Constable by the Sea

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By the same author
Copyright

It was the first week of July and I was on a slow train which was carrying me to the seaside. Mine was not a holiday trip, however, but a police duty engagement. I was on my way to Strensford, a picturesque and sometimes busy seaside resort on the north-east coast of Yorkshire. Graced by miles of smooth, yellow sand, Strensford is famed for its kippers and the fact that the bright summer sun both rises and sets over the sea. It is also known for its towering cliffs with a ruined abbey gloriously perched on top, and the haphazard cluster of red-roofed cottages which crowd around the harbour side, at times touching the water.

A few years ago, I had started my police career in this town, but much as I liked Strensford, I hadn’t volunteered for this return visit. Who would volunteer to leave behind a loving wife and four tiny children? It is at times like this policemen realize that their wives are angels and models of patience and
understanding
– well, most of them are!

It was Sergeant Blaketon who had said, ‘Rhea, I put your name down for coastal duties. You could do with a change of scenery and the chance to do some real police work; it’ll do you good to cope with daft holiday-makers, drunken locals and masses of cars all heading for the same parking space. So I’ve volunteered you for this duty. Fourteen weeks, it is. Each spell
of duty is seven days on followed by two days off. You’ll be working shifts, so you’ll get home once in a while.

‘You’ll be in uniform, helping the local lads to cope with the summer rush. Report at Strensford Police Station prompt at 9 a.m. a week on Monday, and take enough stuff to last you a week. Digs will be found and food will be provided. It’ll be no holiday, mind you, so don’t go thinking it’s a doddle.’

It didn’t matter whether or not I wanted to volunteer – I was on my way, but one thing did please me. For three blissful months or so, I’d be free from the domineering presence of Sergeant Oscar Blaketon. That pleasing thought was the one bright spot in the gloom which would follow departure from my little family.

I was familiar with the coastal problems. I’d served my police apprenticeship at Strensford and knew that during the winter months the town literally died. Lashed by fierce north-east gales, high seas, dense fogs and intensely cold weather, the little resort simply ceased to appeal to anyone. Even its own residents grumbled about the treatment it received from the uncaring weather. As the claws of winter chased away the
holiday-makers
, Strensford’s streets and hotels emptied, its beaches became deserted and its shops closed their doors against the Arctic blasts. To walk those blustery streets on a Sunday in winter was tantamount to trekking to the North Pole.

This was in direct contrast to the summer months, when the town changed beyond all belief (even the fogs were a few degrees warmer). Holiday-makers swamped the place. Boarding houses and hotels re-opened, the amusement arcades dusted their machines, camping sites bustled with activity and the shopkeepers gave their premises a new coat of paint. Lines of traffic flooded into the town; bus-loads came for the day and train-loads came for longer periods.

Even foreigners came to Strensford in the summer.
Flat-capped
folks came from the West Riding of Yorkshire, and beer-swilling Geordies came down from the north. Scots folks arrived for two-week stretches to spend a little cash, Europeans passed through, and it was even rumoured that some from the south of England ventured this far north.

And as if to please all those visitors, the sun occasionally broke through the summer fogs to bathe the town in a warm, pleasing glow.

From the police officer’s point of view, this annual influx presented severe problems. In the winter, the resident
constables
were bored out of their minds due to a lamentable lack of activity, whereas the hectic summer months pushed them to their limits and beyond. There just weren’t sufficient officers to cope with the plethora of problems the visitors managed to generate.

It is widely known in police circles that when people descend
en
masse
upon a place, they produce problems. Those problems are bewildering and awesome in their range and complexity, and it is invariably the police who have to deal with them. At the seaside, they range from simple things like children getting lost or vehicles travelling the wrong way along one-way streets, to mammoth worries like people leaping off cliffs to end their lives or ships going down with all hands. The coastal constable sees a lot, learns a lot, copes with a lot and, in despair and disbelief, shakes his head a lot.

I was aware of all these factors as my train neared the end of its journey. I was to become, however temporarily, such a
constable
. For the next few weeks, which embraced the height of Strensford’s summer season, I was to be a constable by the sea.

After a very early morning start, I had caught this train, the only one which would allow me to arrive at Strensford Police Station by no later than the stipulated hour of 9 a.m. This train was also the school-train, for on its long tortuous but incredibly picturesque route through the Strensbeck Valley of the North York Moors, it gathered masses of children from the dales and villages and poured them into Strensford to be ‘eddicated’ as the dalesmen put it. Once in town, they dispersed daily to their secondary schools or to the grammar school.

In those days, railway carriages were divided into individual compartments, each of which seated about ten people, and so I had entered one which contained nothing that looked remotely like a rampant schoolchild. Schoolchildren can be very wearisome as travelling companions. Instead, my fellow
passengers were a sober bunch of people from the villages, people whose livelihood was earned in Strensford through earnest toil in its shops, offices and factories. As I’d entered, they had stared at me briefly; for one thing, I was a stranger on the train, and secondly, my mode of dress was an obvious mixture of civilian clothing and police uniform.

I had deemed this necessary because I had to be at the police station no later than 9 a.m., and the train arrived at Strensford at five minutes to nine. This meant I had no time to change, so to save time, and to prevent a possible disciplinary charge by being late, I had donned my best uniform and wore it beneath a civilian mackintosh. Thus I sported large black, polished boots, dark blue serge trousers, a blue shirt and black tie, all of which were clearly visible and which announced that I was a member of the Force. My tunic was nicely concealed beneath my raincoat, while my hand luggage comprised a bulky holdall, a small suitcase and some bags of assorted necessities.

One snag was that police uniforms are the most difficult things to pack, consequently my cumbersome greatcoat was slung on top of my holdall, between the handles, and for the time being my police cap on top of that. These were all on the rack above my head. I had a second tunic slung over my suitcase and had other bags and belongings draped around it. I reasoned that, even though my luggage was bulky and a nuisance, I could cope with it during the short, brisk walk from the railway station.

Sergeant Blaketon reckoned it was only a two-minute walk, but I knew the train could be late. Fortunately, this one was on time, but even so, I would have no moments to spare once the train halted at Strensford. Believing in early preparation, I stood up and began to gather my belongings as it rattled beneath the huge viaduct on its final mile or so. I was determined to have my things off the racks and securely clutched in my hands by the time the train halted. Then I’d make a dash for the barrier with my ticket at the ready, and I would gain the town’s streets before the other passengers clogged the exit.

‘Ah wouldn’t bother,’ said a man in the corner opposite.

‘Pardon?’ I wasn’t sure he was addressing me.

‘Ah said Ah wouldn’t bother,’ he was pointing at my unwieldy collection of belongings. ‘Getting them things down yet. You’ll not beat ’em.’

‘Beat ’em?’ I suspended my work and placed one hand on the edge of the rack as I questioned him.

‘Aye,’ he said. ‘The kids. Schoolkids. They’ll be out afore you, like a horde of bloody rampaging cattle, they are. It’s a bloody stampede. We allus sit tight till they’ve got clear. It’s safer in the long run.’

The other passengers clearly agreed with this middle-aged chap in the sports jacket, for they nodded and smiled at his words of common sense. But I couldn’t afford to wait – it was already six minutes to nine.

‘Thanks,’ I smiled at them all, and at him in particular. ‘But I’ve got to be at work prompt at nine o’clock, not a second later. I’ll get through the crush. But thanks for the warning.’

After all, I told myself, I had been in the RAF during my National Service, and that experience had taught me a lot about rushing for trains, rushing off trains, galloping heavily laden along busy platforms, changing stations with seconds to spare, battling through rush-hour crowds – we servicemen had done it all, and that expertise was going to be my salvation this very morning.

I stood at the carriage door and lowered the window so that I could operate the catch from the outside. As I did so, I breathed in the clean salt air, air which some believe contains ozone but which in fact is a heady mixture of evaporating brine and kipper smoke. Even so, the blast of fresh air which blew into my face and ruffled my hair had a definite tang of the wide-open sea. It was clean and refreshing, beautifully pure and enervating. It held a promise of excitement and romance.

We were now reducing speed; the train had arrived at the outward end of the long, curving platform and was braking. There was the clash of brakes, the squeal of iron wheels on iron rails, the clanking of buffers all accompanied by the shuddering motions of a heavily laden train being forced to a halt. We entered the station buildings, and the roof appeared in view; slowly, we cruised to a halt.

Quickly, I opened my door. The train was still moving, albeit very, very slowly. I gripped my assorted baggage just as I wanted it, and I could see the deserted barrier near the head of the train. There was no reason why I should not be first through. A forlorn ticket-collector stood there, his dark blue uniform prominent against the greyness of the station’s
stone-work
, and there was no one ahead of me. The way was clear.

With my customary agility and my practised RAF leap, I descended from the still-moving train, and in spite of my luggage, my legs had no trouble adjusting to a rapid running motion. I was on my way, and my luggage bobbed and bounced as I ran. I was running towards the ticket-collector at the speed of the slowing train. I could see him waiting for me, even though he did seem to be an awful long way off.

I’m not sure what went wrong with my strategy.

I became aware that I was being rapidly overtaken and
simultaneously
surrounded by noisy, galloping schoolchildren. Hats, scarfs, satchels, waving arms and bare knees were all about me, all heading in the same direction but with even more speed and urgency than I could muster. I was vaguely aware of countless stomping feet, many shrill voices all raised in unison and an unseen determination by each one of them to be first through that ticket-barrier. I was probably unwittingly involved in a daily race for some kind of momentary, childish glory.

I was unavoidably swept along by the thrusting crowd; this was mass movement at its very worst, for even if I’d wished to turn around, it would have been impossible. I had no choice but to go along with the stampeding mass of school-bound youngsters, and as I galloped along with them, I realized that they had also to be in class by nine o’clock.

To add to my impending and inevitable delay at the barrier, my uniform greatcoat, which had been lying on top of my holdall, had gradually slipped, and its tail was trailing on the platform. It was gathering dust as I ran, and with horror I realized that my cap was also working loose. Being swept along as I was, I could not halt my onward rush to rectify matters.

And as these doom-laden realizations impressed themselves upon me, disaster arrived. As I pumped my way through the
crowd, I trod upon that loose coat tail. My running motion was rudely interrupted and I was launched briefly into mid-air, then went sprawling to earth in an entanglement of arms and legs, some of which did not belong to me. As I fell, I lost my grip on the holdall; I recall that it bounded, or was kicked, from my grasp, and it disappeared among hundreds of stamping feet as it was bundled along by the moving mass. My cap broke loose too and went bowling along beneath a tumult of feet as I lay on the platform with a multiplicity of shoes pounding my back, head, arms and legs. The surging crowd moved on. I tried to get up; I couldn’t. Each time, more feet pounded me back into the ground. And then, quite suddenly, it was all over and there was peace.

I struggled to my feet and saw that a mass of children had come to a halt around the unfortunate ticket-collector, but their number was reducing rapidly as they squeezed through the barriers and ran for their waiting buses or hurried to their schools.

My battered holdall was lying midway between me and the barrier, and my trampled greatcoat was spread open nearby, something like Walter Raleigh’s famous cape, except there was no royal personage to walk upon it and no puddle to justify its position on the ground. It was smothered in the thick grey dust of the railway station.

I had no idea where my cap had gone.

I dusted down my trousers and mackintosh and then began to make my slow, somewhat painful way to the barrier, retrieving my holdall and greatcoat
en
route
. I got there eventually, by which time the last of the children had passed through. Their disappearance through the narrow gap was rather like sand slipping through an hourglass, and their final departure produced an air of sudden peace and tranquillity.

‘Your cap,’ grunted the ticket collector. It was perched on the gatepost at the barrier, buckled, bruised and very dirty. ‘They’re animals, the lot of ’em. Bloody animals. No respect.’