She was lying on a high ledge about twenty feet above the pool into which the water fell, having fallen from the tree trunk as she was attempting to prove to herself that she was not afraid. And she had a broken ankle as well as minor abrasions.
She’d been there for almost two hours, shouting to no avail, crying in her terror and distress and was semi-conscious when we arrived. I shouted to rouse her, exhorting her not to attempt to move while adding that help was on the way. Before determining the precise nature of the assistance needed, I managed to clamber to the summit of the wall, using trees and vegetation to haul myself through the rocks, and then managed to look down upon her. Crossing the beck at the point the fall tumbled into the pool below was the long, pale grey remains of a fallen beech tree, some parts covered in moss and others damp and slippery from the moisture it had accumulated. Certainly, it was unsafe as a footbridge.
‘Hi, Susan,’ I shouted and she waved in response. ‘Help’s coming . . .’
I went back to Sylvia and told her Susan was responding but that we needed a stretcher party; I then told her to shout along the relay ‘Help, stretcher party needed, Hagg Foss’, followed by ‘All Guides to remain at their stations’ before coming to the point where she could speak to Susan. And so, as the sound of water roared in my ears, I could hear the first shout, ‘Help, stretcher party needed . . .’
As I swopped places with Sylvia, herself very nervous in this precarious position, I could hear the shouts growing fainter as the message was passed speedily through the woods, moving at a much faster pace than any runner could have achieved. I just hoped these children would rise to the occasion and not let us down, but they were marvellous. The message reached the Guider who was waiting at my Mini-van, and she called Sergeant Blaketon on my radio.
Instead of calling the ambulance service, Sergeant Blaketon summoned the Ashfordly Search and Rescue Organization because they did have stretcher-bearers with mountaineering and rock-climbing expertise. The short delay in responding to the emergency would be more than compensated by their skills at the scene, and so their van arrived at the campsite within three quarters of an hour. They had no trouble finding Susan — they simply followed the line of Girl Guides who had steadfastly remained in position all that time.
To cut short a long story, Susan was rescued and taken to Strensford Hospital for treatment. Although she had a broken right ankle and a few bruises, she was otherwise unhurt, but her friends had been right: Susan had, in fact, been frightened of attempting to cross the log bridge which spanned the top of Hagg Foss and she had declined originally by not admitting she was terrified. Instead, she’d claimed it was dangerous — which it was! On her lone trip to prove herself, she had slipped from it and had crashed down the waterfall, luckily landing on a protruding ledge which had prevented a longer, more dangerous tumble on the rocks in the shallow pool below.
Her mother went to visit her in hospital and, as she stooped to kiss her daughter, Susan said, ‘I told them it was dangerous . . .’
‘And your lesson gave them two adventure days!’ Her mother gripped her hand tightly. ‘But I want no more, not like this one . . . but your friends were great . . . a rescue relay team! How about that?’
‘I might join a search and rescue team when I grow up,’ said Susan.
‘A good idea, so long as you don’t attempt to cross any more waterfalls on log bridges!’ wept her mother.
5
Better dwell in the midst of alarms.
WILLIAM COWPER, 1731–1800
The North York Moors and the area which surrounds them are each rich with large but extremely remote houses. Some are working farms, some are mansions occupied by the aristocracy, some have been turned into hotels, some are used as shooting lodges, centres for recreation and research or even offices. Sadly, since my time at Aidensfield, several have become deserted and are now little more than sad but atmospheric ruins with the wind sighing through the stones and birds nesting in what remains of their roofs and walls.
Elsinby Grange is one of those large and somewhat mysterious houses but it remains in splendid condition. It is a huge, square edifice built of dark moorland granite with a blue slate roof. For that reason alone it differs from the soft yellow limestone houses of the region, houses which have red pantile roofs often with honeysuckle and roses around the doorways. The imposing front door of Elsinby Grange, fashioned from oak and studded with iron, stands beneath a portico which faces south across a gravelled parking area while the huge front windows of the reception-room, morning room and dining room gaze across an uninterrupted view of the moors. One corner of the house comprises a rounded turret structure while a blue-faced clock is prominent upon another tower behind the main house. Also behind the house is a conglomeration of outbuildings large and small, a legacy of the days when this was the home farm of a massive estate.
During the estate’s days of glory, the main house was Elsinby Hall, the home of the Marquis of Elsinby, but soon after the estate was broken up and sold to pay the death duties of the last marquis, the Hall caught fire and was totally destroyed. The sole surviving house in what had been the grounds of the former Elsinby Hall was Home Farm. This, along with some forty acres which surrounded it, was purchased by a London property developer, drastically modernized and renamed Elsinby Grange. That is the name by which I have always known the house.
It stood — and still stands — on a lofty finger of land high above the village of Elsinby. It is the only house on that elevated site, the remainder of the finger comprising copses, scrubland, grassland and the extensive gardens of the house. The lower slopes of the finger are covered with a dense mixture of coniferous and deciduous trees which serve to conceal the house from below; quite literally, it is impossible, even during the winter months, to see the house from any vantage point in the village or the neighbouring dale. Even when walking on the surrounding hills, Elsinby Grange is practically invisible, in spite of its size and position, the only way to gain a proper view being from the air. Indeed, helicopters did occasionally fly into the grounds of the Grange for they were spacious enough to admit them.
Road access, however, was via a steeply ascending and winding track which snaked through the trees from an ever-closed gate. That gate was at the end of a cul-de-sac and next to the churchyard in Elsinby; at first glance, a visitor might think the gate led only into the church grounds, but it followed the line of the eastern boundary wall of the churchyard before veering up the hill and through the trees.
Even from that gate, it was impossible to see the house on the top of the hill. The local people knew about the almost secret entrance to the Grange and in their mind it was not unusual, but few casual visitors ever guessed there was such a splendid building on the hill behind the facade of trees. This illusion was furthered by the fact that the name of Elsinby Grange did not feature on the gate or anywhere near it. Thus, there was nothing in Elsinby to suggest the presence of the house and I know that visiting delivery men had trouble finding the place.
Indeed, it was some time before I knew the house was there. Although Elsinby was a village for which I was responsible as a village policeman, there was never any reason to visit the Grange. It was not a working farm; consequently, I did not have to inspect the owner’s stock registers or firearms certificates, neither did I have to visit the house for any other purpose. It was virtually a secret house.
Inevitably, there was an air of mystery about it. Its occupants often came under cover of darkness and there were times we knew the house was occupied only because there was an occasional glimpse of lights behind the trees or a stranger calling at the shop for provisions. The owners of the Grange did not employ local people to clean or maintain the premises or its grounds, consequently no one in Elsinby really knew who was coming and going. Some of the people who came for holidays or weekends brought their own staff; it was they who did the shopping. At times the gardens and grounds would be cared for by teams of visiting specialists. After a whi
le, I realized the house was a haven or retreat for the rich and famous, people who wanted to get away from public gaze if only for a few days.
This dawned on me when I carried out a routine check of a motor car which I’d seen prowling around Elsinby at two o’clock one Saturday morning. After cruising slowly through the village several times, it vanished along Church Lane just as I managed to obtain its registration number, and then made for Elsinby Grange. I saw the lights climbing the hill — and later, when I received the result of my enquiries, I discovered the car was owned by Jason Ridgeway, a well known and very popular television personality of the time. It was that discovery that prompted me to make a few discreet enquiries and I was able to establish that that was the new function of Elsinby Grange. It was let to famous people who wanted a bit of peace and quiet and it was soon clear to me that the establishment was run in an amazingly secretive manner. Quite literally, we never knew who was in residence there.
Several people in the village knew the secret of the Grange but, Tight from the beginning of the enterprise, they had been asked to exercise discretion, particularly if members of the public and adoring fans came seeking their heroes and heroines. The usual places of enquiry by tourists and fans were the post office, pub and village shop, but the proprietors of those establishments always shook their heads and denied any knowledge of the presence of famous people in the village and said there was no such hiding place in tiny Elsinby. In that way, the people of Elsinby helped to protect the famous people who came to relax among them — and that served only to encourage more famous people to visit this tiny place. From time to time, I became privy to secret visits by some of the world’s most famous people, but I never revealed my knowledge to anyone.
On the other hand, famous people came and went without me, or anyone else in the district, knowing of their presence. Although most of the Grange visitors never emerged during their stay, there was one occasion when Bing Crosby called at the Hopbind Inn for a drink, minus his toupee. The pub was full of tourists at the time and no one recognized him. Charlie Chaplin was another visitor to the Grange, as were some of the Beatles, various film and television stars, singers, actors and musicians. Prominent politicians came too, both from Britain and the United States, and on more than one occasion, various members of the British Royal Family have stayed quietly at Elsinby Grange.
Not once did I have any worries or problems, but then a disturbing rumour began to circulate one September. It reached my ears fairly early in its infancy — and it was to the effect that some of the Great Train Robbers, i.e. those who had not been quickly arrested, were in hiding at Elsinby Grange. I bore in mind that this particular rumour had been heard in most of the villages of England, especially those with large and remote houses, but it was a tale that I could not ignore.
That famous robbery occurred in the early hours of Thursday, 8 August 1963 when the Royal Mail train from Glasgow to Euston was stopped by a team of armed robbers at Sears Crossing near Linslade which was then in Buckinghamshire. The raiders were armed and something like £2.5 million was stolen, then the largest amount of cash known to have been the subject of such a raid. Thanks to the fairly swift discovery of the robbers’ hideout some twenty miles away at premises known as Leatherslade Farm, several of the perpetrators were arrested. Furthermore, a small amount of stolen money was also recovered, all these events being prior to my arrival at Aidensfield. Even with the passage of a few years, the robbery remained in the public consciousness due partly to the audacity of the raiders, but also because some of the participants, whose names were known to the police, were still being hunted — along with more than £2 million of stolen cash.
People throughout Britain were fascinated by this crime even though the unfortunate train driver, Jack Mills, later died following injuries he received during the raid. In the years immediately following the robbery, there were many reported rumours and claimed sightings of alleged train robbers in hiding, in some cases proving to be innocent people seeking peace and solitude whereas in others the suspected birds had flown — so the police never knew whether or not they’d just missed the fleeing robbers.
But now I had such a rumour on my own quiet rural patch. In view of the secrecy which always surrounded the people in residence at Elsinby Grange, I knew that such a thing was not impossible and it might even be feasible for the raiders to gain legal access to the house through the help of friends in so-called high places. With the right amount of money and the backing of agents and helpers, almost anything is possible and in the case of Elsinby Grange, its ability to maintain secrecy for its clients had been proved many times. There were many reasons for persons in hiding to come to such a place. As a police officer, however, I knew the dangers of attaching too much credence to a mere rumour and it was important that I established whether or not there was any truth in this one.
If there was any truth whatsoever, then action would have to be taken, probably in the form of a raid on the premises by highly trained police officers and so, without losing any time, I began to investigate the source of this tale. My first problem was that I must approach this with care — if I started to ask questions in the village, it would serve only to give credibility to the rumour — and my second problem was that no one could tell me where or how the yarn had started.
My first approach was George, the landlord of the local pub. The Hopbind Inn was always a port of call for me during my patrols, although it was not my practice to drink alcohol while on duty. My visits were purely for police purposes and on this occasion I arrived during the lunchtime opening hours. The place was busy with local drinkers including Claude Jeremiah Greengrass. I was pleased he was there — I knew that if a rumour was circulating, he would know about it. My job was to tempt him to repeat it and perhaps to expand upon it, albeit with just a little bait — getting Claude to air his knowledge or to claim the police were not doing their job would not be difficult. On this occasion, Claude was my unwitting start to this low-key start to my investigation.
‘How’s things in Elsinby, George?’ was my opening gambit as I watched him pull a frothy pint for a customer.
‘Same as usual, Nick,’ he said. ‘Quiet, no bother.’
‘The holiday season’s over.’ I tried to make light conversation. ‘I suppose that reduces your casual custom — but you’ve got these regulars to keep you busy. And I don’t think we’ve anybody in the Grange this week.’
At that comment, Greengrass piped up, ‘If that’s what you think, Constable, you’re not doing your job. Train robbers. That’s who’s in the Grange. Hiding there, holed up so nobody can see ’em. Them who’s not been caught.’
‘That’s rumour, Claude, nothing but rumour.’ I tried to make light of this while at the same time attempting to glean any useful information. ‘They’ve been seen in every holiday cottage and rural pub in England over the past year or so. In fact, I don’t think there’s a cottage anywhere that’s not had one or other of the train robbers there in hiding, that’s if we believe all the stories.’
‘Aye, well, they’ve got to be somewhere and there’s no smoke without fire, that’s what I say. You want to get yourself up there and knock on the door, and take Blaketon, Ventress and the rest of your mates with you because the spot is full of train robbers and their minders. That’s what I’ve heard.’
‘You’ve been conned, Claude,’ I added more bait now. ‘It’s folks pulling your leg. Besides, it would take more than Blaketon, Ventress and me to surround the place and execute a successful raid.’
‘You’re dead right! There’s some heavies up there, Constable, make no mistake about it. Watching the doors and patrolling the grounds; nobody’ll ever get near the place. And they don’t come down here for their bits of shopping . . . they never leave the place. Came by night, they did, last Saturday . . .’
‘You’ve been up there, have you?’ I put to him.
‘Me? Not likely, mate! You’ll not catch me risking my neck in them woods when tho
se chaps are about.’
‘Has anybody else heard this rumour?’ I directed my question at George, but I knew it would be heard by all the men in the bar.
‘I heard it, Mr Rhea,’ said a quietly spoken farmer. ‘Third-or fourth-hand mind, but somebody told my mate the train robbers were hiding there. The chap who told him sometimes supplies milk when folks are in the Grange. He was pretty certain about it because he’s been ordered to leave a crate at the bottom gate, that’s the one in Church Lane, every day this week. Twelve pints. A lot of milk, Mr Rhea, so there’s obviously a few folks living there. Twelve pints a day takes a bit of supping. But he was told he had no need to take it right up to the house. He reckons they don’t want him to see who’s staying there.’
‘So who’s likely to know the names of these people who arrange the rental of the Grange?’ I asked George.
‘No idea,’ he admitted. ‘I’ve never known, Nick. It’s all done from offices in London. I haven’t their address or phone number, they’re not keen for such things to become common knowledge. It’s not often we get to know who’s in residence, then we can’t let the press know. To be honest, I don’t want to know who’s renting the place then I can’t be criticized for gossiping about them. But this tale about the train robbers has been pretty strong, I must admit.’
‘What did I tell you?’ smirked Claude. ‘You’re not seeing the obvious, Constable. Just imagine — a wanted man or mebbe more than one living on your patch and you know nowt about it! You and your mates shut your eyes to real criminals and persecute innocent blokes like me who’re struggling to earn a decent living.’
As I chatted to the customers in the pub, it appeared that the rumour had some foundation although I knew enough about the characters involved to realize a lot of it would be due to imagination and speculation fuelled by fancy rather than hard fact. Nonetheless, I decided I must establish just who was currently living at the Grange; but I felt I had to do so very discreetly — if it was the men or even just one man currently being sought for the Great Train Robbery, I did not want to frighten him or them away. I wanted any villain to be arrested — and it would be nice to have them caught on my own small patch of England. Upon leaving the Hopbind Inn, therefore, I went for a chat with Gilbert Kingston who ran the local post office and delivered the village mail.
CONSTABLE OVER THE STILE a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain’s best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 20) Page 10
