‘Borrow my Alfred?’ he frowned. ‘He’s very particular who he mixes with, is my Alfred.’
‘He’s been happy enough to eat all those bits of ham the policemen have given him,’ I said. ‘He likes these coppers, Claude. Besides, we could come to some arrangement about free drinks in here, for you, I mean.’
‘Aye, well, if it’s business you’re talking . . .’
And so, for the price of three free pints of beer every night for a week, Claude agreed to lend us Alfred and to say he had reported to us that Alfred had been lost in the storm. Silently, Alf Ventress, Phil Bellamy and I crept out of the rear door with Alfred on a lead, leaving the footballers to sing as loudly as possible so that Inspector Pollock would hear their dulcet tones. Outside, we allowed the rain to drench our uniforms and, from an outside tap, we filled an old bucket with water and threw it over the startled Alfred. We stood him in the old tin bath and swished gallons over the miserable dog until he looked as if he truly had been lost on the moors.
The poor dog was baffled by this treatment and did not like it one bit; he whined and struggled, he thrashed about which made us even wetter and shook himself so that each one of us was very wet very soon.
Eventually satisfied with his bedraggled appearance, we replaced the bath and bucket, climbed over the fence behind the pub into a ploughed field, got our boots, uniforms and the dog well and truly filthy with mud, and then trudged down a narrow path back into the village. I knew we could appear some distance from the pub’s entrance.
The three of us, drenched and dirty, with Alfred resisting at the end of the lead, trudged through the street until we arrived at the pub door. There we could see the lights of Pollock’s car, so we made towards them.
‘Good evening, sir,’ said Ventress, hauling Alfred to his side as he approached the car.
Pollock wound down the window and peered at the three of us. We must have been a sorry sight.
‘What on earth’s going on, Ventress? I’ve been touring the moors and dales looking for you, and for you, Rhea, and not a sign, not a sound . . . not one of you answered my radio calls . . . I came to the locations . . .’
‘We’ve been looking for this dog, sir, he’s a valuable animal. He escaped from his owner and so, as a humanitarian act, we decided to look for him. Sorry we missed you, that would be when we got off the beaten track, into side roads, up farm lanes, along bridleways, looking for Alfred . . . anyway, sir, we’ve found him.’
‘It doesn’t look like a very valuable animal to me,’ said Pollock. ‘In fact, it looks like a downright mongrel . . . where’s it from?’
‘Aidensfield, sir,’ I said. ‘His owner is in the pub, we’re just returning the dog to him.’
At that moment, the front door of the pub burst open and the Strensford Police football team poured forth.
Singing some bawdy song, they traipsed out of the pub and headed for their bus in the car park. Pollock watched them with a frown on his face.
‘Isn’t that Sergeant Jowett?’ asked Pollock.
‘Is it, sir?’ said Alf Ventress. ‘Your eyesight’s better than mine . . .’
‘And PC Bateman . . . and Campbell . . . and Wood . . .’
‘Oh, they’ll have been celebrating their win, sir, the Chief Constable’s Cup,’ I said. ‘It had slipped my mind because of this dog . . . the pub was granted an extension of hours, sir, for the party. You’ll remember — the licence was approved by Ashfordly magistrates a month ago.’
‘Yes, of course. I do remember. You know, it would have been nice to have joined them,’ smiled Pollock. ‘Especially on a night like this.’
‘Yes, sir, but one’s constabulary duty must be done,’ said Alf with water dripping from the peak of his cap. And at that moment the door of the pub opened to reveal Claude Jeremiah Greengrass who stood in the light cast from within.
Playing his part like a hero, Claude shouted, ‘Alfred, you old bugger, are you out there?’
Alfred whined and leapt towards his master; his sudden move meant that the wet lead slipped from Ventress’s hands. The happy dog galloped across to Claude and leapt up to greet him. Alfred made a huge fuss and wagged his tail as Claude hugged him.
‘A most touching scene,’ smiled Inspector Pollock. ‘Is that the owner?’
‘Yes, sir,’ I said.
‘It’s five minutes to midnight,’ smiled Pollock, glancing at his watch. ‘Five minutes to go before closing time, so I think that man ought to buy us all a drink, to thank you gentlemen for making such an effort to trace his dog.’
‘A great idea!’ beamed Ventress.
‘I say, you,’ said Pollock leaping from his car. ‘You with the dog!’
Claude halted as the inspector galloped across the road.
‘Me?’ asked Claude, in amazement at the sight. ‘What have I done now?’
‘These men, officers of mine, I might add, have worked jolly hard tonight to find your dog, I believe.’
‘Aye, they have. And I’m very grateful . . .’ Claude played his part very well. ‘It’s not often I’m grateful to the police but, well, on a night like this . . .’
‘There’s just time for you to buy them all a drink, I can authorize them to take a drink on duty, being their senior officer, and there are just a few minutes left before the inn must close . . . so might I suggest you buy us all a drink, to celebrate the recovery of your dog? And there are more of my men on the car park, just about to leave . . . I might even persuade them to stay a few minutes more, just to celebrate the return of this dog . . .’
‘Me? Buy a load of coppers a drink?’ blustered Claude. ‘It’s them that ought to be buying me a drink or two . . .’
‘Consider it an investment, Claude,’ I said softly.
‘Aye, well, if you put it like that. I’m just pleased I’ve got Alfred back safe and sound!’ He meant every word of that final remark and so he trudged back into the pub with Alfred on his lead. Pollock brought in the bus-load of officers and we all had a drink, paid for by Claude Jeremiah Greengrass. George was astounded, I was worried but Alfred was happy. He shook himself all over Claude and then went to lie by the fire once more.
‘Alfred, an odd name for a dog,’ said Pollock.
‘He’s named after me,’ said Alf Ventress. ‘I rescued him as a puppy, somebody threw him in the river and I found him. I gave him to Mr Greengrass, who named the dog after me. So you see, sir, there was a sentimental reason for our work tonight.’
In the touching moments that followed, Claude leaned over to Ventress and said, ‘You don’t half talk a load of old mush! That dog was never named after a copper ’
‘It is now,’ smiled Alf.
* * *
And so the police officers of Ashfordly, Strensford and district settled down to await the impending changes. Most worried of all was poor Sergeant Blaketon. He could see himself plodding the beat in Strensford as a shift sergeant rather than being in charge of his own section. This worry was compounded when a sergeant and a constable from the Research and Development department at force headquarters suddenly arrived at Ashfordly police station.
‘We’ve come to measure your office, Oscar,’ announced Sergeant Higgins.
‘Measure it? What on earth for?’ bellowed Blaketon.
‘We can’t say, it’s confidential,’ said Higgins. ‘It’s all to do with changes to the force structure, new divisions being created, sections disappearing, that sort of thing.’
And for the next half-hour, Sergeant Higgins and PC Dawson measured Sergeant Blaketon’s office and the enquiry office with a long tape-measure. Dawson wrote down the details in a shorthand notebook as the two men discussed matters like offices for secretaries, toilets for women and parking places for senior officers’ cars.
Poor Sergeant Blaketon just sat with a defeated look on his face. He knew that Headquarters theorists worked in strange ways but he did now think that Ashfordly police station was earmarked for some future role of great importance. He also got
the impression that his humble office was being earmarked for someone of high rank. It would be three weeks after that visit, when I took my van into Headquarters garage for its regular service, that I saw PC Alan Dawson.
‘I was on your patch the other week, Nick,’ he said. ‘With Dan Higgins. We played a joke on Oscar Blaketon.’
‘A joke?’ I asked. ‘What kind of joke?’
‘Well, years ago, Blaketon dropped Higgins into the mire, something pretty minor, it was. Blaketon should have delivered a message from Higgins to the superintendent, but he forgot. It was petty stuff, but as a result, Higgins got a bollocking from the superintendent.’
‘So what was the joke?’ I pressed.
‘We were on our way to Scarborough police station,’ smiled Alan Dawson. ‘We just dropped into Ashfordly police station and measured it. Measuring someone’s office always gets the incumbent worried — we told him it was confidential, something to do with impending changes in the Force structure. He’ll worry about that for months now.’
‘The Serious Rumour Squad in action?’ I smiled.
‘Some rumours have a habit of becoming fact,’ he said, leaving me to ponder that statement. So was something important really going to happen at Ashfordly and Aidensfield? Or was it just a rumour? I could only wait and see.
THE END
ALSO BY NICHOLAS RHEA
CONSTABLE NICK MYSTERIES
Book 1: CONSTABLE ON THE HILL
Book 2: CONSTABLE ON THE PROWL
Book 3: CONSTABLE AROUND THE VILLAGE
Book 4: CONSTABLE ACROSS THE MOORS
Book 5: CONSTABLE IN THE DALE
Book 6: CONSTABLE BY THE SEA
Book 7: CONSTABLE ALONG THE LANE
Book 8: CONSTABLE THROUGH THE MEADOW
Book 9: CONSTABLE IN DISGUISE
Book 10: CONSTABLE AMONG THE HEATHER
Book 11: CONSTABLE BY THE STREAM
Book 12: CONSTABLE AROUND THE GREEN
Book 13: CONSTABLE BENEATH THE TREES
Book 14: CONSTABLE IN CONTROL
Book 15: CONSTABLE IN THE SHRUBBERY
Book 16: CONSTABLE VERSUS GREENGRASS
Book 17: CONSTABLE ABOUT THE PARISH
Book 18: CONSTABLE AT THE GATE
Book 19: CONSTABLE AT THE DAM
Book 20: CONSTABLE OVER THE STILE
Book 21: CONSTABLE UNDER THE GOOSEBERRY BUSH
Book 22: CONSTABLE IN THE FARMYARD
Book 23: CONSTABLE AROUND THE HOUSES
Book 24: CONSTABLE ALONG THE HIGHWAY
Book 25: CONSTABLE OVER THE BRIDGE
Book 26: CONSTABLE GOES TO MARKET
Book 27: CONSTABLE ALONG THE RIVERBANK
Book 28: CONSTABLE IN THE WILDERNESS
Book 29: CONSTABLE AROUND THE PARK
Book 30: CONSTABLE ALONG THE TRAIL
Book 31: CONSTABLE IN THE COUNTRY
Book 32: CONSTABLE ON THE COAST
Book 33: CONSTABLE ON VIEW
Book 34: CONSTABLE BEATS THE BOUNDS
Book 35: CONSTABLE AT THE FAIR
Book 36: CONSTABLE OVER THE HILL
Book 37: CONSTABLE ON TRIAL
MORE COMING SOON
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GLOSSARY OF ENGLISH SLANG FOR US READERS
A & E: Accident and emergency department in a hospital
Aggro: Violent behaviour, aggression
Air raid: an attack in which bombs are dropped from aircraft on ground targets
Allotment: a plot of land rented by an individual for growing fruit, vegetable or flowers
Anorak: nerd (it also means a waterproof jacket)
Artex: textured plaster finish for walls and ceilings
A Level: exams taken between 16 and 18
Auld Reekie: Edinburgh
Au pair: live-in childcare helper. Often a young woman.
Barm: bread roll
Barney: argument
Beaker: glass or cup for holding liquids
Beemer: BMW car or motorcycle
Benefits: social security
Bent: corrupt
Bin: wastebasket (noun), or throw in rubbish (verb)
Biscuit: cookie
Blackpool Lights: gaudy illuminations in seaside town
Bloke: guy
Blow: cocaine
Blower: telephone
Blues and twos: emergency vehicles
Bob: money
Bobby: policeman
Broadsheet: quality newspaper (New York Times would be a US example)
CONSTABLE BENEATH THE TREES a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain's best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 13) Page 21
