The Beater's Tale

The Generous Host presented his backside to the dying embers of the fire.  Closing time was two hours ago; even the most grateful landlord hopes the punters might go home some time before dawn breaks. But in the back bar there was no sign of cessation.

It had got a bit quiet around 9.30pm, but B, with the skills that made him justifiably famous, had engineered a merger between the shootists in the back bar and the beaters and picker ups in the front, using that most polished tool of the investment bankers armoury (“Drinks on us, in the back bar!”).  Since then the hooley had flourished and the Generous Host’s credit card was slowly melting under the strain.  The landlord had changed the barrel at ten-thirty and he was beginning to consider another trip to the cellar.


There is nothing like the end of the season, and the knowledge you’ll be paying for your own booze until next September, for sharpening the thirst.  And that last opportunity for the serious shredding of reputation and character that is so much an integral part of English shooting society must not be missed. So let’s join them for pints mild and bitter and conversation bitter and mild.

The Generous Host is telling a story about a Scotsman, the Pakistani Ambassador, and a Taxidermist – but we’ll leave that one to another time.  B is leaning on the bar with his head very close to that of the Brigadier’s Wife.  You might well suspect seduction, but B is a little rotund for her tastes, and in any case B is being wickedly indiscreet about Walter and his recent company flotation and who exactly was discovered to be on the payroll.  Walter is talking to the Keeper, about three partridge days for next year and trying to explain why the company will be paying a high price for two, and that the correspondence should relate only to those two. The Keeper is new to high finance, especially as practised by low persons, but is starting to grasp the concept.

In the snug corner, dear old Weobley, top shot with a pair of Purdeys,  is talking to dear old Roger, top beater with a pair of spaniels.  Mr Weobley thinks Roger is very drunk; but he isn’t. Roger thinks old Weobley is very drunk; he is.

“Rum lot, this lot,” says Weobley  “I did think they might show a bit more gratitude over the way my bank sorted out that loan for them before the election.  Of course, one does it for the good of the party and of the country, of the country, yes.  But it is customary, you know to...”

“Customary, Mr Weobley?”

“To...err, you know, to...um...mark their appreciation in some public way...”

“A vote of thanks, you mean, Mr Weobley?”

“Ha-ha-ha. No, no, Roger, my dear chap – two more please landlord – no, by, um, well...  Well, these things don’t matter to me, of course, but Jane, she would have loved to be Lady Weobley, and nice for her, you know. Had to put up with a lot over the years whilst I served commerce and country and what not.  Don’t care myself naturally, but to be Lady Weobley would have been nice for her, impress the butcher and so on”

Roger looks utterly blank as he considers why the government would want to honour that rather fierce lady; then he gets it:

“Ah, you mean you would be Sir Weobley.  Aaaah.”

“Shush-shush-shush! Just between us dear chap. But yes, I would be Sir Frank Weobley.  Does have a certain ring I must admit.  Not my thing really, of course, doesn’t matter to me. Just for the lady-wife you know.  Don’t tell this lot. Jealous you know. Worked hard for all this, they don’t realise that”

“Yes, of course. SIR Frank”

“Shush, shush, strictly private, just between us, no more need be said”

“Of course, Mr W”

As the sadly still Mr Weobley disappears to the gents, B wanders over wondering, with that City instinct for valuable information, what all that was about.

Roger tells him.  “Not to be repeated Mr B.”

“Of course, Roger.”

Roger stops by the Brigadier’s Wife, and B pauses by the Generous Host.  Who turns to.....and so it goes.

But now Mr Weobley is leaving:

“Goodnight Sir Frank!”
“’Onour to shoot with the h’aristocracy!”
“Sleep well mi Lord Weobley”
“See you soon Sir Frankie”
“Night night Knight!”

He shakes his head in modesty and embarrassment; but can’t help feeling, as he gets in the back of the Land Rover, a frisson of pleasure as to what should have been.
    

And a Spaniel in a Stubble Field

You might well recognise the cast; it is indeed the usual suspects, gathered in a beautiful corner of .... did we give this away before, as the torrential rain tore down the village street?  I think we did; if we didn't, and for anybody who worries about these things, it is Wiltshire.

Last year’s partridge day on the Wiltshire Downs consisted of a large breakfast and a slow drive back to Chelsea enlivened only by the frantic dance of windscreen wipers.  But here we are again, fifteen months later.  Here again, led fearlessly by the Generous Host whose rain dance seems to have worked this time.  It is a crispingly clear sunny January late afternoon, not a cloud in the sky, a reddening glow on the western horizon, a certainty of frost tonight. The GH has procured a late pheasant day to replace last year’s washed out partridge day. 

And what a day it has been.  The wily January pheasants have finally learnt that if you see a well spaced line of tweedy chaps it is not a good idea to head directly for them.  They rocket steeply upwards away from the beaters and dogs, curving and swerving, escaping sideways and backwards and to stratospheric heights, knowing that if they can just win through the next two minutes they will get to enjoy spring and all the joys thereof.

Not a lot of birds are left, but oh, what amazing birds survive, what worthy opponents they have become.  The tweedy chaps may, by virtue of gunpowder and lead, think they have the upper hand, but the birds are educated now.  They are quicker, higher, and faster than the earthbound shootists far below, and they know the subtle arts of undermining confidence.  A gun who misses a high curling bird will never get on them again; he’ll shoot below and in front and above; each time he’ll curse and pull the trigger further below or in front or above.  The pheasants snigger, gliding at full power and watching the sweating grumbling line below.  In this they are in unconscious league with the beaters and pickers- up, who watch disbelievingly, tutting, groaning, knowing how much better they could do this.  Occasionally a fusillade of eight shots will ring out, a bird does not make it, and five different guns make a mental note to add that to their personal bag. It is strange indeed how in January the individual totals always add up at least twice the actual bag on the game cart.

The shooters swing and groan and stretch:  “I was right on that one, saw him shake, he’ll be dead behind that wood.”  The picker-up smothers a giggle and in pretence of looking, goes  behind the hedge for a quick fag.  And the pheasant glides to an elegant landing in the aforesaid wood, serenely strutting away among the rusty bracken and wizened blackberries. 

Finally, the keeper blows the horn, two pheasants flap elegantly and slowly over the line, the mad spaniels are unleashed, the sun sinks below the languid curves of the chalk horizon. The guns look hopefully towards those birds that must have come down a long way back.  The pickers-up try to look as though they are looking.  The Generous Host tells a last funny story.  The guns guffaw and then fall silent. The spaniels run around in great circles pointlessly swishing the stubble. The labradors gaze reflectively over the field of dreams.

That eerie winter silence falls upon the land.  The light fades, the frost creeps out of the wood and down the hill.  A distant pheasant lets out a cackle of triumph as it sweeps up to roost.  The guns are sheathed.  A beady fox grins from the hedge as the little army departs.

It is the end of the day; and for most present, the end of the season. The log fire in the King’s Arms beckons, the beer in the cellar is at peak perfection, stories are been mentally polished.  The half empty game cart trundles away. 

Night descends upon the downs.