Just the Job, Lad

by Mike Pannett

  When I’d caught up with him I looked up at the hedge. It was all of ten feet high, mostly thorn bushes with a few elders growing out of it, and plenty of ivy. Here and there you could see an old oak fence-post, disguised under a layer of grey-green lichen. ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘Tell me the worst. You want a hand trimming it. Am I right?’

  Walt shook his head. ‘No, I shan’t be taking owt off this. Not until I’ve harvested her.’

  ‘Harvested? Harvested what? Elderberries?’

  ‘I already have some of them,’ he said. ‘Mix ’em up wi’ me brambles to make jam. But tek a closer look, lad.’ He was pointing at something up above where we were standing.

  I took off my glasses, gave them a rub on my shirt front, and had a closer look. ‘What are they?’ I said.

  ‘Why, they’re sloes, lad. Fruit of t’blackthorn.’

  ‘Oh, right. But you aren’t going to eat them, are you?’

  ‘I may do, after they’ve sat in a jar of mother’s ruin for a few months.’ Walt’s face had the gleeful, slightly guilty look of a schoolboy who’s just filled his pockets from someone else’s orchard – and who knows he’s getting away with it.

  ‘Ah, sloe gin. Yeah, of course.’

  ‘Have you never made it, lad?’

  ‘Never even drunk it, Walt. Is it all right?’

  Walt closed his eyes, and took a long slow breath. His face suddenly looked ten years younger. ‘All right?’ he said. ‘Why, you open a bottle of sloe gin by t’fireside on a freezing winter’s night wi’ the snow piling up on yer windows and a draught whistling under t’doors, and it’s like – why, it’s as if someone’s magically switched t’sun back on and you’ve a mouth full of ripe fruit, and all that lovely juice trickling down yer throat.’ He opened his eyes, looked at me a bit embarrassed, and added, ‘Aye, and not forgetting it’s got a kick like a bloody donkey.’

  ‘Blimey, Walt. I’ve never heard you talk like that. Proper poetic, that was.’

  ‘Aye well, never mind that. What I want to know is, can you see them sloes – and more important, can you reach the buggers? ’Cos I reckon they’re beyond my grasp, best ones, unless I get me steps out.’

  I followed his gaze, up towards the higher branches. ‘No,’ I said, ‘you don’t want to be going up a stepladder out here, not on your own at any rate. ’Cos that lot’ll take some reaching.’ I’d finally spotted the little clumps of fruit, about the size of olives, some of them still green, the bulk of them starting to turn a deep purple. By standing on my tiptoes I was just able to reach out to pluck a handful.

  ‘No! Don’t be picking ’em. They want a frost on ’em yet, lad. Wait while it gets a bit colder, then I’ll whistle you up.’

  ‘Oh, so you’ve already got me pencilled in for the job, have you? Before you even asked me?’

  ‘Aye, I reckon you’d do your old landlord a favour.’

  ‘I might do, but what’s in it for me, Walt? That’s the question. Do I get a bottle of this stuff, or what?’

  Walt screwed up his face, as if what he was about to say was causing him physical pain. ‘I can’t be giving gin away, the price it is. But I tell you what, lad, I’ll do a deal with you. If t’crop’s as good as I hope it is I’ll let you tek some home, then you and that lass of yours can mek your own. How about that?’

  ‘I get it. You mean, I supply me own gin.’

  ‘It’ll be worth it, lad. You wait till you’re sat in that little house of yours, with young Ann, Christmas time, after you’ve had your roast turkey. I guarantee you’ll be raising a glass to me. You see if you aren’t. One of t’great pleasures of winter-time, is a drop of sloe gin.’ Walt turned away from the hedge and started to make his way back towards the house. ‘Anyway, how you fixed now? Have you time for a cuppa?’

  ‘Aye, go on. If you’re twisting me arm.’

  We sat in Walt’s kitchen, by the stove, and it wasn’t long before we got onto the subject that was now on everybody’s lips; the proposed hunting ban – and the demonstration that was being planned by supporters of the Countryside Alliance.

  ‘They’re all off to London,’ Walt said. ‘Muriel, Ronny. I believe your pal Algy too. Some’s gone on t’train, some on t’bus.’

  ‘What d’you mean, gone? When is this demo?’

  ‘They’re having it today. They reckon it’ll be on t’news tonight.’

  ‘Oh, blimey. I’ve been that busy I clean forgot. Of course it is. I’d better make a point of watching that then. But why aren’t you with them?’ I asked.

  ‘London?’ Walt shook his head. ‘What do I want to go all that way for?’

  ‘I believe the phrase they use is “to register your disapproval”,’ I said. ‘I presume you do disapprove of the ban.’

  ‘Aye, I do. Not that I’ve ever been a huntsman, mind. Never appealed to me. But this ban business, it’s a lot of nonsense. Blooming townsfolk and politicians meddling in country matters.’

  ‘Well, if you feel that way maybe you should have joined them.’

  ‘No, you won’t catch me going all that way just to wave a placard. Besides, what meks you think them politicians’ll listen to us? Have they ever? You mark my words, lad; they’ve made their minds up, long since.’

  After I’d left Walt’s I drove over the top and down into Birdsall, past the big house and then round the corner towards the yard where they kept the hounds for the Middleton Hunt. I had the window wound down and could hear them yapping in their kennels – but I soon wound it back up. They’d been mucking out that day: there was the usual fire in the yard and the pungent smell of burning straw, singed hair and other matter, all mingled with the smoke, wafted across the road on a strengthening breeze. It got me thinking about the hunt, and the time I’d sat and observed it in action, when I was out on patrol and had Nick the gamekeeper to guide me through the network of farm tracks and green lanes that connect the fields. It’s one thing finding your way into some of those enclosures, quite another to find your way back out – and never mind the becks you have to cross. Some of them are barely a yard wide, but they flow through cuttings eight or ten feet deep. As Nick said at the time, ‘Aye, there’s a lot smarter fellows than us got lost in here.’ I would’ve been one of them had it not been for his intimate knowledge of the landscape and field boundaries. I was impressed, and told him so. ‘Why,’ he said, ‘course I know me way around. I’ve been walking these fields since I were a nipper – with and without t’landowner’s permission. And now,’ he laughed, ‘I get paid for it. Rum going-on, isn’t it?’

  I was out with Nick that time because a part of my rural duties included gathering intelligence on the hunt saboteurs who had started to make a nuisance of themselves in our area, especially since the government had proposed the ban on hunting with dogs. We’d soon realised that these people were not to be underestimated, and on a couple of occasions, having searched their vehicles, we’d found offensive weapons. As is so often the case, we came to recognise that you couldn’t tar them all with the same brush at all. The majority of protesters were simply advocates of animal rights, passionate in their beliefs, who opposed the sport on the grounds of cruelty – and as such they had a perfect right to demonstrate, peacefully. However, a minority were politically motivated and more inclined to adopt violent measures. They’d start out with letting down the tyres of horseboxes and similar acts – irritating rather than life-threatening – but some of them graduated to pepper-spraying the horses themselves and on occasion getting into fistfights with the huntsmen and women.

  Policing the hunt – policing the saboteurs, and preventing the confrontation from getting out of hand – also gave me a few insights into the nature of the event and the sort of people who are involved in it. Yes, there are the red-coats, and some of them happen to be very wealthy. But it’s too easy to label them all toffs. It’s downright lazy, in fact. Look around you at a typical meet and you’ll see a substantial number of ordinary country people who simply like to ride cross-country and fol
low the hounds, and quite a few who’ll do so on foot or from their cars. As far as I can see, some of the opposition are motivated by the wealth of the hunters, as they see it, just as much as by any concern for animals. And let’s not forget that hunting’s not exclusively a rural thing. It’s not unusual to find folk from the cities following in their cars. They come for the spectacle.

  As for the actual quarry, well, old Rich over at Hovingham had had plenty to say about the fox as a pest – although I think he was more exercised about the domestic cat, to tell the truth. But what I remembered about our conversation was that he spoke of them not so much as hapless victims but as very canny operators. And I agreed with him. I told him how Ann and I had been keeping an eye on the den just across the beck from us, and how we’d watched the dog fox pay regular visits to the rabbit warren in the adjoining field. I already regarded the daddy fox, as we now called him, as something of a character. There was the autumn morning – it must have been in the autumn, because the lane was covered in golden brown needles from the larch trees, but it was still warm enough for me to sit out on my log for a mid-morning cuppa – anyway, what I remember was glancing up the lane and spotting Mr Fox padding his way towards me with a cock pheasant in his mouth, and at the same time, right in front of him out of the long grass popped a rabbit. The rabbit froze, the fox stopped, and I sat absolutely stock-still, my mug halfway to my mouth.

  I think we’d all held our positions for about half a minute when the fox dropped the pheasant on the ground and eyeballed the rabbit. It still didn’t move. It was quite clear that the fox was weighing up his options. There was no way he could carry a big bird like that, and a plump rabbit, back to the den – even if he managed to catch it – but he was clearly tempted for a few moments. Then he came to the only sensible conclusion. I could’ve sworn he shrugged his shoulders as he bent down, picked the pheasant back up and plodded on towards me before veering off, crossing the beck and disappearing down his hole – by which time the rabbit had recovered its composure and scooted off into the woods.

  So I already had this notion that the fox – the archetypal bad guy of so many stories – was something of a character. And there we were, Nick and I, out in some field on the Wintringham estate, looking down on a little copse, maybe four or five acres. All around us were huntsmen and women, with the pack a hundred yards or so ahead of them, tails erect, scrambling through the undergrowth and cascading over ditches, their barks mingling with the sound of the horn.

  ‘Here.’ Nick nudged me and passed me his binoculars, pointing to the right-hand side of the little wood. ‘Just down there: d’you see him?’

  It took a moment to focus the glasses, but I soon got a fix on a large dog fox running along the side of the trees at what seemed a steady pace, with the hounds maybe a quarter of a mile behind him.

  ‘Now,’ Nick said, as first the fox and then the pack disappeared around the back of the trees, ‘let’s see how he goes on – ’cos he looks a clever old bugger to me.’

  Sure enough, a few minutes later, as the field galloped off out of sight, the fox reappeared on the left-hand side of the wood, trotting along as if he hadn’t a care in the world. ‘Will you look at that?’ Nick handed me the binoculars again, and there was the fox, sitting in the long grass and idly licking his privates, before getting back to his feet and sauntering into the woods. They never did catch that one, but, as they say, a good time was had by all – and I was left with the distinct impression that the quarry had run rings around his pursuers.

  That night, Ann and I put on the TV news at six o’clock – and got quite a surprise. The demonstration in London was headline news. It seemed funny at first, seeing so many people in checked shirts, waxed jackets and flat caps in the capital. There were filmed reports of what looked like a peaceful demo outside the Houses of Parliament, and shots of a sea of protesters walking down Whitehall with a forest of banners: FIGHT THE BAN, WE WILL HUNT and FOX OFF TONY – a reference, that one, to Tony Banks, the Labour minister whose Department for Culture, Media and Sport was the focal point of the legislation. But later – as the filmed reports showed only too clearly – it had turned ugly, with actual fights breaking out.

  ‘God, I hope Algy and Rich and all that lot steered clear of trouble,’ I said. We were watching images of my old outfit, the Territorial Support Group, batons drawn, confronting angry demonstrators. Fists were flying and people were being dragged away to the waiting police vans. It was an odd feeling, seeing my old outfit in conflict with protesters who, in theory, represented my part of the world. I didn’t like it. It was confusing. Back in the days when I was on the TSG, it was usually about tackling football hooligans, anarchists, rioters and people who were violently opposed to the establishment. This lot we were watching on the news were people who would normally be law-abiding members of the public. I don’t ever accept anyone using violence towards the police, but this just didn’t sit right. Folk who would normally work with the police – who could easily have been in my Country Watch scheme – were now head to head with the forces of law and order.

  Ann could sense my consternation. ‘Probably the usual story,’ she said. ‘A minority of troublemakers. But you can see how everybody gets sucked into it.’

  Later in the report we heard how protesters had actually got onto the floor of the House of Commons, with the result that parliamentary proceedings were suspended for a period.

  ‘It doesn’t look good, does it?’ Ann said.

  ‘Certainly not for us. I mean, if that sort of trouble kicks off up here we’re going to be caught right in the middle, aren’t we?’

  As soon as the report from London was over we put the telly off. We were both disturbed and upset by what we’d seen. We were sure that the vast majority of the people who’d gone south had done so for no other reason than to make their protest peacefully, but it is so, so easy for order to break down. When people are passionate about their cause – well, it’s understandable that things can get edgy.

  Next morning I got over to Hovingham as soon as I could. I wanted to hear about what had happened from a reliable source. But Rich was out when I called at the house. I went across to the little shop and post office where Penny worked part-time. ‘Now then,’ I said. ‘You survived.’ She was busy tidying up the fruit and veg boxes down in the front corner. ‘What time did you get back?’

  She stifled a yawn. ‘Far too late.’

  ‘Any trouble? Ann and I saw it on telly last night. It didn’t look good.’

  ‘Yes well, that’s the telly, isn’t it? Find the trouble and focus on that. We had a fine time. No real problems at all – apart from trying to find the coach afterwards.’

  ‘So where’s your man this morning?’

  ‘He’ll be back about lunchtime,’ she said, retreating behind the little counter. A couple of customers had come in and wanted serving. ‘Why don’t you pop in then?’

  ‘Hmm – it may have to wait,’ I said. ‘I’ve another call to make. Tell him I came by, will you? And I’ll try to call in later in the week.’

  ‘Righto, Mike.’

  The other call I had in mind was Algy. I couldn’t wait to hear what he had to say about the events in London, and to find out whether he’d managed to stay out of trouble. What always worried me about him was his refusal to bow to authority unless he was utterly convinced it was the right thing to do. It wasn’t something he could help. It was the way he was. But I knew from my experience that TSG officers didn’t like to get into long-winded discussions. However, I was sure that if something had happened I would have heard, somehow, probably through Soapy. But for now that was all academic; it seemed I was destined not to catch up with Algy for the moment, any more than I was Rich.

  I’d come through Leavening and was driving up the hill towards the brow, making my way to Algy’s place, when I caught sight of Walt, in his driveway, hopping about from foot to foot with his arms in the air. He had a broom in one hand, a raincoat in the other, and was d
ancing backwards towards his front gate.

  I slammed the brakes on and opened the car door. ‘Walt, mate! What you up to?’

  As I stepped out he shouted, ‘Don’t be coming in! Don’t be opening that gate!’ and carried on dancing around like a demented hippy.

  ‘Why, what on earth’s the matter?’ I walked towards the hedge and peered over. ‘You got a problem in there?’

  ‘If this bugger gets out I will have.’

  ‘Ah.’ Now I saw what he meant. Walt was still dancing backwards around the yard, pursued by a large turkey, its dark tailfeathers fanned out and its bright red wattles jiggling this way and that as it pecked at Walt’s ankles.

  ‘You don’t wanna be going backwards,’ I said. ‘Get on the front foot, mate. Show him who’s boss.’

  Walt stopped dancing and turned towards me. ‘You get yourself in here and see if you can boss the bugger, you clever young . . .’ But he was cut short as the turkey launched itself at his feet.

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘Enough of this nonsense. What you trying to do with him anyway?’

  Walt thrust his broom at the manic bird, forcing it back, then pointed to a wood-and-wire coop at the side of the garage. He’d got the door open and had a row of logs, like traffic cones, to each side. ‘In there,’ he gasped, trying to leap backwards and swat the turkey as it came again, gobbling furiously.

  ‘Hang on a bit.’ I stepped back and racked out my Asp, then undid the gate. ‘Coming in!’ I shouted, and slid into the yard – or should I say battle zone?

  ‘Don’t you go killing yon bugger yet. His time hasn’t come.’

  ‘Well, if he keeps dashing about like this all morning there’ll be nowt on him worth eating, Walt.’ Then I grinned and said, ‘Hey, what if I did, eh? Press would have a field day, wouldn’t they? “Police wildlife officer Asps helpless turkey to death”!’