Constable on the Prowl (The Constable Nick Series Book 2)

by Nicholas Rhea

  Constable on the Prowl

  Nicholas Rhea

  © Nicholas Rhea 1980

  Nicholas Rhea has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1980 by Robert Hale Ltd.

  This edition published in 2016 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 1

  Good things of day begin to droop and drowse, While night’s black agents to their prey do rouse.

  WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE — Macbeth

  *

  For the police officer, night-duty is a time to reflect upon his duties, to ponder upon the meaning of life and to assess the value of the police service as a career. Alone in the midnight hours with nothing but dead leaves, stray cats and legends of ghosts and ghoulies to accompany him, the police officer goes about his multifarious tasks unseen and unpraised. In his solitude, he deals with all manner of incidents and problems, and there is no one to thank him or console him, although if he errs in the smallest way, it can be guaranteed that someone will see him and report his misdemeanour to a higher authority.

  Alternatively, the witness will write to his local newspaper about the reduction in police standards or the lack of internal discipline within the Force. This area of injustice is stoically accepted by members of the Force. Perhaps they know the writings of ‘Junius’ (circa 1770) who said, ‘The injustice done to an individual is sometimes of service to the public’.

  With such dangers at the back of his mind, it is fair to say that every police officer is nurtured upon a diet of nights. In police jargon, Nights is that period of eight agonising hours which stretch interminably from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m., or in some areas from 11 p.m. until 7 a.m. Sometimes the duty is worked a week at a stretch; on other occasions it is worked by performing two Nights, followed by two Late Turns (2 p.m. until 10 p.m.) and then three Early Turns (6 a.m. until 2 p.m.). This involves ‘quick changeovers’ when one seldom seems to sleep between those spells of bleary-eyed periods of work.

  Some police forces try to ease the eternal lack of sleep by starting with Early Turn, then going on to Nights and finishing with Late Turns. Then there is the sequence Nights, Early, Late or even Late, Early, Nights or in fact any other combination, all of which are designed to ensure the maximum of work is crammed into the shortest period of time with a minimum of hours wasted in sleep.

  Another attempt to baffle the policeman’s sleeping routine is Half Nights. This is the period of eight hours from 6 p.m. until 2 a.m., or from 5 p.m. until 1 a.m. This duty is often welcomed during a period of full nights because it enables at least some of the night to be spent in bed and is therefore considered a perk or even a devious way of saying ‘thank you’ for some obscure task, well performed.

  Many youngsters start their police career by working three weeks of full nights, broken only by a rest day or two somewhere during that tortuous spell. This first session is a long and extremely exhausting affair because sleep patterns of many normal years are interrupted and the constable’s endurance is tested by the requirement to remain awake, or at least to have the appearance of remaining awake, in spite of crushing weariness and sore feet. By the onset of Night No. 3 the policeman’s sleep pattern has adjusted reasonably well to the demands placed upon it. One of these demands is the ability to eat breakfast at 2 a.m., followed by another at 6 a.m. which ought, in the strictest of sequences, to be called lunch, but which never is. There is little wonder that police stations reverberate with strange gastronomic sounds at such mealtimes — stomachs do need to protest from time to time.

  A period of sleep follows a night-duty and this lasts until around two or three in the afternoon, which is a time free to bathe one’s feet and have a nap. By nine o’clock in the evening, it is back into uniform for a rapid supper. Sandwiches are collected and a flask is filled with hot liquid like coffee, tea or soup, then it’s off to the station to parade at 9.45 p.m. in readiness for another period of lucernal duty.

  By the time the officer has totally adjusted to his changed bodily rhythms it is time to have a day off. It is then necessary to readjust to a sort of normality, a task which is not difficult after only two or three nights but which is nigh impossible after a long, breaking-in spell of three weeks full nights. Jetlag has nothing on this period of readjustment, for it requires a total rethink on teeth-cleaning routines and toilet necessities, all aggravated by weakening torch batteries and the absence of all-night torch battery emporiums.

  If this long enforced spell of somnambulism appears to be futile, it does have a purpose. The idea is to allow the budding constable to become properly acquainted with his beat before he is turned loose upon an unsuspecting public in the full glare of British daylight. It is reasoned that in the wee small hours of the morning he can potter about the town, often accompanied by a seasoned local officer, to learn all about vulnerable properties, to discover places where cups of tea can be obtained at any hour of the night, to know which bakers use police officers to test the quality of their buns and to locate shops which offer discounts. There is the added bonus of discovering windows at which attractive ladies undress without curtains. It is also advantageous to be shown hiding-places where the sergeant never looks, along with a host of other useful information. A lot of experience is gained on night-duty. It is the foundation of future ‘bobbying’.

  After the introductory term, the young officer is turned out to face his public with his training-school confidence either pleasantly consolidated or totally shattered by the experiences of those three weeks.

  It is of such experiences that I now write, for this book relates some incidents which have occurred during prowling periods of night-duty.

  I feel that it is prudent from the outset to state that the term ‘night’ is of considerable academic interest to the prowling police officer. It has so many different meanings within the law of England, many of which affect the performance of the bobby’s duty. Although the law has dramatically changed since my early days in the Force, the definition of ‘night’ continues to be interesting.

  I first learned of the legal intricacies of ‘night’ at my Initial Training Centre where, by flicking through my official issue of Moriarty’s Police Law I learned that there were several definitions of ‘night’; they were as follows:

  Night — arrest; Night — Billiards; Night — burglary; Night — disguised with intent; Night — dogs; Night — larceny; Night-lights on vehicles; Night — loitering; Night — malicious damage; Night — offences; Night — Old Metal Dealers; Night — poaching; Night — spring guns, etc.; Night — walkers; and Night — Refreshment Houses. The problem was that the word ‘night’ bore little resemblance to our night-duty times and indicated something different in most of the indexed cases. In addition, there were other ‘nights’ like Night — arrest for indictable offences; Night — cafes, offences in; Night — employment; Night — work (women) and finally, as if to clarify it all, an entry entitled Night — Meaning Of.

  For example, ‘night’ for the purpose of the convention concerning the night work of women employed in industry, meant a period of at least eleven consecutive hours, including the interval between ten o’clock in the evening and five o’clock in the morning. Under the Larceny Act of 1916 then in force, but now superseded by th
e Theft Act of 1968, the term ‘night’ meant the interval between 9 p.m. in the evening and 6 a.m. the following day. In those days, an offence committed during the night-hours was considered infinitely more serious than a similar one committed during the daytime, consequently lots of officers patrolled the streets in case something fearsome occurred and lots of emphasis was placed upon things which might go wrong in the night. The officers had to know how to cope with anything that might arise, be it a domestic disturbance between man and wife or an aircraft crash upon the town.

  Typical of the things learned was that a licensee with a billiards table must not allow anyone to use a table or instrument between 1 a.m. and 8 a.m., a provision made under the Gaming Act of 1845. Another learned gem was that burglary was a crime which could be committed only between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m.; if it occurred at any other time it was known as housebreaking, shop-breaking or by some other suitably descriptive name. The same period of night, 9 p.m. until 6 a.m., was also featured in the Larceny Act for many offences, including the famous Four Night Misdemeanours. These were:

  1. Being found by night in any building with intent to commit felony therein;

  2. Being found by night and having in his possession without lawful excuse any key, picklock, crow, jack, bit or other implement of housebreaking;

  3. Being found by night armed with any dangerous weapon or instrument with intent to break into a building and commit felony therein;

  4. Being found by night having his face blackened or disguised with intent to commit a felony.

  For the purpose of keeping dogs under control, the period ‘night’ meant the period between sunset and sunrise, while the laws governing lights on vehicles determined that ‘night’ comprised the hours of darkness which were specified as the time between half-an-hour after sunset until half-an-hour before sunrise, although under a 1927 Act, it meant, during summertime, the period between one hour after sunset and one hour before sunrise in any locality. The reporting of offenders under such a multiplicity of rules could be hazardous although we were helped by a High Court case in 1899 (Gordon v. Caun) which determined that sunset meant sunset according to local, not Greenwich, time.

  So many references to ‘night’ meant that all manner of juicy crimes could be committed, many of which gloried in the realm of felony. A felony was A Most Serious Matter, like entering a dwelling-house in the night or breaking into homes which was called burglary. It was felonious to lie or loiter in any highway, yard or other place during the night. Other Less Serious Matters, known as Misdemeanours, included Old Metal Dealers who were convicted of receiving stolen goods, making purchases between 6 p.m. and 9 a.m., and prostitutes or night-walkers loitering or importuning in any street.

  In addition, there were those villains who set spring-traps to catch humans, although at that time, the 1950s, it was not illegal to set them between sunset and sunrise if it was done to protect one’s dwelling-house. Non-licensed refreshment houses must not be kept open between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., while pubs were subjected to a whole host of rules which we had to memorise.

  With all this potential illegal activity, it follows that night-time patrols were full of interest, although it ought to be said that the interesting things were rarely related to any of these statutes. Most of them had grown seriously out of date during the first half of the 20th century and were ignored to a large degree. None the less, they did exist and they were the law.

  Having studiously learned all the necessary definitions of ‘night’, and having calculated when one was supposed to be on duty, we were exhorted to go out and fight crime. A suitable town was selected by Headquarters, one which was deemed ideal for the operational birth of a budding bobby and it was to such places that we were dispatched. There were several suitable towns in the North Riding of Yorkshire and the one selected as my tutorial community was Strensford. To this peaceful place I was dispatched to quell riots, solve crimes, arrest burglars, catch rapists and report cyclists without lights. It was my time of learning, my period of studying police procedures and of learning the craft of bobbying from seasoned men. It was also a time to appreciate some of the dilemmas into which members of the public managed to get themselves.

  No policeman ever forgets those first faltering steps of nights. If there is a time when the public is at its most vulnerable, it is during the hours of darkness, or between sunset and sunrise, or between the period half-an-hour before sunset until half-an-hour after sunrise…

  Having been posted to Strensford, I began to learn the craft of being cunning, I began to fearlessly shake hands with doorknobs and learned how to make use of the shadows to conceal myself from everyone, including the sergeant. Hiding from the sergeant was considered good sport, particularly when it was possible to observe him seeking ourselves. Strensford taught me a lot.

  I learned never to put my weight upon a doorknob when trying it for security. It could be guaranteed that that particular door was insecure and that it would pitch me headlong into the shop, to land in a tub of rotting tomatoes or a pile of ovenware or other noisome paraphernalia. The alarm created in the bedrooms of nearby slumbering members of the public can easily be imagined, so doorknobs were treated with great respect. Back doors were treated with even greater respect because they were frequently left open by shopkeepers or their staff as they rushed home at 5 p.m., trusting to God and the patrolling policeman to save a lifetime’s work from opportunist villains. Some doorknobs abutted the street and they were simple to cope with; others were in deep recesses where many a courting couple has disturbed a policeman going about his legitimate business. Some were along paths or alleys and others up rickety steep stairs. One could almost write a ‘Constable’s Guide to Door Knobs’ after contending with such a range.

  The idea of this twice-nightly friendship ritual with doorknobs (once before the meal break and once afterwards) coupled with an examination of windows, was to make sure no one had been burgled. All ‘property’ as we termed it, must be ‘tried’. That was our main role during the night, while the supervisory sergeant surreptitiously prowled in our wake to check that none of us omitted to discover unlocked shops or attacked premises. If we did miss a knob, we were in trouble, although it did occur to me that if the sergeant tried all the knobs in the town, why did we bother? It seemed such an elementary question that I was terrified to ask it in case the answer made me appear a naïve fool.

  If we found an insecure place, we had to enter it and face the unknown foe inside. Biting our chin-straps to silence rattling teeth and in pitch darkness, we must search the place for villainous felons, or people with faces blackened by night and other evil creatures. God knows what we would have done if we’d found anyone!

  Having found no one, and having noted that the exposed stock appeared untouched, we had then to make our way, on foot, to the office to discover the name of the key holder. The next stage was to drag him from his bed with the news that he’d almost lost everything that was dear to him.

  Some key holders appeared to relish being knocked up at all hours because they regularly left open their shops, pubs, banks, offices or clubs. For others, however, the appearance of a cold, grim-faced constable at their door at three in the morning was enough to ensure they locked up in future. Others couldn’t understand why we didn’t simply drop the latch ourselves instead of making such a fuss. Such an action could be fraught with danger. If something had been stolen and its absence discovered after the policeman’s visit, all sorts of accusations would be levelled at the patrolling bobby. There are plenty of unsavoury types all too eager to concoct stories too; so we checked insecure premises very thoroughly in the presence of some responsible person.

  The simplest way to complete one’s allocation of property each night was to ignore it entirely and curl up for a sleep in a telephone kiosk. There were officers who were very able at this; many equipped themselves with portable alarm-clocks to rouse them from their cramped slumbers, happy in the knowledge that the sergeant would make the
tour and find all the insecure properties. It meant a telling off but it saved a lot of boot leather, torch batteries and leg ache. Some dedicated constables went on night-duty armed with reels of black cotton. Having checked a property for secure doors and windows, these cotton-toting constables would fasten a length of cotton about chest or knee height across the path or doorway. Any intruder would break the strand, the logic being that the second tour of one’s property would not involve extensive walking along paths and through gardens. It would comprise nothing more than shining a torch upon selected pieces of black cotton. If the cotton was broken, someone had been. The trouble was that it might have been the sergeant, it might have been legitimate visitors or it might have been a villain. There was no way of telling, so I did not rely upon the black cotton syndrome. Besides, it was not the easiest of tasks, finding black cotton at night.

  One of my tutorial sergeants at Strensford had a nasty habit of finding properties open in advance of the patrolling constable. He would then sit in them, secretly, until the arrival of the policeman. If the policeman diligently found the insecurity, praise was heaped upon his shining cap, but if he did not find it, he was in dire trouble for neglect of duty. It rapidly became obvious when Sarge was playing his game because no one saw him around the town. Sometimes, he did not turn up at the station for his mid-shift meal break, so we knew he was sitting in a shop, waiting to pounce.

  If that was his contribution to crime prevention, ours was equally good. When he was in charge, we would hurry around our beats to check those properties we knew were most vulnerable or in the hands of careless owners. If we found an insecure or open door which had not been burgled or forced, we did not action it immediately. We left it alone.

  Sarge would potter along to find the self-same door some time later and would disappear inside to begin his constable-catching vigil. He failed to realise that we knew he was there. We would leave him there until shortly before six o’clock in the morning, when one of us would return to the premises and ‘find’ the insecurity. Did he praise us? Not on your life; we got a bulling for being late in making the find, but he gradually got the message. After sitting alone all night among objects like sausages, ladies’ knickers, fruit, pans and antiques, he decided there were better ways of passing the time.