‘That’s the Loch Ness Monster,’ said Josephine in a most matter-of-fact voice. ‘Simon nearly got a picture of it when it came of the water, but by the time he’d got his camera out and focussed it was going back under the waves.’
‘The Loch Ness Monster?’ I couldn’t believe this but when I looked at the caption it did say ‘Loch Ness Monster’ and the rear of the picture bore the legend ‘Loch Ness — 10th August 1951’.
‘It was his summer holiday and he was staying at that monastery near Loch Ness, Fort Augustus it’s called. He was walking along the shore with another visitor when the Loch Ness Monster came out of the loch. They both saw it, Mr Rhea, and because Simon’s camera was in his haversack it took a few moments to get it out. By the time he got it ready the monster had gone back into the water and was submerging.’
‘Did he tell anybody about this?’
‘No, he didn’t want to make a fuss. He said nobody would believe him, even if he was a priest and even if he had a witness with him, but he did get that picture. He said it was a bit like a hippopotamus with a long, slender neck, but he didn’t want a fuss made. He knew what he saw, Mr Rhea, even if no one else does.’
‘But if this picture is genuine . . .’ I began.
‘Oh, it’s genuine, Mr Rhea, I mean, a priest wouldn’t lie about such a thing, would he? There’s no point in lying, is there? Not when you’re not going to tell anybody.’
‘It must have been some other animal,’ I said. ‘A seal of some kind.’
‘Some of the other monks have seen the Loch Ness Monster, Mr Rhea, and they never talk about it. Anyway, our Simon got a picture of it and it was that picture, just the one. He had no time to take another, it had gone under the waves by then.’
‘And the witness? Who was it?’
‘It was a man staying at the monastery, Mr Rhea, a man from America, not a priest. Just a traveller of some kind, a visitor staying there for a day or two during a tour of Scotland and England. Simon called him Ray. That’s all I know. I do know that Simon tried to contact him later, but no one knew who he was or where he’d come from. He didn’t leave any address at the abbey.’
This was beginning to look just like any other Loch Ness Monster story where the evidence is not quite complete, where witnesses cannot be traced and where no positive photograph can be found. From what I could see of the creature in Simon’s photo it appeared to be a large and somewhat cumbersome beast with no hairs on its body and thick skin rather like a hippo or an elephant, but because this was a black-and-white print it was impossible to determine the colour, neither was there any other object in the picture from which to gauge the size of the animal. Something like a water fowl or tree trunk in shot would have helped enormously. The portion of its neck which was visible was quite distinct, but it was arched because the head was under the water which meant I could not see what the head looked like, nor did it give any indication of the length or thickness of the neck. I could not see a tail either, because the rump was beneath the surface. So, was this a genuine photograph of the famous Loch Ness Monster? Was it a cow or bullock bathing in the loch, or a seal of some kind such as the huge grey seal or some other kind of deep-sea animal? And how big was this creature? And what did it really look like? A large head, a small head, a head with horns, or a tail which was short and fat or long and thin? There were many questions to answer.
But I could not upset Josephine by insisting she had the photograph analysed by photography experts, nor could I risk there being any publicity about the picture if it got into the wrong hands. I smiled and closed the album.
‘I wish Simon was here to tell me about it,’ I said.
‘Yes, it would be nice,’ she said quietly. I did not look at the photograph on any other occasion and while Josephine was alive I never told anyone about that picture. Sadly, she died not long afterwards, and I do not know where the picture is now. I can only assume that it was passed to Simon’s brother, but he might not have been interested in the collection and it might have been dispersed or thrown out. But to my knowledge that photograph has never been published and it has never been reproduced in any book or feature about the Loch Ness Monster. I have always waited for its appearance in the public arena and am still waiting.
Perhaps, one day, it will surface for us all to admire and discuss. Just like the monster itself, I suppose.
* * *
Another man upon whom I called on a fairly regular basis was a very fit and active retired military gentleman, a former lieutenant colonel whom I think had served in the Green Howards. Everyone in Aidensfield referred to him as the Colonel and he was not the sort who insisted that people addressed him by his full military rank. He seemed to be quite happy being known as the Colonel and would even use that term whenever he rang me — ‘Hello, Constable, it’s the Colonel here,’ he would announce himself.
His wife, Lucille, was still very much alive too and very able to look after the house, herself and her husband, as well as the garden. Her small but exquisite garden was a picture, a truly beautiful display of flowers and shrubs which changed throughout the year. I found it amazing that such an elderly, tiny woman could maintain such a wonderful display of plants.
The couple were in their early eighties and the Colonel’s real name was Lieutenant Colonel Joshua Kilburn-Bardsworth and he was from an aristocratic background, something which was evident in both his speech and bearing. His wife called him Josh and he had fought at the Somme during the First World War, being awarded the Military Cross as a junior officer and later the Distinguished Service Order, added to which he had been mentioned in despatches on several occasions.
After a successful army career he had retired on pension from the service some thirty years before I came to know him and had then enjoyed a second but rather shorter career with a subsidiary of a major British petroleum company. The subsidiary company, known as OSO Ltd, was then searching for oil and natural gas throughout Britain, both on shore and off shore, and a good deal of its exploratory work was in and around the North York Moors.
For all his bravery and military experience the Colonel was a quiet gentleman who preferred to remain in the background of village life, not volunteering to chair or join committees, organize events or turn up at parish council meetings to complain about things. Lucille was of like mind, although she had once been president of Aidensfield Women’s Institute.
The Colonel was quite content for others to ‘run the show’ as he put it, believing he had done more than his bit for England during both his military career and in the time he had spent searching for oil in the UK. It was that second career which led me to become one of his regular visitors. Every month he received his pension cheque from OSO Ltd but, somewhat oddly, it had to be countersigned by what was termed ‘a responsible person’ who was not a relation of the pensioner or an employee of the pensioner’s bank. The purpose of this signature was to prove the pensioner was still alive at the time he cashed his cheque and that no one else was committing a fraudulent act by cashing the cheque or paying it into some other account. Lieutenant Colonel Kilburn-Bardsworth told me that people like the vicar, the doctor, a Member of Parliament, a Justice of the Peace, a police officer or someone of similar standing was able to satisfy the company’s desire that this chore should be done by ‘a responsible person’. As I was out and about in the village perhaps on more occasions than other acceptable signatories I found myself being asked regularly to confirm the Colonel was still alive and kicking. And, of course, I did not object to this — it was one way of meeting the variety of people who lived in the village.
If I chanced to be passing the Colonel’s detached home at the end of the month I would pop in, and if I didn’t pop in as expected he would telephone me to ask whether I could oblige. Sometimes I was away on some urgent task, or even on leave, or attending a course for an extended period, and in those cases he would find some other ‘responsible person’.
Whenever I did call, however, my visit i
nvolved a modest ritual which involved at least one glass of sherry while being entertained by the Colonel in his study along with a cup of coffee and a chocolate biscuit. Inevitably, this was all accompanied by the old man’s vivid account of his time in the Somme or some other aspect of his long career, and so that modest cheque-signing chore tended to occupy us both for an hour or more on every occasion. Lucille would disappear during this ritual, either to do something in the house or to tend her beloved and beautiful garden.
We did embrace something of police work during these chats because the Colonel knew what was happening in Aidensfield and district and at times he was able to acquaint me with details of suspected law-breakers, such as unknown young men visiting the home of the elderly for doubtful purposes, the activities or latest scheme of Claude Jeremiah Greengrass, or gossip pertaining to various facets of Aidensfield life. In short, the cheque-signing was useful to both of us.
From time to time the Colonel referred to his earlier life, usually indirectly or in fleeting moments when he wished to emphasize a particular point and it was at those odd times that I realized he had come from a privileged background. He might refer to his public school, for example, or the gamekeeper on the estate upon which he had lived, or perhaps a titled person who turned out to be an uncle or aunt, or customs like dressing for dinner and passing the port to the left, or even holidays with Lord and Lady Somebody-or-Other.
But even if he did briefly refer to that aspect of his youth he did not show any signs of boasting about his family tree or ancestry and seemed more content with and proud of his military career than any of his noble relations. Even his house was nothing like a country mansion — it was a nice detached house in its own medium-sized garden, with modest accommodation while being tucked away behind the main street. Just the sort of place you’d expect to find a retired military officer keeping a low profile, I thought.
It was during one of those visits that he asked what commitments I could expect to deal with during the coming weeks and I mentioned Ashfordly Fair. This was held twice a year, once in the spring and once in the autumn, invariably in May and October as specified in a charter dating to the fifteenth century, and it attracted a considerable crowd. The modern fair was probably nothing like the original; today’s fair comprised a host of fairground attractions like dodgem cars, shooting galleries, bingo and a lot of games involving skill and machines, although some of the villagers did attend in the hope of selling their handiwork — artists, wood carvers, basket-makers, embroidery experts, jam-makers and others, even some musicians came along to add to the festive atmosphere. The original fairs would have been very commercial, with sales of livestock, farm produce, fruit and vegetables, cakes and bread, tools and equipment and all manner of handicrafts, but it would also have attracted music, feasting and dancing.
‘You’re there to keep the peace, I suppose?’ he smiled.
‘There’s rarely any real trouble,’ I told him. ‘But sometimes young lads get a bit high spirited, some have too much to drink, and you can guarantee there’ll be a dispute of some kind over a girl! We try to keep things calm.’
‘Nothing changes!’ he smiled. ‘My family were granted a charter to hold a fair in Bardsworth, that was years ago of course.’
‘Bardsworth?’ I didn’t know the town or village.
‘In Shropshire,’ he said. ‘It’s a smallish village now but it used to be a substantial market town and the Bardsworth family sought permission to hold a fair. My ancestors, that was. Some kind of organized outlet was needed for the country people, so they could bring in their wares and sell them, and of course, it meant they could let their hair down twice a year. There was feasting and dancing, with a good deal of drinking and courting too, I have no doubt. But it was good for local trade, Constable, and it attracted custom from a very wide area, even from France and Spain. Bardsworth Fair was renowned in its time, but it faded away about a century ago.’
‘And the charter was granted to your family?’ I asked.
‘Yes, that’s how it was done in those days. The lord of the manor had to approach the king to ask that he grant a charter for the town to be allowed to hold a fair. We provided the dates we thought best — usually saints’ days — and hopefully the king would grant us a charter. Once it was granted, of course, no one could halt it or rescind it, and I do know instances where modern local authorities have tried to abolish ancient fairs. It’s not on, Constable. The charter gives permission for eternity.’
‘So, your family were Lords of the Manor of Bardsworth?’ I asked.
‘We were. The Earl of Bardsworth. That was my father’s title; I don’t carry it because I’m not the eldest, and I don’t bother with all that stuff about the honourable and so on. I’m the Colonel, that’ll do me!’
‘That is a world quite foreign to me,’ I smiled. ‘But when was all this?’
‘The grant of the charter, you mean? 1476. Getting on for five hundred years ago. Stow-on-the-Wold received its fair charter at the same time, from Edward IV. Ours, Bardsworth I mean, was granted the same year by Edward, of course. I have the charter here, perhaps you’d like to see it?’
‘A copy of it, you mean?’
‘No, the original, signed by Edward IV in his own fair hand. Come along, Constable, I’ll show you where I keep it!’
He led me from his study and across the spacious hall with its parquet floor and Persian rugs, and I thought we were heading for the library or some other grand room, but he opened the downstairs toilet door and said, ‘In there, hanging on the wall. It makes good reading for anyone who has the time and knowledge to decipher it.’
He switched the light on and I saw an oblong length of parchment, very yellowed and dark, with closely written words in what I thought was Latin, and I could just distinguish the signature and seal at the foot. It was in a glass-fronted frame and appeared to be in excellent condition.
‘It’s hard to believe this is nearly five hundred years old and that that is the actual signature of Edward IV,’ I had to say. ‘I would have thought this would have been in a museum.’
‘I might donate it to one before I depart this earthly life, there are few responsible Bardsworths left, but we keep it in the loo because the darkness suits it and the temperature is just right. And it provides good reading during those long moments . . .’ he chuckled. ‘The frame is fairly modern, though, and air-tight, but the charter’s been in the family since it was granted. It was granted to the family, you see, not the town, and I’m delighted to have it here, in my house. I don’t think it has any commercial value, Constable, it’s not the sort of thing a thief would want to get his hands on, but from an historical point of view I think it is valuable.’
‘I’ll bet there are not many people with a royal document hanging in their toilet!’ I laughed.
‘There’s more than you think, Constable!’ was his reply.
But even now, all those years later, it is difficult to believe that an ordinary house in Aidensfield contained such an historic treasure. When the Colonel died his wife did donate the charter to a museum, but it did make me wonder what else was hidden behind the curtains of Aidensfield.
* * *
It was not only houses, or perhaps attics, which contained surprises. In the countryside especially, the outbuildings and barns of remote farms and distant cottages would often produce gems of furniture, valuable paintings, old grandfather clocks, antique kitchen equipment, discarded family letters, unwanted objects like farm and dairy machinery, old typewriters and sewing machines and a host of other fascinating treasures. I knew one man who bought a house and, in the attic, found a huge collection of postage stamps which the outgoing owners had left behind because they did not want them. Another found a beautifully carved wooden statue of St Cuthbert which had lain undiscovered in a shed during the occupancy of several other house owners. It was the work of a well-known artist who had earlier lived nearby. Another found some valuable seventeenth-century silver spoons conceal
ed in his thatch and from time to time householders found things like wells in their garden, old motor bikes in the garden shed and a hoard of money hidden beneath the floorboards. The cast-off rubbish of one generation had become the antiques of another.
As the village constable I was usually aware of these discoveries because the question of ownership might arise. Generally, the finders of such things, even on the premises they now owned, did not wish to be accused of theft or dishonesty of any kind by retaining the found objects and so they took steps to remedy any defect in the question of ownership. In some cases, the outgoing householders had forgotten all about the stuff they’d abandoned, and the goods were returned to them; in other cases, they had not wanted the clutter they had left and had no wish to have it restored to them.
On occasions, this left the new occupiers with the problem and expense of disposal, but from time to time the new householders found themselves owners of a valuable or interesting object. In the case of the silver spoons in the thatched roof of a cottage, this was reported to me so that I could inform the coroner because it might be treasure trove — in fact, the spoons were declared treasure trove because they had been hidden there. The owner of the house in question received their valuation from the state and the spoons found their way into the British Museum. That was a very satisfactory outcome.
In one case, though, a fascinating object became the focus of my enquiries. For reasons which were never evident, a very successful grain farmer from Suffolk decided he wanted to become a sheep farmer on the North York Moors and while looking for suitable premises discovered the deserted and windswept High Whin Farm in the hills above Elsinby. This was a stone-built long house with a blue-tiled roof and plenty of outbuildings, some of more recent construction than the house. Although it had been unoccupied for years it was in surprisingly sound condition. It was within his price range too and offered the range of household accommodation along with the extensive moorland and numerous buildings he thought he required, and so he bought it — lock, stock and barrel, as the saying goes. The isolated house, owned by the family of the last farmer to live there, had been empty for some ten years and it needed a lot of improvements, but the buyer was a wealthy man and soon the domestic quarters were undergoing a long overdue modernization. The outbuildings could be dealt with once the new owner had moved in.
CONSTABLE AROUND THE HOUSES a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain’s best-loved authors Page 16