“Earth time? Earth bleeding time? What is Earth time?”

“Well, as target world, it must be considered to be standard solar time.”

Lombard Omega spat on the platinum-coated deck and ground the spittle in with a fibreglass heel. “This doesn’t half get my dander up,” said he.

Standard solar time was approaching ten-fifteen of the p.m. clock, and the Four Horsemen and the Flying Swan now stood even at two games all and one to play for the Shield. Tension, which had been reaching the proverbial breaking-point, had now passed far beyond that, and chaos, panic, and desperation had taken its place. Omally had ground seven Biros into oblivion and his book now resembled some nightmare of Einsteinian cross-calculation. “I sincerely believe that the ultimate secrets of the universe might well be found within this book,” said Pooley, leafing over the heavily-thumbed pages. For his outspokenness, he received a blow to the skull which sent him reeling. Omally was at present in no mood for the snappy rejoinder.

“For God’s sake get another round in,” said Professor Slocombe. Omally left the table.

“Forgive me if you will,” said Pooley, when the Irishman was engaged in pummelling his way through the crowd towards the bar, “but you do remember that we are under imminent threat of annihilation by these lads from Ceres. I mean, we are still taking it seriously, aren’t we?”

Professor Slocombe patted Pooley’s arm. “Good show,” he said. “I understand your concern. It is always easy to surround oneself with what is safe and comfortable and to ignore the outré threats which lurk upon the borderline. Please be assured that we have done everything that can be done.”

“Sorry,” said Jim, “but strange as it may seem, I do get a little anxious once in a while.”

“Ladies and gentlemen,” croaked the adjudicator in a strangled voice, “the end is near and we must face the final curtain.” There were some boos and a few cheers. “The last match is to play, the decider for the Challenge Shield, and I will ask for silence whilst the two teams prepare themselves.”

A respectful hush fell upon the Swan. Even the boy Rathbone ceased his game. However, this was not through his being any respecter of darts tournaments, but rather that his last two-bob bit had run out, and he was forced up to the bar for more change.

“It is the playoff, five hundred and one to gain. By the toss, first darts to the Horsemen, good luck to all, and game on.”

Professor Slocombe’s eyes swung towards the Horsemen’s team. Something strange seemed to have occurred within their ranks. Old Jack had declined to take his darts and sat sullenly in his wheelchair. The man Kelly was nowhere to be seen, and the other disembodied members of the team had withdrawn to their places of perpetual night and were apparently taking no more interest in the outcome of the game.

Alone stood Young Jack, hollow-eyed and defiant.

“He means to play it alone,” said the Professor. “I do not believe that it is against the rules.”

“By no means,” said Omally. “A man can take on a regiment, should he so choose. As a bookmaker I find such a confrontation interesting, to say the least.”

The Swan’s patrons found it similarly so and Omally was forced to open book upon his shirt sleeves.

Young Jack took the mat. He gave the Professor never a glance as he threw his stygian arrows. To say that he actually threw them, however, would be to give a false account of the matter, for at one moment the darts were in his hand, and in another, or possibly the same, they were plastered into the darts board. No-one saw them leave nor enter, but all agreed that the score was an unbeatable multiple of twenty.

“One hundred and eighty,” came a whispered voice.

Norman stepped to the fore. Although unnoticed by the throng, his darts gave off an electrical discharge which disabled television sets three streets away and spoiled telephonic communications a mile off.

“One hundred and eighty,” came a still small voice, when he had done his business.

Young Jack strode once more into the fray. His eyes shone like a pair of Cortina reversing lamps and a faint yellow fog rose from the corners of his mouth. He turned his head upon its axis and grinned back over his shoulders at the hushed crowd. With hardly a glance towards the board, he flung his darts. The outcome was a matter for the Guinness Book of Records to take up at a later date.

“I don’t like this,” said Professor Slocombe. “I am missing something, but I do not know what it is.”

“We are scoring equal,” said Omally, “he needs but one unfortunate error.”

“I am loath to intervene, John.”

“It might get desperate, Professor, say a few words in the old tongue, just to be on the safe side.”

“We will wait a bit and see.”

“He is closing for the kill,” said John.

Professor Slocombe shook his head. “I still cannot see it, he appears to be winning by skill alone.”

“God bless him,” said Pooley.

Omally raised a fist towards his companion. “We are talking about the Swan’s trophy here,” he said, waggling the terror weapon towards Pooley. “This is no joke.”

“One day,” said Jim calmly, “I shall turn like the proverbial worm and take a terrible retribution upon you, Omally, for all the blows you have administered to my dear head.”

“Sssh,” went at least a dozen patrons. “Uncle Ted is up.”

Uncle Ted, Brentford’s jovial greengrocer, was possibly the most loved man in the entire district. His ready smile and merry wit, his recourse to a thousand cheersome and altruistic bons mots, of the “laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone” variety, brought joy into the lives of even the most manic of depressives. It was said that he could turn a funeral procession into a conga line, and, although there is no evidence to show that he ever took advantage of this particular gift, he was never short of a jocular quip or two as he slipped a few duff sprouts into a customer’s carrier-bag.

Omally, who could not find it within himself to trust any man who would actually deal in, let alone handle, a sprout, found the greengrocer nauseous to the extreme degree. “That smile could make a Samaritan commit suicide,” he said.

Uncle Ted did a little limbering-up knee-work, made flexing motions with his shoulders, and held a wet finger into the air. “Is the wind behind us?” he asked, amidst much laughter from his supporters. He waved at the smoke-filled air with a beermat. “Which way’s the board then? Anybody got a torch?”

Omally groaned deeply within the folds of his beard. “Get on with it, you twerp,” he muttered.

Uncle Ted, who for all his inane clowning, was well aware that a wrong move now could cost him his livelihood, took a careful aim whose caution was disguised behind a bout of bum wriggling. His first dart creased into the treble twenty with very little to spare.

“Where did it land then?” he asked, cupping his hand to his forehead and squinting about. His supporters nudged one another, cheered and guffawed. “What a good lad,” they said. “Good old Uncle Ted.”

Ted looked towards the board and made a face of surprise upon sighting his dart. “Who threw that?” he asked.

To cut a long and very tedious story short, Uncle Ted’s second dart joined its fellow in the treble twenty, but his third, however, had ideas of its own and fastened its nose into the dreaded single one. The laughter and applause which followed this untimely blunder rang clearly and loudly, but not from any of those present who favoured the home team.

“What a good lad,” said Young Jack. “Good old Uncle Ted.”

The greengrocer left the Flying Swan that night in disgrace. Some say that like Judas he went forth and hanged himself. Others, who are better informed, say that he moved to Chiswick where he now owns three shops and spends six months of the year abroad.