Read Online The Broken Chariot by Alan Sillitoe - Free Book Online

Archie showed him how to bend from the knees instead of the waist. ‘Ye’re tall and thin, see? and this way you wain’t snap yer backbone. Yer wouldn’t be any good at fuckin’ then, if yer did that, would yer?’
    Not that the labour was hard to get used to, Herbert mused, maybe due to the game and cadet scramblings on the obstacle course at school. Everything was so new that whenever he looked at the clock another hour had gone by.
    In the evening he sat in his room and popped blisters with a needle heated over a match flame, dousing them in TCP, then picking brass splinters out with tweezers before they could fester. Archie was his mentor, with no asking, sharp eyes for his problems and always volunteering a remedy. ‘If you don’t tek care o’ yer ’ands they’ll get to look like tree stumps, and the women don’t like that. As long as they’re nice and clean they’ll let you get at their knickers.’
    He was clocking out when Walter Price, a toolsetter of about forty who had been lame from birth, asked if he played darts. He remembered Isaac’s advice to fall in with everything. ‘Now and then.’
    â€˜It’s like this, yer see, we need a new chap on the team, because that bleddy fool Jack Blundell cum off ’is motorbike and broke ’is arm last week. Can yer cum to the Plough tonight, after yer tea?’
    He had scorned the dart board in the games room at school, as something to amuse the tiddlers who were miserable at being away from mummy and daddy. Now he wished he hadn’t, though he recalled some of the jargon. ‘I’m a bit rusty. Down from three-o-one, though, in’t it?’
    Walter smiled like a man who only did so to hide his pain. ‘That’s the ticket. We’ll show yer. It’s the enthusiasm of youth we want on the team.’
    Herbert’s uncertainty was overcome by assuming that if these men could do it, so could he. At his probationary session, he tried for the bull, and though the first half-dozen went all over the board at least none gouged a hole in the blue plastered wall.
    â€˜Don’t ’urry, lad. Just chuck ’em about a bit to get yer ’and in.’ But after a few more scatterings Walter lost patience. ‘I’ll coach yer. Now, just watch me.’ The disability of having one leg shorter than the other had made Walter a better player than most. ‘I want a treble, don’t I? A seven? Now don’t tek yer eyes off me.’ Lopsided he got one. ‘Now a double six, then a bull – inner and outer. Y’er not lookin’! Look at me!’ He got those as well. ‘Now yo’ ev a go, me owd duck.’
    Herbert applied the rules of the firing range, while taking in what he could of Walter’s expertise. Legs apart and firm on the ground, arm straight and fingers holding the dart as if an extension of both, he aligned his eye along the length. Taking time, he let go, and got an outer bull. When the next dart hit a treble Walter set a pint on the table. ‘Sup that. Y’er doin’ well, for a beginner. I on’y ’ope it ain’t starter’s luck.’
    He doused his chagrin, but smiled agreement with irony he hoped, at each comment. ‘He’s got a cool ’ead, that’s the main thing,’ Walter said to the others.
    Herbert’s long drink of beer put a fur lining in his throat. Use all the time you need, just like they’re doing. Imitate, he told himself. Act. Mimic. Away from work, they knew how to go easy, from long experience. On the next run he tried for a double and a treble, and got them with two darts, though the third was nowhere.
    â€˜It’s a matter o’ patience, from now on,’ Walter said.
    â€˜He’ll do, though,’ came a voice from the back.
    Better to try the accent while wiping beer froth from his lips. ‘Mekin’ progress, am I?’ The thud of steel