Nicola Barker - Burley Cross Postbox Theft

‘Very well,’ I eventually compromised, ‘I’m willing to strike you a deal. I’m going to dash off to the lavatory for a couple of minutes, and while I’m gone I’d like you to sit here, on your own, and try your best to come up with another word for green. If, when I return, you’ve come up with something especially good, I’ll give you a very, very beautiful gift — a prize, of sorts — which I currently have hidden away in my bag.’ (A lovely bookmark, Mr Jennings — plastic-coated — which I acquired on a wonderful trip to Wordsworth’s house in June. It had an abridged version of ‘I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud’ printed in pretty gold lettering on to a calming, daffodil-yellow background.)

‘Okay,’ Lydia May instantly obliged me. She then gazed up at the ceiling, frowning, as if deep in thought.

I clambered (heavily!) to my feet, grabbed my stick, and set off for the Ladies’ lavatories. And yes, yes — I know exactly what you’re thinking, Mr Jennings: that it was utterly foolhardy, even downright irresponsible, to leave Lydia May entirely to her own devices again at that sensitive juncture! And you’re right, of course (100 per cent!), but a call of nature is a call of nature, is it not?

Aside from that, I was determined to locate Catrin now, come hell or high water. I had a fairly good idea that she wasn’t in the pub (I had a partial view of the car park and the front entrance from where I was sitting). My only sensible course of action, I felt, would be to try and persuade some charitable individual to let me use their mobile (I don’t own one myself, more’s the pity) in order to phone her from the pub and find out what the delay was all about (better still, to try and locate Wincey, and convince her to perform this small service for me).

I visited the lavatories, Mr Jennings (really beautifully done out, they are, in subtle shades of grey and ivory), then returned to the bar in the hope of locating an obliging local whose phone I might use, but even as I did so, I became aware of some kind of a ‘commotion’ in the saloon bar (the regular ‘thud’ of the darts had been temporarily interrupted, and the caller was instructing the crowd to ‘please remain calm’).

I have subsequently been informed of the extraordinary sequence of events that apparently played out during my short sojourn in the lavatories (all — or most — of which you yourself were a direct witness of, Claw).

Can I just say that when I saw that Lydia May was gone from our corner table (and that every remaining scrap of alcohol had been consumed — totalling one and three-quarter pints!) I turned and literally sprinted to the saloon bar to try and protect my young charge from any of the potentially hazardous scenarios that instantly crowded into my overheated mind (none of which, may I add, were anywhere near as bad as what later transpired!).

I use the phrase ‘my young charge’ advisedly, Mr Jennings, because I’m sure it’s clear by now that I considered Lydia May to be my sole responsibility (in so far as one can be ‘responsible’ for such a wild and wilful creature!). It was in this spirit that I entered the saloon, full in the knowledge — in other words — that I was ‘standing in’ for Catrin (Lydia May’s temporary — but official — carer).

Imagine my horror then, Mr J, when my old eyes (and forgive me for playing the age card again at this point; as I believe I said before, I have perfect vision, so this is cheeky of me, to say the least!) were greeted by the unwelcome sight of my young ward, Lydia May (I say ‘young’, but I fear this is an emotional description rather than an actual one; I’ve since been informed that she is actually thirty-eight years of age!), in the midst of a bellowing throng, having her breasts manhandled (her breasts!) by an imposing, bearded, somewhat ferocious-seeming, silver-haired fellow in full biker apparel (this ‘imposing fellow’, it later transpired, was no less an individual than you yourself, Mr Jennings!).

I didn’t know (indeed, how could I have known?) that this incident wasn’t simply a cruel and random attack, but the culmination of a series of immensely provocative (nay, wrong-headed) acts on the part of Lydia May herself (i.e. acts that might almost be said to have demanded the kind of response they ultimately garnered — not that manhandling a young woman’s breasts is ever justifiable, Mr J! Perish the thought!).

These aforementioned ‘acts’, e.g. staggering on to the ‘oche’ and parading around, annoyingly, in front of the dartboard (thereby interrupting play at a critical juncture), ‘mooning’ the caller (when he politely asked her to desist), pushing over Mutley’s table (festooning his wife and your oldest daughter with drinks/bar snacks), and, finally, stealing your highly prized, reserve flights (as I understand the feathers on the dart are called) from the top pocket of your leather jacket (where you usually have them displayed during crucial matches as a kind of lucky ‘talisman’, I’ve been told) cannot and should not be supported under any circumstances.

Although — in Lydia May’s defence — they were green flights, Mr Jennings! Fluorescent green! That’s why Lydia May persisted in yelling, ‘Fluorescent green! Fluorescent green!’ throughout the subsequent brawl; the foolish girl was still hoping to win her prize, I imagine (and as a matter of fact I posted the bookmark to her, a couple of days later. I do, of course, realize that ‘fluorescent’ isn’t really a type of green, as such, but I had to give her top marks for tenacity, Claw, if nothing else, and a deal is a deal, after all).

Like I say, Mr J, I knew none of these pertinent details at the time. If I’d had even so much as an inkling that your precious flights had been cunningly shoved inside her bra (for safekeeping), how different things might have been! (It seems that Lydia May always stores precious objects inside her bra. When we were strip-searched at the police station an hour or so later, they found not only your flights, but a £50 note, a crumpled picture of Gordon Brown, a small plastic model of Father Abraham from The Smurfs and half a ‘bumper’ packet of Maynard’s Fruit Gums all stuffed in there.)

Had I been better informed (and feeling a tad more like ‘myself’) then I may well have resisted the rash, not to say ill-advised course of action I consequently took (in fact I’m sure I would have thought better of it!).

What I did was obviously wrong, Mr Jennings, but it was not premeditated in any way! And yes, I am seventy-two years old (pretty much ‘over the hill’ in most people’s estimations!), but I still can’t ignore the fact that I was a reserve for the 1960 British Women’s Olympic Hockey Team (my usual position was right back, formally a defensive role. I have a hefty ‘thwack’, in other words — no matter what manner of stick I happen to be employing!).

But enough of me, now, Claw! I can find no earthy justification in ‘mithering’ on any further about these issues (to do so, at this late stage, would surely be pure self-indulgence!). Although I think it only fair to tell you that once I’d hit you with my stick (and had dragged Lydia May, kicking and screaming, from the saloon bar), I seriously believed that the worst of the affair was over — ‘done and dusted’, so to speak!

Little did I realize that the worst was yet to come! Because Lydia May still had those precious flights hidden about her person (your late father’s flights) and you consequently felt unable (once you eventually came around, that is) to play on. The match was then awarded to the opposing team — a cruel decision, I feel, under the circumstances: you were suffering from quite a serious case of concussion, after all, an important detail which, I have been assured, your solicitor will be very keen indeed to put forward in your defence in court come January — and your thwarted hopes, profound sense of bafflement, deep feelings of frustration and disappointment simply combined to overwhelm you…