Constable Across the Moors

by Nicholas Rhea

  “Oh, dry the starting tear, for they were heavily insured.”

  Sir W. S. Gilbert 1836–1911

  One of my greatest delights was to ride the sturdy little Francis Barnett across the wild acres of stirring moorland which lie to the north of Aidensfield. Lofty roads and rough tracks interlace across the more accessible regions of the heathered heights while prominent summits dot the horizons to mark the extremities of the more remote parts of the unpopulated portions. But even those far-flung borders conceal beauty and mystery, and are worthy of exploration.

  Many is the time I have parked my little machine on the roadside at some eminent outcrop, to sit and admire the panoramic spread below. Mile after mile of uninhabited land, some of it moorland but much of it comprising green valleys, can be seen from countless vantage points. A succession of artists have attempted to capture the expansive attraction of the moors and dales, but few have painted a memorable reproduction. One or two have captured the exquisite purple of the heather, and some have caught the sheer enormity of the emptiness within the ranging hills. A true picture of the landscape eludes many. The hardiness of the residents has also defied interpretation by striving artists and the region is virtually ignored by novelists.

  I have often considered myself fortunate to be paid a salary for touring these moors and valleys, whereas visitors pay substantially to explore them. That is the chief perquisite of the country constable in North Yorkshire.

  But if the countryside is replete with attractions, then so are the people who scrape a living from these hills. Sheep farming dominates but in the lowland districts, the farmers manage to eke out a living through versatility and hard work. Few of them take a holiday or even a day off because their work and responsibility makes full-time demands upon them and their families. Because their work is their entire life, they are utterly happy and deeply content, a rare thing in any era.

  On my visits to the more distant areas, I made regular calls at the lonely farms. These were chiefly to inspect stock registers or to renew or verify firearms certificates, and it meant I was known to every farmer in the district. The homesteads comprised every kind of farm from the huge, multi-owned premises run by a manager, to the tiny single-cow farm with a few hens and pigs, but which somehow maintained a man and his wife.

  I learned to negotiate cattle grids, unmade tracks, water splashes, woodland ravines and every type of obstruction on the way to these premises, and I could cope with all sorts of gate, bulls, pigs and abandoned farm machinery. But almost without exception, my admission was friendly and courteous. At every place, I could expect a cup of tea or coffee with a slice of fruit cake, and in most cases something seasonally stronger, like whisky or brandy if warranted by the occasion.

  Many of the farmers expected more from me – they expected me to sit down and eat their huge dinners, called lunch in less civilised areas. These are invariably massive, the logic being that the working man’s body is in need of powerful fuel to keep it going correctly. The bigger the man, and the heavier his workload, the more fuel he needs to sustain him during a long working day. This logic seems eminently reasonable, because most of the farmers were huge, muscular men who kept working without a rest from dawn until dusk, their only sustenance being repeated doses of massive meals. As one farmer explained, “Thoo needs mair petrol for bigger, faster cars than for little cars, and they go better an’ all. Ma lads is all like big cars, so Ah need ti feed ’em well.”

  It appeared to be the custom to offer a seat at the table to any stranger who chanced to arrive at meal time. Inevitably, there was enough food to cater for an army of unexpected visitors, and the meals were never made from fancy food. It was all good plain Yorkshire grub, substantial and tasty, comprising local dishes like potato and onion pie, or roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, or joint of lamb with roast potatoes. Home-made soup was invariably offered, with sweets like steamed treacle puddings, apple pie and custard, or fruit pies of most kinds. Rice pudding was common, as was any milk pudding, and a cup of tea concluded the meal, with buns, ginger bread or fruit cake. These were everyday meals, not feasts for special occasions.

  This typical farm dinner (lunch) was followed by a light tea around five o’clock which was something like a fry-up of sausages, black puddings, potato, bacon, eggs and tomatoes, with a light sweet like tinned fruit and a cup of tea with buns, cakes or biscuits. Supper was similar …

  Because the farmers of the moors ate so well and so bounteously, they beamed with health and the hard slog of their daily toil never appeared to have any ill effects. The volume of their unceasing toil would shame today’s so-called workers, and their appetites would make a Roman feast look like a Sunday School tea party.

  After a few months of patrolling and visiting my friends on the moors, I learned never to pack myself a meal. I also learned not to return home for my refreshment breaks. I ate with whomever I called upon around midday or at any meal time and it was deemed discourteous to refuse this hospitality. Thus I had many superb eating houses on my daily rounds, and my moorland patrolling became a gastronomic delight.

  This applied equally to other routine callers, like the postman, the vet, the electricity-meter reader and similar officials. It was during this merry round of epicurean duty that I became aware of another regular visitor to my farms.

  Sometimes, the fellow was leaving as I arrived and we would hold gates open for one another; sometimes he followed me in and we would eat at the same table with eight or nine farm workers, but no one bothered with introductions. I began to wonder who he was. He appeared to visit the farms with the same frequency as myself, and always availed himself of the mountainous meals.

  He used a small grey Austin A35 car, immaculately kept with its chromium shining and its coachwork polished in spite of frequent muddy excursions. He was a smart man in his forties with neat black hair, who was invariably pleasant and courteous. We passed the time of day many times, without progressing beyond that basic formality.

  Inevitably, we would meet one day with sufficient time for an introductory chat and this happened one spring morning shortly before twelve noon. I arrived at Howe End Farm near Langbeck after a tortuous ride up a stone-ridden incline, and my mission was to check the particulars of Farmer John Tweddle’s firearm certificate, which was due for renewal. As I parked my motor cycle against a pig-sty wall, the little grey Austin chugged into the farm yard and came to a halt at my side. The neat man with black hair climbed out, clutching a briefcase in his hand.

  “Morning,” I smiled, removing my crash helmet. “You’ve survived the bumps, then?”

  He laughed. “Aye,” he said. “I’ve grumbled at old John about his road, but he never does anything about it. He reckons if folks really want to visit him, they won’t mind a few bumps and buried rocks, and if they don’t want to come, they deserve to suffer a bit.”

  “I’m P.C. Rhea,” I introduced myself. “I’m the new policeman over at Aidensfield.”

  “This is a bit off your beat, isn’t it?” He closed his car door.

  “Not now,” I said. “Since they issued us with motor bikes, they’ve closed some beats and extended the boundaries of others. I cover a large patch now, including this end of the moor.”

  “And me,” he said, offering me his hand. “Norman Taylor, insurance man.”

  We shook hands warmly.

  “I’ve noticed you coming and going, and having those massive meals,” I laughed. “It seems all and sundry can just stop and eat with them.”

  “They’re offended if you go away unfed at dinner time. It’s as natural to these folks to feed their visitors as it is for, say, a policeman to give advice to a lost motorist. I think it stems from the days when visitors took days rather than hours to reach these remote places. If anyone came, they’d need feeding before they left, and I reckon these folks are continuing that custom. They haven’t realised that our cars and bikes get us from place to place within minutes rather than hours.”

  Togethe
r, Norman and I walked to the back door which was standing open and he entered without knocking. He walked straight to a teapot on the mantelpiece, lifted the lid and took out a £1 note. He made an entry in a book which lay beside the teapot and smiled at me.

  “Monthly insurance premium,” he said. “She always leaves it here.”

  “They’re trusting folk,” I commented.

  “They are; they trust those who call, as if they were their own family. Mrs Tweddle is a good payer, she never forgets to leave her £1 for me once a month.”

  “I’m looking for John, his firearm certificate’s due for renewal.”

  Norman looked at his watch. It was twelve o’clock, and he said, “He comes in for his dinner at quarter past twelve. Elsie will be here soon – there’ll be a potato and onion pie warming in the Aga.”

  And he sat down.

  I pondered over my next action; I ought to go into the buildings to seek my customer and Norman recognised my hesitation.

  “Sit down,” he advised me. “They’ll be in soon, and it’ll save you chasing about the place.”

  I settled in one of the Windsor chairs and he occupied the other. We talked about our respective jobs, and it transpired he lived at Milthorpe, a hamlet on the northern edge of my beat. His agency embraced the whole of the North Yorkshire moors, a huge slice of countryside with scant population, and he told me how he enjoyed every minute of his work.

  As we talked, a large rosy-cheeked woman entered the kitchen.

  “Hello, Elsie,” greeted Norman.

  “Hello, Norman. Nice morning,” she smiled happily. “By, Ah’ve just been down hedging in our five acre. Ah’m famished – have you checked the pie?”

  “No, P.C. Rhea came and we’ve been talking.”

  “Oh,” she said, looking at me. “Thoo’ll be after our John?”

  “Firearm certificate,” I told her. “It’s due for renewal.”

  “He’ll be in soon,” and she went about her business of examining the pie in the Aga. A delicious smell wafted into the kitchen as she opened the door and examined her handiwork. There were no introductions, no fuss over me, no false niceties. I was here, and that was it.

  She lifted the steaming pie from the oven and prodded the thick, brown crust with her finger. It was contained in a huge brown earthenware dish and there was enough for a table of eight or nine people. She placed it on the Aga to keep warm and laid the table. She set four places, I noted, four knives, four forks and four spoons. No table cloth and no condiments. There was a good deal of pleasant small-talk between herself and the insurance man, and then big John entered. He saw me and Norman, nodded briefly and went to the sink where he washed his hands thoroughly with a grease-removing agent, then swilled his face with cold water.

  “Bin greasing machinery,” he informed us. “Spring time comes fast, eh? Winter’s gone and next thing we know, it’s time to get cracking, and my awd tackle allus gits rusted up.”

  Having washed, he plonked himself in a chair at the table and his wife pulled a hot dinner plate from her Aga and filled it with a massive helping of steaming potato and onion pie. The crust must have been an inch thick, and the pie filling consisted of sliced potato, onions and gravy, masses of it. The pie had no bottom or sides – just the rich food with a heavy lid of luscious pastry.

  “Norman,” and she filled a plate for him, and then looked at me. “Sit there, Mr Rhea,” and she pointed to the fourth chair. It was not a request and not really an invitation. Because I was here, it was understood I would eat.

  I was not used to this hospitality and my face must have registered surprise. Even though I knew of this custom, its manner of execution was strange to me.

  “Come on, Mr Rhea,” said John munching at the crust. “There’s no time to waste.”

  And so I found myself tackling a gorgeous pie. It needed no flavouring with salt or pepper, but there was far too much. I daren’t leave any, and was on the point of finishing the first helping when she ladelled a second dollop on to our plates. How Norman coped I do not know, but I must admit I struggled. Eventually, I cleaned it all away. I saw Norman and the others cleaning up the gravy with a lump of pie crust held in their fingers. Luckily I had some left, so I copied them. The result was four very clean plates.

  Mrs Tweddle took our plates and placed them on the Aga; then she lifted an equally large glass dish of rice pudding from the oven. It had a tough brown skin on top, and the contents beneath were creamy and thick. She spooned generous helpings on to our first course plates and I now knew why we’d cleaned them so thoroughly. I must admit I was surprised at this but I later learned it is a widely practised custom on moorland farms. And it saves washing up!

  After the final cup of tea with cakes and biscuits, Norman bade farewell and I was left with John. He produced a whisky bottle because it was our first meeting, and over a strong draught we completed his application form for renewal of his certificate. I collected the half-crown fee and left the farm, having made new friends.

  As things often tend to work out, I bumped into Norman many times during my farm visits. His little grey car would be negotiating tricky farm tracks and moorland roads as he went about collecting his premiums and offering advice to his many customers. I learned that his honesty was such that everyone left their doors open, from big farms and houses to tiny cottages and bungalows, and he knew where each person left his premiums. I never knew the name of his company because everyone called it Norman’s Insurance, and this is how I came to refer to it. The money left on tables or doorsteps was always for Norman’s Insurance.

  But his activities began to interest me. He appeared to be something of a general dealer because I often saw him carrying rolls of wire netting, hunting boots, old pictures or other objects to his car. On one occasion he carried a brace of pheasants, and on others I saw him variously with a three-legged stool, a brace and bit, a clip rug, two hunting prints, a car tyre, some brass lamp holders from an ocean-going liner, a garden bench, a scythe, a butcher’s bike, a side of ham and a Victorian fire screen.

  During the times we passed or met one another, he never enlightened me about his extra-insurance activities, and I did not ask. One does not pry too deeply because it indicates a betrayal of trust, but I did consider asking around to discover what he was up to. But, in the event, that course of action became unnecessary.

  By chance, I was called urgently to Norman’s village of Milthorpe because a visitor had reported his jacket and wallet stolen. It seems he had removed them while changing the wheel of his sports car, and when he’d finished the job, his sports jacket, and the wallet it contained, had vanished. I was on patrol at the time, astride my Francis Barnett, and the radio summoned me to the scene of this foul crime.

  It took me thirty-five minutes to arrive, and I found the irate motorist waiting near his Triumph Spitfire. I eased to a halt, parked the motor bike and removed my crash helmet. I left it on the pillion.

  “P.C. Rhea,” I introduced myself. “Are you the gentleman who has lost a jacket?”

  “Not lost, constable. Stolen,” affirmed the man. He was tall and well-spoken with expensive clothes which spoke of a nice line in tailoring. His hair was plastered across his scalp with some kind of hair cream and he seemed totally lacking in humour. On reflection, it’s not funny having your belongings stolen while changing a car wheel.

  “Tell me about it,” I took out my pocket book. He told me he was Simon Christie from Southwark, having a touring holiday alone in the moors. His wallet contained some sixty pounds in notes, together with his driving licence and other personal papers. The jacket, he explained, was of Harris tweed, tailor-made in London and worth a lot of money. I didn’t doubt it.

  I asked how on earth he’d managed to get it stolen.

  “That is something you are here to establish,” he said haughtily. “Look, I got a puncture in my front offside tyre, and stopped right here to change wheels. I removed my jacket and placed it on the railings at the rear of
the car. I worked on the wheel at the front, and when I’d finished, my jacket was gone.”

  “How long did it take to change the wheel?” I asked.

  “Ten minutes, maybe less,” he said.

  “And did anyone walk past while you were working?”

  He shook his head. “I’d swear that no one came past, constable. I’d swear it.”

  “Are you sure it’s gone? It’s not in your boot, is it?”

  He sighed the sigh of a man who’d hunted everywhere, but raised the boot lid. No jacket. I looked in the car, under the car, over the hedge and everywhere. It had vanished.

  “I’ll make enquiries in Milthorpe,” I promised. “Can I contact you locally if I find it?’

  “You sound hopeful, constable?” There was almost a smirk in his voice.

  “This is a very small community, Mr Christie,” I said in reply. “If anyone has stolen your jacket, someone here will have seen the culprit. These folks have eyes everywhere.”

  I made a deliberate attempt to sound confident, for I imagined his coat had been lifted from the verge by a passing tramp or hiker. If so, the locals would know where he was. I had complete faith in my ability to recover this property and emphasised that point.

  “I’m staying at the Crown Hotel in Ashfordly,” he said. “I’ll be there for a further four nights, constable.”

  “I’ll be in touch before you leave,” I assured him.

  Having obtained a detailed description of his jacket and of his wallet, I watched him leave with a roar of his throaty exhaust, and set about detecting Milthorpe’s crime of the century. When beginning enquiries in any village, it is prudent to begin at the Post Office. Village post offices are replete with gossip and information about local people and their affairs, so I strolled into the tiny, dark shop with its multitude of scents, dominated by soap and polish.

  At the sound of the door bell, a young woman appeared and smiled sweetly. She would be in her late twenties, I guessed, and had pleasing dark hair and a ready smile full of pure white teeth. She was very young to be a village post mistress, I thought.