“What’s up, mate?” he asked, wiping his brow.
“You realise where you are?” I put to him, wondering how to open this conversation.
“Aye,” he said.
“Well, you’re causing embarrassment,” I continued. “The folks in the pub are embarrassed.”
“Not them!” he wiped his brow again. “They’ll be lapping it up. Look, it’s not illegal, is it?”
“It depends where you do it and who you do it with.”
“She’s the missus.”
“Whose missus?” I asked the obvious question.
“Mine,” he said flatly. “She’s my missus.”
“Well, can’t you go home?”
“Home?” he growled, peering up at me. “I have no home. We live with her parents, the bloody-in-laws. Her mother’s an interfering old cuss and we haven’t a minute to ourselves. Paper-thin walls, an’ all. No privacy even in bed. We can’t relax, there’s no fun. So we go out and do it in the car.”
“But not on a pub forecourt?”
“Couldn’t wait,” he said. “Look mate, I’m sorry if I caused upset, honest. I thought the windows were steamed up.”
“They are,” I agreed, “but the light from the pub shines right in, and although you couldn’t be seen in detail, there’s no mistaking what was happening.”
“There’s no peace, luv,” he said to his wife. “Come on, let’s go.”
“There’s a disused aerodrome a mile up the road,” I advised him. “First turn left.”
“Is there?”
“Let’s go there,” said a sweet voice from the depths of the car, and they did. I checked that his car number was correct and tallied with his name. The woman really was his wife. I felt a twinge of sorrow for people who live in conditions so appalling that they must carry out this most private of acts in a public place. Privacy is a valuable commodity.
There are many furtive lovers who perform in public places which they believe to be private, and they do so because they do not wish to be caught by their respective husbands/ wives/ boyfriends/ girlfriends/ lovers. In truth, illicit romance of this kind is usually discovered, and a tryst of this sort captured our imagination late one Friday night.
We are fortunate in North Yorkshire to have lots of open countryside and spacious moorland areas which are ideal for those who wish to “get away from it all”, even for an hour or two. Many of the moorland heights and green valleys have become rendezvous points for lovers of all ages and both sexes, and if one travels around at night, like policemen do, one sees cars, vans, tents and uncovered people dotted about like daisies on a lawn. The period of peak activity is around eleven o’clock in the evening which broadly coincides with pub closing-times. Some of the very hardy and determined remain there until one or even two o’clock. On a winter’s night, this demands devotion of an extraordinary kind.
Such a couple were John Withy and Sheila Grove. John was about thirty-three years old, married with two children, and a painter and decorator by trade. He was a busy man who successfully ran his own business, and, although he worked long hours, he did have a certain amount of freedom of movement. This was usefully employed among the many desirable ladies he met in the course of his work, lots of whom wanted their fronts decorating. As a consequence, John had many romances, most of which were short-lived in the extreme, even as short as half-an-hour, but once in a while he would find someone with whom he fell deeply in love.
Such a woman was Mrs Sheila Grove. She was a delightfully vague sort of girl whose husband was a commercial traveller. He was away from home for lengthy periods and Sheila grew somewhat lonesome. John had been contracted to paint the Grove household, and, as a consequence, Sheila invited him in for a cup of tea. From that stage the romance blossomed. Sheila, however, was a crafty lover and, upon realising what the neighbours might think, took great pains to conceal her new-found friendship. She let the kettle steam up the kitchen windows or met John away from the family home.
Romances of this kind never escape the notice of neighbours. Neighbours see all, hear all and say everything; what they don’t see, they invent, and what they can’t invent isn’t worth thinking about. Word therefore got around to everyone except John’s wife that he was very busy decorating Mrs Grove’s panels and architraves. John, meanwhile, had informed his wife that he was working late on an important and rushed job, which to a certain extent was true.
Much of his overtime and rushing was spent in his little van high on the North Yorkshire moors on the edge of Aidensfield beat. His favourite pitch was a lofty spot on a moorland ridge beneath some pine-trees. A small knot of pines grew from this exposed ridge and they were bent due to the prevailing winds never dying away, but this slender row of timber provided some sort of shelter for his little van, marked “Withy — Decorator”. It would proceed to that lovely place once or twice a week and inside its cosy interior John and Sheila would commence their stripping and pasting.
During my routine patrols, I passed the van several times but did not disturb the happy couple. It was a very lonely area and they caused no harm to anyone. I did not investigate because I knew who it was and what they were doing, and it was no part of a policeman’s duty to interfere with moral misbehaviour of a personal kind. I did wonder, however, when and how their little game would be discovered. Invariably, such liaisons are discovered, and I felt sure John and Sheila were no exception.
It was very appropriate that their meeting place was known as Lovers Leap, for legend said that years ago towards the turn of the century a young couple leapt to their deaths from this point. This was due to some parental opposition to their romance.
Sometimes on my day off I would walk here with Mary and the children for the vantage point provided a wonderful view of the surrounding countryside. It was breathtakingly beautiful. From the small plateau beneath the stooping firs the ground fell steeply away across a heathery and bracken-covered hillside. That hillside is covered with young silver-birch trees, knotted briars and acres of tightly growing bracken as it slopes steeply into a ravine many feet below.
The ravine contains a moorland stream of purest water which bubbles happily over granite as it makes its way, full of minerals, to the sea. Beyond is the wild, colourful expanse of the North Yorkshire moors with Fylingdales Early Warning Station in the background and, beyond that, the romance of the wild North Sea.
At night the view is equally grand because the valleys and hillsides are dotted with tiny lights, shining like glow-worms, and the dark block of moorland suggests intrigue, danger, mystery, and of course, romance, just like the inside of Withy’s decorating van.
It was to this location therefore that John Withy and his van, with Sheila at his side, proceeded one night, intent upon a spot of dressing down and undercoating. I was on duty at the time, patrolling in the little Ford Anglia, and had no occasion to visit Lovers Leap that night — not initially, that is. From what I learned later it seems that the happy pair, excited and keen, had reached the site of their future passion. In the cosiness of the decorating van, with its load of paint, wallpaper, ladders and associated tins and bottles of fluid they had commenced their evening ritual.
Kisses and cuddles developed into slaps and tickles, and in no time all their clothing was thrown off as they settled down to the real business of the evening. The two warm and naked bodies writhed and pumped in sheer ecstasy, although they were rather hampered because they had to manipulate themselves into all kinds of positions on the front seats. Unfortunately, the rear of the van was laden with tomorrow’s wallpapers, paint and brush, cleaning fluid, and there was no room for humans in love. This did not deter John and Sheila — in fact, it spurred them to make a decent job on a poor location, and soon the little van was bouncing rhythmically to the movements of the blissful pair.
Their frantic and ecstatic writhing performed a small act which was destined to lead to their eternal embarrassment. Their movements knocked the handbrake of the little van and it release
d its grip on the vehicle. Slowly but surely the handbrake abandoned its post under the undulating movements of the couple, and the vehicle began to move, very slowly at first.
In their climaxing moments, the couple did not notice this gentle motion, and before long the van was running down the slope. Very slowly it moved from its parking place while every delirious action of the pair inside gave the van more momentum. Soon it was travelling quite fast, and before John and Sheila realised what was happening, the van was careering out of control down the steep, bracken-covered slope of Lovers Leap.
It was too late to stop it. Panic-stricken, John leapt from the object of his passion and managed to open his door, shouting for his lover to jump. Both jumped out. There was nothing else they could do. They rolled over and over in the thick bracken, Sheila screaming with fear, pain and shock as the bouncing van careered along its downward route, rattling and crashing through the thick undergrowth and demolishing a host of tiny silver birches. It could go no farther than the gully.
As expected, there was an almighty crash as the van and its contents dropped like a stone into the ravine and burst into flames. Petrol, paint and the paraphernalia of decorating, all combined to create a time-bomb within the van. An enormous explosion followed as the entire thing blew up. Fires broke out along the hillside as the dry bracken began to burn and soon the intense flames of the blazing van roared into the heavens, illuminating the night sky for miles around.
The couple whose hot passion had literally set the countryside alight stood naked on the hillside, clutching one another and bleeding from numerous scratches and cuts. Sheila was crying softly into John’s arms as he simply stood there, spotlighted in the dancing flames and not daring to believe this had really happened.
The noise and brilliance of the display attracted the attention of many eyes, and in no time the police station and Fire Brigade offices were notified. Emergency fire tenders roared to the scene, and I was contacted at a telephone kiosk only minutes later. The constable at the desk at Malton gabbled something about an aircraft crash, and immediately I was roaring to the location. There was no difficulty tracing the scene, for once I gained the elevation of the hills I was guided easily by the flames and smoke. I was first to arrive, and I parked among those bending pines wondering what had caused this turmoil. The entire hillside was ablaze, crackling and roaring in the eternal wind.
And there, shining in the light of the fire, I saw two naked figures struggling up the hillside towards me. The man was clutching a weeping woman as they struggled, bleeding and battered, towards my car. And they wore not a stitch of clothing between them. There were all kinds of jokes I could have made at that point, but while it was undoubtedly the place for a joke, it was certainly not the time. I called to them and suggested they get into the police car. Inside there was my cape and an overcoat, and I advised them to use those while I decided what to do about the blazing moor.
I ventured part of the way down the hillside and got as far as a small area of burning bracken, which happily had been contained by a patch of sphagnum moss. From there I could see the van deep in the gully, still burning fiercely and emitting sparks and fumes in its death throes. It was beyond any help. As I climbed back up the steep incline, the Fire Brigade arrived, and I was able to inform the leading fireman of the situation.
My chief concern was that the whole moor would catch fire, a regular event on these hills, but it seemed the fortunate location of the sphagnum moss had largely eliminated that likelihood. Members of the brigade ventured down the slope and finally began to spray the burning wreck with foam, smothering the blaze and quenching the flames. Others tackled small pockets of fire among the vegetation, and the moor was given a liberal soaking of water. This soaking continued, using water from the gully, just in case the fire did penetrate the upper layer of moorland topsoil. But within a couple of hours the fire was out, and the brigade left the scene. It hadn’t been as bad as we had feared.
Back at my car, I found Sheila shivering in my cape and John wrapped in my overcoat. She had dried her eyes but was in a state of shock as he sat dumbfounded with his arm about her.
“So what happened?” I asked.
He told me his story.
“You’ve got some explaining to do,” I added when he had finished.
“What can I tell the wife?” he pleaded. “What shall I do?”
“I’m not going to put ideas into your head, John,” I said. “But first you need clothing.”
“My husband has some old clothes,” Sheila offered. “I can tell him I threw them out.”
“How can I explain to my wife?” John pleaded. “What will she think if I turn up in different clothes?”
“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” I returned to the driving seat and started the engine. “Well, who’s first?”
“My house,” Sheila said.
“What about hospital for a check-up?” I suggested.
“Not likely, there’s enough explaining to do,” John said. “We’re all right, apart from cuts and bruises.”
“Take us to my house,” Sheila repeated. “Your overalls are still there, aren’t they, John?”
“So they are,” he smiled. “Yes, do that. I’ll manage somehow.”
I took them to Sheila’s home and went inside with them, each as naked as a babe. They were not shy in my presence and when both were dressed, Sheila in a sweater and slacks and John in his overalls, I had a coffee with them.
I left feeling it had been an interesting night. Days later I could not confirm a rumour that John’s van had been stolen while he was on the job, although the rumour circulated the village for weeks. I have no idea how John explained to his wife about his missing clothes, but I can confirm they were not reported lost or stolen.
If love and its side effects cause problems to people beyond the police service, they also create problems within. Policemen are like other lusty male humans who, from time to time, succumb to the charms of lovely ladies who are not their wives or sweethearts. Many have risked their careers for a few moments of tender illicit love.
It is refreshing, therefore, to discover a policeman who loves his wife so much that he risks his career to spend blissful moments in her company.
Such a man was Constable Simon Simpkins, a tall, slender, twenty-two-year-old with a penchant for quizzing scooter-riders and an intense dislike of children who sucked ice-lollies. His arrival at Eltering coincided with the arrival of Inspector Bert Minskip at the nearby Sub-Divisional Headquarters. Both these arrivals coincided with my posting to Aidensfield and we met from time to time.
Inspector Minskip, it had been rumoured, was with us only temporarily having been sent from one of the busy urban areas of the county where the pace and quality of life had been too much for his sensitive nature. Headquarters had considered it wise to post him briefly to a rural patch where life was pleasant and straightforward, where the people were human and where he could exercise a different sort of policeman-ship. His posting was a kind of official holiday, a period of adjustment and unwinding for him, a spell without pressures and lacking the problems of an inspector in a busy urban station.
The snag was that Inspector Minskip found the solitude and lack of sordid criminal happenings rather boring and he occupied his time in the close supervision of his men. This was disconcerting for rural bobbies who traditionally enjoyed a great sense of freedom. The outcome was that instead of relaxing and enjoying his three months with us Inspector Minskip became very neurotic about the affairs of the station, the timings, personal lives and duties of those officers under his command. He was perhaps unfortunate that PC Simpkins, newly married and fascinated with his new life, was one of the officers beneath his care.
I met PC Simpkins once or twice and found him a very pleasant young fellow, if a little immature at times. Sometimes we shared night-shifts; from time to time when I was patrolling from Aidensfield he would be on duty in the southern area of our division and we would meet at El
tering Police Station for a chat over our supper. He was keen to learn the job and was particularly anxious to understand the intricacies of traffic legislation as he had ambitions to become a Road Traffic patrol car driver.
It was this ambition which appeared to upset Inspector Minskip. He believed that all good policemen patrolled on foot or on cycles and that traffic men were not really police officers but merely glorified forms of taxi drivers. He therefore allocated to young Simpkins many tours of cycle duty, hoping to impress the lad that a constable aboard a pedal cycle can hear and see many things of value to a patrolling policeman.
One night in late summer I was patrolling around Eltering town when I saw young Simpkins on a pedal cycle. It would be around one o’clock in the morning and I stopped to speak to him.
“Morning Simon,” I said, stepping out of the little Ford. “Are you lost? You’re a bit off your patch, aren’t you?”
He smiled dreamingly. “Yes, I am, but I know you’ll keep it to yourself. I’m going to have a quick visit to my wife. She gets lonely when I’m on nights.”
“Ah!” I understood the situation very well.
“I thought I’d manage an hour with her. I reckon this bike’ll get me there and back without being missed.”
“Isn’t Inspector Minskip around?” I asked.
“No, he saw me at eleven and said he was going home to bed. There’s no sergeants on duty either.”
“Best of British!” I wished him and off he went, looking gladsome and elated.
He pedalled into the darkness with the official red light wavering slightly as he tried to coax extra speed from the cumbersome machine. I watched him turn a corner to pedal his way to his love-nest. He would have to report at Eltering at six o’clock to book off duty, so that gave him plenty of time to achieve his purpose, and he would have to risk the consequences of missing one or two points.
CONSTABLE NICK BOX SET 1–5 five feel-good village cozy mysteries Page 40
