CONSTABLE ABOUT THE PARISH a perfect feel-good read from one of Britain’s best-loved authors (Constable Nick Mystery Book 17)

by Nicholas Rhea

  If the local residents refused to talk to descendants of the family concerned, it was hardly likely they would confide in a policeman, particularly one who was not born and bred in the district. This was not the first time that a village has collectively decided not to reveal things to outsiders — police officers on murder enquiries have encountered it from time to time. But this was not a murder investigation and although it was no concern of mine, I began to wonder if a piece of subterfuge was called for. When I met the postman, Gilbert Kingston, later that morning, therefore, I tried to elicit some information from him.

  ‘Morning Gilbert,’ I greeted him. ‘Nice day.’

  ‘Not bad for the time of year,’ he said, as he often did. We chatted for a few moments about nothing in particular, and then I said, ‘Gilbert, there’s a couple wandering around the village, a Mr and Mrs Melrose from Staffordshire. Tracing their lost relatives.’

  ‘I’ve seen them,’ he said. ‘We’ve had a chat, not that I could help.’

  ‘Did they ask about High Barns?’

  ‘What do you know about High Barns, Nick?’ Quite unexpectedly, he adopted a very defensive attitude.

  ‘Nothing,’ I had to admit. ‘But I’ve just come from there and that couple had been to see Jim, about their ancestors.’

  ‘Well, I hope he told ’em nowt . . .’

  ‘He told them nowt and he told me nowt,’ I said. ‘So it all makes me wonder what there is to hide.’

  ‘Some things are best left alone, Nick, and I should have thought a policeman would know that. Now I don’t know whether these Staffordshire folk will ever find out what they’ve come to unearth, but if they do, they won’t get it from any of the folks hereabouts, not those who have lived here all their lives anyroad. Take that from me.’

  There was a distinct air of coolness and finality about his attitude and I got a similar response from George Ward, landlord of the local pub. Sam Cook the cobbler, Harold Poulter the undertaker and Doctor Archie McGee. They were all local men of many years standing but none would say anything about the mysterious events at High Barns long ago. It made me even more determined to find out what had happened but I knew it was something I would never be able to discover in the short course of a single weekend. It would require several weeks of fairly diligent and secretive enquiries. For one thing, I had no desire to upset or antagonize the villagers.

  I knew, of course, that all the sources of information which were available to the Melrose couple were also available to me and I was sure that, given time, they would eventually exhaust all their avenues of investigation — and they would discover the secret which was currently being kept from them. If so, it was pointless me following in their footsteps — but I had additional sources of information, i.e. police records. I became determined to uncover the High Barns secret, if only for my own satisfaction.

  The North Riding of Yorkshire Constabulary had been founded in 1856, a little more than a century earlier and most police stations had kept written records of every occurrence with which its officers had dealt since that time. Some large leather-bound books, full of data in beautiful copperplate handwriting and dating from that era were still on the shelves of many rural police offices. One was a list of executions — dating from 1856, it listed offenders who had been dealt with at committal proceedings before Ashfordly Magistrates Court and who had later been executed after a trial at York Assizes — and those who had been executed had the word ‘hanged’ in red ink beside their name.

  Another equally ancient book was a handwritten list of every inn and public house in the petty sessional division, with details of the type of licence held and the landlord’s name. Another was a list of local villains and ne’er-do-wells, also dating to 1856, some of the surnames being familiar even today. There was a lot of social and criminal history on the shelves of Ashfordly Police Station — and lots more stored in brown paper parcels in the attic above the cells.

  The problem was that I had no idea what I was seeking. I asked Alf Ventress, whose knowledge of local police matters was encyclopaedic, whether he was aware of any incident, long ago, which was associated with High Barns at Elsinby, or with people named Barr or Sinclair. He shook his gnarled old head.

  ‘Sorry, Nick, I’ve a pretty good knowledge of local affairs and folks, but not those from Victorian times or earlier. Sorry.’

  I knew that whenever Sergeant Blaketon was out of the way, and I was on duty at Ashfordly Police Station, I would have to plough through those old records, not knowing where or when to start or what to look for. But that’s how discoveries are often made. So that is what I did.

  During the months which followed, I systematically searched every old book on the police station shelves without finding any reference to the name of either Barr or Sinclair and then set about a similar search of our ancient files. The volume of work in the early days of the Force was far less than in modern times and so the files were fewer. Fortunately, they were listed upon a simple index. Under the Crime main heading there were lots of sub-titles including Murder, Arson, Malicious Damage, Robbery, Burglary, Rape, Sacrilege, Housebreaking, False Pretences and so forth. There were subject files such as Inquests, Brothels, Carriers’ Licences, Explosives, Fugitive Offenders, Hackney Carriages, Pound Breach, Street Lighting, Road Accidents, Mantraps, Weights and Measures, Magistrates’ Courts, Public Nuisances, Missing Persons, Intoxicating Liquor, Knackers, Children and Young Persons, Aliens, Animals Wild, Domestic and Diseases of, Obscene Publications and many, many more.

  More mundane files included maintenance of the police station, decorations to police houses and similar subjects. Quite clearly, I could ignore a high proportion of these; furthermore, Kathleen Melrose was about forty, I reckoned, which suggested she was born in the mid-1920s. That would suggest her parents’ era was around the turn of the century, probably earlier.

  Thus if she was seeking information about a period beyond her own parents’, i.e. her grandparents’ and great-grandparents’, it would be prior to 1900 — and as the Force records went back only to 1856, this considerably reduced my area of search. The files had been tied together in bundles — for example, all the Murder files were stored together and dated from 1856, with a file for each year until 1956. Those from 1956 until the present time were kept in the current system. Thinking that the worst possible thing that could happen to a family was the crime of murder, I started with those files. It took a long time, but I found nothing associated with either High Barns, the Barrs or the Sinclairs. Likewise, rape, arson, burglary . . . I found nothing. In the weeks which followed, whenever I was on night duty in Ashfordly or had time to spare from my routine duties, I plodded meticulously through the files, but found nothing that would provide a lead. In the meantime, Mr and Mrs Melrose continued to visit the area in their quest, although I rarely saw them. My local network of informants acquainted me with their visits.

  In the case of some of the files at Ashfordly Police Station, papers were missing, probably having been removed to be added to more recent casefiles with which they were linked. But the officers of the time had not endorsed the files with the location of the removed items, so it would not be easy to trace the missing papers, if indeed they had been retained. I began to think I was trying to achieve the impossible — and besides, I kept reminding myself, it was really nothing to do with me.

  ‘Do you know what’s the most common crime?’ said Alf Ventress one Sunday morning as we were working beside one another in the office at Ashfordly. Sergeant Blaketon was enjoying a weekend off and I knew he’d gone to Blackpool for a break. I was surrounded by a pile of old files, having now reached ‘Coinage Offences’, and he was grinning at my endeavours.

  ‘Stealing,’ I said. ‘Larceny, simple larceny to give it its official name.’

  ‘Wrong, he said with a smile. ‘Try again.’

  ‘Assault? Common assault?’

  ‘No, it’s incest, Nick.’

  ‘Incest? But you rarely see a case of inces
t in court, Alf!’

  ‘Exactly. That’s because it’s kept quiet, Nick. It’s kept within the family, in a manner of speaking. But criminologists and welfare workers of all kinds, ‘specially those concerned with cruelty to children and associated problems, will tell you that incest — especially involving children — is the most prevalent of any crime. Kids with unexplained bruising and injuries, young girls running away from home, lads running away as well, going off to London for the bright lights, lads being awkward or turning to crime . . . there’s a whole host of juvenile troubles which are caused through incest, but the victims never talk, Nick. They’ve been frightened or tricked into silence, so we are never told. The true instance never comes to light. Families ensure it’s kept under wraps.’

  ‘Are you saying I should be looking into that?’

  ‘Speaking as a very experienced police officer and a man who has spent his lifetime in this part of the world, I would suggest it is worthy of your consideration, Nick. And that is precisely the sort of thing a family would want kept secret, isn’t it?’

  ‘Do we have a file on cases of incest in this area?’

  ‘If we have, it’ll be in that loft among the others.’

  I went straight up to find it and there were folders dating to the origins of the Force, but they contained very few papers. Like the files I had examined previously, there were papers missing and I assumed they had been removed to be added to more recent case papers. Nonetheless, I searched the records from 1856 until 1900, but there was no record of either the Barrs or the Sinclairs having been involved in an incest investigation. It was a good try, but it produced nothing. I thanked Alf and continued with my steady search of the other files.

  It would be six or eight months later by the time I reached the files headed ‘Missing Persons’ and there, to my delight and astonishment, I found a reference to Thomas Sinclair of High Barns, Elsinby. It was dated 1863 and it seemed that Thomas, then aged thirty-three, had simply walked out of the house and vanished. My heart began to beat — the period was right. I felt I had begun to solve the mystery. I had a name, an address and a date, always a good start to any enquiry.

  The first paper in the file was a missing person form which had been completed by the police inspector then in charge of Ashfordly section. His name was Inspector Bernard Horner.

  The date of the form was Wednesday, 4 March 1863 and it comprised a series of boxes which had been filled in by the Inspector. The person making the report was named as Hester Sinclair, 30 years of age, of High Barns, Elsinby. The missing person was Thomas Sinclair, 33 years of age of the same address, described as a farmer. Following the sequence of the form, I learned he had last been seen at the farm on Sunday 1 March 1863 around 7 p.m., having completed the milking for that day. Hester had been upstairs tending her baby at the time and Thomas had not even said goodbye.

  There followed a physical description of Thomas — stocky build, dark-brown hair, a healthy complexion, dark-brown eyes, good teeth, moustache and sideburns, wearing brown corduroy trousers, dark-brown boots, a white shirt with long sleeves and no collar, a dark-green waistcoat and dark-brown jacket. Neither his horse nor any of his personal belongings were missing, his nightwear was in his bedroom and no firearms were absent from the house. That suggested he had not intended to harm himself, and indeed, there had been no such indication in his behaviour. The hat he sometimes wore was hanging on a peg in the hall, another indication that he had intended to return.

  His absence was therefore odd, and it had taken Hester a few days to contact the police because she thought he would return — he would often go for long walks alone in the surrounding countryside which he knew intimately, and she thought he had done so on this occasion. Initially, she had not been concerned when he had not returned and she had gone to bed at 9 p.m., falling to sleep immediately as she’d had a tiring day with her child, but when Thomas had not returned for milking the following morning, she did begin to wonder where he was; a further worry was that he had not taken anything with him that might be used during an extended absence. It was at that stage she wondered if he had come to some harm.

  In the file, there was a note to say that the police had checked his usual visiting places — the blacksmith’s shop, the inn, neighbouring farms, the village store and all likely places, but he had not been seen at any of them following his departure from the house. The stationmaster said Thomas had definitely not taken a train anywhere and several people in Elsinby, and on the surrounding farms along the routes he usually walked, had been interviewed by the police, with no sightings of Thomas being reported. A thorough search of the farm and its entire range of buildings had been undertaken without success, and there had also been a physical search of the countryside around Elsinby. That had been done by the police and teams of villagers who were familiar with the landscape and all places of risk, but Thomas had not been found.

  The report added that there was no reason to think that Thomas had harmed himself, the general belief being that he had been involved in an accident after leaving home for one of his long walks. The odd thing was that no one had reported finding him in an injured condition, and none of the hospitals or doctors in the vicinity had treated him. In the file there were several continuation sheets, each saying that further enquiries had been made, but it became clear to me that Thomas Sinclair had never been found, dead or alive.

  Local enquiries had continued for six months after his disappearance with more leisurely enquiries continuing for a further nine months or so. But of Thomas Sinclair, nothing had ever been found. Even so, that particular file had never been closed.

  I made a copy of the salient details and returned the file to its place. I felt quite proud that I had discovered Thomas Sinclair, even though the mystery of his disappearance had apparently not been solved.

  A few days later I had to visit the vicarage at Aidensfield. During my conversation with the vicar, I recalled the visits by the Melrose couple and asked The Reverend Lord, ‘You remember Mr and Mrs Melrose? From Staffordshire? They came looking for their ancestors?’

  ‘I remember them well, Nick. Nice people, but very persistent. They’ve been back several times.’

  I told him about my discovery and he said, ‘Well, that explains part of the mystery,’ he smiled. ‘The Melroses knew about a Thomas in the family and felt sure he would be buried either here or at Elsinby, but I administer both churches and have searched our records — there’s no sign of his grave in any of the local churchyards, neither is his death registered with us. Having heard your story, I now know why!’

  ‘And their baby? Was it baptized at Elsinby?’

  ‘Yes, there is a Maud Sinclair in our registers; she was baptized in 1863. I found that entry for the Melrose couple. That child was the grandmother of Mrs Melrose; it was she who told Kathleen Melrose about the local family connections.’

  ‘So they have examined all your registers?’

  ‘Thoroughly; they found records of Maud’s birth and christening, but no birth or christening for either of her parents — clearly, they came here from another parish. I could not find any record of the marriage of Thomas and Hester, probably for the same reason, although after Thomas disappeared, Hester remarried. Thomas was declared dead after nothing had been heard of him for seven years. He does not have a grave in any of the local churchyards. The Melrose people know all this, Nick, I think their concern was the fate of Thomas. They want to know what happened to him.’

  ‘If he had committed suicide, would he be buried in a churchyard?’ I asked. ‘Didn’t they bury suicides at the local crossroads, with a stake through the body.’

  ‘They did, but that was a long time ago. The practice ended in 1823. If Thomas had died in this parish, Nick, he would have been buried here — or if his body had been found on the moors or somewhere beyond our parish boundary, he’d have been brought here for burial. I’d say he perished on the moors and his body has never been found.’

  ‘So H
ester was left a widow. Who did she marry?’ I asked.

  ‘A local farmer called Sanderson. That was in 1872. He moved into the farm, then he and Hester ran it together for years, passing it down through the eldest son as is the local custom.’

  ‘And Maud?’

  ‘She married Henry Barr, an Elsinby farmer, in 1894. They produced a son called John in 1897; he moved to Staffordshire to work in one of the potteries and after the First World War married Hilda Craggs. Kathleen was their daughter, and she is now Mrs Melrose.’

  ‘So the mystery is what happened to Thomas Sinclair?’ I said. ‘The rest seems an ordinary family story, much like any other.’

  ‘Right, Nick.’

  ‘So why won’t the local people talk about it? Is there something they’re keeping from us — some dark secret? If it was merely a case of Thomas vanishing without trace, you’d think it would still be a talking point, a thing of interest even for the present village.’

  ‘I’ve not been here as long as you, Nick, so they’re not likely to tell me if they won’t tell you. But I know of no dark secret — and neither do the Melroses. Anyway, why are you involved? It’s not a police matter, is it?’

  ‘Pure curiosity, Christian. I like to know what is happening, and what’s been happening, on my patch. If somebody’s covering up something, then I want to know. Call it snooping if you like, but there is something odd about all this. I can’t understand why the local folks refuse to talk about it, especially as it happened such a long time ago.’

  ‘Perhaps it’s because they don’t like people snooping!’ he smiled.

  Following that chat with the vicar, I decided I would not spend any more of my free time trying to discover a solution to the mystery of Thomas’s disappearance.

  Like the other villagers, I would declare the subject closed. But like all lengthy crime enquiries, and especially murder investigations, it is often something totally disconnected which leads to a solution. In this case, it was a visit to a second-hand shop at Keswick in the Lake District.