Under the Car

Day one hundred and forty-three, Georgia. In two weeks I will sit up half a night with Joseph Turner arguing about whether the world is a dream. I don't know that yet.

What I know today is that the clutch is playing up. The gear lever has play in it and moves forwards and backwards without meeting anything. Was it always like that? I am no longer sure.

So the car is up on blocks and I am underneath it, looking at the linkage from below.

A rubber bush has gone somewhere. Nothing dramatic. But I want to be certain — I have already had the electrics in Turkey, and without this car I am finished, and soon I want to push further into the interior.

From down here the clutch looks no better than it did from up there. The tangle of rods and cables and pipes tells me nothing. The vertical rod from the gear lever ought to be visible. I feel my way towards it with my right hand.

Something cracks, and the linkage between my thumb and forefinger stops resisting.

The cold goes down my back the long way.

Have I just broken it?