CONSTABLE BENEATH THE TREES a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain's best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 13)

by Nicholas Rhea

  ‘Good evening, PC Rhea.’ He climbed from the little vehicle, returned my salute and asked, ‘Everything in order?’

  ‘Yes, sir, all correct,’ I chanted in the regulation tone. ‘All cars correctly parked and illuminated. No cars parked without lights.’

  ‘Yes, I have performed a tour of inspection around Aidensfield,’ he said. ‘And I must admit I am impressed by the law-abiding nature of the villagers. You clearly run a very efficient beat, Rhea.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  I took him into the pub and introduced him to George; Pollock’s eyes scanned the assembled locals who fell into a respectful silence as he scrutinized them, doubtless seeking under-age drinkers, but nothing untoward caught his eye. Even Claude Jeremiah Greengrass, sitting with a pint in his hands, made no comment.

  ‘A very well-run establishment, Mr Ward,’ said Pollock. ‘An example to many others, I would suggest. Well done.’

  ‘We do our best,’ beamed George. ‘We have no wish to break the law here in Aidensfield, Inspector.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Ward,’ and he left with me at his side. He then decided upon a short foot patrol of Aidensfield, to get acquainted with the layout of the village.

  As we perambulated, we discussed a few local matters such as the crime rate for Aidensfield, the lack of any special constables in the village, the overall conduct of the other licensed premises on my patch at Elsinby and Crampton and, apparently satisfied, off he went, a happy man. When I was sure he’d driven out of Aidensfield, I returned to the pub to thank George for his co-operation; he’d ensured that all his customers were on their best behaviour tonight and so that first brush with Inspector Pollock’s law enforcement strategy was over. But I knew he would return. I could not relax my vigilance just yet.

  I learned afterwards that it was a different story in Ashfordly. Throughout that first day of Pollock’s Purge, poor Alf Ventress had been faced with a queue of very irate and upset residents; they queued out into the street, they had all received tickets and all had presented themselves as required. The determined night-duty constables had visited every nook and cranny of the town and had swamped hundreds of unlit cars with tickets.

  On the morning after the first phase of Pollock’s Purge, poor old Alf had been at the receiving end of a non-stop tirade of verbal abuse and complaints; there were grumbles about a police state, about the insensitivity of the purge, about the daftness of having to display lights at the end of a no-through road and about the mentality of the police who sought to persecute motorists instead of solving real crimes.

  A local magistrate, a doctor, two solicitors, several dozen holidaymakers and sundry other people had been caught. The catch included several moving vehicles whose lights had been faulty, several caravan units, a hand-cart, a lorry with a load projecting more than the specified distance without the specified lights, a mechanical crane, a yacht on board a low-loader, several pedal cycles without lights and a horse-drawn agricultural implement, namely a binder.

  It was not a happy day for Alf; in addition to coping with the bad-tempered customers, he had problems explaining the law on the lighting of hand-carts more than two and a half feet wide by more than six feet long and four and a half feet high; the rules about tail lights on horses, white lights on motorcycle sidecars and whether a combine harvester travelling backwards needed red and white lights at both ends. In short, it had been a downright miserable day for Alf.

  It would not be a happy day for the court officer either; Sergeant Bairstow, the man whose task it was to get these offenders to Ashfordly Magistrate’s Court, would have the chore of issuing summonses and bringing all these malefactors before the bench to answer the charges against them.

  When Alf had finished his miserable spell of duty at five o’clock that first day, his place had been taken by PC Alwyn Foxton and that evening he was faced with a continuing stream of angry motorists.

  As Alwyn was to say later, he had no idea there were so many car drivers in Ashfordly. The night-duty shift had certainly been active and while Alwyn had been dealing with them in a most patient and apologetic manner, Inspector Pollock had arrived. Sergeant Blaketon had been in the office, too, helping to process the non-stop stream of offenders. As the new inspector had marched past the queue to gain access to the office, some had booed him, recognizing him as the architect of their misery. Alwyn had stood briefly to attention before continuing with his work and then Pollock had said, ‘Ah, Sergeant Blaketon. Still on duty, eh? That’s what I like to see, a man dedicated to the work in hand, a really conscientious officer . . .’

  As Blaketon had taken Pollock into his office for a discussion about the effectiveness of the purge, a large rotund man with jet black hair and dressed in a smart grey suit had entered the police station. He had pushed past the queue shouting, ‘Where’s that man Pollock?’

  Before Alwyn could stop him, he had thrust his powerful way past everyone and had entered the police office, his face red with anger and his fists clenched.

  ‘Just a moment, you can’t come in here, this is private, please wait outside, sir, take your turn . . .’

  ‘Turn?’ the man had blustered. ‘I’ll give him turn. Do you know who I am?’

  ‘No, but that is the public area, out there, you are supposed to wait in the passage,’ said Alwyn.

  ‘I am Detective Superintendent Galvin, Regional Crime Squad and I want to see Inspector Pollock. Now.’

  ‘He’s with the sergeant, sir, through there . . . I’ll show you . . .’

  ‘No need, I can find my own way. Now, who are all these people? Why are they queuing like this?’

  Alwyn had explained about Pollock’s Purge whereupon Galvin had thrust his head through the hatch, ‘Right, I’m overruling this foolish escapade. All of you, hand in your tickets and get away home. You’ll not be prosecuted. This is ridiculous. And you, Constable, take those tickets and cancel them. And cancel any more who come in. Do it on my authority. I’m pulling rank on that bloody stupid man. And I’ll get the sergeant to cancel those who have come in earlier. That man Pollock has just ruined weeks of carefully planned work by the Crime Squad, we’ve lost a major criminal through this stupidity and I’m going to have his guts for garters, so help me.’

  And he stormed along the corridor towards Sergeant Blaketon’s office.

  ‘Very good, sir,’ smiled Alwyn with some relief.

  It was later that we learned the full story. The voice of the angry detective had carried into the office where Alwyn had suddenly found himself alone with a pile of useless tickets. But even as Alwyn carefully cancelled each ticket, more people were entering with their slips of paper. Alwyn simply warned them to display lights next time and sent them home.

  He told us later, however, that Detective Superintendent Galvin had bellowed at the inspector, making him acutely aware of the fact that he had ruined a major crime squad exercise to trap a gang of important villains. It seemed that a group of northern criminals were planning a series of armed raids on building societies and crime intelligence had alerted the Regional Crime Squad. In the event of there being insufficient evidence to prosecute all the plotters when the actual raids occurred (the raids would use only two or three men out of a total of eight or nine plotters), the Crime Squad needed evidence sufficient to sustain a charge of conspiracy against them all. And they had learned that the group was to meet at a house in Ashfordly — on the very night of Pollock’s Purge.

  The CID, in several unmarked vehicles, had positioned themselves in various strategic places which provided a good view of the house and all who entered it that night. Night cameras, radio controls and an entire back-up team had been gathered for this operation, with the detectives concealed in vehicles disguised as a fruiterer’s van, a plumber’s van, a bread van, a caravan and car and sundry small private cars.

  And at the crucial moment, as four of the suspects were walking towards the house, a uniformed constable had appeared.

  The four suspects
simply kept on walking, they did not even attempt to enter the drive of the target house; clearly they had seen the constable and had thought he was keeping observations. Thus, in that very simple way, the exercise was ruined and months of hard and even dangerous work had been rendered useless. And to add insult to injury, all the Crime Squad vehicles had received tickets for parking without lights, that being their means of merging unobtrusively with the other cars parked nearby.

  Detective Superintendent Galvin was not a happy man and spent the next half-hour shouting his anger into the shell-like ears of Inspector Pollock. It did not appear to worry him that his verbal abuse could be heard by everyone in the police station, and probably everyone in the street outside. He was determined to embarrass Inspector Crispin Pollock.

  Galvin’s outburst had the desired effect. Next morning, the inspector issued an instruction which cancelled his campaign of effectiveness; we said somebody had pulled the plug on Pollock’s Purge. But some good did result from his idea — for a very short while, the garages in Ashfordly and district did a roaring trade in new bulbs and 12-volt batteries.

  * * *

  It was the poet Matthew Green (1696–1737) who wrote that

  Experience joined with common sense,

  To mortals is a providence.

  What is common sense to some, however, does not necessarily appear to be common sense to others. Some unfortunates don’t have much common sense and there are others who lack any semblance of this most basic of human gifts — we can all quote examples, as do-it-yourself enthusiasts who bring down portions of their houses by stupid work, motorists who set off for a strange part of England without even a map in the car, picnickers who light fires on tinder-dry moors, people who work on electrical wiring without switching off the power, people who go sailing on the sea without any previous experience. Most of us can provide many other examples of sheer idiocy. Sadly, many of these silly actions result in extra and unwelcome work for Britain’s police officers and I often think the police officer’s job is to tidy up the mess that others leave behind. In some ways, police officers are the salvage operatives of a very careless society.

  In trying to define common sense, most of us who suffered from Pollock’s Purge considered it was something he lacked. Inspector Pollock was an academic, not a practical sort of character and it seemed he was going to go through his career making an almighty mess of most things. He seemed to possess lots of bizarre theories which could never work in practice. Furthermore, his lack of common sense was, unfortunately, compounded by a corresponding lack of experience in his job and we felt that this was not a very welcome combination in a senior officer of supervisory rank.

  In spite of his shortcomings, however, we did feel he would learn from his experiences. But he did not. After getting lost in the woods at Aidensfield, and then the fiasco of his vehicle lighting purge, he decided he would organize a crackdown on local pubs.

  The two aspects of pub life which upset him were those landlords who served under-age drinkers and those who did not close at the required time. After-hours drinking was a well-known and very popular sport in most rural areas and most police officers tolerated this, unless it really got out of hand. Tolerance of the liquor licensing laws was one of those unwritten aspects of police work which need to be tempered with humanity, a precise understanding of the laws and, of course, common sense.

  Quite a lot of us could not understand why one could sup from a pint of beer until precisely 10.30 p.m. while the same act was illegal only ten seconds later. Fortunately, that law was changed in the 1960s, allowing a ten-minute drinking-up time. But even so, the liquor licensing laws were fairly rigid. It must be stressed, however, that the police do not make the laws — that is done by Parliament and the task of the police is to enforce them without fear or favour, however daft some of them appear to be. And so Inspector Pollock, in his infinite wisdom, decided to enforce the law on the sale and supply of alcoholic drinks which were consumed after permitted hours. Under-age drinking could be tackled at a later date.

  Now, most rural police officers know that a pint of beer supped after closing time tastes infinitely better than one purchased within licensing hours. It would not be breaking any confidences to report that many off-duty police officers have enjoyed a pint or two after hours. Furthermore, it would likewise be truthful to say that many of them were very senior officers. For policemen to find a pub which served drinks after hours was like finding an oasis in the desert; at the end of the permitted drinking hours the bar curtains were drawn, the doors locked and the assembled multitude got down to the serious task of supping their golden nectar. This act was somehow a defiance of the silliness of the liquor laws and there was a deep satisfaction in beating the system.

  Police officers knew that once the awful shout of ‘Time gentlemen please’ rent the air, the beer assumed a delicacy of its very own; it became like ambrosia, the mythical food of the gods, a golden life-giving liquid which helped its supporters to get through the tough days and weeks ahead. And so men risked their reputations by drinking late. The landlord risked his licence by selling alcoholic drinks after time and those who were caught drinking risked public humiliation in the courts and in the local newspapers. Drinking late was as exciting as driving a racing car. It was a very risky business — but almost every pub was prepared to take that risk for the comfort and well-being of the customers. It was indeed a rare inn which closed exactly on time every night of the year.

  Oddly enough, many town inns did close on time, chiefly to prevent trouble from some of their more robust customers, but in rural areas there were isolated hostelries in lofty places which were meccas for the faithful. Even if the law was being bent slightly, who could honestly claim that they suffered from the cheer which flowed from their study walls? There were few neighbours to complain and most of the imbibers did not have cars, preferring to walk home and so enjoy the still night air of the moors. Some even sang to themselves during the homeward journey, a sure sign of their ability to commune with nature in the bliss and solitude of the calm night hours.

  It seems that Inspector Pollock, a non-drinker, did not fully appreciate these finer points. He lacked any hint of romance and had never even tasted a glass of best bitter, his drinking being restricted to a small, sweet sherry at Christmas. Thus his views were biased against the most English of pastimes. Following his arrival at Strensford, we discovered that he had undertaken several missions into the countryside specifically to check up on late-opening inns.

  Armed with a list of rustic hostelries, he had sallied forth in his official car, and indeed had sometimes performed the journey when he was off duty. He had toured the inns, noting the names of those whose bar lights were still shining at eleven o’clock or later, noting those with cars and bicycles parked outside after closing time and writing down the names of those with the noise of happy voices coming from within.

  And he had been shocked by his findings — he discovered that every moorland inn and village pub within Ashfordly section was busy after closing time. Inspector Crispin Pollock had therefore decided to have a second purge, this time on village and moorland inns. It was to become known as Pollock’s Public House Purge.

  It ought to be said that the period in question was one of impending change for inns and public houses. In addition to the ten-minute drinking-up concession, many were offering bar snacks; some took advantage of changes in the licensing laws to open smart restaurants and another factor was that members of the female sex were now visiting pubs without the risk of being labelled as women of doubtful virtue. To sit in the lounge of a country inn and sip a gin and tonic was not then considered quite as sinful as some might have suggested a few years earlier.

  It needs to be further added that the raiding of pubs whose landlords sell drinks after licensing hours required the extreme cunning and superb skills of those who used a wooden horse to gain access to the ancient city of Troy. If landlords decided to sell drinks after licensing hou
rs, they did not leave their doors open so that the police could enter the premises and catch them in the act. They locked the doors, closed the windows and drew the curtains to make the place secure against any raiders, whether they were police officers or late-night drinkers who’d been ejected from other places.

  Acquiring the evidence necessary to gain a conviction was therefore very difficult but this did not deter the gallant Inspector Pollock. He gathered us together for lectures on the art of raiding pubs, reminding us that we needed evidence of the sale of alcohol, that we must catch the customers with the drinks actually in front of them and that we must seal every glass and initial it with a note of its contents.

  Thus we would raid licensed premises armed with sticky labels and pens; the idea was to rush to a table of drinkers, order them not to move and then stick a label over the top of each glass saying, for example, ‘Three-quarters of a pint of bitter seen before a man who gave the name of Eddie Donohue.’ Logically, we had to obtain the names of the drinkers, take photographs of the scene if possible, seize all the evidence and warn the landlord or landlady of the impending prosecution. Lots of officers were needed to raid just one pub.

  And so Pollock commenced his Public House Purge. What he had failed to realize was that all the landlords in the district were very aware that a new and very keen police inspector had arrived. They knew he was operating in the vicinity and they knew what he would do. Like generations of new inspectors before him, he would raid their premises and so they were prepared for whatever action he might take. Their response to a purge on after-hours drinking was very simple. All doors were locked at the end of licensing hours.

  Those drinkers who were leaving would be told to simply let themselves out but make sure the latch dropped. If a police raiding party wanted to gain admission, therefore, they would have to knock or otherwise demolish the door. If they knocked, the landlord would alert the drinkers who would immediately dispose of their beer, either by drinking it quickly or pouring it down the sink. Thus by the time the police actually gained access to the bar, they would be confronted by lots of empty glasses and many happy customers playing dominoes or discussing horse racing, politics or some other topic, all of which were quite lawful.