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.If there was any one still alive who could give you a truthfulaccount of conditions in the early part of the century, it could only be a prole.Suddenly the passage fromthe history book that he had copied into his diary came back into Winston s mind, and a lunatic impulse tookhold of him.He would go into the pub, he would scrape acquaintance with that old man and question him.He would say to him: Tell me about your life when you were a boy.What was it like in those days? Werethings better than they are now, or were they worse?Hurriedly, lest he should have time to become frightened, he descended the steps and crossed the narrowstreet.It was madness of course.As usual, there was no definite rule against talking to proles andfrequenting their pubs, but it was far too unusual an action to pass unnoticed.If the patrols appeared hemight plead an attack of faintness, but it was not likely that they would believe him.He pushed open the door, and a hideous cheesy smell of sour beer hit him in the face.As he entered the din of voices dropped toabout half its volume.Behind his back he could feel everyone eyeing his blue overalls.A game of dartswhich was going on at the other end of the room interrupted itself for perhaps as much as thirty seconds.The old man whom he had followed was standing at the bar, having some kind of altercation with thebarman, a large, stout, hook-nosed young man with enormous forearms.A knot of others, standing roundwith glasses in their hands, were watching the scene. I arst you civil enough, didn t I? said the old man, straightening his shoulders pugnaciously. Youtelling me you ain t got a pint mug in the ole bleeding boozer? And what in hell s name is a pint? said the barman, leaning forward with the tips of his fingers on thecounter. Ark at im! Calls isself a barman and don t know what a pint is! Why, a pint s the alf of a quart, andthere s four quarts to the gallon. Ave to teach you the A, B, C next. Never heard of em, said the barman shortly. Litre and half litre -- that s all we serve.There s theglasses on the shelf in front of you. I likes a pint, persisted the old man. You could a drawed me off a pint easy enough.We didn t avethese bleeding litres when I was a young man. When you were a young man we were all living in the treetops, said the barman, with a glance at theother customers.There was a shout of laughter, and the uneasiness caused by Winston s entry seemed to disappear.Theold man s whitestubbled face had flushed pink.He turned away, muttering to himself, and bumped intoWinston.Winston caught him gently by the arm. May I offer you a drink? he said. You re a gent, said the other, straightening his shoulders again.He appeared not to have noticedWinston s blue overalls. Pint! he added aggressively to the barman. Pint of wallop.The barman swished two half-litres of dark-brown beer into thick glasses which he had rinsed in a bucketunder the counter.Beer was the only drink you could get in prole pubs.The proles were supposed not todrink gin, though in practice they could get hold of it easily enough.The game of darts was in full swingagain, and the knot of men at the bar had begun talking about lottery tickets.Winston s presence wasforgotten for a moment.There was a deal table under the window where he and the old man could talkwithout fear of being overheard.It was horribly dangerous, but at any rate there was no telescreen in theroom, a point he had made sure of as soon as he came in. E could a drawed me off a pint, grumbled the old man as he settled down behind a glass. A alf litreain t enough.It don t satisfy.And a ole litre s too much.It starts my bladder running.Let alone theprice. You must have seen great changes since you were a young man, said Winston tentatively.The old man s pale blue eyes moved from the darts board to the bar, and from the bar to the door of theGents, as though it were in the bar-room that he expected the changes to have occurred. The beer was better, he said finally. And cheaper! When I was a young man, mild beer wallop weused to call it -- was fourpence a pint.That was before the war, of course. Which war was that? said Winston. It s all wars, said the old man vaguely.He took up his glass, and his shoulders straightened again. Ere s wishing you the very best of ealth!In his lean throat the sharp-pointed Adam s apple made a surprisingly rapid up-and-down movement, andthe beer vanished.Winston went to the bar and came back with two more half-litres.The old man appearedto have forgotten his prejudice against drinking a full litre. You are very much older than I am, said Winston. You must have been a grown man before I wasborn.You can remember what it was like in the old days, before the Revolution.People of my age don treally know anything about those times.We can only read about them in books, and what it says in thebooks may not be true.I should like your opinion on that [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]