The Fading of the Light

On the top of the hill....

The Keeper occasionally finds his way in; and no doubt the local poachers wander through. But, keeping a watchful eye for these gentlemen about their lawful (or unlawful) occasions, it is a good place to meet for a chat.  Discreet and shaded in this forgotten corner, the brambles and saplings twist together; wearied trees lean ever more towards the ground. For the hungry there are still a few withered rosehips and aged blackberries. For the very hungry, on a mild day, even a few bugs and beetles. But not today, the ground is hard and crisped with an icing of snow. 

 Not that that has stopped a gathering taking place.  The last day of the season is over, the sun is low across the valley and the guns have fallen silent. Beyond the slumped wooden five barred gate all is peaceful. The participants of this last day have gathered in this discreet glade to review, with today’s busy drives still fresh in their minds, how it went, what might be a good plan for next year, how things could be done better; and of course, plans for the summer, the outlook for the children, all the usual gossip that is mulled over when a group of friends know they may not see each other for a while. Or ever again, perchance.  

 These are the survivors; these are the ones that flew bravely and landed safe, the ones that flew high (or in some cases very low) and avoided the barking guns. And the ones that sat tight in the dense places as the spaniels snuffled about and the beater’s heavy boots and thin sticks came breath-holdingly close.  They remember those who are not there this day; and will never be there again.  Then the cheerfulness breaks through, they are here and summer is a’coming. They roll and strut and nod.

 Then, the sun sinks from sight, the light fades, the cold creeps into bare feet. The distant threat of a prowling fox distracts the crack and the crowd disperse, flying to roost in the trees or strutting with nervous pattering self-importance along the wood edge to their chosen spot for the night.

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At the bottom of the hill...
 

The Keeper occasionally finds his way in here too, and the local poachers wander through, each keeping a watchful eye on the other. Watching these wary persons is a further delight for those who know this to be a good place to meet for a chat. In discreet and shadowy corners the beaters and shooters titter and gossip together; wearied fingers tip ever more beer to the ground. For the hungry there are packets of crisps and a rack of ageing dusty packets of pork scratchings. For the thirsty; a pint of mild, or couple of local brewed bitters. Especially this day when the ground outside is hard and crisped with an icing of snow.

 Not that that has stopped a gathering taking place. The last day of the season is over, the sun is low across the valley, and the guns are making a lot of noise, five of them slumped against the old wooden bar.  The participants of the last day have gathered in this dusty old pub to review, with today’s busy drives still fresh in their minds, how it went, what might be a good plan for next year, how things could be done better; and of course, plans for the summer, the outlook for the children, all the usual gossip that is mulled over when a group of friends know they may not see each other for a while.  Or ever again, perchance.

 These are the syndicate members, they have shot all the days and drives they could, taking birds that flew high, sometimes a little low, every one noted by the yelping barking dogs. Oft times the birds fell in dense wooded places so the spaniels snuffled about aided by the beater’s heavy boots and thin sticks crushing the blackberry briars.  They’ll all remember the birds shot this day; rehearsing them through their minds again and again.  Then the cheerfulness breaks through, it’s been a great year and summer is a’coming. They roar and snigger and nod.

Then, the sun sinks from sight, the light fades, the cold creeps into booted feet. The distant scream of a prowling fox dissects the crack and the crowd disperse, climbing into the driving seats of Land Rovers or strutting away to the car park swinging Porsche keys to convey them away for the night.

                                                                         ---

Old George, the head beater, lives at the top of the village and rolls away in the twilight toward a snoozing fireside and warming tobacco. As he rounds the corner an old cock pheasant jumps up onto the bank of the lane. They nod and wink.

 “See you next season” they each mutter as they pass.

More Stuffing, Vicar?

In some corners of rural England ancient traditions survive, if tenuously.  You may think of your local clergyman as having a distinctly pink tinge to his dog collar nowadays, probably a vegetarian, member of the RSPB, Grauniad reader; in short, not so much the church militant as just Militant.  But in or two remote counties, in upland parishes, the huntin’ shootin’ parson does survive; a rare beast and a shy one, but a welcome figure among the sporting cognoscenti.

This morning we are in Cumberland, the verge of the Lake District, beautiful and wonderful shooting land.  Below an ancient wood, lined across a steep wet grass field upon which a cow would have difficulty standing with any degree of dignity, are an assorted – indeed the word motley is probably not overstating it – line up of nine figures with shotguns, eyeing each other surreptitiously.

That is, apart from one, whose eyes are raised, to heaven, you may think by the dog collar above the secondhand Barbour.  The Reverend Julian Taggart. A sporting parson. In fact, a parson newly inducted to shooting by the blandishments of certain tweedy parishioners at various tea parties, post Morning Service coffees, and (whisper it softly) a couple of excursions into the village pub, at his new and very rural parish.

Large parts of that parish are in the ownership of a well preserved estate, with a moderately well preserved proprietor, the 5^th Lord Lowesdale.  We have met that splendid rural magnate before, in his stately home, open to the hordes at £7 per head, guide book and cream teas extra. But it is for its shooting possibilities that Lord Lowesdale so loves his rolling acres, and today he is in his natural habitat, in ancient and ill matched tweeds, hosting a local syndicate day.  Not that such a grand personage strictly needs to host, but as the guns are local, and the head keeper is a close drinking companion of at least two of the finer shots, mi’lord does not want any risk of miscalculation of the 200 bird allowance for the day.

Here they are; three farmers, the local garage proprietor, our parson, a rural estate agent, a local businessman, and two guests, one of them the bank manager of the businessman, the other a nephew of one of the farmers. 

We’ve met that nephew before as well, a local lad made good, a City banker with a black Range Rover Sport and a house in Chelsea. Yes, it is indeed B, born and raised in this very parish where his uncle still farms; and puzzles over what exactly it is his nephew does in those far off glass towers.  B once spent an afternoon explaining it; his uncle, more confused than ever, wonders where B keeps all those hog sides and what a wheat future is, as opposed to wheat in a heap on the granary floor.

Lord Lowesdale surveys this line up somewhat dubiously and stations himself between B and the parson.  Between God and Mammon, he might have thought, if he had that turn of mind.  His radio crackles, m’lord applies his whistle loudly, and the assembled multitude look alert.

The Reverend Mr Taggart continues to gaze at the sky, not as you may think, seeking the early high bird, but trying to remember everything he had been told by his mentors at the pub and in his two lessons at the shooting school.  He is starting to realise that not much has actually sunk in and that most of what has is completely contradictory.

At the far end of the line the action begins; an early flurry, a couple of shots, the nervous whinnying of a shaking spaniel.  The vicar frowns in concentration and moves his feet. And then moves them again. And once more.  To the right of B a high bird drifts across.  B swings onto it much too late and misses with both barrels. Lord Lowesdale sighs deeply, though consoling himself inwardly that that is one more for the family day next week.

Then a shout: “For’wrd”, calls of “Over, over” and from the wood sails a convoy of birds, splitting and curling and curving and soaring and swooping.  The shots ring out, cartridges are ejected and busy hands stuff warming barrels.  The man of god looks eagerly to left and right, thrusting the borrowed gun hither and thither. Then he spots a possibility, a bird swooping rather than soaring, drifting low from the wood. The gun is shouldered, the trigger is pulled, and Lord Lowesdale, who is looking skywards, is surprised to find himself in a cloud of feathers.

The vicar sees another bird approaching him at head height to his right and discharges the second barrel. This time it is B who is distracted by a cloud of feathers rolling past.  The vicar fumbles with gun (left hand), cartridges (right hand), pocket (fastened), ear defenders (slipping over forehead), feet (tangled).  The noble host catches B’s eye and raises a bushy eyebrow. B raises both of his in return. 

They both survey the distant wood and hear that promising cackle of pheasants rising.  Lord L takes two steps back and at the same time calls to B in a stentorian whisper, intended to convey a subtle hint further down the line: “That’s enough for a duvet; a couple more and we can stuff the pillows as well”.

The vicar smiles beatifically at this shooting field repartee about which he has heard so much, and swings his twelve bore across the wooded horizon.  B, thinking with that incisiveness that has made him legendary in City dealing rooms, calls “Vicar, hang on a minute, you’re shooting so well that we had better get a loader to help you”.

The beaters in front and the pickers up behind breathe a sigh of relief that causes the few remaining leaves to tremble on the ancient trees. All is serene. And by next season, after some coaching from the assistant keeper discretely incentivised by a case of Lord L’s whisky,  the Reverend Mr Taggart will be pulling down the high ones almost as well as his sporting parishioners.

The Keepers Tale

It was 2am. Crisped leaves were twisting a final farewell to the groaning trees and swirling across the muddy 4x4’s in the Kings Head car park. The faded pub sign groaned and creaked; the gents loo door had been left open and slammed back and forth; the garden tap dripped self importantly into an old tin.  The landlord had turned the outside lights off at 11.30, and drawn down the blinds.  A stormy night in the country…

In the back bar the lights were still on, the conversation washed back and forth across the battered brown tables.  The landlord leaned professionally, his face caressed by a soft smile, the gleeful face of a public house proprietor who watches the premium malts undergo vigorous attack by well tweeded customers. 

And well tweeded customers they were indeed. None less than the Usual Suspects Syndicate; in persons.

The Generous Host was in the position he automatically adopted in any public house – viz: toasting his posterior by the fire whilst telling a story.  In fact, it was yet again the one about the Pakistani Ambassador and the affair of his missing motor car.  The audience had heard it many times before but still roared at the approach of the familiar punch line.

With his back to the bar was B, finding the polished caress of the ancient wood helpful in counteracting the increasing influence of the Glenmacfeckly, with a glass to his left, and due to a moment of forgetfulness, another to his right. 

Old Mr Weobly had long departed, but his nephew Wayne Weobly was maintaining the family reputation for never missing an opportunity for useful financial information, malicious gossip, or a free drink.

Naturally, The Keeper was amongst those present.  A shoot keeper’s duties are many and varied and this was one The Keeper took seriously indeed. No shoot day was complete until each guest had finally retired to bed or under the table. The Keeper could out drink any man that ever shot here; and still be up at 6am to begin the walking in of the birds for the next day.

Indeed it was a most majestic group of shootists, and most majestic of all was the familiar figure of Stuffer; presently settled back on the settle but eyes sparkling with mischief – or was it just from the flames catching the oak logs?  We will settle for mischief; and we will be right.

The chuckles at the thought of the Pakistani Ambassador and the occupant of the back seat of his car slowly subsided.  The landlord had been pondering for some time a matter which was perplexing him and finally gave the thoughts form. B being the closest possible confidante, he leaned in that gentleman’s direction and confided.  B gave him a beady look and pointed out that the landlords remarking of the coincident looks of Stuffer and The Keeper was indeed well founded.  “Not really surprising, as they are brothers”.

The landlord let out a deep “Ahh” as though therein hid some deep scandal.

“That’s how we got to be here” continued B “But we had to pay cash, of course”.

“Aaah-ha” said the landlord.

The glances in his direction had not been missed by Stuffer, who, suddenly reminded of something, nodded at his brother, rose from the settle and slipped out of the back door.    

The Keeper glanced briefly at the Generous Host and cleared his throat.

“Tomorrow gentlemen we are at De’Ath Court. We’re going to meet at 9am at the back door of the house. Not the front, if you please, gentlemen, there is an ancient tradition that the front door be not used”

“To avoid the bailiffs?”

“Very witty Mr Weobly. But no; it is because of an ancient legend that brings doom to the head of the family there. It is a strange lonely place up on that wold; long long winters.  The family have always been great fox hunters and there are lots of wily foxes living in those broken down woods, even in the ruins of the chapel they say; devil foxes they must be, but there never was a fox that a De’ath of De’ath Court would not pursue”

His voice dropped and he fixed his audience with a penetrating gaze. B felt a shudder run down his spine and sought to sooth it by emptying the right hand glass. Just at that point Stuffer re-entered and joined the silent group.

“They do say” The Keeper continued “that when the head of the family is about to die that the foxes of De’Ath Wold gather in a great circle around the front door of the house.”

The Generous Host giggled nervously.

“You may laugh gentlemen, you may laugh, but in 1976, to my own knowledge, they were there for the death of Major De’Ath; he opened the front door at midnight and found his certain fate gathered, all silent and waiting for him”

The rattle of a collapsing log in the grate startled B, who coughed and staggered for the back door, muttering something about the gents. The rest of the group stirred uneasily and reached for their mugs and glasses.

B fumbled with the back door and went out, slamming the door behind him. Then, in the silence, the group heard a strange muffled shriek and a frantic scrabbling at the door.

Weobly was the nearest and opened it, to admit what appeared to be the ghost of B, a visage changed from fire-engine red to lime wash white.

“Crikey old man, what’s happened?”

The Generous Host pushed past and into the yard. He jumped to see a ring of cock pheasants surrounding the door. But the Glenmacfeckly had not worked quite so hard on him as on B, and he noticed also the canes under them; and that the magnificent specimen in the centre seemed to be perched on a wooden base. He sniggered and went back inside to where B was on the settle by the fire, being given a restorative by Stuffer.

The Generous Host caught Stuffers eye and sat down next to B. “What’s the matter, old boy, look as though you’ve seen a ghost?”

B pointed at the door “Out there…”

“There’s nothing out there old man, I just had a look, all quiet, just the wind, and a lot of dead leaves”

“I’m giving up shooting” croaked B “maybe too late, but I promise I will never shoot another pheasant”

“There, there, old man, you’re delirious, you’ve been mixing the malts, they’ll be the death of you….”

B spluttered and began a coughing fit. A fit so intense that he did not notice Stuffer and his keeper brother quietly going back in to yard to put the pheasants back in the Keepers truck, and the magnificent stuffed specimen for Old Mr Weobly back into Stuffer’s Landy. 

 

 

 

 

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.

Left and Right

You may not be aware, but it’s been a wonderful year for grouse.  Extraordinary.  Never seen a season like it. Five invitations I’ve had, and each one of them to a well stocked moor, and each moor with a jolly nice shoot hut and ample liquid supplies.  None that one indulges of course.

“Can’t, driving, old boy”

“Really? You should get a driver old son, I don’t know how I’d get by without mine”

Pah.  Bloody estate agents.  What have we come to, with estate agents paddling across grouse moors; and having drivers, for goodness sake. Rum lot, probably spend the day lotting the moor up into suitable parcels for development.  But I have to admit this one could shoot.

He had arrived in a white gold lined Range Rover Sport at 9.25am, just in time for the instructions, his chap handing him all the kit out of the back.  All new and shiny of course, and a triumph of cheque book over taste.  Orange socks as well.  Dash it all.  What is matter with blue or red, I ask you, orange! The final twist was from the host and moor owner, one of those tenth generation old colonel types who breed so well in the north, who looked at the socks and the white Rangy and the tweedy man unzipping the Purdeys and through the upper lip caterpillar snorted “Bloody bankers”. 

I pointed out that he was not a cutting edge professional such as yours truly, but it was obvious that such distinctions of class were lost on our host, who said “It’ll be traffic wardens next” and marched off to the beaters, a finer class of chap altogther.

The estate agent was not phased by any of these matters and proudly told us he was about to pull off the property deal of the year and brandished two mobile phones at us.

“Better not let the Colonel see that” one of our team said, seared by the Colonel’s reaction to his i-phone going off in mid-drive the previous year; “Lead shot direct to the bottom would be less painful”.

“Nah, this is the big one, I’m not losing the deal or the day.  Move with the times mate, this is business.  In’it?”

We went to our pegs and business commenced. It really was a superb day, lots of the little g-birds and very challenging. I did notice our Two Phoned new friend had his head at funny angles at various times between drives and there was a lot of maneuverings between pockets, but also that the grouse near him were coming down; he certainly had a good eye.  But so, I noticed, did the Colonel, who was waving the old eyebrows in his direction at frequent intervals.

On the 3^rd drive Two Phones and I were not in butts, but in grassy tussocks in a shallow valley.  The whistle sounded to warn us to pay attention to the start of proceedings, but now Two Phones was in serious action, Nokia’s fully deployed, one in each hand, gun tucked under his arm.  And I could see what he could not, which was a fully primed British Army ex-Colonel advancing at fast march from the rear.

“You! You! What the devil are you doing?  Damn it sir, the drive is underway.”

Not easy to deal with this sort of rear attack when fully conversational on two mobiles, but the shrug and the toss of the head was not the best calculated response. 

The Colonel stepped it up “Mobile telephones are forbidden on this shoot.  Forbidden, not allowed, I have never…”

What he had never we shall never either, because his attention had been distracted by a brace of grouse approaching from the left.  I think we all saw them at once, I began to raise my gun, but old Two Phones in one swift manoeuvre dropped both phones, applied Purdey to upper hip, fired both barrels, ignored two grouse crashing to the ground, and retrieved both phones: “Sorry mate, bit of action on the other line.”

The Colonel swerved at this point and went rather pale.  As he passed I said, unable to think of any words that exactly fitted the situation “Lovely drive, Colonel”

He paused, with the look of a man who is contemplating an immediate sale of the ancestral lands, snorting so hard the upper lip fungus blew around like a palm tree in a hurricane. 

“I should send him home; but the [military term deleted] bugger is too good for that.”

And so it did prove.  By lunch our hero was sitting next to the Colonel and the body language strongly suggested the Colonel was about to invest in real estate in a big way. And that there was a gold Sports Rangy on order to replace the white one.

   

The Interview

“B; my dear chap....”

Andrew’s massive hand reached out and casually crushed mine. 

“So good of you to come.  Let me introduce the rest of us – no, no; first let me give you a snifter”.

A large tumbler of golden life was pushed across the table in front of me.  I eyed it, hoping my hand might recover consciousness enough to lift it in the next few minutes.  The introductions were made.  To the casual observer, here were eight City types meeting in one of those old fashioned City restaurants that in truth survive more from the tourist business than the bowler hat business.  But beneath the pinstriped uniforms lurked the terrible truth – this was Andrew McTavish’s Scottish shooting syndicate; and your nervous and trembling correspondent, surreptitiously shaking his hand behind his back in the hope of restoring some circulation, was here in hope of chumming in to said syndicate and thus some fine shooting in dearest Albion.

“We should go to the table.  Drink up B.  Not like you to hold back from finest Talisker"

It was obvious that the rest of the syndicate, Andrew’s old lags, had been here a brace of doubles earlier than me, presumably to dissect my character and parse my reputation.  But as I downed the Isle of Skye’s finest product, it was also obvious that my brace of doubles was all in the same glass.  I had a momentary sensation of being hit by a tank and my hand came suddenly back to full functionality.

The little procession proceeded across the dining room with some impressed looking tourist types gawking at us.  No doubt, next week they would be telling the folks back in Hicksville, Wisconsin, (population: 1,926) that they had dined in the presence of the Governor and Court of the Bank of England.  Andrew directed us to our places with him in the middle, and me next to him.

“Now, B, we know your taste for all things Italian...” - much guffawing from those present who had obviously received a full briefing on various complications arising on a business trip to Milan a few years before, complications at the expense of yours truly but instigated by Andrew whose recommended Milan nightspot had turned out to be even more dubious than the quality of bonds he flogged to widows and orphans to earn the crust.

“...For all things Italian, so I ordered a rather jolly Barolo for tonight.”  Indeed he had.  There was a uncorked bottle at each place, together with a massive balloon glass.

“But first we traditionally wash down the salmon with a further soupcon of Talisker”.  A tray of overfilled golden tumblers appeared and were distributed amongst those present.  “Sláinte!”  He drained the glass at one flourish.

More training should have made for this event.  I operated the glass and had an odd sensation of the tank backing up over me.

What the loyal reader will be expecting now is an insight into Scottish shooting, tales of glens full of whirring pheasants and vast moors trembling with eager grouse, the craic at the lodge in the evening, the exuberance of the ghillies and their bonnie lasses at post shooting balls.

But, I am sorry to say, all this has passed unremarked into the highland mist of memory.  I do recall another pair of bottles of the Barolo appearing and Andrew’s vast hand knocking one over so that it poured over Gregor sitting opposite.  “Christ!” exclaimed Andrew, “That’s a calamity, it’s drinking so well”.

And I recall Philip rising incredibly slowly to his feet and announcing:  “I am going outside, and may be some time”, before turning, and with great dignity, one tartan brace hanging to the floor, disappearing out of the room.

“He nicked that line from somewhere” said the alarmingly red faced broker opposite me, “was it Robert Louis Stephenson?”

But we resume the narrative with my Blackberry ringing in my ear; with me finding it in my jacket breast pocket which I was surprised to find under my head; and most unexpectedly of all, with my slow dawning awareness that I was in the guest room bed, fully dressed , down to and including my brogues.  An uneasy feeling began to grow that Mrs B was (a) probably aware of this; and (b) probably not totally happy about it.

The noise of the phone continued and by a process of thoughtful reasoning it occurred to me to answer it:

“Hullo?” (groan)

“Morning B!”

“Oh lawks.  Morning Andrew.  What time is it?”

“6.49 old boy; just going to the Savoy for breakfast, then off home to bed. Care to join us for haggis and egg?”

I thought not.

“Having fun elsewhere, old boy?  What a hound dog you are, B.  Anyway, thought I would let you know you are in the syndicate, you’re just the sort of eighth man we are looking for. Though you been kind enough to pick up last night’s bill did help.  Much appreciated by us all.  See you at Cally Lodge in October”

Deer Oh Dear

Several attractive ladies of various ages sat blushing in various alcoves, the pint of Black Sheep was settling on the counter-top, the hound was in his favourite place, and the familiar Stuffer cackle dominated the saloon bar.

The hand powered into the air in greeting: “B, you old bar-steward; what are you doing here? Nobody asked you grouse shooting – again?” He patted the empty stool next to him.

“I might ask the same of you” I said, trying to force a grin, “Shouldn’t you be away in the north parting rich Americans from hard earned dollars?”

“No, that’s your job B, ripping off the widows and orphans, that’s what you City lads are trained for – though in your case B, I should think it’s pretty instinctive.”

I worked harder on cranking up the unwilling grin.

“But,” he continued “As it happens, I have been with an American client and getting him an introduction to high society. And seeing you asked, he has rewarded me rather appropriately. Care for a Black Sheep?”

It appeared. I settled on the next stool, knowing that the oncoming anecdote was as inevitable as a high plains tornado and that one best be seated and watered for it.

“I don’t suppose you know the Duke of Clapham, B, Jonny Clapham? Nice chap, not a bad shot now, I gave him a few lessons and sorted him out. He lets me run the stalking in the park at Penge Abbey. Always impresses the Yanks – real live Duke, not utterly gaga, great mouldy house with lots of blotchy furniture, acres of woods and parkland and some easy shots at a stag or two. Not that I tell them they’re easy shots of course. And Jonny, for an extra five hundred pounds, will put them up in the east wing overnight, let them be eaten by blue blooded bed bugs, and in the evening even take bread with them. Great grandfather’s claret is extra. It’s from Majestic really of course, pull half the label off and throw dirty water over it.

Nearly went wrong this time though.

This yankee chap is in hard drives or hard oil or hard cheese or something in Des Moines, he arrived with his grandson, Dwayne or Dwight, nasty surly lad of 15 with his hat on backwards. But plenty of spare rooms so no problem at the Abbey, and Darren behaved pretty well whilst we were in the hide. Not a squeak, entire time on his iphone, never looked up. Could have been in Des Moines for all he cared.

Granpaps got a very nice stag, I took it behind a bush and gralloched it, and we posed for the hunter home from the hill pictures in front of the Abbey. Then dinner with the Duke at 8pm, some pretty repulsive sherry in the Great Hall but the Yank had never tasted it before, so could not tell that any gentleman would have rejected it even in the soup.

Into the dining room, the butler, forced out of retirement and into the black livery for this – Jonny gives value for five hundred quid you know – doing all the serving and pouring. Smoked salmon to kick off, the Dylan kid gave it a dirty look and nibbled very cautiously but soon got the hang of it and wolfed that down.

Rather a long pause and the visitors started to look impatient but just when I thought we might get a little talk on fast food and the wonders of the drive through diner, in came butler and cook – nice looking girl, the cook incidentally – with four vast plates with silver lids on. One in front of each of us and then lifted simultaneously – the cook did Jonny’s and I noticed they gave each other a very beady look. A partridge each and all the trimmings, very nice. Little exclamations of delight – except from Dwebble who was staring at the salver.

“It’s a boid” he hollered, “a dead boid!”

More intelligence there than I would have given him credit for. Granpappy looked daggers and was about to tell him to get munching when the kid delivered the coup de grace:

“Granmaw won’t like this, Granpaps, when I tells her I eaten parrot”

“Say Duke....” says Granpaps.

But Jonny was ahead of him.

“Parsons” (this was to the butler) “Do we have any choice for dinner tonight?”

From the shaking of family portraits as Parsons slammed the door I suspected his preferred choice was diced callow youth. I started to draw Jonny out with stories about great stags missed, as part of our guest self esteem management programme, but within about two minutes Parsons was back with another vast plate and silver lid, which he plonked rather firmly in front of Dwobble. White cloth over left arm, and the lid was raised to reveal – a hamburger and fries, with lettuce leaf on the side to satisfy the five a day requirement.

Jonny half raised an aristocratic eyebrow, though Granpaps and the kid seemed unmoved by this turn of fortune. Presumably they thought that ducal kitchens at all times housed a range of hot foods for every taste, like TGIFridays.

Later that night I happened to have to go to the kitchen for a glass of water, and was able to interview the cook (did I mention she was rather pretty?) on this remarkable substitution. “As soon as I saw Fat Boy in shorts and baseball cap in the Great Hall I knew he wouldn’t want the Partridge a la Mode, so I ran up a burger as well.”

“But why not send it up with the partridges?” I asked.

“Because then Jonny, I mean, his Grace, would have wanted one too, he hates game and all that fancy food, only eats it to impress the paying guests. Another cognac, Stuffer?”

The Deal Hunter

The holidays are over at last, and B is at work.  The pinstripe jacket is over the back of the chair, the bowler hat has been dusted and is resting nonchalantly on top of the filing cabinet, the pewter pheasant perched on top, the laptop is open on the corner of the desk, both screens of the PC are on, prices scrolling with elegant deliberation across the right hand one.  And in the high backed chair is B himself; hair shorn like a summer lawn, shoes polished to sergeant major standard, a suitable expression of frowning concentration keeping the double chin taut, his eyes focused on the left hand screen.

So let’s move round behind him and see if we can get a glimpse of the great financier at work, of an epoch making deal in final structuring before we read about it in gushing praise from the FT.

The right little finger presses a keyboard button and a tantalising glimpse of the screen seems to show black and gold and the words “Holland and...” before they are replaced by the sobriety of a rate sheet; maybe a very prestigious deal for the Kingdom of the Netherlands?  “Yes, dear boy?”

“Oh, nothing much B, do you think we could look at the second quarter results when you are not so busy?  We need to send them upstairs.”

“Of course, my old duck, maybe this afternoon?  Bring me a macchiato next time you happen to pass the machine could you?  And a Kitkat”

B picks up the phone as we move away and by walking very slowly perhaps we can pick up the theme of the deal:

“Hi, Harry, I’ve moved the diary around, and I could do that partridge day on the 21^st, very kind of you indeed.  And, look, we’re taking a day at Snizort on 14^th January, some very late well trained seriously high pheasanties.  Just your thing.  Would you come to that, be lovely if you could....”

The bank better check its deal targets for the year, because if B hasn’t done his share by now, there won’t be much else getting booked in the P&L this quarter under his name.  The season is started, the leaves are beginning to turn, the woodlands beckon; the bowler’s in the office and the flat cap is in the Rangie.

Oh yes, the holidays are over and the top sportsman is seriously at work.

Frozen Assets

Aaaah. Spring at last.  Daffodils and green shoots and lambs and all that stuff.   More importantly invitations for the autumn, early booking of sporting hotels, shooting syndicate reunion dinners, bargain sales of sporting goods (no madam, not tennis rackets),  quiet contemplation of the diary working out how to get from Devon-on-Thursday-to-Northumberland-on-Friday-to-Buckinghamshire-on-Saturday.

And who the guests might be on Thursday and Friday so that these can be put down as corporate days, and the hotel accommodation upgraded so that the bank, and of course, its representative, can be shown as serious and heavyweight players worthy of doing business with.  Could one, B ponders, put down a Devonshire farmer as a possible purchaser of complex derivatives? Maybe he would like to hedge his milk production in case the Exmoor lanes get blocked with snow?

Blocked with snow; my lord!  Supposing they get blocked with snow that vital Thursday shoot day!  Would the boss be willing to pay for helicopter hire?  Surely yes, for seizing such important corporate marketing leads.   Such are the thoughts that bother the modern countrysportsman as he juggles a busy business career with his corporate marketing obligations.  And dozes gently in his garden chair on a Bank Holiday Monday.

Which in light spring kissed dreams brought a remembrance of one of Stuffer’s stories. Therefore, without doubt, true in every single respect and of the utmost verisimilitude.  This was set not in Devon, but far west Cornwall. .Somewhere on that snow blasted side of Bodmin Moor, where the woodcock for some reason like to spent their winters and the snipe jink across the bogs, soaring up into the low cloud at the slightest sign of tweedy gents and guns  

Four sporty chaps and Stuffer (why he was there we shall never know) were out in the sedgy reed bogs for a day’s sport.  The snow was lying long and the bogs were a week frozen, ideal conditions for wild flighty birds. Not so good for wild sporty chaps though. It was cold. Bitterly cold.  The brass monkey jokes had been abandoned as too proximate to the truth.  Mental notes had been made to upgrade long johns (or in two cases, to wear them next time).  Military fleeces and winter coats were been worn together.  And still the chill crept through into the aching bones and the fingers and toes slowly froze into immobility.

Without being too biological, a doctor would advise that a bottle of claret per chap in the evening and three cups of coffee over breakfast to mitigate the effects thereof are not best advised when said chaps are intending to spend their mornings standing in exposed places in virulently low temperatures.  Especially where there is a distinct lack of those nice little cubicles sited on London streets where a chap might retreat for a quick...erm.. perusal of the rugger pages, in fact, a distinct lack of walls, hedges, trees, old sheds, and any other form of cover for the performance of nature’s call, or even shielding from the western blasts.

Tom had stood it as long as he could, but finally as the Land Rover emptied for yet another sweep of a hopeful frozen expanse, he made his excuses and hung back as the others began their cautious sweep across the sedge and reed. Shielded from them by the Landy he fumbled with layers of coats and trouserings and long johns and even lower layers that we will not dwell on, and finally was able to excavate the required equipment and turned to begin that blessed relief which we must all from time to time seek.

Turned to find that he was facing directly two orange clad blue hatted lady walkers who somehow had walked up the track whilst all the fumbling was going on and by a mischance of timing were now forming a fascinated audience.

A fascinated but not very impressed audience “My goodness, it must be a cold day” said number one.  “Yes indeed, although you never know do you” replied number two. They raised their eyes back to the horizon and walked on.  Their giggling was borne downwind for a good hundred yards as Tom found his biological need no longer so pressing.

Swing Lowe

I was not born the proud occupant of a corner cubicle and window desk with a view across the dreaming money mountains of the City. Oh no, indeed. My beginnings were much more humble.

My climb to this locational glory began as a student, a student equipped with, my children entirely refuse to believe, all the essential apparatus of 1970’s studenthood – a magnificent Zappa moustache paid due homage to a great man, fourteen inch flared jeans sat elegantly on my 30" waist, my long golden tresses were habitually tied back in a long wavy ponytail.  Well….  A small ponytail. And the colour was perhaps a little more mouse than golden. And maybe the waist was 32”. Or 34”. Not 36”, absolutely not.  And, looking at the photographs, the moustache seems perchance more Niven than Zappa.

This essay at hippydom was a rather short period of my life, as it turned out.  For my second long vacation I had been expecting to go back to the farm where I had worked in the first long summer and which seemed very appreciative of fashionable dress and hairstyling. To my surprise, my letter seeking renewal of my post garnered an instant response. From this it was very obvious that the incident involving the ditch, the tractor, and the three ton trailer of barley had not been forgotten, or forgiven.

So I applied to the local stately home to work as a guide, escorting the steaming masses round the treasures and trinkets of one hundred and fifty years of throwing nothing away. A colonel’s wife commanded the regiment of guides and my charm went nowhere with her. She perused me over the top of her half-focals, a technique learned no doubt from her husband as perfected at El Alamein

“It would be nice to have a man among the team” she boomed – with a look and in a tone that indicated that yours truly was not helping achieve this objective.

She looked again, eyes narrowed against the desert sun, sighed, and said “Start on Tuesday.  No doubt you can get a proper hair cut and shave by then. Oh, and buy some clothes. Good afternoon”

So the pony tail was cropped, the flares replaced with best country cords and the Zappa zapped, with a razor..But, this sartorial vandalism apart, I took to life at Lowesdale Hall rather well. It was warm and dry, an easy bike ride from home, the guides’ tea was generously provisioned (though one did have to watch the sharp elbows when trying to get at the scones and jam); and the gawping masses generally not too trying.  

The most trying thing was trying to remember the history and provenance of all the clutter which was laid about to amuse the hordes.  Lord Lowesdale was a bit coy about this, and did not care to hear his staff admit that most of it had been bought off dealers in the late nineteenth century, the ancient family and fortune of Lowe going only as far back as a cotton mill in Accrington in about 1856.

After a couple of weeks I was given the heavy responsibility, but more generous tipping potential, of the evening parties. These were not jolly cocktail parties, but groups of, mostly, Americans who were prepared to pay very generously for a tour of the tat by candlelight (much better that way actually, it looked more distinguished and less distressed) and then dinner with Lord L himself – who also by candlelight looked more distinguished and less distressed.

He normally avoided the tours part, presumably to avoid awkward questions as to the presence of a lot other people’s ancestors on his walls, but graciously received the punters in the Green Drawing Room, for a quick glass of something reviving before dinner.

My last evening tour, before I was demoted to the dizzy depths of supervising the correct placement of cars in the car park, was of a party of very Californian Californians, all in jeans and tie dyed T shirts, and indeed probably all relatives or mates of F Zappa. I was very taken by all this laid back coolness, which is probably why I forgot to mention to his lordship that they all had to a man, and to a rock chick, opted for the vegetarian choice for dinner (three courses, each mostly of cheese).

Into the Green Drawing Room we shuffled, with his lordship lolling heavily in front of a large Munnings of the 4th Lord Lowesdale with the hounds of the Lowesdale Hunt, in front of Lowesdale Castle.  His son gave them the ritual three minutes of the charm of the English cotton spinning aristocracy, ending with “Do feel free to ask any questions, though I doubt I’ll know the answers…hohoho”.

The sun-kissed ones were regarding the hunting picture with what a lesser noble might have noticed to be considerable distaste. Silence. Then one blond rock chick spoke up, speaking, one could not help but feel, for them all:

“Gee Sir Lord Lowe, is that you in the hunting gear?”

“Hahaha, my dear, certainly not. Not at all”  The Californians suddenly looked happier, and at the back a short haired clean shaven guide breathed out.

“No no, dear lady, the hunt is banned from Lowesdale Hall and all its lands”  The group began to look as they might raise three cheers for this splendid example of a modern aristocrat.

“I banned them twenty years ago, my dear, absolutely inappropriate. Created havoc with my shooting, can’t run a decent pheasant shoot with my woods full of hounds. Eh? Eh? What? Where are you all going? Mr B, where are they all going?”

 

The Illustrious Client - Part Two

Mr Great gave me a reassuring smile, the smile that says "Well done for trying, but you are in the prescence of true talent", and walked off, pulling out his cigar case as he made for the gunbus.

The pretty picker-up provided further confirmation that her true future lay in investment banking. Thoughfully folding the £50 note she said "Every drive here is like this'un, yer know" And tucked the note in an inner pocket of her astonishingly battered barbour..

"And Ah'll be picking up behind you and 'im, each drive, like"

A smaller and purpler version of the first note made the short journey from my wallet to the inner pocket.

She raised an eyebrow. Two more of the larger and redder variety of notes followed their companions (the art of long term gain is knowing when to make that vital investment decision). She smiled confidentially.

"Don't know who that bloke is, love, but ah'll make him love his day" 

And (unlike your average investment banker, I hear you say) she delivered. At the end of each drive she produced Mr Great's birds and pointed out the sparse numbers brought down by Mr B. By the fourth drive Mr Great was feeling so sorry for the terrible day I was having that he proferred his cigar case to me and lent me his silver lighter to lit the chosen stoogie with.  I notice his gaze rather lingered on the picker-up at several points, but then, she was a pretty girl. Or had he noticed, as I fancied I had, that some of these birds did seem to slightly resemble ones that had been produced on previous drives? But then, who on earth can tell one pheasant from another....

Finally, the last drive was completed, the guns stood in the lee of a wood that curved away from the prevailing wind. The view was truly magnificent with the ruins of a distant castle tower catching the last of the sun a long way below us. The beaters slowly emerged from the wood, and the lightely loaded game cart hove into view.  Mr Great looked thoughtful again as the picker-up hung two brace of birds on the rack, giving me a wink as she turned away. 

Finally the keeper appeared, a magnificent figure in estate tweed and battered hat: "Had a good day gentlemen?"

We assured him we had, Mr Great in terms of enthusiasm which gladdened my heart .

Each of us walked forward with a note or two rolled in our right hands, and as we shook his, a mysterious sleight of hand took place as the notes disappeared into his waistcoat pocket. Best be generous I always feel, as I suspect part of the advanced training for head keeping is to how to know exactly who is Mr Generous and who is Mr Skinflint, and next time out to direct the drives so that not much passes over the Skinflints.

As host I waited until last, and then the ritual handshake and transfer took place. Finally relaxed, I engaged this colossus of his craft in conversation:

"Thank you, it was a really astonishing day; our client, I mean our clients, loved it"

"Oh, aye" 

"One doesn't get birds like this in the south, astonishing, I fear we didn't do them proper justice"

He scratched his head under his hat: "Aye, nev'r mind, they'll be there for't next lot on Munda"

"Haha, indeed.  We certainly have left them a few.  Another corporate group?"

"Nay, local syndicate, farmers and like."

"I think we had better come up and take some lessons as to how to hit such high birds, there must be some special technique in Yorkshire for hitting birds on drives like these ones."

He pulled his hat down: "No Yorkshireman would shoot these drives, tha knows, these birds is completely out of range; they wouldn't waste their cartridges. We keep 'em for foreigners. Afternoon to you"



  

The Illustrious Client (with apologies to Dr John Watson, MD)

Your correspondent leads a wearisome and difficult life. You, no doubt, think that life in the City is all four course lunches and champagne, but the modest enjoyment of the basic pleasures of life is oft sullied by the demands and thrusts of vulgar commerce.

Which is why your correspondent was on the crest of a steep hillside in finest North Yorkshire one recent frosty morning.  The keeper was in attendance in his best estate tweed, the beaters and pickers-up had donned new plastic sacks as leggings, holes in flat caps had been roughly stitched up, and even a few of the retrievers had been lightly brushed.

Standing slightly apart were eight fine chaps in eight fine caps. Not adorned in the discounted products of the local agricultural merchant these grand fellows, but all kitted out by visits to Messr’s F and Messr’s P and Messr’s B (correctly, it has been pointed out to me, Signori’s B), and, let us not forget, Messr’s H&H.  Today they too looked especially well scrubbed, polished and brushed; and even a casual observer would soon have spotted the reason for all this sartorial elegance in, behind, and in front of the line.  For there, smoking a small breakfast cigar and regaling his fellow guns with a few amusing words, was Mr Great.

You might not have recognised him; indeed very few people would, but to a certain select crowd of City bankers, he is a very well known face indeed. And to your humble correspondent B and his modest financial institution it is a face which strikes both fear and hope. Fear, in case he takes his huge portfolio of transactions away, and hope, that he might not, and the bonuses will grow ever more straight and strong.

So it is worth keeping Mr Great happy and smiling. Each year he gracefully accepts our proffered invitations to a lunch and a dinner, a visit to a private box at Ascot, and a shooting invitation.  Competition growing ever more intense for Mr Great’s business, this year it was decided that the boat should be well and truly pushed out and that no expense should be spared.  One of the grandest shoots in the far North Riding was booked, as was a dinner and appropriately salubrious accommodations the night before. 

And thus far, so good; though I was rather glad that I had thought to bring along a couple of colleagues to split the expenses submission with, the contents of the hotel cellar being unexpectedly good and Mr Great’s thirst remarkable.

Here we were, a fine morning, a modest wind, and all looking good with the world. Except that into my mind had come sudden doubt. Which was occasioned by my looking down into the deep valley and seeing far far; indeed far, below us tiny yellow tickets on sticks. The pegs for the first drive.  At least, I reckoned, one hundred and twenty feet down from the valley crest where Mr Great was waving his cigar.

Now, Mr Great likes his shooting, and he likes a suitable pile of pheasants at his peg at the end of the drive so he can show us amateurs how it is done.  But no doubt the cares of intensive money making mean he does not get as much time as he might like to get the practice in.  And doing most of your shooting in the Home Counties does not really allow you to get used to the amount of lead and swing and fancy footwork that some might think ideal for the 40 yard bird.  I have seen him hit high birds. Sometimes.  Once or twice. When given proper notice.  Not in a deep Yorkshire valley with a lifting wind. Low birds are, let us be honest, more his thing.

I began to contemplate next year’s bonus.

Twenty minutes later the eight chaps were at the bottom of the valley, the beaters were behind the ridge, and the whistle had been blown.  And ten minutes later I was wondering how Mrs B might feel about giving up three August weeks on the Amalfi coast for a sweet self-catering cottage in the Lake District. 

Our best shot was, I reckoned, maybe hitting one pheasant for every ten cartridges. And the rest of the line was looking like a ratio of  20 to 1. Except for two of us, your correspondent who had lowered his gun to contemplate the occupant of the adjacent peg, his bank’s most important client, whose ratio, I conservatively estimated, was in the region of Infinity to 0.

Hugely high curling birds approached, in sparse and perfectly presented drifts. And practically all of them disappeared over the other side of the valley in unsullied form.  Hours passed. Or at least five minutes. 

Self preservation and the bank’ best interests finally overcame paralysis.  As soon as the final whistle blew I moved from my peg toward Mr Great. Too slow. He turned proudly and called to the pretty girl who was picker-up on the hillside above us: “How many?”

The world suddenly slowed, my feet stuck to the ground, Mr Great smiled with confident modestly, the picker-up opened her pretty mouth. “Lie, lie, lie” I silently transmitted across the bracken to her.

But your Yorkshirewoman is of honest and straightforward stuff.

“NUN” she bellowed.

Mr Great looked around him, perplexed at this sudden religious fervour: “What?”

“None; all missed”.

Sometimes chance and fortune run together. In my coat pocket was the £50 note for the keepers tip at the end of the day. Mr Great was staring up the hillside. The £50 note was in my hand and I waved merrily at the picker-up.

Bright girl that one. Very quick on the uptake. She has great potential for a career in the City I suspect.

“NONE FOR MR B. We are still collecting yours Mr Great. Ten, mebbe a dozen”

“Ah, B, bit high for you, old man, those little birdies. Bit more practice with the clays on the high tower is my advice”

Bagged

Any sportsman will tell you that one of the great joys and sorrows of any sport - indeed of any recreation, I am sure, is the endless opportunities for buying more and more equipment. Capitalistic vultures lie in wait to take advantage of the unwary and when it comes to shooting and fishing types there is an especially close attention to catching the prey. Messrs F, and Messrs P, and Messrs B, and indeed Messrs H&H, are just a few of those entrepreneurial types - or great grandchildren of such - who set up their traps for the unwary in the rabbit runs of the West End.

Your naive sporting gent goes off for an innocent lunch with a few chums, a little business conversation to ensure that the bill can be passed through expenses, and a lot of chat and gossip. Then after both bottles are empty and the light is failing, out of Scotts or Wiltons or the Connaught he staggers in a friendly and avuncular manner, and blow me, before he knows what is going on, Messrs F or P or B, or indeed H&H, have got him in their carefully bated trap and into the cage he is lured.

And then there is all that blasted business trying to smuggle some piece of kit into the matrimonial dwelling and into the bottom drawer or back of the wardrobe, and just when you think the domestic authorities have not noticed and you are in the arm chair with the G&T, the trick question:

"Do you really need three pairs of boots?"

"I am sure I got you one of those cleaning rod thingies for Christmas last year"

"Just how many pairs of breeks can you wear at once, darling?"

But when this is got over and the credit card bill winced at, and the car loaded with all this stuff that seemed so vital at 3.30pm one Thursday afternoon and may be not quite so useful now, when all this is dealt with, it does mean that one can proudly go out and stand in a wet muddy field in great style, glorying in the knowledge that one really does look the part, the envy of one's fellow shootists, and would have done credit to any of those great Edwardian top shots.

At least you can do this glorying if you actually put the kit in the car before you set off to the most remote parts of North Yorkshire. And not realise at breakfast at some small hotel in some tiny market town consisting of a bus-stop and fourteen pubs and a Co-op, when otherwise perfectly and immaculately dressed for the forthcoming day, that you do not seem to have any one of the four cartridge bags that ornament the shooting cupboard. And at that precise moment, presumably still do, because not one of them has accompanied you to Yorkshire.

But I am been churlishly rude about the amenities of this small town, because on peering out of the dining room window, there, right opposite, was a sporting goods shop. Jno. Woodall, whoever he was, or had been, had learnt at the feet of the F's and P's and all the rest of them, and situated his premises where no visiting sportsman could possibly overlook it.

And what is more Jno. Woodall, or his grandson, had already opened the doors and put the lights on. Your correspondent abandoned his toast and leapt across the road and into this heaven sent boudoir of pleasure.  Mr Woodall was behind his counter.

"Good Morning! I am so glad you are open".

"Well, I wouldn't sell much if I wasn't".

"No, indeed! Well, I left a bit of kit at home yesterday and I am hoping you might have a cheap cartridge bag to sell me this morning!"

Mr Woodall looked me closely up and down, with the keen and discerning eye of a Yorkshireman, from brand new and highly polished DuBarrys, up the tailored plus fours with pink socks and gaiters, the new seasons waistcoat (fresh from Messrs P themselves), the matching tailored jacket, to the Hermes silk tie, and not forgetting that rather snazzy silver tie pin.

"A cheap...", he lingered, "... a cheap cartridge bag?"

"Mmm, yes please".

"No. NO. Sold the last one yesterday.  But we have this nice calf leather one by H&H, silk lined"

I didn't have the heart to ask for a discount; I don't carry that much cash.

Rabbiting On

An enthusiastic and loyal reader - Stuffer, you guessed - with whom I was sharing a modest glass in The King's Wotsit off the Kings Road, has suggested that this column is a little too devoted to the pleasures of the countryside as seen with benefit of gun. He welcomed the recent brief excursion into the strange and dubious pleasures of fishing, but urged exploration of the yet wider shores of men hunting supper.

This threw me a bit, I  must admit - the old gun cabinet contains a modest range of shooting implements suitable for pheasant, rabbits, pigeons, geese, and even grouse - not much used that one. But what else did he have in mind?

"Bow and arrow, mate, bow and arrow".

This threw me no end. I mean, when was the last  time you saw a woodland edge with eight or nine chaps lined up in plus fours and flat caps with great bows and a quiver full of Hull Cartridge Company arrows? Though I suppose at least it would be a lot easier to resolve those disputed birds if each bow had his own coloured arrows.

I asked what had brought this on.

"Ah well, old son, it was actually a Welsh Rabbit the missus produced the other night for supper"

"Welsh Rarebit you mean" I responded rather primly (one likes to keep standards up).

"No no, Welsh Rabbit, that's what made me think of it. Welsh Rarebit is just your posh English name."

"Well, whether it's a rare rabbit or whatever it is, I don't see what it has to do with bows and arrows"

And he explained thus:

"Most people think that it was the English yeoman that developed the skill at the longbow that defeated the Frenchies at Agincourt, but actually it all began in the Welsh valleys. Lots of yew to make good strong flexible bows, and not much else to do in the valleys except target practice, let's face it. So, the Welsh got pretty good at it.  Then the English barons got wind of all this and started sending their fit young soldiers to improve their skills. They had always shot arrows for food in the fields and warrens but they weren't used to the much bigger yew bows of the Welsh.

This all went very well and soon the English had strengthened their right arms (well, except the left handed ones of course) and they suggested that it was time to practice under battlefield conditions. How about, the English suggested, an element of a sporting contest to sharpen the wits. And a sporting contest to fill the larder would be even better.

So a rabbit hunt was organised, two teams, Welsh and English. Along the valley and onto the hills. The English of course were used to rabbit hunting so they soon had a pretty impressive bag.  But the poor old Welsh were only used to standing targets and by the end of the day they had only a couple of bunnies between them.

So when that evening the soldiers strolled into the medieval thatched olde welshe village, naturally the English soldiers were hunks of the month and got the rabbit stew  with onions and...er...onions, whilst the Welsh with nul bunnies just got the usual cheese on toast.  As the English soldiers passed by on their way to stuff themselves with rabbit with all the extras they saw the poor valley boys miserably eating cheese on toast, and to cheer them up in that jolly English way, shouted sneeringly, "Call that Welsh Rabbit?!?!"   Absolutely true."

I looked at Stuffer and his empty glass.

"Do you seriously think I am going to put junk like that in my blog?"

He waved his glass at the barman and pointed meaningfully at the beer pump.

"Yes".

And The Rains Came

Maybe the rains never left. Anybody who recalls reading "Somerset: An Apology" may still feel the rain trickling down their backs and into their very damp socks amongst the wet Welsh hills last January.

And sitting in a well known public house in a well known village the night before shooting on a well known estate in a well known county - enough of this coyness, it was Wiltshire - a couple of Sundays ago, nothing much had changed. The village street seemed to have retasked as a stream, the car park was in a new use as the village pond, and the gutters overflowed their gurgling load onto any careless passer-by.

Eight fine gents were gathered in the bar, dealing in the best way with it being very wet outside - by getting very wet inside. (And a special commendations for Wiltshire's beers, which assist this process very nicely.)

We went into dinner; and the water could be heard gurgling down the downpipes and dripping off the porch outside.

And when we had got to that glorious point where all is consumed; and the wreckage of the means of happiness lies strewn across the table; and one steps outside to look at the stars illuminated by a modest cigar; well, I was jolly lucky the cigar was not immediately extinguished, and not a hope of trying to work out which was the Plough and which Mars. No doubt in the Amazon basin this sort of thing is regarded as normal and good for the fish, but come on, this is partridge time in Wiltshire.

There was only one thing for it.  Any port in a storm, they say, but our ever generous host insisted not just on any port, but on the finest to be procured from the cellar. It didn't stop the rain; but we did sort of forget about it. So it came as a bit of a shock to draw the curtains the next morning, wincing at the grey light, to find that the deluge continued.

Jokes about building arks were banded about over the bacon and eggs (and, as we could see this was not going to be an early start) also the sausage, the grilled tomato, the fried bread, the beans, the hash browns, and yes, let us confess ALL our sins, the black pudding.  The sporting agent arrived; and the estate manager shortly after, and both were invited by our gracious host to partake in the feast. When they did so, we knew  that things were not looking good for stubble skimming Frenchmen. (Partridges, to any politically correct types who have strayed into this column.)

More coffee arrived; and more toast; and more marmalade.  Our host was seen standing in the porch of this fine old inn, reading his pluvious insurance documents.

Another pile of newspapers was produced, with some rather delicate jockeying to get hold of the only copy of the Sun. (Hah; singularly highly inappropriately named rag!)

Time stretched. Then a magnificent and large presence was suddenly amongst us, dripping amongst us on the flag stones and dampening the Farrow and Ball; clad in very muddy wellies, a very damp flat cap, and a wet Barbour of ancient vintage. The head keeper, no less.

"11am, gentlemen!" He looked around at our hopeful tweedy faces.  "I've got four rods in the Land Rover; who wants a days fishing?"

And so ended the first day of the 2012 season. A slow drive back to town, with much loosening of the belt. A few irritable phone calls on the Blackberry. Through the wet narrow Chelsea streets to home, and stowing all the kit back from whence it had been dug out 48 hours before. Careful filling in of the game book with the names of my fellow guns, and in the columns of birds and drives, the mournful entry:

"Rain Stopped Play"

Flat Caps, Fat Wallets

Sometimes I manage to slip a mention of these scribblings into a conversation, in the hope it might attract new readers. But like the joke about the General who signalled "Send reinforcements, we're going to advance" causing consternation at HQ who descrambled it as "Send three and fourpence, we're going to a dance", sometimes the message gets a bit confused. Certainly, one new reader was a bit disappointed to find that this column is not stories about whippet racing in Barnsley, having mistaken the nature of the flat caps deployed herein. But hopefully the account of the following event will cheer at least him up.

For yes, this is a story of Yorkshire folk, and, as anybody who is acquainted with that proud race will recognise, it shows them operating at their finest.

"You can take the boy out of Yorkshire, but you can't take Yorkshire out of the boy." This old saw is very true, and much appreciated by half a dozen of us, approaching, shall we say, early middle age, whose proud origin is in that fair land and who have additionally in common an addiction to gun and rod. And to further keep the blood thick, each summer we all lunch together on beer and pies.

The time was approaching this May when Freddie, a lawyer formerly of Leeds, called to suggest that this summer we could push the boat out a bit and he could organise a dinner instead, at a well known smart West End (London that is, not Leeds) restaurant. The other five of us thought this was a touching and generous idea and the evening was duly booked.

The Yorkshireman likes his night out and we were all there on time - indeed four were early and made good progress at the bar before we even got to table. But we were seated soon enough and the orders given; and we can pass over the scoffing and quaffing simply by saying that a blxxdy good time was 'ad by all, ba gum.

So you join us again in a more or less empty restaurant, dregs of fine wines in the glasses, plates scraped clean, and the whisky glasses being regarded thoughtfully. The shooting stories had worn out a bit, the business environment was agreed to be appalling, the merits of Range Rover and the new Mercedes 4x4 compared, summer yacht charter costs complained of, and several juicy bits of gossip analysed and thoroughly wrung out. We were in fact feeling that it was time for the bill; and eventually the estate agent present (there's always one) turned to Freddie and said "Great idea this, Fred, we've thoroughly enjoyed it. Thanks very much old lad."

Freddie suddenly looked as though a violent bout of indigestion had overcome him, but not so much he did not manage to splutter "Nay, nay, I was just organising, I thought Tom might pick up the bill this year, accountants are doing very well; so he's just said".

The food poisoning seemed now to have spread to Tom as well, who went slightly puce and said chokingly "I paid for the pies year before last, it must be Kevin's turn; or is it B---'s?"

With that instinct with which they are born, the maitre d' had suddenly materialised close by, looking a little anxious. We all looked, one to each other, trying to avoid the maitre's increasingly steely look; and then, as if possessed by the same idea at the same time, we all turned to Frank. Frank is a our group billionnaire, his fortune made in construction and clever land buying, going public at the top of the market (twice), leaving his main care, as he had told us earlier, being which bank to keep the stache in. We all smiled gently at Frank; but Frank did not get where he is today....  "Na then, lads; share and share alike, that would be reet. What's damage, Freddie, lad?"

£900 was the damage.

With a groan that could not be heard, but could certainly be felt, six hands pulled out six wallets; cash was clawed unwilling from the dusty recesses and counted, and recounted. The maitre relaxed and the cash was piled up on the bill in the centre of the table. Or at least, £750 was. At that point a rugged hand reached out, grabbed the cash, and put down the company credit card. The cash disappeared into some mysterious inner pocket of Frank's jacket.

£750 cash, tax free. And a bill payable by the shareholders. Truly a Yorkshireman amongst Yorkshiremen.

  

No Fish

The son and heir reads little other than Facebook and various twitters (and this, I fear, will be clearly demonstrated when he gets his "A" level results this summer). But he does find it expedient at times (such as when the Golf has been scratched yet again, or when he might need a lift back from a party at 2am) to pretend to take an interest in the old man's mad electronic scribbling. Last Saturday he was making some witty remarks concerning his dad's ability to shoot and scribble, but then made a very perceptive remark: "Dad; you never write anything about fishing. When you are staring out of the window don't you ever daydream of salmon and trout?" 

That is very true, (writing about fishing I mean,  naturally not the guff about staring out of the window) and as I explained, the reason for that is because I never go fishing. And the reasons for that are the usual ones of time and money.  "But, my boy, when you are earning zillions on an arbitrage desk in Canary Wharf then I shall at last and at least have the money to pop off to Hardy's and commission a rod, and the time to find some new friends with nice riverside walks", I thought.  But did not say - not least because the zillions thing may be a long time off  in the future at present rates of progress.

Occasionally though I have found myself by the river bank with a couple of mates in very long wellies, in my case flask in hand rather than rod.  I will admit that on a warm summer afternoon there is nothing wrong with allowing one's mind to wander around the wilder shores of derivative products in a sylvan setting, inspiration being kindled by the sparkle of sunlight on water, and new complex structures driven by the tantalising pattern of willows on quiet pools. And then waking up to enjoy a decent Romeo y Julietta, and the thought of trout for supper.

Indeed I have a hospitable northern mate, Bill, who has managed to devote his life to doing almost nothing but still somehow made a reasonable pot of money, which enables him to rent a couple of bits of well stocked river in north Lancashire. 

A few years ago he asked me up for a weekend in June, and having not much to do and the thought of a jolly country inn with feather bed and proper cooked breakfast appealing a lot, I headed north. On my arrival at the designated spot I was brutally reminded that Bill is a proper northern lad and did not get where he is today by thoughtless extravagance. Oh no. My dream of the agreeable village pub turned out to be the reality of an ageing very modest caravan parked close enough to the river that he could sit on the steps and fish. The feather bed was a plywood shelf with some waterproof type of bed "sheets" probably recycled from supermarket carrier bags. And somehow, I knew that breakfast would be Kellogg's by way of Morrison.

But your scribe can rough it if required; on being told that the pub in the village did a selection of decent beers things seemed a little brighter, and I was happy enough to go along with the suggestion that on the way there we strolled along the river to see if the fish were jumping or biting or dancing or whatever it is they do.

Rounding a bend in the  river we came across another northern type standing up to his hocks in the middle of the current and with that sort of dreamy gormless look that anglers seem to take on when near water. The two great sportsmen regarded each other in silence until finally Bill launched into what in the north of England is regarded as sparkling repartee:

Bill: "Aye"

Man in Middle of River (brightly): "Aye"

Long pause whilst these two philosophers absorbed their exchange.

Bill: "Owt?"

MiMoR (after extended thought): "Nowt!"

Further long pause for due consideration.

Bill: "Aye"

MiMoR: "Aye"

And, conversation over for the day, Bill and I walked on.

MiMoR may well have been right. Probably there was nowt. But what there was, was first class beer in the village pub, and do you know, after a couple of pints (or maybe six) of it I have no memory whatsoever of sleeping in that caravan. It must have been the soporific effect of sleeping next to the sound of the river. Or maybe fishing really is good for you.