CONSTABLE ABOUT THE PARISH a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain’s best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 17)

by Nicholas Rhea

  Then, one summer afternoon, I called at the Anglican parish church and heard her voice, this time louder and more vociferous than at any previous time. The range of impious oaths which were emanating from behind a yew tree were enough to turn the air blue for miles around. When I went to investigate the cause, I found Emily Jane. She was directing her anger and disrespectful language towards the silent lawnmower.

  It was stubbornly refusing to start and she was venting her frustration in a very sailor-like manner. I offered to examine it for her — it was a very ancient piece of machinery and I suspected there were problems with the flow of fuel. The two-stroke mixture was not getting through — dirt in the fuel pipe or in the carburettor was the probable reason, but in any case the lawnmower was well beyond repair. Like poor old Emily Jane, it had almost reached the end of its useful time on this earth.

  As we pondered the cause of the problem, she levelled a well-aimed kick at the mutinous machine and said, ‘I’m going to ****ing well retire,’ she announced with determination. ‘They can get some other daft ****** to cut the ****ing grass.’

  It was at this very moment that another character arrived on the scene. He was Laurie Cunningham, a keen churchgoer, church warden and member of the parochial church council. Like Emily Jane, he was retired, having been a stationmaster at Elsinby, and he spent a lot of his spare time in and around the church, a sort of self-appointed caretaker. A tall, bald man with a domed head and rounded spectacles, he enjoyed doing running repairs to the building. He liked to work with his hands, making things that might be useful such as a rack for hymn books or a metal boot-scraper to remove mud from the feet of the incoming congregation. He oiled the hinges of the door when it squeaked, repaired minor damage, cleared gutters, fixed leaks, replaced tiles and mended fences. Laurie was another asset to the church because he performed a whole range of useful, money-saving chores, often at his own expense. Like Emily Jane, he was often to be seen working around the church during the daylight hours.

  ‘Morning, Mr Rhea. Emily Jane having bother again, is she?’ and he smiled knowingly.

  ‘I think the lawnmower’s decided to retire,’ I said.

  ‘The ****** thing’s not retired, it’s dead on its feet,’ she grinned. ‘It’s me who’s going to ****ing well retire. Some other daft ****** can cut the grass from now on.’

  ‘Emily, you can’t. If you go, who else will take on this work? You’ve always made such a good job of the churchyard . . .’ Laurie was devastated at her news.

  But he knew, and I knew, that once Emily Jane had made up her mind, she would not retract her decision. It was very clear that, from this moment in Aidensfield’s long history, someone else would have to cut the grass which encircled All Saints Church.

  ‘I’ll still tend the ****** graves,’ she said, knowing what was going through Laurie’s mind. ‘I can still find some ****** flowers and keep the ******* water topped up. But as for the grass, well, that’s for the ****ing PCC to sort out.’

  And she stomped away, leaving the lawnmower where it was.

  ‘Leave it with me, Mr Rhea,’ Laurie said quietly. ‘I’m sure we can find a volunteer and I’m equally sure we can obtain another lawnmower, a good second-hand one will do.’

  But in Aidensfield as well as other villages of comparable size, finding volunteers is never easy. In spite of requests from the pulpit and notices in the window of the Aidensfield Stores, no one came forward. As Emily Jane continued to renew the flowers on the graves and replenish their water supplies, the grass around them grew longer. Weeds began to flourish and it wasn’t long before the churchyard began to appear neglected. A local businessman did donate a replacement lawnmower, a very fine second-hand model, but no one appeared to have the time or willingness to use it on a permanent basis.

  Although people did cut the grass from time to time, there was no permanent arrangement and very soon, Aidensfield churchyard assumed the appearance of an abandoned meadow rather than a well-kept lawn. To maintain it in its former glory required more than the occasional half-hour once a month. It had to be trimmed regularly; it needed another Emily Jane, but the village didn’t have one.

  It could be argued that such matters are no concern of the constabulary but, as a resident of the village, it was my wish that something was done, even if I did not have the time to regularly cut the grass. Besides, this wasn’t my church — I belonged to the Catholic church, but I did trim the Anglican grass from time to time. Its sad state did cause some concern, particularly when there was a funeral or wedding but in spite of those requirements, no full-time volunteer was forthcoming. Laurie, other members of the PCC and several villagers did their turns, of course, but it was a hit-and-miss system and far from satisfactory.

  It was a Thursday afternoon, while emerging from the churchyard via the lychgate, that I chanced to meet Claude Jeremiah Greengrass. I had completed a routine security check and he was pottering along the main street with Alfred his dog on a lead. Seeing me, he stopped for a chat. Even he was concerned about the state of the churchyard.

  ‘Have they got summat done about that churchyard?’ He nodded towards the lush deep grass behind the wall.

  ‘Not yet, Claude,’ I said. ‘No one seems to have the time.’

  ‘It’s not time that’s needed, it’s sheep. Moor sheep. They’d trim it in less time than it takes you to buy me a pint,’ he said. ‘See how they keep the grass trimmed beside the moor roads?’

  ‘You mean you’d turn them loose in the churchyard?’

  ‘Why not? There’s no finer thing for trimming grass. And they’d cost nowt.’

  I recalled a previous occasion when sheep had been drafted into this very churchyard for grass-cutting duties. The vicar at the time, Roger Clifton, hadn’t thought to make sure that the walls were sheep-proof, and the four-legged mowing machines had escaped to invade Rudolph Burley’s prize flower garden. For a time, those sheep, and the idea of using them to keep the churchyard tidy, were rather unpopular.

  Nonetheless, the grass shearing abilities of unfenced-in sheep of the North York Moors are widely known and admired. Villages like Hutton-le-Hole, Goathland, Castleton, Danby and Glaisdale are noted for their smooth grass verges and neatly trimmed greens, all done by the free-ranging blackfaced moorland sheep. The grass is as smooth as a bowling green, the only problem being that sheep cannot distinguish between private gardens and open moorland. In addition to Rudolph’s flowers, other villagers have, over the years, suffered the loss of their prize collections of flowers and vegetables in this way. The villagers of the moorland communities have therefore learned the wisdom of having stout fences and well-maintained gates.

  ‘They’d eat all the flowers on the graves!’ I put to Claude.

  ‘Not if the sheep were fenced in,’ he returned. ‘Fence a part of the graveyard off and put half a dozen ewes inside the fence. When they’ve mown that bit, shift the fence to another spot and let ’em do that bit, and so on until you’ve covered the whole lot. You don’t need a permanent fence, just a length of high wire which can be spiked into the ground and held upright as it’s made into a pen. Summat easily moveable is what you want. Farmers do it all the time with their livestock.’

  ‘Doing the churchyard piece by piece, patch by patch, would take a long time,’ I suggested.

  ‘All right. Get Emily Jane not to put flowers on the graves for a week or so, to let the sheep have the run of the place. Bring the sheep in, say, once a month for grass cutting. Let ’em do the lot all at one go.’

  ‘Maybe we could make some protective flower guards?’ I suggested. ‘Something like a large wire cloche, big enough to fit over a big vase full of tall flowers or a grave?’

  I envisaged something about the size and shape of a bottomless dustbin made from wire and having spikes, say four of them, around the bottom edge. It could be placed over a vase of flowers on a grave, the spikes being pressed into the ground to secure it and thus save the precious flowers from the ruminations of the
sheep. I told Claude I would mention it to Laurie Cunningham and within a few days, I encountered him in the village street. I mentioned Claude’s idea of using sheep to mow the churchyard.

  ‘It’s been done before,’ he said. ‘Not without problems. They do a very good job but the snag is they chew everything. You’ve got to keep all the graves free of flowers while they’re busy, and keep the church door shut otherwise they’ll wander inside and make a mess. Getting visitors to shut gates and doors is impossible, Nick, they ignore signs and never use common sense. They’re a bit like sheep in that respect — follow my leader and all that! And I must remind you that some folks aren’t over-chuffed at the idea of a sheep mowing the grass which covers their great Aunt Jemima. And old Mrs Meldrew never did like mutton, she made that very clear when they sided her away.’

  I mentioned the suggestion of a sheep-proof flower guard for each grave and made a rough sketch for Laurie to help explain my idea. Laurie, regarding himself as something of a handyman, said he would consider it and then refer the matter to the parochial church council. Shortly afterwards, I met the recently appointed vicar, the Reverend Christian Lord, at a coffee morning for the Red Cross and he said, ‘Ah, Nick, Laurie has produced an idea to cope with the wilderness around the church,’ he smiled. ‘He tells me it originated through you. So I am thanking you, on behalf of us all.’

  ‘Actually, it was Claude Jeremiah who first suggested the sheep,’ I said.

  ‘A good idea, but I mean the flower guards,’ he said. ‘The PCC has decided that if we can produce between a dozen and twenty of them, we can protect the grave-top flowers on a rota system, with the agreement of Emily Jane, and then we can introduce a small flock of ewes to carry out the task of mowing the grass for us.’

  ‘Make sure the sheep don’t escape over the walls into people’s gardens,’ and I reminded him of the last time this had been tried.

  With the vicar’s enthusiastic approval, Laurie soon produced his prototype flower guard. He had made it himself using four lengths of stout metal wire which were welded to an X shaped support at the top. The X was about two feet six inches from tip to tip, with a length of wire welded to each tip at right angles. Each length of wire was about four feet long, thus he had a squarish frame which was four feet tall and some two feet six inches wide at all points. Around this frame he fastened some chicken wire. He left four lengths of stout wire protruding about six inches from the surrounding rim at the bottom of the cage to form legs; these legs could be pressed into the earth and so the contraption would fit over the grave-top flowers and protect them from the sheep. The guard was large enough to accommodate something like a rosebush on top of a grave and was almost big enough to accommodate some of the smaller tombstones as well as the flowers.

  I was told that the first fitting of the flower guard would occur on Wednesday next at half past ten in the morning, so I went along. With the vicar, Emily Jane, Laurie Cunningham and a few others, I stood and watched as Laurie fitted his flimsy contraption over a large ceramic pot containing a bunch of irises which was perched upon a grave. Gently, Laurie pressed the slender feet into the soft earth and the guard stood firmly in position, enough to defy the most determined sheep or rabbit. And it protected its wares.

  Emily Jane spoke. ‘So you *******s want me to work around those ****** things?’

  Laurie was patient with her. ‘What we are suggesting, Emily Jane, is that we place, say, a dozen or perhaps twenty of these guards around the graves bearing the freshest flowers. Then we can let the sheep in and they can work undisturbed for a few days to produce that lovely shorn look on the grass. At the right moment, you can put fresh flowers on some other graves, and we can repeat the process, allowing the sheep to graze those graves you tended earlier . . . the guards are very light and portable, they can be easily moved around to suit our requirements and we need to have the sheep in at intervals, say once a fortnight or so. I do not envisage them being with us permanently.’

  ‘It’s a very positive solution to our problem, Emily Jane,’ said the Reverend Lord.

  The fact that the entire decision about the future mowing of the grass now depended upon the reaction of Emily Jane Taylor gave me some indication of her importance to the church authorities, and so we all awaited her reaction.

  ‘It’s going to be a bloody chore, shifting those ****** wire cages around, but if it means the damned place looks tidy, then I’ll ******* well do it.’

  The feeling of relief among us all was tangible and it seemed that a suitable compromise had been reached. Laurie went off to produce more of his guards, Emily Jane went back to her flower-tending, the vicar went off to visit a sick parishioner and I resumed my patrol.

  I experienced a great feeling that the village was returning to normal. Within a week, the first volunteers of churchyard-mowing sheep were in action. They were a dozen blackfaced moorland ewes which belonged to Gordon Saddler of Moor End Farm and he was happy that they should perform this holy task. In fact, one of them had been blessed by the vicar at the last Harvest Thanksgiving, thus that particular animal was adequately qualified for its divine mission. Meanwhile, Laurie had manufactured a few more of his patent plant protectors and Emily Jane had, albeit with a little reluctance, consented to the format of this planned grass-mowing operation.

  About a fortnight later, I was patrolling Aidensfield on foot and decided to pay my customary security visit. Pushing through the swing gate, I noticed that the grass inside was beautifully shorn, as good or even better than after the efforts of Emily Jane. In the far right-hand corner of the churchyard I could see eight or nine wire cages which had been erected over a selection of the newest graves, and in the area before the tower were a handful of contented ewes, ten or so, I estimated, all munching merrily at the lush feast before them. It seemed that the operation was highly successful and I knew that Gordon Saddler changed his sheep every few days on a rota system. I entered the church, checked that the offertory box had not been attacked and that the other artefacts were present and correct, and then resumed my patrol. But as I made my exit from the porch, I heard, from somewhere at the back of the churchyard, the distinctive tones of Emily Jane shouting, ‘Get away you daft old ****, sod off!’

  I wondered, for the briefest of moments, whether Laurie was getting too frisky with her, but decided it wasn’t him, even if she did admire his wire plant protectors. I paused and listened, and then she cried again.

  ‘Sod off . . . you stupid bloody animal . . . you ****ing lunatic . . . clear off . . . help! Is anybody there . . . help!’

  It was the cry for help that sent me running towards Emily Jane and I found her crouched behind a tombstone with a sheep standing and staring at her. It was a ewe, but blackfaced ewes are fitted with a useful pair of horns and this one had adopted a very antagonistic stance, glaring at Emily Jane as a bull might stare at a matador.

  ‘Don’t move!’ I shouted as if I knew what to do next.

  ‘Don’t you worry yourself, Mr Rhea, I’m not ****** moving while it’s looking at me like that . . . ger off . . . you ******* animal . . .’

  The sheep made a move as if to attack her, but stopped after a step or two, apparently puzzled by the tombstone which served as a shield for Emily Jane. As she cringed on the ground peering over the top of the tombstone, her eyes stared into the face of the sheep as if she was trying to outstare a lion. Endeavouring to be brave, I went towards the sheep and shooed it off, waving my arms and shouting and, much to my surprise and relief, it backed off, turned away and trotted off quite amicably to rejoin its companions.

  ‘You can get up now, Emily Jane,’ I said, reaching out a hand to help her to her feet.

  ‘They shouldn’t allow such ****** dangerous animals to be let loose!’ she grunted. ‘Here am I, doing my ****ing best for this **** of a village and that ****** ewe goes for me.’

  Even as she spoke, the ewe turned around and galloped towards her, its yellow eyes looking fierce against the smooth black of i
ts face. Emily yelled in fright and once again sought the security of the tombstone as the sheep came towards her, then stood and gazed solemnly at her while she crouched in fear. For what seemed an eternity, ewe and woman stared at each other, neither moving as each tried to gauge the next move by the other. I went to Emily’s rescue again, shooing away the silly animal which, when I approached it, trotted off without any sign of antagonism. I made sure it was well away from Emily before I signalled for her to rise to her feet and join me.

  ‘Are you frightened of it?’ I put to her, knowing that some animals can smell fear in humans, a scent which makes them react fiercely against the person who is afraid.

  ‘I can’t honestly say I love the bloody thing,’ she whispered the words. ‘But I’m not frightened of ******* ewes if that’s what you mean. I mean, Constable, I’ve lived among the ******* things all my life and I’ve been working my ****ing fingers to the bone in this ****** churchyard among all those **** looking animals and not one has bothered me, until that ****** came. No, it’s that one. It hates me.’

  ‘Come on, I’ll take you out; you’ve finished here, have you, for today?’

  ‘Aye, I’ll go home now,’ she consented in a very tiny voice. ‘I’ve just got to put this ******* watering can in its usual ******* place.’

  She did so, then as I walked with her towards the lychgate, she turned to look with some apprehension towards the group of grazing sheep, none of which paid the slightest attention to us. At this point, it was impossible to identify the rogue one — it had rejoined its companions to become anonymous.

  When we reached the gate, Emily Jane turned and shouted at the sheep, ‘Well, that’s a ****, I’ve never been driven out by a ******* sheep before . . .’