“What the hell . . .” began the doctor as the huge door swung open. “Oh, the police!”
He was dressed in a large green dressing gown and slippers, and he looked unkempt. Undoubtedly, he’d been in a deep sleep, but the sight of my uniform made him realise the bell hadn’t been ringing for frivolous reasons.
“This boy is badly cut,” I said, “He needs treatment, Doctor.”
“Does he now? Well, then, bring him into the surgery. Come in, all of you.” His musical Welsh voice sounded odd in a North Yorkshire market town, and I knew his burly, aggressive appearance concealed a warm heart.
We followed him along the passage and into the surgery where he pointed to a chair. “Sit down,” he said to Kev. “Now, let me see.”
Kev slowly opened his hand and Doctor Williams removed the blood-stained handkerchief. He studied the cut with care and tenderness, before saying, “My word, a nasty one here, isn’t it?”
“I’ll leave now,” I offered.
“Can I stay?” asked Sandra.
“I think you’d better, girl,” smiled the doctor as he rolled up the sleeves of his dressing gown. “Thank you, Constable, this does need treatment. Now son,” he said, “just let go of that muscle of yours and let’s see how the blood is flowing . . .”
I left them in his tender care, closed the big door behind me and resumed my patrol of the market square. Alwyn spotted me and said, “I’ll do a quick recce of the council estate. Can you look after the town centre until one o’clock?”
“Sure,” I said, breathing in the clean fresh air.
Less than five minutes later, I was walking past the side door of the King’s Head Hotel when I spotted the landlord standing at the door.
He noticed me at the same instant and said, “Oh, hello, Constable. Got a minute?”
“Of course,” and he took me into the inn, along the passage and into the gents’ toilet. “Just look at that!”
One of the small windows was broken, with a large hole apparently punched through the middle of the glass, and there was blood all over.
“I wouldn’t mind if they’d come to tell me — that can’t have been an accident . . . nobody would be daft enough to shove a hand through there . . .”
“What would it cost to replace it?” I asked him.
“Not much. Thirty bob or so.”
“If I get the villain in question to fetch the money, would that settle the matter?”
“You know who did it?”
“I’ve a good idea,” and I told him of the sequence of events at the dance.
“That fits what the locals said,” he confirmed. “They said a lad with a bleeding hand rushed out of here, down the yard and out.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” and I left the pub. Sure enough, the light of my torch showed a trail of blood from the yard door near the broken window, and it led the few hundred yards to the town hall, entering via the rear door.
I saw no more of the injured youth that night, but as I left the quiet market place at one o’clock that Sunday morning, the lights of Doctor Williams’ surgery were still burning.
It was the following Thursday evening when I next met Kev. He was walking through Ashfordly market place with Sandra on his good arm, and they spotted me standing near the monument. I was on duty, and clad in my flat cap and summer uniform, making a routine patrol of Ashfordly town centre.
The couple came towards me, with Sandra smiling broadly. She looked a picture of happiness, but Kev looked rather bashful and surprisingly shy.
“Hello.” Sandra broke the ice. “Thanks for helping Kev last Saturday. Dr Williams was good to him, he bandaged the hand and gave him an injection.”
Kev, his pale face now showing signs of its normal colour beneath his neglected hair, looked at his arm and hand. His fist was swathed in rolls of bandage and he had his arm in a sling.
“Yeh,” he shuffled uncomfortably before me. “Yeh, he was good. Look . . .”
I waited for his speech. He was clearly not accustomed to speaking to a policeman in this way and I didn’t want to dissuade him from the effort. I smiled at Sandra.
“Well,” said Kev, his feet still shuffling upon the surface of the market square. “It’s like this. I mean, no copper’s ever done anything for me, not ever. Not like you did, I mean. Help. That sort of thing . . .”
“It was the least I could do, Kev,” I said. “You were hurt and it was my privilege to be able to help you. You’ve Sandra to thank, you know, she called me in.”
“Yeah, she’s great, isn’t she? Too good for me, that’s true. Too good. I’m a layabout really, no bloody good to anybody. Nothing but trouble . . .”
“There’s good in everybody, Kev,” I said. “Anyway, thanks for your kind words.”
“I’d like to do summat to help . . . I mean . . . I didn’t deserve help at all . . .”
“You could give the landlord of the King’s Head the price of his broken window,” I suggested. “Thirty bob.”
“You know?” he lowered his eyes in shame and stared at the ground.
“There was a trail of blood — your blood — from the window into the Town Hall. I knew that cut wasn’t done in a fall — it was too clean.”
“Sorry about that, Officer. It was an accident — my mate shoved me and I fell, put my hand clean through that window, I did. Then I ran . . . he did, an’ all.”
“Thirty bob will square the whole thing. I want no more to do with the window — the landlord won’t push for any more action if he gets the damage paid for.”
“Oh well, in that case . . . I mean . . . it was my fault wasn’t it? For fooling about . . .”
“OK. Well, it’s all over, Kev. Are you off work?”
“Yeh, till the hand’s better. Look, Officer, like I said before I’m not good at saying things and I’m a right villain really, allus fighting and things . . . well, I mean, I don’t help the law, me nor my mates. Never. But, well, if there’s trouble in any of the dances and you’re needing help, well, like, I’ll be there. With you, I mean. Helping you to sort ’em out. That’s a promise, honest. I’ll help you.”
“Thanks, Kev,” I knew what this offer must mean to him. It meant as much to me, and I made a show of attempting to shake his bandaged hand. I simply touched his right arm and wished him luck in the future.
At several of the local dances in the months that followed, I saw Kev and Sandra, and he always came across for a quiet word with me. We talked about nothing in particular, and I do know that he paid for the damaged window. But the sincerity of his promise was never tested, for I never experienced bother at any of the subsequent dances.
Nonetheless, he did attend them all, and this gave me a strong feeling of security. It still does.
Chapter Three
No sound is dissonant which tells of life.
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, 1772–1834
I am not really sure how I came to be a member of the Aidensfield String Orchestra. Perhaps, during some off-guard moment in a casual conversation, I let it be known that I played the violin, or it may be that some other person who knew me as a child let it be known that I could produce a tune from a battered old fiddle.
Whatever the source of the tale, I was approached by our local auctioneer, a Mr Rudolph Burley, who had heard of my doubtful prowess. He informed me there was a vacancy for a second violin in the village orchestra. I protested that I had not put bow to string for many years, and that I was as rusty as a bedspring on a council tip, but all my protestations were in vain. By the following Monday night, I was in the village hall partaking in a practice session of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.
It is fair to say that the noise was awful, and that the acoustics of the hall did not help; the village piano was out of tune, and our conductor, the said Mr Burley, seemed unable to co-ordinate all sections of his thirty-piece orchestra. I was never sure of the real purpose of these weekly gatherings because we attempted to play impossibly difficult pieces like Brahms’ Violin
Concerto and finished in the pub to discuss our errors. I began to wonder if it was just an excuse to visit the pub.
Because most of the practice sessions were littered with wrong notes, wrong timing, flat and sharp faults, and almost every other kind of musical disgrace, the entire orchestra spent a lot of time in the pub. There were deep discussions on the best way of righting all our wrongs, and at length it was deemed the only true solution lay in two parts. The first was to comprise lots of diligent practice, and the second was to have some objective in mind, like a concert or public performance.
It was therefore decided to hold a concert in precisely one year’s time. It would be in aid of village hall funds, and it is pleasing to record that this decision injected the orchestra with a new enthusiasm. Now, we had a goal; the fund for modernisation of the village hall had been stagnant for years, and had lately lacked the necessary impetus to commend it to the community. Our tuneless practice sessions, plus the publicity we began to stimulate was responsible for generating a necessary new desire to achieve something.
Fired with a fresh zeal, the rate of orchestra practice sessions was increased to two nights a week, Mondays and Thursdays. Although this put pressure on the key instrumentalists and the conductor, it did help those like myself with family commitments and duties at odd hours. Even by attending once a week, my rusty skill would be renewed.
Early that spring we started in earnest and our objective was to produce a full orchestral concert in the village hall by the following Easter.
Quite soon, the anomalous collection of people with their equally anomalous collection of instruments began to behave in a disciplined way. Our noises began to sound like real music, and I began to think that even great composers like Mozart or Chopin might have found something of interest in our enterprise. We tackled pieces like the Violin Concerto, but eventually decided that the concert would comprise: Mozart’s Divertimento in D; Holst’s St Paul’s Suite; Dvorak’s Serenade; Handel’s Concerto Grosso; Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings; our favourite Eine Kleine Nachtmusik; the Introduction and Allegro for Strings and String Quartet, and Dag Wirén’s Serenade for Strings.
Looking back on those halcyon days, the Aidensfield String Orchestra possessed a remarkable cross-section of the village, most of whom had delved under their beds or climbed into their attics to produce ancient violas, cellos, a double bass, several violins and even a harp. The initial idea had come from Rudolph Burley, and it was his drive and enthusiasm that welded the group together. He could be a bully at one moment and a cajoling charmer the next, but he got results. He was a one-man committee, the sort that achieved success without the hassle of open-ended and fruitless discussions marked with opinions of great stupidity.
Rudolph was a character. He lived with a shy wife in a big house on the hill overlooking the west end of Aidensfield, and was in his late forties. A successful auctioneer, he sold household junk by the ton, and also conducted business at cattle marts in the area, managing to make his rapid-fire voice heard above the squeak of pigs, the bellowing of bulls and the bleating of sheep. His stentorian tones were an asset when conducting the Aidensfield String Orchestra — when unwelcome sounds emanated from the music makers of the village, he could quell them with suitably loud advice.
He looked like a successful auctioneer. He had a thick mop of sandy hair which was inclined to be wavy and always untidy, and this was matched by a set of expressive eyebrows which fluctuated according to the volume of his voice. Those heavy brows lowered dramatically when he spoke softly, but when he raised his voice high enough to lift the roof of the hall, his eyebrows appeared to rise in an attempt to muffle his tones. When he was conducting, they behaved in a similar manner, rising during the crescendos and falling during the diminuendos.
His bulky figure tended to sway rhythmically during the romantic moods and jerk up and down spasmodically when things got exciting. I felt that music was bred in him even if he did stand before us in his tweed jacket, cavalry twill trousers and brogue shoes, while shouting like a salesman at a horse-market. Somehow, he coaxed sweetness from that motley collection of re-discovered musical instruments.
The double-bass player was another character of charm and fascination. His name was Ralph Hedges, and he was a retired lengthman, a man whose working life had been spent in the maintenance of our highways and byways. He was a stocky fellow with simple, grey clothing and black shoes, always clean and well kept. His rounded face was the picture of health, and he peered short-sightedly through thick spectacles during our practice sessions; turned seventy, he was dependable in that he came every practice night, and he knew most of the pieces by heart. This could be a problem at times because he played them at his own speed, but Rudolph gradually tamed him.
His double bass was ancient but its tone was mellow and beautiful, and he could pluck its thick strings in a way that showed remarkable empathy between man and instrument. His strong fingers, hardened by years of working with a pick and shovel, coped easily with the powerful strings of the bass and possessed an agility that was remarkable in a man of this age.
Everyone loved old Ralph.
Lovable though he was, Ralph had one very distressing habit. By this, I mean it was distressing to other, more sensitive members of the orchestra. Try as they might, they never did grow accustomed to it, for it was a habit which meant he had to be placed at the rear of the orchestra, nicely beyond the sight of any audience, and well away from those who were distracted by his noisy effusions.
The problem was that he spat on the floor as he coaxed such lovely music from his double bass. Furthermore, he did this in time to the music, the result being that, to the count of four, the orchestra would be complemented by the sound of Ralph’s spittle positively smacking upon the polished wooden floor. At times, when the pace increased, or when it was a particularly exciting piece of music, Ralph would increase his rate until he sounded like a distant herd of cows, all dropping juicy pats in time to the prevailing beat.
The snag with Ralph’s problem was that if he ever dried up and failed to produce his unique, well-timed sound, there would be a vacuum in the minds of the musicians. This could cause them to miss a note, or to turn their heads away from their scores to see if the ageing Ralph was still alive. The disruption could be catastrophic during a concert.
It was suggested that the orchestra subscribed to a spittoon for him, with a never-ending supply of sawdust. The idea was rejected because, although this would save the caretaker some unpleasant work after band practice, it would not produce the particular sound of Ralph’s special blend of music. He was therefore allowed to continue, and his spitting noises were accepted as a part of the orchestra’s stylistic tones.
I learned that several older members were pleased to tolerate his spitting as a sign of good fortune. The custom had been practised among the ancient Greeks and Romans, and even Pliny believed it averted witchcraft. Local farmers would spit on their hands before shaking over a deal, and a large number of rural businessmen continue to spit on the first money of a deal. I think we all came to regard Ralph’s musical spitting as a harbinger of good fortune for the village hall and our fundraising efforts.
One of the orchestra’s embarrassing members was the Honourable Mrs Norleigh, Rosamund to her friends. A lady of noble ancestry, so she told us, she had married plain Mr Norleigh because she loved him dearly, and the fact that he owned a chain of hotels and shops might have contributed to her romantic climb down the social scale. Embarrassing as she was, she was a valuable member of the orchestra because she played the cello with some skill, having been nurtured on the instrument in her native Surrey.
Now in her late forties, she had been rejuvenated musically and, it was rumoured, she’d also had a facial and a nose-job because of the limelight into which she was about to be thrust. She had a figure which was as exciting as a southerner’s attempt at making a Yorkshire pudding and a face which did a lot for the cosmetics industry. Her noble features were rarely
seen in a natural light because they were always swathed in pounds of powder and many liquid ounces of make-up. The result was something like a walking waxwork of very indeterminate age, while the clothes she wore were indicative of a lady approaching the autumn of life but who steadfastly believed she was in the eternal spring of youth.
Her most embarrassing feature was her choice of knickers. For some inexplicable reason, Rosamund always wore bright red flannelette knickers of the directoire type which came down to her knees, and for a cello player this was hardly the recommended dress. When she opened her legs and spread her skirts to accept the formidable breadth of the cello, she displayed yards of bright red which caused amusement or embarrassment according to the viewer’s understanding of “entertainment”.
The diplomatic Rudolph had tried positioning her to the left, to the right, in the middle row, back row and even behind the piano, but from whatever angle she was viewed, Rosamund’s red knickers were visible. The only way to conceal them was to sit her facing the rear of the stage, but this was not wise because she would be unable to see the conductor. Rudolph decided the audience would have to suffer her propensity for showing off whatever she had, or for proving she’d hidden whatever she wished to hide.
The pianist, young Alan Napier, was interesting because he couldn’t read a note of music. He was a farm labourer, more accustomed to milking cows and digging ditches than making music, and yet those heavy, scarred fingers could coax the most wonderful music from a piano. Even complicated pieces like concertos or major orchestral items did not deter him. For simple pieces, he would ask for them to be played through just once, and for the difficult scores, he would acquire a gramophone record. At home, he would listen to the record and the next time he came to practise, he could play the entire piece by ear.
The lad was a born musician, but maintained he was not interested in the piano as a career; he liked to play for fun. Alan was about twenty-five years old, a single man who lived with his parents, and he had a handsome, dark face with curly black hair. Music was in him, and yet he could not sing a note, nor would he agree to being schooled in the finer art of piano-playing. He did not want his piano-playing to become a chore.
CONSTABLE NICK BOX SET 1–5 five feel-good village cozy mysteries Page 84
