CONSTABLE AROUND THE GREEN a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain's best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 12)

by Nicholas Rhea

  And I did discover that towns called Karachev, Karakuny, Karakumskiy and Karakulimi did exist in various parts of the USSR. I also found out that one of the bishops of the Monophysitic Orthodox Church was called Severus. He was Bishop of Antioch in AD 513. Our chap had taken his name.

  But having made these minor discoveries, I also knew that the hallmark of a good con man was to establish what appeared to be an authentic base for his story. This man had done that — it would take a great deal of infinitely more detailed research to prove that his church did not exist and equally, because communication with the Soviet authorities was so difficult, it would probably be impossible to establish the bona fides of Father Severus. So who was he? Was he English? German? Russian? Hungarian? I had no idea.

  In my policeman’s mind, this man was a mystery and when I had a rendezvous with Sergeant Blaketon one morning, I decided to voice my concern. I told him about Father Severus and he listened intently.

  “Have you had any complaints about him, Rhea?” he asked.

  “No, Sergeant,” I had to admit. “Not one.”

  “Then it’s no concern of ours, is it?”

  “But if he is conning all those monks and those women, then he ought to be stopped. If they are being charitable because they think he’s genuine when in fact he might be a rogue, then he’s nothing more than a cunning and evil scrounger.”

  “If one of them makes an official complaint, we can do something about it, but what’s he done wrong, Rhea? There’s nothing wrong in people being charitable! And well-meaning people do create new religions and churches. Jesus did it, didn’t he?”

  “Jesus got crucified because folks thought he was a villain,” I reminded Blaketon.

  “There’ll always be miscarriages of justice, Rhea, and I don’t want one in the case of your Father Severus. If there’s no formal complaint, it suggests he’s done nothing wrong, and that means we can’t — and shouldn’t — take action. And he hasn’t done anything wrong, has he?”

  “He hasn’t been found out, you mean,” I retorted.

  “So he charms the ladies and persuades holy men to support him. Where’s the criminality in that, Rhea? It’s being done the world over, and has been for centuries.”

  I realized I was not making any headway and decided to keep my ears and eyes open for any further hints about the background of Father Severus. I even paid a visit to his church, just to have a look inside, and he was charming and helpful, speaking in good English with what appeared to be a strong Eastern European accent. He showed me into the caravan with its small altar, its icons and its ornate gold leaf decor. Before the altar stood half a dozen chairs and there was the all-pervading smell of incense. It was an Orthodox Church in miniature.

  In the few months he had been in the village, he did muster half a dozen regular members of his congregation, all ladies of means. Lonely ladies, I believed. Ladies with husbands out at work all day and absent for most of the night.

  Severus remained with us for more than a year and not once did I receive any complaint about him or his church. I did make discreet enquiries into his claims and into his name and background, but found absolutely nothing. Other than searching his house, I realized I could learn nothing of the man — and I could not search his house unless he was arrested for a crime.

  Then it became known that he had had a calling to visit America, there to establish yet another of his monasteries. Notices appeared on the parish noticeboard and in the local paper; there were papers pinned to the door of his church because he was attempting to raise funds to finance his visit to America on a missionary basis. And, of course, the rich ladies provided their support. They organized events in the village like raffles, jumble sales, whist drives and other gatherings with the sole aim of raising money for his charitable and religious work in the pagan USA.

  And, sufficient funds having been raised, he conducted a thanksgiving service in his church, thanked everyone for their support and left Aidensfield.

  The cottage remained empty for a long time, and the caravan with the onion on its roof began to look rather neglected.

  No more ladies came to pray there, although some did receive postcards from America signed ‘Severus’ and saying it was a wonderful country for the free and that he had managed to establish several small churches in various neighbourhoods. But there was no address or contact number on any of the correspondence, and no hint about where precisely those churches had been established. In time, Maddleskirk Abbey Trustees recovered their caravan, took the onion and leek off its roof then removed the icon and other adornments. It was needed to house a new cowman who worked on the abbey farm.

  And that, I reckoned, was the end of Father Severus, except that two or three years later, I was watching a colourful police thriller at a local Odeon. I forget the title now, but suddenly, in a daring sequence where a trapped man leapt from a high building which was on fire and threatening to collapse, I saw Father Severus. He was the man who was about to jump; his tall, powerful figure, his handsome face with its beard and thick hair were unmistakable and then I realized why he had gone to America. There he would find lots of pretty women with plenty of money but I don’t think they would be the kind who’d be happy spending their spare time in a caravan with an onion on the roof. In Hollywood, there was a different religion and he had found it — but he looked very happy.

  When the credits came up, I saw that the stuntman was called Igor Stepnyak. I wondered if the American police would try and establish who precisely he was.

  But, as I had had no complaints from Hollywood, it was not my job.

  * * *

  If priests and vicars were prey to confidence tricksters, then so were the occupiers and owners of large country houses. One of their chief difficulties was the recruiting of reliable and trustworthy members of staff; even when landowners were being penalized relentlessly by the advance of socialism, they did manage to keep their homes and lifestyle. They found new methods of keeping the homes which had been in the family for centuries, even if it meant opening them to the public.

  Fortunately, many were still able to provide much-needed employment for local people, but it was a changing world which forced them to advertise for staff. Fewer and fewer recruits could be found in the surrounding villages and many young people would not tolerate the long hours, high demands and meagre wages which accompanied this kind of work. The outcome was that even though butlers, housemaids, laundrymaids, gardeners, estate workers and their kind were still in demand by the owners of mansions on my beat, such staff had to be recruited from afar, often from towns and cities, and often from a class of person lacking loyalty, honour and trustworthiness. Gone were the days when you could hire a maid or a manservant for life; no longer was it considered an honour to work for his Lordship. Rather, it was considered to be drudgery.

  But the polish of a trained butler was still necessary and who better to fill the role of butler than a highly skilled confidence trickster?

  Many of them did apply for such posts and many were appointed, only for his Lordship to discover later that items of the family silver or priceless bottles of wine from his cellar had vanished, often at the same time that the butler no longer responded to his bell.

  Our circulars were rich with examples of this kind of treachery and theft and we did try to educate their Lordships into taking care over staff appointments. One simple method was to actually check any proffered references. Many prospective employers, in places ranging from factories to fancy houses, took written references on face value without checking that the signature was genuine or that the supposed signatory had, in fact, written such glowing prose about the chap applying for the post.

  There is a theory, of course, that if a referee writes highly praiseworthy words about an employee, then it is done with a desire to part company with that employee. The ploy was often used in the police force. If an officer in one force was not very proficient, he usually had an unhappy time and felt that a transfer
to a quieter area would be beneficial. When he applied for a post in the new force of his choice, his chief would write glowing praises about him, in the hope that someone would be daft enough to take him off his hands.

  Sometimes, that ploy worked, but very soon discerning chief constables realized that high praise from another chief constable was often an indication that he was trying to offload some rubbish. It was akin to the prose of a second-hand car salesman or a less-than-honest antique dealer. You finished with something that looked good but which did not work. In those respects, second-hand policemen were often like second-hand cars.

  In our attempts to thwart confidence tricksters, we tried to educate all potential employers to check references with great care and, until the Labour Government said it was wrong for us to check a person’s criminal record in such cases, we could even make discreet enquiries on their behalf. After all, it was in the interests of the local constabulary and also the local community not to have a known and active criminal living in the village, even if he was employed at the big house at the end of the drive and even if he said he’d reformed.

  But the socialist creed said otherwise — the socialists said we must give all villains a fair chance to continue their crimes. And so they did. With no check on their activities and precious little punishment to deter them, they continued to commit their crimes and to accumulate an increasing list of victims. But in the days preceding those doctrinaire edicts, we did check a person’s criminal record if he or she was applying for certain posts and I do know that a lot of crime was thus prevented.

  In spreading the message of caution when making vital appointments I did, I know, influence Lord Ashfordly on more than one occasion. Several checks of submitted references proved them to be false and as a consequence, he did not make the appointments in question. Today, of course, the Theft Act of 1968, section 16, deals with dishonestly obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception and this now makes it a crime to obtain a job with forged references or through the use of invalid or faked qualifications.

  But even the most careful checks can fail to flush out a clever villain and so it was with a butler appointed by Lord Ashfordly.

  He called himself Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore and upon applying for the post of butler with Lord Ashfordly, had produced glowing references from his last employer, the Earl of Labberford. He had worked for the earl at his London house, so he had claimed.

  Lord Ashfordly, not knowing Labberford in person, had written to the impressive address on the high-quality headed paper and had received a reply to the effect that Chaldecott-Montefiore was a splendid fellow worthy of anyone’s hire. He had left Labberford’s employment simply because Labberford, a widower of some years, was going into a private nursing home for an extended period and would not therefore require a butler in the foreseeable future. Lord Ashfordly had congratulated himself upon the acquisition of such an outstanding chap.

  In fact, Lord Ashfordly was so pleased with his new butler that for once he did not ask me to discreetly check his credentials.

  But in the weeks that followed, the demeanour of Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore led his Lordship to believe that the fellow was not everything that he claimed. His knowledge of fine wines was very limited, his treatment of the other servants was not in keeping with the position of butler, his attitude to Lord Ashfordly’s guests was not of the kind one would attribute to a trained man . . .

  Lord Ashfordly, with the beginnings of suspicion deep in his heart, rang me one morning.

  “Ah, Mr Rhea,” he always called me Mr Rhea, not just Rhea, “I would like a word with you, on a private matter.”

  “I’ll be in your area this afternoon,” I said. “I could call around three o’clock?”

  “That will be perfect.” He sounded relieved.

  Wondering what could be worrying him, I drove to Ashfordly Park, his magnificent country house, and rang the bell. It sounded deep within the mansion and a maid responded. When I announced that his Lordship was expecting me, I was asked to wait in the library, and was eventually shown into the study. A silver tray of tea and biscuits was waiting, and the maid poured a cup for each of us before handing around the biscuits. As she worked, Lord Ashfordly made small talk about the weather and increasing tourism in the market town which bore his name.

  When she’d left us, he began, “This is a delicate matter, Mr Rhea. I must insist on complete confidence and the utmost discretion on your part.”

  “Of course,” I assured him.

  I liked Lord Ashfordly. A sturdy man in his early fifties with a good head of hair, he was a tireless worker for the townspeople, sitting on the parish council and the county council and protecting the town against unwelcome development. He had a known dislike of square concrete buildings and characterless shopping developments and, fortunately for Ashfordly town, was in a position to resist hurtful change. I had a lot of respect for him.

  “Last month,” he said, “I appointed a new butler, a man called Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore. Excellent references, good bearing, fine manner, good command of the English language, smart and tidy. Ideal in many ways. You’ve met him, have you?”

  “No, I haven’t,” I said, explaining that from time to time I did meet the butlers of such houses, but to date, had not had the pleasure of the company of Mr Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore.

  “It is his day off today,” smiled Ashfordly. “He has gone to Scarborough, there’s an outing been arranged from the town; he’s away all day, hence my call to you.”

  “You are worried about him?” I anticipated. “He hasn’t been stealing from you, has he?”

  “I fear that might follow,” and he told me about his worries which were chiefly based on his butler’s lack of finesse and skill in his chosen profession. As his Lordship itemized the growing number of small errors, I realized they were the kind of fault I would never have recognized, nor indeed would any ordinary person. But to a blue-blooded member of the British aristocracy, those errors and lack of the social graces would be like loud warning bells. With reasonable cause for concern, Lord Ashfordly suspected that the fellow was a charlatan.

  “So, Mr Rhea,” he said. “I am asking if there is any way you can check his antecedents for me?”

  I had no wish for a theft to be committed at Lord Ashfordly’s house; worse still, it might become an unsolved crime if the villain was very clever. And no self-respecting constable wants an unsolved crime on his books. I was therefore keen to help.

  “His name,” I proffered. “Is it genuine? It sounds more like the name of an employer than an employee.”

  “That’s the name he uses, Mr Rhea, and it was on all his documents; medical card, National Insurance and so on.”

  “Thanks.” I knew that it was not difficult to obtain forged documents of that kind. “Have you any of the papers he supplied to you? References and so on? I need something to base my enquiries upon.”

  “There’s his personal file, in the safe. I’ll get it.”

  Unlocking his safe, he produced a file of papers and passed them across. I made notes of the names, addresses and other salient factors provided by Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore in applying for the post, and returned the file to him. I then asked for a physical description of the butler and was told he appeared to be between thirty-five and forty years of age, his documents showing him to be thirty-eight. He was 5’ 11” tall, well-built without a beer drinker’s belly, dark hair cut short and kept tidy with a regular application of hair-oil, no bald patch, good strong white teeth, grey eyes, clean-shaven and he did not wear spectacles. He was always smartly dressed and when off duty, favoured a dark blue blazer with the top pocket bearing a badge depicting a yacht, a white shirt, a striped tie and grey trousers. He was well spoken with no discernible accent, but did not own a car or any transport of his own. He had no known tattoos or other obvious identifying features.

  “I’ll check our records,” I assured him. “We do have a pool of information about confidence trick
sters who are operating up and down the country but if this name has not been used before, we might have trouble identifying him. His description could fit thousands of men. But I’ll let you know what progress I make.”

  I ran a check with our local criminal record office and with the national CRO in Scotland Yard, but the name of Gilbert Chaldecott-Montefiore was not listed as a suspicious character.

  Likewise, I asked the Metropolitan Police in London to find out if the Earl of Labberford was resident at the address given by the butler. They said it would take a few days to produce an answer.

  As I suspected, the butler’s physical description was of little value, a surprising number of active con men having a similar appearance. Having done this, rather than show my uniform at the Park when the butler was working, I rang Lord Ashfordly with my lack of positive news.

  “What I need, sir,” I told him, “Is a set of fingerprints. If he has been convicted, they’ll be on record. Can you get them for me, surreptitiously?”

  “How on earth would I do that?” he chortled.

  “I need to have something he has handled, something with a smooth surface like a wine-glass, a bottle of wine perhaps, or a piece of silver, an ashtray maybe, something that his prints will adhere to. And you would not have to touch it either . . . you will need to persuade him to handle the object and then leave it in your office, without anyone else touching it, for me to collect . . . you could ask him for an opinion about a new wine, perhaps? A glass would be better than a bottle, it has no paper label. Paper doesn’t show prints very well.”