by Rhys Bowen
Evan noted that the farmer had called him constable instead of by his first name. “So you’ve already heard, have you?” he asked. “I was on my way to warn you.”
“Well, then, you’re too bloody late,” Farmer Owens snapped. “I’ve had some pale-faced young prick in a raincoat telling me I’m under quarantine until further orders. I can’t move any stock; I can’t sell any stock. I’ve got a field full of fat lambs ready for market, look you. Who do they bloody well think they are, coming up here from London and dictating to us?”
“I suppose they’re only doing their job,” Evan said, wincing as he said it at the triteness of the remark. “They’re trying to stop the disease from spreading even farther.”
“Then they’re doing a pretty poor job of it, aren’t they? They could have contained it in Cumberland when they had a chance.”
“I agree, but they obviously didn’t realize how serious it was going to be. Look how quickly it crossed the Pennines and spread to the Lake District.”
“But there are no cases that I’ve heard in our area yet,” Farmer Owens said. “What gives them the right to go around slaughtering stock willy-nilly, just in case the disease might come here?”
“I suppose they’re trying to create something like a firebreak, to halt the spread southward.”
“They’re not using my animals as a firebreak,” Farmer Owens said so aggressively that his dogs cowered. “Do you know how long it’s taken me to build up that stock? I’ve got a couple of breeding rams that cost me a year’s income, and some young idiot from Whitehall tells me to be cooperative when the army arrives to slaughter them?”
“Look, I’m really sorry,” Evan said.
“Sorry isn’t good enough. Well, I’m not going to take it lying down, I can tell you that, Evan bach. It’s my land and I have a right to keep trespassers off it, haven’t I?”
“Trespassers, yes, but …”
“Then I want you to help me enforce it. Next bloody young squirt in a raincoat who tries to come through my gate, you arrest him for me.”
Evan laughed. “You know I can’t do that.”
“Then I’ll have to do it on my own. But I’m warning you right now—let them try and bring their army trucks up to my farm. They’ll not find it easy. I’m building roadblocks across both my tracks, and I’ll be waiting with my shotgun.”
Evan chuckled nervously. “Come on now, Mr. Owens. How would it help if you wound up in jail?”
“Just making my stand, look you, Evan. I don’t really intend to hurt anyone, but if my little skirmish makes the daily papers and I can get public sympathy on the side of us farmers, maybe I’ll have done some good. I’m writing to the minister of Agriculture today. I’m telling him that I keep my rams separate from the rest of the flock, so there’s no need to slaughter them if it comes to that.”
Evan didn’t reply. He had a feeling that hundreds of such letters had been landing on the minister’s table.
“Or I was thinking of putting them in my van one night and driving them across to my cousin’s place on Anglesey. Surely this stupid foot-and-mouth won’t be able to jump across the water to get there, will it?”
“And what if your rams have been exposed and you’re the one who brings the disease over there?” He bent to pat the sheepdog’s head, so that he didn’t have to look the farmer in the eye. “Look, I know this is terrible for you, but it’s the same for everyone, isn’t it? This is one of those times when we all have to do things we don’t like for the good of the whole. I bet your dad didn’t want to go off to fight in World War Two, did he? But he went just the same.”
“You’re talking like a sanctimonious little bugger, you know that?” Farmer Owens glared at Evan. “It’s all right for you, isn’t it? What have you got to lose? How would you know what it’s like to work your whole life for something, then watch it taken away from you? It will break my wife’s heart, you know.”
“I’m really sorry—”
“You said that before, didn’t you? I dare say you are, but you’re not prepared to help us keep those bastards out, are you? Good day to you then, Constable. I’ve got work to do. I’m driving the flock up to the high pastures. They’ll not be so easy to catch up there!”
He turned on his heels and strode back up the track with the dogs running at his heels. Evan watched him for a while before he turned for home. When he got back to the police station, his answering machine was blinking furiously. Probably Mr. Owens, he thought, and pressed the play button.
“Constable Evans, where have you been?” came the imperious female voice that he recognized so well. “The most extraordinary thing has happened. I went to go out of my back gate and some malicious person has taped it shut. And I think I know who it was too. I saw the Parry Davies woman out on the path this morning with her horrid little dogs. It would be just the kind of thing she would do to spite me. And one of her dogs left a nasty calling card just outside my gate too. Please go and confront her. I am just getting the scissors to remove her tape.”
Evan sighed. For once Mrs. Powell-Jones, wife of the Reverend Powell-Jones, minister of Capel Beulah, was not his major problem. But he’d have to go and face her before she had a confrontation with the brainless twit from the Ministry of Agriculture who was sealing footpaths without explanation. He let the answering machine play on as he went through the mail. Among the letters was one from police headquarters in Colwyn Bay. He opened this eagerly. It would be the details of his new assignment.
Then he sat there, staring in horror and disbelief. The message was from the Chief Constable, brief and to the point.
To all personnel in North Wales Police. Due to the current emergency situation, all training sessions will be postponed. All leave, apart from compassionate, is cancelled until further notice. I hope I can count on all of you to make this difficult process go smoothly.
Evan dropped the letter, got up, and paced the room. So there was to be no escape after all. He imagined having to restrain Bill Owens as his prize rams were led to the execution pit, and of the same scene being played over and over with other farmers who had become his friends. Even visiting Mrs. Powell-Jones seemed preferable to sitting here brooding at this moment.
Surprisingly that encounter went remarkably smoothly. When Mrs. Powell-Jones realized why her back gate had been taped shut, she was more than cooperative.
“Anything I can do to stop this awful disease from spreading, Constable Evans—anything at all. You just have to ask. We all have to pull together at moments of crisis like this. Mummy was wonderful in the war, you know. She rallied the whole community. I will speak to my husband and arrange a meeting in the village hall. We’ll need volunteers to patrol the area and keep intruders out of the fields. You can start with that monstrosity, the Everest Inn, Constable Evans. Go up there and set them straight. Just because people come there and pay exorbitant amounts, they’ll think they have the right to hike and climb wherever they please.”
Evan left with a full list of instructions and in need of a drink. He went home for a hurried snack of bread and cheese then headed across the road to the Red Dragon, looking forward to a Guinness and good cheering up. The bar was full as he pushed open the door and ducked under the oak beam. There was the usual hum of chatter in Welsh and figures silhouetted in the smoky fug. He stood in the doorway, feeling the tension slip away, then eased his way through the crowd up to the long oak bar with his usual cheerful, “Noswaith dda, everyone.”
Usually this greeting was returned warmly, often with the offer to buy him a pint. Betsy the barmaid’s face would light up on seeing him, and she would usually pull the neckline of her T-shirt just a little lower, leaning forward provocatively across the bar. Tonight, however, he was met with stony faces.
“Hello, Betsy cariad,” Evan said, more than a little surprised. “The usual, if you don’t mind.”
“I’m busy at the moment,” Betsy said frostily. “You’ll just have to wait your turn.”
; “Hang on a minute,” Evan said. “Have I done something to upset you?”
Betsy went on calmly drawing a pint with just the right amount of froth on top. “You’ve upset everyone, haven’t you?”
“By doing what?”
“If you don’t know, we’re not going to tell you.” She put the pint down in front of a small wiry man. “There you are then, Charlie bach, get that down you and you’ll feel a lot better.”
Evan turned to the elderly man. “Charlie?” he said. “What’s this all about then?”
Charlie only half met his gaze. “Owens-the-Sheep was in here already. He told us about you. Said you weren’t even sympathetic. Told him a lot of guff about doing his duty. I thought you were one of us, Evan bach.”
“Of course I’m on your side,” Evan said. “But there’s not much I can do, is there? I can’t arrest the blokes from the Ministry of Agriculture for trespassing, like Mr. Owens wants me to do. And I certainly can’t stand by and watch him keep the army at bay with his shotgun.”
“But it’s just not right, is it?” Charlie Hopkins demanded. “He’s worked all his life to build up that flock. Do you know how much he paid to buy one of those rams from a fancy breeder in the South? How’s he going to start again if they slaughter the lot? He’ll be ruined, that’s what he’ll be.”
“It’s not as if we’ve had any cases in the area, is it?” Evans-the-Milk turned to join in the conversation. “I’ve been talking to the dairy farmers and none of them have tested positive yet. But they’ve got to stop selling their milk, just the same.”
“If you want my opinion,” Evans-the-Meat, the large, blustering butcher, poked his head between the other men, “it’s a bloody English plot to wipe out Welsh sheep. They know our lamb is better than theirs and fetches a higher price, so this is a good excuse to finish us off.”
“Oh come on, Gareth bach.” Evan attempted a chuckle. “Look how many English flocks have already been slaughtered. It was really only a matter of time before it reached us.”
“I’m with Evans-the-Meat for once,” Evans-the-Milk said, draping an arm around the other man’s shoulders. “They’ve no right to come interfering in Wales. We’ve got our own Assembly now, haven’t we? They should be making the rules, not some idiots in London.”
“I tell you one thing,” Evans-the-Meat went on, fired by the support around him. “I’m going to stand by Owens-the-Sheep, no matter what.”
“Me too.” A well-built young man in dirty overalls edged his way into the circle. “I’ve already told him I’ll bring the bulldozer to help build a blockade across his tracks. Let’s see how keen those army blokes are if they have to slog half a mile up the mountain.”
“I knew we could count on Barry-the-Bucket,” the butcher said, beaming at him proudly. “One of us, that’s what you are, boyo. Llanfair born and bred.”
“I think it’s wonderful of you, Barry,” Betsy said, a smile replacing the cold stare that usually repelled his advances. “A true champion of our village, that’s what you are. Not like some I could name.”
“Does that mean you’ll go with me to the dance at the Rhyl Pavilion on Saturday?” Barry asked.
“I might think about it,” Betsy replied, smoothing down her T-shirt. “I think that bravery should be rewarded. We should stand up for ourselves, that’s what I say. My old dad’s been dusting off his shotgun so that he can help too.”
“God help us. Your dad never could shoot straight even when he was sober,” Charlie Hopkins said. “He’s more likely to shoot one of us in the back.”
“Or kill off one of Bill Owens’s prize rams!” Evans-the-Milk added as the men began to laugh.
“Know what I heard, boys? I heard he’s planning to drive his sheep up to the top of the Glydrs,” Evans-the-Milk said with a smirk. “Well, that’s all his land, isn’t it? I can just see those army blokes scrambling over rocks and leaping around precipices trying to round them up! And Bill Owens said that if they make him bring his dogs up there, he’s going to give them the wrong commands so they just run around in circles!”
The men at the bar broke into more noisy laughter. Evan smiled too, but he couldn’t shake off the feeling of hollow dread in his stomach. This had become a game for the other inhabitants of Llanfair, a kind of Robin Hood quest against the English authority. And he had been instructed to give that outside authority every assistance. He was now one of the enemy.
Chapter 3
As soon as he had finished his pint, Evan slipped out of the Red Dragon. The men at the bar had become quite jovial, thinking up more and more absurd schemes to thwart the British army and the Ministry of Agriculture. He couldn’t find it in his heart to warn them that they’d find themselves in serious trouble. He suspected most of the talk was bravado anyway.
He came out into pink twilight. At this time of year the sun didn’t set until after nine, but it had already sunk behind Snowdon, plunging the village itself into gloom. The high slopes above were still bathed in glowing light, and the sheep on them were tinged with pink. As he watched, a buzzard soared out from the high crags and circled against a clear sky. Such a perfect evening would have lured him up onto the slopes to watch the sun sink into the distant sea, but the slopes were now off-limits. He hadn’t realized until this moment how much this crisis would affect his own life too.
Instead Evan began to walk up the village street, past the row of cottages where he now lived, past the shops where Evans-the-Meat and Evans-the-Milk spent their days annoying each other, until finally he came to the low wall of the school playground. A light was shining in the schoolhouse window. Evan pushed open the gate and hurried across the playground.
“Bron,” he called as he opened the front door. “It’s me. I need a hug or a double brandy or both.”
“Wait a second. Don’t open that door yet,” Bronwen’s voice commanded. “I’ve got Prince William in here.”
It had been a day of many surprises, but this one bowled him over. What on earth could Prince William be doing in a village school in Wales? Learning about his subjects for the day when he became the next Prince of Wales? Finding out firsthand about the foot-and-mouth outbreak? But weren’t princes always surrounded by a security escort? So why hadn’t Evan been stopped as he crossed the playground and opened the door?
After what seemed like an eternity Bronwen opened the door. She was dressed in jeans and old checked blouse. Wisps of hair had escaped from the long braid she always wore down her back. She looked a little flurried and not at all like someone who was entertaining a prince.
“It’s okay, you can come in now,” she said. “I’ve got him shut in the kitchen.”
“Prince William? Shut in the kitchen?”
Bronwen looked at Evan with a mysterious smile on her face. “Yes, would you like to come and meet him?”
“Now? Well, I suppose … I’m not properly dressed.” It began to dawn on him that she could be playing a joke. “Should I be wearing my crown, do you think?”
She took his hand. “Come along. Don’t keep him waiting. In you go.”
She opened the kitchen door. Evan stepped inside, looked around an apparently empty kitchen until something appeared from under the kitchen table. He found himself looking at a fat, curly lamb. “But that’s a sheep!” he exclaimed.
“Allow me to introduce you. This is Prince William — Eirlys Lloyd’s pet lamb.” She burst out laughing. “Evan, you should have seen your face! You thought I had the real Prince William here.”
“Only when you first told me. I was caught off guard.”
She put her hands on his cheeks and reached up to give him a kiss. “I thought I told you about Eirlys’s lamb. You know young Eirlys from Bryn Hyfryd Farm, don’t you? The poor little thing came to me quite distraught today. It seems her father has been told that his flock might have to be slaughtered and that would have included all animals on the property. Well, Prince William has been a house pet all his life, so I told her to bring him down to me and
I would look after him until this scare is over.”
The lamb came cautiously to check out Evan’s shoes.
“Bron, are you sure that’s the thing to do?” Evan asked. “I’m not sure exactly how foot-and-mouth is spread, but isn’t there a chance he could be infected?”
“He’s been a family pet, Evan. They’re not going to go around slaughtering all the sheepdogs and farm cats, are they? Anyway, I think they’re overreacting.”
“Don’t you start,” Evan said. “I’ve had a bad day with Farmer Owens shouting at me and everyone at the pub telling me I’m a traitor. What am I supposed to do when I’ve been instructed to give the Ministry of Agriculture every assistance, eh?”
Bronwen slipped her arms around his neck. “You poor thing. It must be beastly for you. Sorry — beastly isn’t exactly the right word, given the circumstances, is it.”
“I’m sure you’ll know a way to make me feel better.” Evan pulled her toward him to give her a kiss. There was a crashing sound behind them. The lamb looked up guiltily from an overturned vegetable basket. Bronwen went over and began putting the vegetables back into it. “I can see I’m going to have to lambproof the house,” she said.
“You really think you can keep him here?” Evan asked.
“Why not? He’s been a house pet up at the farm.”
“Yes, well, a farm, that’s different. They have all the outbuildings for him to run around in. You only have three rooms. I take it he’s not house-trained.”
“Not exactly. I’ve been doing quite a bit of mopping up. I’m thinking of investing in disposable nappies, but I don’t want to make him feel stupid.”
“Feel stupid.” Evan chuckled. “Isn’t is wonderful how women go daft over baby animals?”
“Oh, and men don’t make more fuss of their dogs than they do of their families? Anyway, the important thing is that Eirlys adores him, and I’m just trying to help her save him.”