‘Me too,’ I said. ‘I came past at half-past eleven last night, and it was all in darkness. Thanks, Doctor, I’ll have a look. Did you stop at the house?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’ve an appointment at Malton Hospital. Got to be going,’ and off he went.
Mrs Gregory’s house, known as Southview, was only a few hundred yards from my own police house, but I took the van because of its radio capability. I parked outside. It was a magnificent house, a stone-built double-fronted building with a tiled roof and oak windowframes. It stood in its own grounds and was tucked deep into the hillside midway down Aidensfield Bank, with expansive views to the south.
I knew Mrs Gregory by sight. She was a lady in her mid seventies, I guessed, and she had been a widow for years. She had no children, but I did know she had sisters in various parts of Yorkshire. The house revealed something of her status – although she was a Yorkshirewoman from a simple background, she had married well, because her house was what is often described as ‘a gentleman’s residence’ or even ‘a gentry house’. I knew little of her husband, for he had died long before my arrival in the village.
Upon leaving my van, I could see the light burning in one of the front rooms, so I knocked on the front door, and when there was no reply, I tried the back. Again there was no response, so I examined the windows. Those at the front and rear were secure but as I went around the side, where the house wall was literally a yard from the limestone cliff face near where it had been built, my heart sank. A small pantry window had been smashed and was standing open. I knew better than to climb in that way, for evidence of forensic interest might be adhering to the framework.
I returned to the doors and tried the knobs. The back door opened easily – the key was in the lock on the inside, and chummy had used this route as his exit. As I entered, aware of the need to proceed with great care, I knew the house had been burgled. My heart sank. This was probably the first time for years that Mrs Gregory had been away, and I could only feel deep sorrow on her behalf. But it was time to set in motion the official procedures and then to trace Mrs Gregory.
I did make a quick tour of the stricken house, just to ensure that the villain was not still hiding, and then closed the doors as I set in motion the investigation. I called the CID in Eltering, who said Detective Sergeant Gerry Connolly and Detective PC Paul Wharton would attend within the half hour. In the meantime, I left the van outside the house and walked down to the post office-cum-shop to ask Joe Steel if he knew how I could contact Mrs Gregory. He did; he gave me her sister’s home number. I returned to the van and radioed Force Control, asking them to contact Mrs Gregory with the sad news and ask her to ring me before coming home. Then I stood outside the house to await the might of the local CID.
Connolly and Wharton came and commenced their investigation. The curious thing was the state of one room. The entire floor was covered with masses of wrapping paper and screwed-up newspaper. It covered the tops of flat surfaces, such as the table and sideboard, and even filled the spaces beneath chairs and bookcases. The room looked like an expanded version of our children’s bedrooms on Christmas morning.
‘What’s all this, Nick?’ asked Detective Sergeant Connolly, showing me the rubbish.
‘No idea,’ I had to admit. ‘I’ve not been in the house until today.’
‘It’s neat and tidy otherwise, but we can’t tell what’s gone until she returns. Certainly the place has been done over, and it looks like an expert job. We’ve not found any marks.’
By that, he meant there were no fingerprints, which suggested the work of a professional thief rather than a local lad who had broken in for kicks.
‘We’ll be off, Nick,’ said Connolly. ‘Lock the house and then call us when she gets back – we’ll find out what’s gone then.’
When I got home, Mary said there’d already been a call from Mrs Gregory, and she would be home that evening around seven o’clock; in view of the awful news, her nephew was driving her home and would stay a day or two. I made sure I was at the house to meet them.
Mrs Gregory arrived in her nephew’s Hillman Husky and headed straight for the front door. She was a sturdy woman of moorland stock, with iron-grey hair peeping from beneath a tight-fitting purple hat. She walked like a farm labourer, her stout legs carrying her quickly across the ground. She almost waddled into the house after nodding briefly to me. I followed her in, leaving her nephew to see to her luggage and the car.
‘I’m sorry this has happened, Mrs Gregory.’ I tried to reassure her but she seemed not to care. ‘The CID have been. They’ve done their work but will have to visit you when you can tell them what’s been taken.’
She buzzed from room to room, saying, ‘Nowt from here, nowt from this ’un …’ until she arrived at the room with all the waste paper on the floor.
‘This is how we found it, Mrs Gregory. We’ve not touched anything.’
‘They’ve had a right do in ’ere, eh?’ she said. ‘They’ve opened stuff I’ve had parcelled up since I was wed.’
She picked up one piece of ancient silver-coloured wrapping paper. ‘Egg cups, I think,’ she said. ‘From his lot.’
I stood back as she examined the mess, and when her nephew came in, I suggested he make a cup of tea for us all. I learned his name was Robert Atkinson. Gradually she moved every piece of paper, and when she had finished, she led me into the kitchen, where Robert had prepared a cup of tea and some biscuits. It was an old-fashioned kitchen with a black-leaded fireside and beams overhead.
‘It’s all my wedding presents,’ she said eventually. ‘That’s what he’s got. Crockery, silverware, pots and pans, linen, glassware …’
‘You mean you never used any of it, Mrs Gregory?’
‘Never had the need,’ she said. ‘Allus had enough stuff without opening presents. Besides, my Alexander died two days after our wedding, so I never had the heart to open anything.’
‘Oh, dear, I am sorry.’
‘It was a long time ago,’ she said. ‘Long before you saw t’light of day, young man. He went off t’war, First World War that was, and got himself killed. Married for two days, I was. And so I never opened any of them presents. He left me well provided for.’
‘What did he do? For a living?’ I asked her as Robert poured the tea.
‘He was in business, ironmongery. His family have a chain of shops in t’West Riding; they’re still there. I get a pension from ’em, and I’ve shares. I’m all right for cash, Mr Rhea, and that stuff is all insured.’
‘If I might say so, Mrs Gregory, you are taking this remarkable well.’
‘It’s no good doing any other,’ she said. ‘You can’t make things better by worrying. I’ve never used any of that stuff, so I shan’t miss it. In fact, Mr Rhea, it’s mebbe solved a problem. All them nephews and nieces o’ mine might have fought over those things. Well, they can’t now.’
‘I’ll need a list,’ I said. ‘To circulate through our channels, to other police forces and antique-dealers.’
‘I’ll have my wedding “thank-you” list somewhere,’ she said. ‘I can get a full list in a while.’
‘We’ll need a description of the objects,’ I said. ‘You know, any distinguishing marks, unusual designs, that sort of thing.’
I rang Gerry Connolly from her house and explained it would take a while for her to compile the list, but he was happy that she was able to do so at all; many in this situation might not know exactly what had been taken. I kept her company for about an hour and was delighted that she had been such a tower of strength in her loss.
As I got up to leave, she stooped and picked up a black-lead brush from the hearth.
‘See this brush, Mr Rhea?’
‘My granny had one like that,’ I said.
‘That was a wedding present,’ she smiled. ‘I use it every day. I’m right glad he never took that. You can’t get good black-lead brushes like that nowadays.’
I left, marvelling that she had never had any use o
r joy from her wedding presents, save the black-lead brush.
As a postscript, we did recover several of her silver items, because they had been monogrammed by her late husband’s family. They began to turn up in second-hand salerooms and antique shops in various parts of the country, but the thief was never arrested.
I think that, if he had stolen her black-lead brush, she would have been very upset. But we might not have recovered that – it didn’t bear the family monogram.
6 Kittens Among the Phobias
Our antagonist is our helper.
Edmund Burke (1729–97)
There is no doubt that some people are truly afraid of police officers, and there are also some who dislike or even hate them. The reasons are many and varied.
From my own experiences, I found that political propaganda of the more sinister type is responsible for a large amount of fear and distrust, this often being based on one solitary act by a less-than-perfect officer or through well-chosen photographs of highly publicized confrontations. There is certainly a wealth of anti-police myth in some political circles through which gullible idealists grow to believe those who preach poison rather than those who are better equipped to reveal the truth. The trouble is that it is easy to accept the ravings of those who profess to know more than oneself. Enlightenment can come later, sometimes much later and sometimes too late, and it is often achieved when the disaffected one has been subjected to some experience which starkly reveals the falsehoods upon which past beliefs have been based.
But there are some who are afraid of the police for other reasons, such as those which have deep-rooted origins in one’s childhood or upbringing. Sometimes a belief imposed upon a child’s mind will never be eradicated. A lot of children grow up in fear of the police because their parents have regularly threatened to ‘tell the policeman’ if they are naughty. And, for a child, it is naughty to spill one’s dinner or wet one’s pants. I believe children should be brought up with a healthy respect for the police, because the service exists for the benefit of all society and not just a portion of it, but I do not believe youngsters should be taught to fear the office of constable.
Having said that, there are those who nurse an irrational fear of the police, and over the years while patrolling from Aidensfield, I came to know such a woman in Ashfordly. The strange thing was that she was not frightened of policemen – she was frightened of police stations. Maybe she was a member of that group of people who fear or hate official places such as banks, dentists’ surgeries, council chambers, income tax offices or DHSS departments. Whatever the root cause of her fear, she knew it was irrational and even silly, and yet she could do nothing to overcome it. She had no fear of police officers, however, and was quite happy to chat with them in the street or mingle with them socially. I grew to know her from my irregular but frequent patrols in Ashfordly, our local market town.
Being the village constable of Aidensfield, I had to patrol Ashfordly’s streets from time to time, usually twice a week during a selected morning or afternoon, each time being a four-hour stint. We rural constables undertook such duties when the town was short of officers due to other commitments, such as court appearances, courses, annual leave and so on, and in time I came to know several Ashfordly residents.
One of them was a busy little woman who seemed to trot everywhere. She was in her middle forties, I estimated, with rimless spectacles and a hair-do that kept her dark brown locks firmly in place. She was always smartly dressed but she scarcely reached five feet in height. She had the tiniest of features – little feet, little hands, a little body, and she drove a little car, a Morris Mini, in fact. She was like a petite and pretty china doll and at times looked almost as fragile.
I first became aware of her as I patrolled the market-place. Periodically during the day she would rush in, park her tiny car and then trot into a succession of shops, offices and cottages, her tiny feet twinkling across the cobbles. Occasionally the face of a Yorkshire terrier would peer from the rear seat of her car, and sometimes there would be a poodle or a tiny terrier of some sort. More often that not, she was accompanied by a small dog, and if I was hovering anywhere nearby, she would smile and bid me good morning or good afternoon before rushing about her business.
There was no official reason for me to wonder who she was or what she was doing, but it is a feature of police work that one acquires local knowledge, often without realizing. And in time I learned that this was Mrs Delia Ballentine. She lived near the castle, and her husband, Geoff, worked for an agricultural implements dealer in Ashfordly. She did not have a job, but she was heavily engaged in work for local charities and organizations – she was secretary of the Ashfordly WI, for example, and she did voluntary work for the Red Cross, the parish church, the RSPCA and a host of other groups, which explained why she was always rushing.
The first time we spoke was when she was collecting for the Spastics Society. I was in the market-place in uniform when she asked if I’d care to make a donation, I did and was rewarded with a badge which I pinned to my tunic. I commented on the state of the weather, as English folk tend to do, and she said she had to hurry home to prepare Geoff’s dinner, as Yorkshire people call their lunch. On several occasions thereafter she persuaded me to part with small sums of money for an amazing variety of charities and worthwhile causes, and in every case she had to rush off to attend to some other task.
Then one Friday morning, when the market was a riot of colour with its fascinating range of stalls, vehicles and crowds, I saw her collecting for a local school for handicapped children.
I slipped some money into her collecting box and said, ‘You should get around to the police station. There’s a conference there; it starts in twenty minutes. There’s eight traffic officers just dying to support worthy causes. You might get a few bob, with a bit of luck.’
She shuddered. It was a visible shudder, and it surprised me. ‘Oh, no.’ She tried to shrug off the moment. ‘I couldn’t.’
‘They wouldn’t mind …’ I began.
‘No, it’s not that.’ She hesitated and I waited for her to continue. She added, ‘I’m terrified of police stations.’
‘Police stations?’ I must have sounded sceptical, because she laughed at me.
‘Silly, isn’t it?’ she chuckled at her own absurdity. ‘I just don’t like going inside police stations. I don’t know why.’
‘I can understand folks not wanting to go into a prison or even a lift, but I’ve never come across this before,’ I said. ‘But you’re not frightened of policemen?’
‘No, not at all,’ she told me. ‘That makes it all the dafter, doesn’t it?’
‘Well, if you ever go around to our station and I’m there, just shout and I’ll come outside to see what you want!’
‘Thanks, I will! Well, I must be off. I’ve other calls to make …’ and she twinkled away towards her little car. A dachshund barked from the front passenger seat, and I wondered how many dogs she kept.
As she disappeared, I pondered upon her odd phobia and tried to work out whether there was a word for it. I knew that the fear of a particular place was known as topophobia, the fear of night was nyctophobia, and a fear of streets or crossing places was dromophobia. There were others, such as ergasiophobia, which is a fear of surgeries, brontophobia, which is a fear of thunder, and thalassophobia, which is a fear of the sea. A fear of confined spaces is claustrophobia, a fear of deep places is bathophobia, and a fear of dry places is xerophobia, with dipsophobia being a fear of drinking or drunkenness, and hydrophobia a fear of water or wet places. Thinking along these lines, I wondered if fear of police stations was nickophobia, cellophobia, custophobia or mere constabularophobia. Whatever its name, it was a curious and somewhat unsettling fear, but one with which she could live without too many problems. After all, many people live and die without ever entering a police station. I felt sure Delia could survive without having to face that challenge.
But I was wrong.
I was per
forming another tour of duty in Ashfordly one July afternoon and was in the police station when a youth came in. About seventeen years old, he was carrying a hessian sack which was dripping wet and squirming with some form of life.
‘Now, what have got?’ I asked him.
‘Kittens,’ he said. ‘Somebody threw ’em into t’beck but they landed in some rushes, tied up in this sack. They didn’t go right into t’water. I found ’em when I was fishing. They’re all alive.’
He opened the top of the sack to reveal three beautiful black-and-white kittens, several weeks old. Their eyes were open and they were quite capable of walking. Within seconds, they were crawling all over the counter, and I asked him if he was prepared to keep them.
‘No chance,’ he said. ‘I live with my granny, we’ve no space, that’s why I fetched ’em here. I thought you’d know what to do.’
‘Right, we’ll see to them,’ I assured him. ‘Thanks for saving their lives. It was a rotten trick, eh? Throwing them in the beck like that.’
‘If I’d seen who’d chucked ’em in, I’d have chucked him in an’ all,’ said the youth, whose name was Ian Trueman. I took details for our records, and off he went.
I was now left with the problem of three active and interesting kittens which had to be fed and housed, but we did have procedures for dealing with stray dogs and lost and found pets of every kind. Because these three active chaps were literally crawling into everything, threatening to overturn filing trays, clog the typewriter and send the telephone crashing to the floor, I decided to pop them into No. 2 cell until I could deal with them. A dish of milk would keep them happy as they explored its delights.
I began to prepare the cell for their stay. I went into the garage to find a cat tray and some litter or earth, found a saucer in the sergeant’s office and used some of my own milk from a bottle I carried for my break periods. As I fussed over the kittens in their prison-like home, I heard someone enter the enquiry office, and so I called ‘I won’t be a moment’. I then tried to close the cell door without the kittens rushing out at my heels, for one of them seemed determined to escape from custody. I had to sit him on the cell bed as I rushed out. But in time I got them all safely behind the proverbial bars and returned to the enquiry office to dispose of the wet and ruined sack.
Constable among the Heather Page 10
