Chat 2
I am sending this message from Spain where we have been in TOTAL lockdown for 2 weeks now. Not to dwell on the horrible virus, but the lockdown is very strict here. We have a minimum 600 euro fine if you are caught breaking the rules. We have roadblocks everywhere and you must only be alone going to the shops in a vehicle to get essential goods. You can't even take your partner with you in the car (some might say a blessing in disguise!)
We have started something similar to this '"Virtual Chat" on the campsite for those still here. I am trying to post a "teaser photograph"
every day.
Here is the photograph and the question is "how does the chain and sprocket system work on this vintage bicycle?".
The solution will be revealed in the next "Chat".
Regards, John and Julie Grew.
Revolutions.
Short story by Pat Robotham.
“What a day! What a morning. The first day of the rest of my life. New digs, new job, sun’s out, newish bike, to him anyway, let the good times roll.”
He rolled out of bed having got a bit of a shock when he looked at the clock. Not a good idea to be late for his first day at work. All his stuff was still in a load of cardboard boxes arranged round his new bed sit; it wasn’t easy to see what clothes he had, let alone what he should wear. What do you wear when you become an apprentice butcher? He had no idea, his mum had told him the keep his hands and nails clean, and she had cut his hair, which had been pretty long. They didn’t care how long it was when he was at college, so long as he did the work, so he had grown it. Still it was gone now, probably never to return, something that happened when you became an adult with your first real job.
He made himself a cup of instant with Marvel and sat drinking it looking out of his window that looked over the pub car park. The car park was empty now except for one car, a Ford Capri, which the owner had obviously left there after having a skinful last night. He made a resolution. “Just because I live above a pub, I mustn’t get in the habit of sitting in the bar every night, it’ll cost me all my wages if I do and I’ve better things to spend them on now.” Still not bad digs for the first time, a bit of, luck his dad talking to someone at work who knew someone who knew someone etc, etc, and here he was. Forty miles from home, first job, new flat. Can’t be bad. Time to go.
His landlord had said he could park his bike up the side passage so long as he didn’t block the entrance to the Gents, so he had shoved it right to the back and leant it up against the wall. The only trouble was that it was very dark up there so if he dropped anything or had to fix the bike he couldn’t see. Still it kept it dry and out of sight of the general public, who couldn’t even see it when they went to visit the Gents. He’d lost a set of panniers to some lowlife when it was parked up outside his parents’place, even though it was padlocked up. So he was still paranoid enough to keep it locked up as well. Trouble was finding the padlock in the dark and making sure he didn’t drop the key in the process.
With the bike on its stand sitting in the car park in the sun, he put his riding gear on, and slung his shoulder bag over his head. One kick and the old NH was ticking over, a snick up into first and he was off into the road and the rush hour traffic which he had to admit on the edge of a rural Hertfordshire village at seven forty-five was not very heavy.
The abattoir-cum-shop was about four miles away out, even further into the sticks. He had no idea what to expect but imagined all would be revealed. He had answered an advert in Exchange and Mart for a butcher’s apprentice and when he rang the owner up all that seemed to be needed was some enthusiasm and willingness to learn, which he had always had for almost any activity. He had never even met the bloke who ran the shop, so it was all going to be a bit of a surprise.
First day’s work over and he was riding home with the afternoon sun on his back. It was warm and he had strapped his leather jacket to the rear carrier as, despite being provided with all the right overhauls and other gear, he did seem to smell of meat and didn’t want that inside his expensive jacket. He would have to come up with a plan before the winter, another cheap coat or something, as it would be far too cold for shirtsleeves on the bike once summer had gone.
“Dammit, not again.” He looked down to see that the needle on the speedo had stopped moving and that it was stuck pointing between thirty five and forty. It had never worked reliably but usually with a bit of waggling on the cable he could get it to respond, but this time was different, it had actually stuck.
He pulled in the pub yard and stopped short of the side alley. He gave the speedo a couple of sharp blows with the heel of his palm, but nothing moved. He turned the bike round and ran it backwards into the alley up to the back, leant it against the wall and locked it up.
By eight o’clock he was bored, there was nothing any good on the radio and he had finished his last Mickey Spillane story. He still had a few quid from his Dad so he went down to the bar for a beer. There was still a bit of warmth in the sun so he sat outside on a bench at the edge of a car park.
“That your old Ariel parked up the entrance?”
He hadn’t seen the guy approach but standing slightly to his left and a little behind him was a small scruffy man about thirty years old, holding a half finished pint.
“I said, is it your bike leaning on the wall up the entrance?”
“Sorry, I was miles away. Yes, its mine.”
“Do you want to sell it? I’ll give you fifteen quid for it, that’s a good price, you know.”
“No mate, I need it for work and stuff, it’s not for sale.”
“Pity. Let me know if you change your mind. Name’s Les, you’ll find me in the bar most nights. If it starts to let you down you may change your mind.”
The sun set and he returned for a second pint inside the bar. Les appeared to have gone home.
“Bloke called Les just offered to buy my motorcycle, seemed a bit odd.”
“Don’t go anywhere near that one, can’t be trusted, don’t know why we let him drink in here after all the tricks he’s pulled on the other customers. Stay well away from him is my advice.”
He sat at a table for the rest of the evening nursing his second pint until closing time. Apart from that brief chat with the barman, no one said a word to him and some distinctly eyed him with suspicion, as if he shouldn’t be there.
His first day at work had gone well so on the morning of the second he leapt out of bed and got ready for the new day with some enthusiasm. As he wheeled the bike out into the car park he noticed the front felt a little wobbly. In the light he could see he needed to put a bit of air in the front tyre, so out with his stirrup pump, which he kept strapped to the back carrier, a few pumps up and down and all was well again, so off to work.
At lunch time he nipped out to the bike shop he had passed on his way to work and bought one of the new fangled electronic speedometers that had become all the rage on push bikes. He had seen one fitted to a motorbike just recently, and reckoned it would do him to get over the problems with his old speedo.
In the remaining fifteen minutes of his lunch break, he ate his sandwich and read the fitting instructions, which required him to measure the circumference of his front wheel in order to calibrate the device. He would have to get a tape measure or a piece of string to do this, neither of which he had. However there was a ball of string in the shop used for tying up meat orders, so he would ask to have a piece of it.
The boss was happy for him to have some string, so with a long piece in his pocket, he went to get on the bike at the end of the day. As he moved it it was wobbly again. Out with the pump, a few more pumps and off he went. Curious, probably a slow puncture.
He left the bike on the stand in the car park so he could measure the front wheel circumference with the string. As he was doing this he noticed it. A large flat headed felting nail straight in the top tread of the tyre. He couldn’t resist the temptation and prized it out of the tyre with his penknife. A slow puncture became a very fast puncture.
“Shit.”
He went to his room to change and with resolve not to get his hands too dirty for work, came down into the evening sun to fix the puncture. It took him about half an hour to fix and another half an hour to clean his hands adequately for the butchers trade. He marked the string for the circumference of the newly inflated tyre and pushed the bike up the side alley and locked it up.
He noticed Les sitting at a bench watching him over his beer.
“Trouble?”
“Not really just a puncture.”
“If you ever want to sell my offer’s there.”
“I don’t. Sorry.”
He spent the evening in the bar being careful not to drink more than a couple and reading the speedo instructions. He had a measurement from the string for the circumference and had calibrated the speedo head to it. All he had to do was attach the magnet to the spokes and the sender to the forks and he would be all set. Another evening on his own with his thoughts and his speedo instructions. “Not a very friendly lot, obviously don’t much care for incomers.”
Up early next morning to fit the bits of the speedo. He had to decide on a place to fit the magnet on the spokes, as he didn’t want it getting knocked when he locked the bike up with the chain and padlock, doing this up the alley in the dark was hard enough but he had developed a ritual so that once on the stand he rolled the wheel back so that he could get the chain through the gap between the fourth and fifth spoke before the valve, that way only one area of the rim got scratched. Once the magnet was fitted he was off to work. Trouble was, when he went to go home there it was again, the bike felt all wobbly and closer examination of the front tyre showed there was another identical flat headed felt nail in the top tread. He left it in place this time and just put some air in to get home.
When he arrived, he saw Les sitting on the bench, looking at him. He parked the bike up under his window and went up to his room. He was dammed if he was going to become Les’s afternoon entertainment. He glanced out of his window to see Les walking round the bike peering at it in an almost proprietorial way. He didn’t much like what he had experienced of Les, the bar man had warned him about him and now this, and what about the punctures?
It was nearly dark by the time he had fixed the second puncture, which he noticed was in almost the identical place as the first one had been on the tube. He pushed the bike up the side alley, locked it, cleaned his hands and walked down to the fish and chip shop for supper. On returning he didn’t feel like another unfriendly night in the bar so went to his room to listen to the radio and get an early night. Still at least the speedo worked OK.
He had to ask the boss next day for an advance on his wages as he had to pay his next weeks rent. The boss paid up but made it clear that this had better not become a regular thing.
He could not believe it when he went to leave for home - he had another bloody puncture, exactly the same sort of nail. This was getting beyond a joke.
Following the same routine he pumped it up and set off home. On getting there, there was Les in his usual seat, watching. He felt like walking straight up to him and having it out with him, maybe punching him. Then he realised he was just being stupid and paranoid. Still he didn’t stand on any ceremony and virtually ripped the tube out of the wheel, stuck on yet another patch, refitted the tyre and wheel and blew it up. As he walked past him to go upstairs and clean his hands he nearly snapped as Les said simply. “Another puncture then?” and appeared to grin.
As he washed his hands, which were getting increasingly raw as each day and each scrubbing passed, he looked at the three identical flat headed felting nails that he had retrieved from the tyres. They now stood side by side in a line next to the basin, just like the enemy lined up in a row. “Some bastard’s doing this on purpose, and I know who it is.”
When it happened for the fourth day in a row, he knew he had to do two things. First, because all the holes were in the same place he needed a new tube, which he had bought from the bike shop on the way home. Second, he needed to stop it happening and he had decided that this could only be done by a face to face confrontation with Les, who he was now convinced was behind this, presumably as a way of getting him to lose faith in the bike and sell it to him.
He fitted the new tube, and while tidying up peered at the old tube, almost marvelling at the grouping of patches all in the same area. If it had been a shooting competition he would have won a prize for grouping, but as it was punctures it was just a bloody mystery.
“That’s bloody odd!”
He nearly jumped out of his skin. He hadn’t noticed Les creep up on him and now he was also peering at the tube over his shoulder. “Them punctures is all together, just like that bike was cursed.”
How he stopped himself from punching Les he never knew. Not only was the bastard sabotaging his bike he was bloody well mocking him straight to his face. But somehow, he could not punch him. It must have been the quizzical almost thinking look.
“Have you looked up that alley where you park?”
“No, why should I?”
“Because I just took this out of my shoe after I went up there to the Gents.”
The two men were standing next to each other, both holding identical flat headed felting nails.
“Reckon there be a stack of em up there, probably left by the sloppy bugger who re-felted the roof of the Gents a few weeks back.”
With the help of Les’s Zippo lighter they inspected the alley. And there they were - a rotting cardboard box of discarded flat headed felting nails almost right under the front tyre. He could see it happen. You pick up a nail on the tyre and it takes so many revolutions to stick it into the tread and so many more to stick it into the tube. Then the flat head sort of seals the leak enough for you to get to where you want to, hold some air, get back home, and the punctures are all in the same place. It’s all to do with tyre circumference.
“I’ll clear these up, nip upstairs to clean my hands, and come down and buy you a pint. I’m still not going to sell you the bike though.”
“Pity that.”
Eddy.
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