The Complete Enderby by Anthony Burgess

said Edie’s husband. ‘You want to keep that for the saloon bar, where they pay a penny extra for the privilege, do you mind? We don’t want your sort in here.’
    ‘Doing no harm,’ said Enderby huffily. He then poured over the huff a trickle of sweet sauce of ingratiation. ‘I mean, I was just talking.’ He leered. ‘Just passing the time of day, if you see what I mean.’
    ‘Well,’ said the dart-man, ‘don’t you try to pass the time with my missis, do you mind?’
    ‘Do you mind?’ said Edie, in near-unison.
    ‘I wouldn’t want to pass the time with her,’ said Enderby, proudly, ‘I’ve other things to do, thank you very much.’
    ‘I’ll have to do you,’ said the man, sincerely. ‘Too much bloody hoot altogether, mate, to my way of thinking, that’s what you’ve got. You’d better get out of here before I get really nasty. Been smelling the barmaid’s apron, that’s your trouble.’
    Prrrfffp.
    ‘Look,’ said Enderby, ‘that wasn’t intended, I really had no intention, that was not meant in any way to be a comment, I assure you that is the sort of thing that could happen to any man, or woman too, for that matter, even Edie here, your wife, that is to say, yourself included.’ Prrrfffp.
    ‘Do you mind?’ said Edie.
    ‘This here’s my fist,’ said the man, pocketing his dart. The other customers quietened and looked interested. ‘You’ll get it straight in the moosh, straight up you will, if you don’t get out of my bleeding sight this instant, do you mind?’
    ‘I was just going anyway,’ said dignified swaying Enderby. ‘If you will allow me the privilege of finishing my drink here.’
    ‘You’ve had enough, you have, mate,’ said the man, more kindly. From the saloon bar came the call of ‘Last orders.’ ‘If you want to drown your secret sorrows don’t do it where me and my wife is, see, because I take the sort of thing that you’ve been saying very hard, see.’ Enderby put down his glass, gave the dart-man a glassy but straight look, then eructed strongly and without malice. He bowed and, pushing his way courteously through the long-swallowers anxious to get one last one in, made an exit that was not without dignity. Outside in the street the heady air of a Guinness-sharp refrigerated night hit him and he staggered. The dart-man had followed him out and stood there, gauging and weighing. ‘Look, mate,’ he said, ‘this is not for me really, because I’ve been like that myself often enough, God knows, but my wife insists, do you mind, and this is like for a keepsake.’ He bowed, and while bowing swerved his torso suddenly to the left as though listening to something from that side, then he brought left fist and torso right and up and let Enderby have one, not too hard, straight in the stomach. ‘There,’ he said, somewhat kindly, as if the blow had been intended purely therapeutically. ‘That’ll do, won’t it?’
    Enderby gasped. The procession of the evening’s whiskies and beers passed painfully through a new taste-organ that had been erected specially for this occasion. They grimaced in pain, making painful obeisance as they passed. Gas and fire shot up as from a geyser, smiting rudely the crystalline air. Premonitions of the desire to vomit huddled and fluttered. Enderby went to the wall. ‘Now then,’ said the man, ‘where is it you want to go, eh? Kennington you are now, see, if you didn’t know.’
    ‘Victoria,’ said Enderby’s stomach-gas, shaped into a word by tongue and lips. He had, at the moment, no air.
    ‘Easy,’ said the kind man. ‘First to the right second to the left keep straight on brings you to Kennington Station, see. Get a train to Charing Cross, that’s the second stop, Waterloo’s the first, change at Charing Cross, see, Circle Line. Westminster St James’s Park and then you’re there, see. And the very best of luck and no hard feelings.’ He patted Enderby’s left shoulder and re-entered the public