Episode 2 - Anyone for hockey?

Weekend

Saturday turned out to be one of those November days you could do without. It was cold, windy and spitting with rain.

Charlie, Lottie and the ebullient Cecilia were persuaded to be taken to school in the Hurley family van. Gary felt sorry for them. They felt quite exhilarated about trying their luck against the boys of one of the local private schools. Gary wondered how his little girl could have grown into a quite a toughie when a hockey stick was put into her hand. Lottie was happy to go along with anything Charlie did. Cecilia just did her own thing.

“Those boys will murder you,” Gary said.

“They won’t, Daddy. They play hockey because they don’t like rugby and cricket is off for the winter. They think hockey’s really a faster version of cricket, but they can’t run for the life of them.”

“Anyway, Cecilia will take care of most of them,” said Lottie.

“I don’t need an invitation, Mr Hurley,” said Cecilia. “I had two eggs and 5 rashers of bacon for breakfast and I’m ready for them.”

“Well, good luck and don’t get injured, even if it means losing.”

“We won’t lose, Mr Hurley. I’ll make sure of that,” said Cecilia. “Boys are silly, and anyway, we’re insured.”

“That’s not the point,” said Gary.

Cecilia was a bad influence. The girls were at a susceptible age and Cecilia had clearly decided against humanity. Gary had seen it all before. Girls like Cecilia got into bad company and ended up in court.

***

Gary dropped the trio off and drove home to collect those of the family who were willing to brave the elements. That included Cleo, Grit, PeggySue and Roger. PeggySue, Tommy and Teddy, Max and Mathilda would stay in the warm with Toni the part-time au pair and her colleague from the nursery where Toni now had a proper job. The Hurleys arrived in good time for the match and wrapped themselves in blankets against the wind. Th smallest infants were almost invisible under a pile of blankets in their pram. They would sleep through it all-

***

Miss Plimsoll was already warming up her team by shouting at them not to shiver as she was not shivering (albeit because she was dressed for the weather and the girls weren’t). They were to keep moving! Hop! Hop! Hop!” she screamed.

The boys were warming up at the other end of the playing field, getting final instructions from their sports teacher, Mr Block, and drinking punch out of thermos flask beakers. Their opponents were not girls, they were monsters in pleated skirts, Mr Block was telling them. The hot, spicy red wine would help thicken their blood against the cold, and they were to be courageous.

Joyce was going to referee. The boys did not know she was about to take over from Miss Plimsoll, so they did not suspect corruption. Joyce was not going to be corrupt anyway, though Miss Plimsoll had hinted that it would be all right to prefer the girls.

The boys of Haverstoke Private School were ostensibly aiming at academic glory provided by parents affluent enough to pay the fat fees for sending their little darlings there – it’s a bit like Gordonstoun, you know, where Prince Charles went. The boys thought it was really below their dignity to play against girls, who were not allowed at the school, and had entered a pact to wipe them out. They would not have been pleased to know that the same sort of pact was spurring the girls on, and even less pleased to know that one or two of the boys had discovered that their emotions about girls were not all aggressive.

“If nothing else helps, go for their knees,” whispered Cecilia, who was captain of the girls’ team, being the tallest, fattest and strongest. She was echoing Miss Plimsoll’s exact words.

The match was one-sided. Most of the boys were scared of the girls, but too well brought-up to treat them the way they were being treated. Even drams of whisky in their half-time punch did not warm them up enough to get them running for goals and defying the girls’ hockey sticks. Avoiding injury became their main concern, so they were inevitably victims of Cecilia’s strategy and Miss Plimsoll’s merciless training.

“Boys are natural cowards”, Miss Plimsoll had told the girls. “You have to be part-executioner to be good at hockey, but avoid the heads.”

Miss Plimsoll had always inspired nervousness among the school staff for her bluntness. Some of them had turned up to watch the fun at the hockey match and subsequently affected shock at what the sports teacher shouted, but there was only one serious incident that might well have been an accident, and that was when the hockey ball hit Miss Plimsoll squarely on the forehead, sending her flying. But she was heroic. The game must go on, she insisted. Other members of staff helped her to stand upright. She could not admit to dizziness and expect the girls to fight for victory.

The girls won 10 to 1.

“That was my last match,” cried Miss Plimsoll when it was all over and the lump on her forehead had reached almost astronomical proportions. “Unforgettable. Thank you so much for winning.”

The only person emotionally touched by that little farewell scene was Miss Plimsoll herself, and her tears might have been induced by the awful headache she now had. They were the first tears Miss Plimsoll had shed within living memory. Maybe she had loved her hockey team all along, though she had had a funny way of showing it.

***

Mr Sloane, who had kept an ultra-low profile throughout the match, managed to get over his shyness long enough to congratulate Joyce on her refereeing. While Gary took the shivering Hurleys home, he tried to get on closer terms with her.

“It is Mark, isn’t it?” she said, surprised to see someone she had quite admired twenty years ago and since forgotten completely. “What brought you here?”

“Coincidence,” said Mr Sloane, who was thankful that the high wind made shouting unavoidable. “I’m going to do some detective work for the Hartley Agency in Upper Grumpsfield and two of her girls were playing today, so I thought I should support them.”

“That’s very noble of you in this horrible weather. When I take over, I’m going to introduce indoor hockey,” said Joyce.

”That‘s a good idea. Would you like to go for a drink somewhere?”

“I’ve got to do my shopping,“ Joyce said.

Mr Sloane was not sure if she was trying to refuse his invitation, so he pressed on.

“I’ll help you,” he said.

“Would you? I’d like to hear about your investigation. I didn’t know you were a detective.”

“I’m more of a researcher,” said Mr Sloane carefully. “Shall we move on? I’m cold.”

“I’ll just go to the changing room and get my coat on. You can come with me as far as the door.”

Mr Sloane’s day was made. He swore to breathe and not to stutter.

***

“It’s probably worth a dose of pleurisy to send those boys off with a flea in their ear,” said Roger. “I’ll be glad to get home. Hockey is not my game. Ice-hockey maybe. But watching aggressive girls wielding hockey sticks like tomahawks is not my chosen form of entertainment.

Gary’s father-in-law really had been shattered by the view of those girls hacking away at their opponents. He was glad they were not obliged to drive home in the van. Grit had had the good sense to insist that they take her little car instead.

***

The rest of the day passed peacefully. Gary left before Grit and her party and drove the over-excited girls home. Cecilia was full of having shot the ball at Miss Plimsoll. Though all the other girls said it had not been her. He could drop her off at her gran’s at Pensioner’s Paradise, Thumpton Hill’s home for affluent senior residents. Gran would love to see her and they always had nice cakes.

By the time he reached the cottage with just Lottie and Charlie in the van, Cleo and Grit had got the lunch ready – one of Grit’s memorable stews that had simmered slowly all morning, and Lottie was to stay for lunch.

***

Apart from speculation about Joyce and Mr Sloane, the conversation was general.

Gary had a free weekend from HQ. He and Cleo walked up to the priory to inspect the excavation site.

“How’s he going to tackle all that?” Gary wanted to know. “I’m not helping. I’m sure he’s taking on too much. You should not have encouraged him, Cleo.”

“I had to,” said Cleo. “My conscience made me.”

“I just hope he finds something so that the work will have been worthwhile,” said Gary. ”Let’s get home. This place gives me the creeps.

***

Mr Sloane’s day did not go quite the way a Saturday would normally have gone. After trailing after Joyce all around the supermarket and carrying all the heavy bags back to his car, he felt quite ennobled and was happy to follow her into her bedsit for a cup of coffee and a piece of the quiche she had just bought (and he had paid for). One thing led to another and before he knew it, the late night news was on TV and Joyce, who had slipped into something comfortable, was nestling in his arm on the sofa.

***

Mr Sloane was not really a Romeo by nature. It might have been the first time in recent years that he had only got home from an outing the following morning. How was he going to face digging that afternoon, delirious as he was from a torrid night spent elsewhere?

Mr Sloane had been married briefly, a long time ago, but to a wife who soon became interested in the road-menders building a roundabout nearby and eventually, when the roundabout was finished, ran away with o the most muscular road-worker and applied for a divorce from Gibraltar, of all places. Sloane never saw her again. The divorce had been by proxy as she was about to give birth on the Rock and was not allowed to travel. Since then, Mark Sloane he had prided himself on being a loner, and no, the child was not his.

So at 38, Mr Sloane was already a confirmed bachelor – or had been up to now. Joyce was 32 and single.

Well, why not? He had asked himself over and over again before moving from the  comfortable sofa to Joyce’s comfortable bed.. As a newly installed investigator he now had a steady job beyond the priory project. He would not be able to go on as many paid adventures as before, but would he want to? The agency supplying him with temporary jobs helping out in digging for specimens at archaeological excavations was to be replaced by a dig for ecclesiastical treasures in Upper Grumpsfield under his own direction, and some as yet unspecified work from the Hartley Agency.

Things were looking up for Mr Sloane. He might even be able to afford a new pair of hand-made Italian leather shoes quite soon. And Joyce was a cracker.

***

Sunday Afternoon

Mr Sloane had arranged to meet Al at the excavation site after lunch. On reflection, it was just as well that he had not forced Al to break off his Sunday morning lie-in to get to the dig before lunch. Just the thought of his night with Joyce made him weak at the knees. What had come over him, behaving like a smitten teenager?

Mr Sloane transported a number of tools for the dig. Al transported himself and a pair of sturdy leather motor-bike gloves to the priory since he needed his hands for the bass guitar and was not sure if he would be expected to dig manually.

“We’ll start with the pick,” Mr Sloane shouted at told Al.

“Can I call you Mark?” said Al. “You call me Al and we’re in this together… and I’m not deaf.”

“You can call me Mack if you like,” called Sloane, not wishing to alienate this youth. “Mack isn’t short for Mark, but my mother is Scottish.”

That seemed to be a reasonable explanation.

“Who are the women coming round the corner?” said Al.

Cleo had decided to see how the excavators were getting on. She was accompanied by Joyce, who was eager to see if Mr Sloane was OK. The two women had not arranged to meet, but Joyce had phoned Cleo and asked what was happing. Cleo quickly put two and two together. So did Al.

“Booaaaa!” he said. “You got yourself a dish, Mack. I never would have thought it.”

“Just concentrate on the pick, Al. You might not get injured hands, but I’m worried about your feet.”

Al’s feet were hidden inside enormous army boots and he was using the pick like an old-fashioned stab-and-squeeze tin-opener.

“I’ll do that,” said Joyce seeing how untalented Al was, and proceeded to cover a lot of ground in a short time while Al looked on in admiration.

“Brilliant, Joyce,” said Mr Sloane. “Al, you can start with this shovel where Joyce has been,” he instructed, handing Al the shovel after demonstrating how to use it.

***

A few minutes later, Al stopped shovelling.

“I’ve got a question,” he said.

“Yes? What is it?”

“What are we digging for?”

“Ecclesiastical treasures; metal church ornaments,” Mack explained.

“Not bones?”

“Certainly not. There are no bones here. There might still be some in the cemetery, but that’s over there,” he pointed.

“Isn’t this a bone, Mack?” said Al, holding up what looked very much like a human shin bone.

all gasped.

“Where did you find it?” said Mack

“Just here” said Al, pointing downwards.

Sloane, Joyce and Cleo picked their way to where Al was pointing.

“You’d better dig a bit more,” said Mr Sloane. “But gently.”

“Not me, Mister,” said Al, looking scared. “You dig!”

“I suppose I’d better,” said Mr Sloane. Al handed him the shovel and he used it very gingerly for a moment before getting down on his knees almost reverently, delving into the soil and pulling out a number of human bones.

“They haven’t been there long,” said Cleo. "I think there are vestiges of flesh on some of them.”

Mr Sloane was aghast.

“Do you think…?”

“Yes, I do, Mr Sloane. I’ll call my husband. He’ll know what to do next. We’d better not touch anything. I think a cannibal has been at work here.”

“I don’t want to touch anything,” said Al, “and I’m not into cannibals. Can I go home?”

“Don’t you want to stay until you know more?” said Cleo.

“No Miss.”

“That's all right, Al. You go along. I’ll phone you. We’ll have to leave the digging for a day or two,” said Sloane.

“But what about my money, Mack?” said Al.

“How much?” said Cleo.

“Five pound a day, Miss.”

“Here’s twenty. Come back on Wednesday. By then we’ll have sorted something out,” said Cleo.

“You’ll have to call the police, Miss. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“We know that, Al,” said Mr Sloane. “And Mrs Hurley is married to the police, so they’ll be onto the bones rightaway.”

“Booaaaa,” said Al as he went back to his moped and drifted off home.