One of my constabulary pals was on holiday in Scotland when this problem arose. Paul was with his wife and they had booked into a beautiful bed-and-breakfast farmhouse in the Highlands intending to stay overnight. So nice was the place that they stayed the entire week, and found the only other residents were another gentleman and his wife. They became friendly, especially over the evening meal and at breakfast. As the week progressed, Paul realised that the other gentleman never once gave a clue to his own occupation. Moreover, he never asked Paul how he earned his living.
The state of unspoken bliss continued through the week and on the final breakfast morning, that Saturday, Paul decided to tackle the other about his job. All through the week, he had realised the other was being overcautious about his work and decided to put him to the test.
At breakfast, therefore, he said, “Look, Jonathan, let’s be honest, eh? You and I have been carefully avoiding any discussion about our jobs, haven’t we? All this week, you have carefully avoided talking about your work and so have I.”
The other smiled agreeably. “I don’t like to talk about my job when I’m on holiday.”
“Neither do I,” smiled Paul in return. “But this is our last morning together. By lunchtime, we’ll be on our way home. Let’s tell each other.”
The other smiled again. “All right,” he nodded. “Who’s first?”
“I raised the matter,” Paul admitted. “So I’ll start. I’m a policeman.”
“And I’m a bishop,” said his friend.
For the country constable, however, such anonymity cannot be enjoyed. If he walks into the shop, pub, church or meeting of any kind, he is always “the policeman” and his wife is always “the policeman’s wife”. When visiting one’s local pub, therefore, it is impossible to be anything other than the local bobby, even when dressed in gardening clothes and covered in non-artificial farmyard waste products.
This being so, the talk often turns to motoring adventures in alien cities, of being stopped for speeding, booked for parking, checked for one’s driving licence and insurance or pulled up for faulty windscreen-wipers. But at least in Aidensfield, I had a variation of this eternal theme.
I had a man who talked about buses.
It was soon very clear that he could talk about nothing else. For that reason, it became something of a trial to enter the pub knowing he lurked in the shadows, waiting to pounce on someone with his latest piece of juicy information about a 52-seater with reclining seats. I did my best to avoid him, as did every other regular in the bar of the Brewers Arms. They had had their fill of Plaxton Shells, Wallace Arnold tours and United Express runs with rural bus-stops.
At first, the fellow was interesting. I listened enthralled as he discussed the merits of demisters on side-windows and emergency exits near the front, tool-boxes under the offside exterior and double-deckers on rural routes, but when one has this indigestible manna during every visit it does begin to pall. I didn’t know a great deal about buses anyway, but wondered how much this fellow really knew. Was it all conjecture and legend, or did he really know a lot about buses?
His name was Arnold Merryweather and he would be in his early fifties. He was a genial fellow, heavily built with a thick head of ginger hair and bushy side-whiskers, and he loved Irish jokes and Guinness. He was the life and soul of the pub, and his stories were funny, even if they were all about buses.
Arnold drove the bus which crept around our lanes day after day, week after week, to collect passengers at Ashfordly and transport them through the picturesque lanes and villages into York. His bus left Ashfordly at 7.30 a.m. and trundled through Briggsby, Aidensfield, Elsinby, and then beyond the boundaries of my beat and eventually into York. It did a return trip around lunchtime and turned about immediately for York. It arrived in time to turn round in the City at 5.15 p.m. to bring home the diminishing army of workers. Every day, week in week out, Arnold’s bus undertook those journeys.
On Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, he left York immediately upon first arrival and did a special market-day run, collecting at Ashfordly at ten o’clock and getting into York around 11.30 a.m., having done a circuitous tour of Ryedale to get there. He was just able to fulfil his timetable with this extra trip and there’s little doubt he earned his money on those important three days. Those earnings probably lasted him all week.
I learned eventually that Arnold owned the bus. He did not operate for any company, but earned his living entirely by his bus. During the evenings, he would arrange tours to cinemas in York, or to the theatre, and he did runs to the seaside and works outings to breweries and other places of interest. He did a school run too, collecting a rowdy horde of children from isolated places and risking his bus and its passengers on gradients of 1-in-3 as he visited outlying farms and hamlets. But Arnold always got there and very rarely was he late. His purple and cream bus, with “Merryweather Coaches” emblazoned across the rear, was a familiar sight in the hills and valleys of Aidensfield and district.
To fulfil his many commitments, he had two coaches, and had a standby driver employed to assist when necessary. But if it was possible to use one bus and one driver for his complicated timetables then Arnold did so.
I made use of his bus once or twice. Sometimes, if the weather was atrocious and if Mary was using the car, I would catch Arnold’s bus at Aidensfield if I had business in Elsinby or Briggsby. I always paid, although he did offer me free transportation, for I reckoned he must be struggling to earn a living for himself and his colourless wife called Freda. He had to maintain his vehicles and premises too.
To partake of a trip on Merryweather Coaches was an experience which could be classed as unique. Each bus was identical and I think they were Albion 32-seaters. The seats were made of wooden laths set on iron frames and bolted to the floor. There were no cushions and other comforts, and the door was at the front. It was hinged in the middle and required a good kick from Arnold both to shut it and open it. Arnold acted as driver, conductor and guide as his precious heap of metal navigated the landscape.
My infrequent trips on his coaches proved to be an education. In the few flights I had, I saw him take on board one pig on a halter, three crates of chickens, a sheep and its lamb, a side of ham, several parcels and packages, a bicycle for repair, umpteen suits for cleaning or laundry for washing in York, and on one occasion he transported an unused coffin from Elsinby’s undertaker to a man at Ashfordly who wanted it for timber.
These assorted objects were loaded into the bus via the rear emergency door and I learned that Arnold was paid for these sociable services. In addition to being a carrier of people, he was a carrier of objects and this was accepted quite amicably by his human cargo. If Farmer Jones wished to send a pig to Farmer Brown twenty miles away, Arnold would deliver the said animal by bus for a small fee. It seemed a perfectly sound system, but its legality was in grave doubt.
I knew Arnold had been in buses since leaving school and I reckoned he’d put himself on the road long before officials like the Traffic Commissioners appeared with their P.S.V. licences, certifying officers, certificates of fitness and road service licences. Nonetheless, he displayed in his windscreen the various discs which proved someone knew he was operating a bus service. Even so, the other rules and regulations seemed to be superfluous so far as Merryweather’s Coaches were concerned.
His transportation of goods for hire or reward, for example, seemed to put him in the category of a goods vehicle rather than a bus, but it would be a stupid constable who attempted to stop that. After all, the fellow had to earn a living and he was doing a service to the community. I knew lots of house-bound folks depended upon Arnold for their weekly shopping, for he also spent his non-driving hours in York carrying out shopping requests for pensioners, invalids and others. He dealt with the parcels and packages on his bus, suits for the tailor to repair, carpets for the cleaners to clean, sewing-machines to mend, bikes to sell — the whole of society and its well-being made use of Arnold’s bus.
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Late one winter evening, I was pleased I tolerated his unofficial enterprises. My little Francis Barnet motorcycle broke down due to the driving rain which had penetrated the electrical circuits, and the faithful machine completely refused to go. The savagery of the storm meant I could find no place to dry the connections, then salvation arrived in the shape of Arnold’s bus. He had taken a trip to the Theatre Royal in York to see a pantomime and his returning headlights picked me out in the appalling weather. Realising my predicament, Arnold hauled his laden coach to a halt and shouted:
“Stick it in t’ back, Mr Rhea.”
The rear door was flung open and several willing villagers leapt out. In a matter of seconds, they had manhandled my dripping motorcycle into the back and we rode home in triumph with the inactive bike held upright by pantomime visitors in their best clothes. Arnold refused to accept payment for this assistance, so I promised to buy him a pint in the pub. For me that would be a real penance because he’d bend my ear for an hour or two on the merits of diesel oil for buses or left-hand-drive models for continental tours.
Even I failed fully to appreciate Arnold’s complete service to the public until I took his bus into York one market-day when I was off duty. Mary had a lot of shopping to do and Mrs Quarry took the children; the car was due for a service and it seemed a great idea to make use of Arnold’s comprehensive bus service. Armed with baskets and money, therefore, we waited at Aidensfield one Tuesday morning for Arnold’s market-day special. We were surrounded by little old ladies and retired gentlemen, all wondering why we had chosen this mode of transport, and we said it was because of Arnold’s world-wide reputation as a busman.
Halfway between Aidensfield and Elsinby, Arnold halted and switched off the engine. We were parked in the middle of nowhere — no houses, no village, no bus-stop. Nothing. No one spoke. They all sat there very quietly and I watched Arnold in his driving-seat. He was reading the Daily Mirror. I checked my watch. We were running according to schedule. The fuel was all right, as he’d switched off the engine.
“Why have we stopped?” Mary ventured to ask in a whispered voice.
“I don’t know,” I had to admit. I didn’t dare make a fool of myself by asking the others.
Nothing happened. We must have waited a good ten minutes and by this time we were running late.
Then, as one, the assortment of passengers sighed with relief. I looked out of the window to my nearside and noticed a distant figure hurrying along a winding farm track. It was a farmer’s wife, laden with baskets.
I recognised her as she approached.
“It’s Mrs Owens,” I said to Mary.
“She always goes to market on Tuesdays,” breathed Mary. “I’ve heard her talk about it in the shop. I didn’t realise she lived down that lane.”
I learned that Mrs Owens travelled on Arnold’s bus every Tuesday and he always waited for her. Today she was a little late, but then that could happen to anyone. And so the bus continued.
The next diversion was about a mile out of Elsinby. Suddenly, we swung off the road and along a narrow tarmac lane. We trundled along this winding track for nearly half a mile and then Arnold turned his bus through a farm gate. We were now on a muddy track full of potholes and thick with half-buried rocks. Grass grew down the centre but Arnold’s groaning, bouncing old bus negotiated this rough terrain and came to rest in a grubby farmyard.
At this point, he began to crash the gears, seeking reverse. Eventually, with a shudder, the gear slotted home and he began the difficult manoeuvre of turning the bus within the confines of the farmyard. Chickens and ducks scattered, dogs barked and a horse stared in amazement as the purple and cream vehicle moved slowly forwards and backwards, turning gradually until it was facing the way it had come.
“Now what?” Mary grinned.
“A load of manure?” I ventured.
The engine died and someone threw open the rear door. Out jumped about a dozen passengers, just as they had done for my motorcycle, and I watched them march towards a small outbuilding. The door was opened and they collected trays of packed eggs. Dozens and dozens of eggs. They bore these to the rear of the bus and began to stack them carefully, each tray bearing a dozen fresh farmyard eggs. Gradually the pile grew until it was as high as the shoulders of the seated people, and a second pile began. I lost count but I knew there was an awful lot of eggs. Without a word, all the volunteer loaders climbed aboard and closed the door.
But Arnold did not move yet. He waited until a tiny farm lady appeared. She wore a dull green mackintosh, black wooden clogs and a headscarf about her head. She carried a butter-basket in one hand and a hessian bag in the other, climbed aboard, asked for a “York return” and settled in a front seat.
And so it continued. We took children to catch trains, old folks to visit relatives in hospital, but the most amazing was Arnold’s action in York City. The eggs were bound for York market which is tucked behind the city in a narrow marketplace. Because of sheer numbers, it was impossible to carry them from Arnold’s terminus, so he took his bus and its load right into the marketplace and halted near a stall.
There, the reverse procedure was adopted; the rearmost passengers flung open the door and the clog-shod little woman masterminded the operation from outside. Every tray of eggs was delivered to the market trader who counted them and paid in cash, as Arnold sat in his seat, ignoring the hoots of protest from cars and vans around him. As the job was under way, he disgorged his other passengers and retreated to his official bus-stop, there to offload his grocery orders, parcels and messages.
After that first trip, it was a regular sight to see the familiar shape of Arnold’s bus jolting along farm tracks, or turning around in stackyards, as it took aboard the produce of the district. Arnold’s contribution to the economy of Ryedale was immense. Although he was supposed to follow a prescribed route, he totally ignored it and went wherever he was needed. Somehow he knew who was waiting on any particular day and he provided what amounted to a house-to-house bus service. Furthermore, it was expected of him.
With a service of this nature, coupled with his unauthorised diversion into the city centre, it was inevitable that the Traffic Commissioners would learn of his methods. I waited for that day with some trepidation. But it wasn’t the Traffic Commissioners who caused my first legal brush with Arnold — it was Claude Jeremiah Greengrass.
* * *
Arnold halted his creaking bus at my shoulder one morning as I walked through Aidensfield en route to the post office. His face was like thunder and he was in a highly agitated state. This was most unlike him — Arnold was usually the epitome of pleasantry and bonhomie, but it was clear that trouble was afoot.
“Mr Rhea,” he hailed me by leaning out of his window.
“Morning, Arnold. Something wrong?”
“I’ll say there is.” He left his seat and emerged from the bus. On the street, he took my arm and steered me from the flapping ears of his passengers. “It’s that bloody man Greengrass.”
“Claude Jeremiah? What’s he done to you?”
“He’s pinching my customers, that’s what.”
“You don’t mean to say he’s bought a bus!” I cried, horrified at the ramifications of this and remembering the problems of the pigs and donkey.
“No, he’s got an old car, a right old heap it is, Mr Rhea. He’s running it ahead of me on my market-day runs, picking folks up and charging them less than me. He’s ruining me.”
“He can’t get many in his car, surely?” I said, wondering what sort of enterprise Claude Jeremiah had evolved.
“I’ve seen him with seven packed into that old Austin,” Arnold growled. “And he comes back before me, charging each customer sixpence less than me. He’s taking trade off me, Mr Rhea. He’ll have to be stopped.”
“I’ll have a word with him.”
“He needs stopping, Mr Rhea, words are no good. He’s behaving illegally, so he is.”
“What law is he breaking?” I had
been taught a good deal about public service vehicles at Training School and knew sufficient to appreciate that Claude Jeremiah could be running an unlawful public service vehicle. In those days, it was illegal to charge passengers separate fares in private cars, because this brought the car within the realm of a public service vehicle. Besides, ordinary motorcar insurance didn’t cover such use so it seemed there’d be an insurance offence too.
I wanted to know if Arnold knew the rules. He did. He promptly reeled off a list of rules and regulations likely to be broken by the enterprising Claude Jeremiah.
“You won’t have mentioned this to anyone else, have you?” I put to Arnold.
“No, but I’ve grumbled a lot, to my passengers, my regulars.”
“I was thinking of the Traffic Commissioners,” I told him.
“No, should I tell them?” he asked in all innocence.
“They might investigate your affairs too, Arnold — like your carriage of goods for reward . . .”
“Oh.” He saw what I was driving at. “Oh, aye, well. I see. Can this be dealt with quietly, Mr Rhea?”
“If I take Claude Jeremiah to court, Arnold, he might hit back at you; he might complain officially to me about your activities, or he might drop an anonymous line to the Traffic Commissioners about the goods-carrying affairs of Merryweather Coaches.”
“I am allowed to carry parcels, Mr Rhea, and passengers are allowed to fetch parcels on board, you know.”
“I wouldn’t classify a hundred dozen eggs as a parcel, Arnold.”
“It’s serious, Mr Rhea, I am insured, he’s not. You’ll have a word with him?”
“I will,” I promised. “But you should be more careful about carrying parcels, eh?”
CONSTABLE NICK BOX SET 1–5 five feel-good village cozy mysteries Page 53