Constable Around the Village (9 page)

“His pigs die after eight or nine weeks,” said Claude Jeremiah. “He’s got the kiss of death on pigs, has that chap.”

“Well, that’s the sort of pig thoo can expect with an offer like this. Nine quid a pig! Ah’ve never heard sike rubbish.”

“Ten, then?”

Joshua rubbed his bristly chin once more.

“Mak it eleven and we’ll begin talking.”

“That’s a lot of money for a chap to find for starters, Mr Sanders. What about me taking just half a dozen then? That would be £66….”

“Nut a chance. It’s all or nowt. A dozen or nowt, Claude Jeremiah. Twelve quid apiece.”

“Tak eleven pounds ten bob each?” he queried.

Joshua leaned on the gate and pulled a large briar pipe from his jacket pocket. He began to poke and prod it and eventually lit the fearsome machine to produce clouds of sweet-smelling smoke.

“Ah’ll tak eleven pund ten bob apiece then, on one
condition
.”

“Condition?” Claude’s eyes beamed with satisfaction but seconds later changed to a hue which indicated suspicion. Joshua was up to summat.

“Aye. At that price, thoo sees, Ah’s letting them pigs go for next to nowt. It’s a giveaway price.”

“It’s a fair price, Mr Sanders. The market price isn’t as high as that. You can get good store pigs for £10 each….”

“But not of this quality, young man, not of this quality,” and he waved the pipe around like a conductor’s baton as if to emphasise his claims.

“What’s this condition then?” asked Claude Jeremiah, cautiously.

Before announcing the condition which he was to impose upon Claude Jeremiah, Joshua had recognised the little man’s anxiety to buy the pigs; he’d also taken account of his reputation as a confidence man and concluded that the tale about Aunt Jemima’s fortune did not sound true. Joshua therefore needed some kind of surety, for he knew Claude would try to dodge paying cash. It was to be a dreaded cheque transaction.

“Well.” Joshua puffed at the pipe. “Ah’ve an awd donkey down them fields. Nice friendly donkey, it is, used at the seaside for giving kids rides before it came out here to retire.”

“Yes?”

“If thoo wants them pigs at eleven and a half quid apiece, thoo’ll have to buy yon donkey an’ all.”

“But I don’t want a donkey….”

“And Ah don’t want to sell them pigs at £11 10s.0d. apiece.”

“What would I do with a donkey?” asked Claude Jeremiah.

“Sell it, mebbe, in time.”

“What sort of price were you thinking for the donkey then?”

Joshua pursed his lips. “A giveaway price really, fifty quid.”

“Fifty!”

“Aye.”

“Look, Mr Sanders, I don’t want a donkey….”

“But thoo dis want twelve good pigs, for a knockdown, giveaway price…. them’s my terms, Mr Claude Jeremiah Greengrass. And cash for t’donkey.”

“Now look, I can’t find that amount of money….”

“Then thoo dissn’t get my pigs.”

A long silence then descended as Claude Jeremiah gave this proposal his most earnest consideration.

“Forty,” he said. “Cash, for t’donkey.”

“Forty-five,” countered Joshua.

“Right, £45 for the donkey, cash. And a cheque for the pigs?”

“Twelve pigs at £11.10s.0d each. That’ll be £138,” said Joshua like lightning, puffing at his pipe.

Out came Claude Jeremiah’s cheque-book and he wrote a cheque for that amount. Then he delved into an inner pocket of his old coat, well away from his wallet, and
surreptitiously
produced £45 in notes, which he passed to the waiting farmer.

“What about my luck money?” asked Joshua.

That cost Claude Jeremiah another £5, cash.

“Right,” said Joshua. “Thoo can take them pigs when thoo’s ready, but t’donkey stays here.”

“Stays here?” cried Claude Jeremiah.

“Aye, until that cheque gets through yon bank. That story aboot a rich aunt dissn’t seem true ti me, so yon donkey stays put until that cheque is paid inti my bank.”

“But you can’t do that …”

“Ah just have,” grinned Joshua. “Good-morning, Mr Greengrass.”

Claude Jeremiah returned later in the day with a
cattle-truck
and loaded the twelve pigs. Joshua however had been active during Claude’s absence. Realising that Claude might not take them home, but might instead sell them immediately for a profit, he had effectively prevented this by charging a very high price. Claude would have to keep them for a month or two in order to make any profit, upon his payment for the donkey, but just in case the cheque did bounce Joshua rang all the dealers that afternoon to warn them that the Greengrass pigs had been vomiting and seemed to have diarrhoea. That was enough to put any farmer off a deal; swine-fever was the last thing they wanted on their premises.

The outcome was that Claude was compelled to keep the
pigs for a month or so, whether he liked it or not, and meanwhile the donkey remained on Joshua’s farm.

As Joshua had anticipated, a week after the deal the cheque bounced. There were no funds. It had been a
confidence
trick after all and, when this became known, I was called in.

Mr Sanders invited me to join him in a large whisky and a slice of gingerbread as he explained how he’d been conned into parting with £138 worth of pigs for a worthless cheque. I was not told of the donkey at that stage. So far as I knew therefore, I had a case of false pretences on my hands, and a ready-made suspect for the crime.

“Ah doesn’t want this to go to court,” said Sanders when he’d finished his tale.

“Hang on, Mr Sanders,” I said. “If you report this to me on an official basis, I’ll have to take Claude Jeremiah to court. He’s committed a criminal offence.”

“But if Ah
knew
he’d try it on, and took steps to deal with it myself, Ah’ve not been conned, eh?”

“Er, no,” I had to admit.

He then told me about the donkey deal and I laughed at the notion. I wondered who’d conned who—Claude had unwittingly paid for the pigs at a moderate price.

“So what do you want me to do?”

“See him and put the wind up him,” said Joshua.

“That’ll do no good!” I laughed. “Claude Jeremiah’s my one regular court attender. He knows more about dealing with the court than anyone I know. You’ll not put the wind up him.”

“Well, Ah thought you might do summat, just to cap him.”

“Come on, Mr Sanders. You’ve got something up your sleeve. What is it?”

“Well, Ah sees it like this. He’s not paid for them pigs, so that makes ’em still mine. Right?”

“It might need a civil court action to definitely state that,” I told him.

“Nay, be damned,” he growled, “Ah’ll not have that. Them’s my pigs, Mr Rhea, and mak no mistake about it.”

“So what’s your plan?”

“Tell him you know about his dud cheque, tell him he might go to court for false pretences or whatever you said it was, and then give him another month to pay me. Cash.”

“He’ll never pay you! You shouldn’t have sold him those pigs!”

“But you’ll do that, for me, eh?”

“It might get him off the hook, and I’ll forget about the donkey?”

“Aye, for now.”

Claude Jeremiah Greengrass had won so many battles against me and my colleagues that I felt justified in going along with Joshua’s little scheme. After all, if he had not been deceived in any way by Claude Jeremiah’s stories, the episode was nothing more than a bad business transaction and therefore of no interest to the police. So I went along to Claude’s home and told him what I knew.

From the little man, I got a tale of woe and sorrow. He told me how he’d bought the pigs knowing of a ready market for them, but old Joshua had stopped all that by telling everybody for miles around that there was summat wrong with the animals. And no one would pay the price he’d paid.

“So, Mr Rhea, I can’t sell the pigs to get my money back. If I’d sold them straight away, I’d have made enough to pay Mr Sanders and a little bit for me on the donkey deal.”

“Claude Jeremiah,” I said. “I know you too well. You would have made a profit, but kept the lot for yourself and you never would have paid Sanders. I know that, and he knows that. But he’s made a very generous offer—he’ll allow you one month to pay. You’ve a month to make £138 and square up with him. Otherwise it’s court for you.”

“A month? I’ll never make that sort of cash in a month, Mr Rhea, besides, he’s got my donkey.”

“If you choose to let your donkey graze on his land, that’s a private deal between yourselves,” I dismissed the problem.

I left Claude Jeremiah to his worries and told Sanders what I’d done. He smiled and asked me to go and visit the farm in a month’s time. I made a note in my diary.

A month later to the day, I made the bumpy journey to
Stang Farm and found Joshua in the stackyard, smoking his pipe.

“Ah heard yon bike coming up our lane,” he said. “It’ll be about Greengrass, eh?”

“Has he paid?” I asked.

“Not a penny. I knew he wouldn’t. Right, Mr Rhea, my cattle-truck’s ready. Let’s go.”

“Go where?” I cried.

“Greengrass’s place, to pick up my pigs.”

“You’re retrieving them?”

“Aye, they’re still my pigs. You’ll be needed to prevent a breach of the peace, I reckon.”

And so I followed his rickety old vehicle down to the Greengrass abode and there we confronted the little man. He had no money; he had been cleaned out of cash by Sanders’ actions in selling him the donkey, and his expenses on food had not allowed him to make up the deficit. So the pigs were herded squealing and protecting into the cattle-truck and Sanders smiled at me.

“There’ll be no court case, Mr Rhea?”

“Not on this occasion,” I smiled.

“What about the cost of feeding those pigs?” asked Claude Jeremiah before we left. “I’ve had your twelve pigs on my premises for over a month, and I’ve fed them all that time….”

“And they look very well on it,” smiled Joshua.

“You’ll pay me the going rate for boarding them?”

“That just equals the rent of that field of mine where you graze your donkey,” smiled Joshua. “I reckon we’re square.”

“But you’ve had a month’s free accommodation for those pigs!” came in Claude Jeremiah. “You can’t do that.”

“Ah’ve just done it,” grinned Joshua. “Call for your donkey when you can. The rental goes up next week. If you can’t pay, I could always sell the donkey to settle your overdue account.”

And off he drove, very happy with himself.

Claude Jeremiah Greengrass looked miserable in the extreme. He’d been beaten by this crafty old farmer and I was delighted.

“You wouldn’t like to buy a nice donkey, Mr Rhea?” asked Claude Jeremiah as I climbed aboard my motor-cycle.

“From you? It might have epizootic lymphamgitis!” I laughed as I rode into the sunshine. I left the little man with a very puzzled frown on his weathered features and learned later that it was impossible to catch that donkey. It had lived for years in that field, defying all attempts to get it into a halter or a vehicle.

“If anybody can catch yon donkey, Mr Rhea,” smiled Joshua a week later, “They can have it.”

It could be said that police officers are the dustmen of society, many of them spending their days cleaning up the offal left by the baser forms of humanity. It is true they do spend a lot of man-hours dealing with matters that no one else would cope with, even if they were ordered to. Happily, there is a list of things which must not be done by
policemen
in the course of their duties and this includes the collection and recovery of money under affiliation orders, the collection and recovery of money under maintenance orders (except the acceptance of monies paid to a
police-station
) the collection of market tolls, the duties of mayor’s attendant, or town-crier, the regular cleaning of
police-stations
when the Home Secretary has directed that it is not a police duty, and any other work not connected with police duty which the Home Secretary decides is not to be
performed
by the police.

Strangely, we are allowed to perform a weird range of other duties, like enforcing cinematograph acts and
regulations
and borough byelaws; then there are billeting duties, the inspection of domestic servants’ registries, common lodging-houses, hackney carriages, licensed boats, beach trading, markets, fire appliances and street lamps, and we may also issue pedlars’ certificates.

In addition, there are diseases of animals, licensing matters, duties under the Shops Act and a host of other miscellaneous odds and sods that no one else seems anxious to do. So the police have to do all these things, as well as fight crime, keep traffic flowing, and battle with pickets, demonstrators and yobbos.

It is difficult to specify the most unsavoury of our duties, but for my mind the execution of a distress warrant is one of the worst. This document was not uncommon in
underprivileged
urban areas but I scarcely expected to be faced with one during my spell in rural Aidensfield.

It was with some interest therefore that I answered the call to attend Ashfordly Police Station one fine morning for a chat with Sergeant Bairstow. When he spoke on the
telephone
, he gave no indication of the turmoil that was to come, but I should have realised it would be something very complicated. He loved giving me the awkward jobs.

“Ah, Nick,” he said as I walked in, removing my helmet with a flourish.

“Good-morning, Sarge.” I used the diminutive of his rank, an indication of my progress on the beat. I might even be allowed to refer to him by his Christian name during off-duty moments—only time would tell.

“Nick,” he said smiling with what I discovered was an evil grin. “I’ve a nice little job for you.”

“Something special?” I wondered if I had to interview the Lady of the Manor, or talk to a lovely girl about something fascinating. Maybe, he’d solved a crime and wanted me to arrest the suspect….

“Yes,” he said as he lifted a file from the desk. “A distress warrant. We’ve got one to execute in Crampton.”

“A distress warrant?” I opened my mouth with
astonishment.
“Here?”