, as well as perhaps the slight concern, is that Labuschagne came out of the squad as an unexpected participant. The younger player got a spot during an injury crisis, but has kept it because senior players haven't delivered.

With Usman Khawaja dropped to the bench and David Warner lasting two balls for a duck, the efforts of the team's most junior player stand out all the more. A potential disaster at 2-28 was salvaged to the tune of 3-144, and then on to 3-170 by the close of play.

For Smith, who has so often been left to do the lifting, he has an accomplice who feels increasingly reliable. A fast rise can presage a fast fall, but Labuschagne's glut of runs in English county cricket make this seem less likely.

For now, Smith has less a partner than a junior version, a chip off the old broomstick.

To England's dismay, the fall of footsteps continues unabated.