The Lost Soldier (6 page)

“Not everyone in the village is in favour of it anyway,” Rachel said. “There were other voices of dissension at the meeting you know, before the trees were mentioned.”

“There always are,” sighed Tim. “However good a scheme is, someone won’t like it and kick up a fuss.”

“Well, it is their village.”

“It’s everyone’s village, everyone who lives there I mean. The parish council is representing everyone in cases like this, and it is the parish council that we deal with.” Tim spoke firmly. “The parish council did not mention the trees.”

“What will you do?”

“We have to make further enquiries,” Tim replied. “We’ll find out who the trees were planted for and approach their families… if they’re still around. We are very happy to build a new memorial to the men commemorated there. None of those trees has got a name on it, you know. No one can tell, if they just walk over there, that they are memorial trees at all. There’s no sign, no name-plates, nothing. We shall offer to build a new memorial, perhaps a fountain beside the new village hall, with the names beside, and perhaps the names from the Second World War as well.”

“Is that a definite offer?” Rachel asked as she scribbled his words down in her notebook.

“It is certainly the sort of offer Mike Bradley has in mind,” replied Tim. “Obviously it hasn’t been made yet as the question has only just arisen, but I have no doubt that the parish council will be approached with something of that order.” He smiled at her reassuringly.

Rachel looked at him consideringly. She had spoken to Paula Sharp herself earlier in the day and realised she knew something that Tim Cartwright did not.

“We are going to have a problem,” Paula Sharp had told her that morning when Rachel had called on her. “The parish council owns the land, all of it… the village green and the allotments, all that land was left to the parish by Sir George in his will, but not the actual trees in the Ashgrove. They were given to the families of the men they commemorate by Sir George Hurst, in perpetuity. Each tree is owned by a different family. If they need to fell them all, they will have to get permission from each family, and,” she smiled wryly, “we already know what Cecily Strong will say, I think.”

“Do you know where all the other families are?” Rachel asked her.

Paula shrugged. “Some of them. A search will have to be made for the others, or the descendants of the others.”

“And if they can’t be found?”

“An interesting point,” acknowledged Mrs Sharp. “We shall have to take advice on that.”

“Do they need to fell all the trees?” Rachel wondered. “It might not be necessary to cut all of them down.”

“No,” agreed Mrs Sharp, “but consider the dreadfully bad feeling there will be if some are felled and some are left.”

Rachel knew that she was right. As she looked across at Tim Cartwright she wondered briefly whether to tell him who owned the trees, but decided against it. He’d find out soon enough, and if her paper were going to do battle with his company, it was better to keep some cards hidden. Rachel had every intention of trying to trace the descendants of each family, and she wanted a head start. She wanted to know what each family really thought, not what they might be bribed or coerced into thinking by Mike Bradley and Tim Cartwright, with offers of compensation and new memorial fountains. Of course Tim Cartwright hadn’t mentioned compensation yet, indeed Brigstock Jones must be hoping that the memorial would be enough, but she was sure that the wisdom expressed in the pub had been right, it was almost certainly only a matter of time until it all came down to money.

“I see,” she said returning his smile. “Well I suppose it can’t be helped. But it looks as if you’ll have a battle on your hands. As you already know there will be opposition from some of the families. For instance, Miss Strong spoke out against it very firmly at the meeting. One of the trees is in memory of her brother.”

“Yes, William Strong,” Tim Cartwright said, and seeing her surprise that he was able to come up with the name so quickly, added, “There is another memorial to them in the church. Even if the trees went, they wouldn’t be without memorial, you know. They’re all named in there.”

Rachel didn’t know, but she kept further surprise from her face and said, “Even so, that doesn’t have the emotional appeal of a living memorial, does it?”

“I agree,” Tim said smoothly, “but that’s not our fault. We want to be as sensitive about this as possible, but the bottom line is that if this development is to go ahead for the benefit of everyone, we may have no alternative but to fell the trees.”

Rachel stood up. “Well, thank you very much for your time, Mr Cartwright. Please tell Mr Bradley that I am sorry he wasn’t able to see me, but I think I have all I need now.”

Tim Cartwright held out his hand again. “Well, if I can be of any further assistance, please don’t hesitate to give me a call.” He took a card from his desk and gave it to her. “This is my direct line and my mobile, just give me a call, any time.”

Rachel went home to put the notes she had made into her computer and as she sorted them she considered exactly what she had learned. The ownership of the trees had not been the only thing of interest Paula Sharp had told her. It was the question of the actual land involved.

“The village green used to be part of the Manor estate,” Paula had said. “Though the village people had various rights over it. When Sir George died he left the green and the piece of land beyond it to the parish council, to be used for the public benefit of the village. The village green was left as it was, but the extra piece of land was fenced off and offered as individual allotments to residents of Charlton Ambrose at peppercorn rents. They were all taken up and worked by local people, though the ownership of the land still rested with the parish council.”

“And now the council has sold that land to Brigstock Jones,” said Rachel.

“Yes, subject to planning permission.”

“Didn’t the wording of the will prohibit that?” asked Rachel, surprised.

“We took legal advice on that,” said Paula Sharp. “It was considered that new housing and a new village hall
was
for the public benefit of the village, the village as it is today. In 1918 there was no question of there being no pub or shop or school in Charlton Ambrose, but now there is a very real danger of all three disappearing. We have to move with the times, and help provide the sort of housing needed now. By using the money from the sale of the allotments, we are able to fund the new hall. Part of our deal with Mr Bradley is that he will build the hall at cost. We already own the land, so it is just the building costs we have to find. The sale of the allotments covers those.”

“Let me get this straight,” said Rachel. “You mean building the hall is the price Mike Bradley has paid for the allotments?”

“Not exactly in those terms,” Paula Sharp replied, “but I suppose that’s what it boils down to, yes. As far as the parish council is concerned, it really is a deal beneficial to the whole community. We need a new hall, but more than that, we need those new houses. We must attract young families to Charlton Ambrose. At the meeting Mike Bradley said that it would bring our village back to life and he was quite right.”

“But you must have known about the trees,” pointed out Rachel. “You must have known that the developers would have to cut down the trees to get access to the site. It’s clear from the plans.”

“We did,” admitted Paula. Her face was pale and strained as she spoke. “We did, but none of us knew why they were there. Of course there are families still in the village who have been here for generations, and presumably they knew all about them, but many of us have moved here more recently and didn’t. There is no one from one of the older village families on the parish council at present, you know. None of us knew the significance of those trees.” She looked across at Rachel earnestly. “Have you been to look at them?” Rachel nodded. “Well, there’s nothing to identify them as a memorial now, is there? And none of us knew that’s what they were. It is extremely embarrassing. I went to the public record office yesterday and found the document recording the donation of the trees to the families. It’s quite explicit; the trees are theirs. We’d only checked Sir George’s will when we wanted to sell the land, and the trees were planted when the land still belonged to him. They weren’t mentioned in the will.”

Rachel mapped out her article. She needed to speak to the planning office, but there would be no one there now until Monday. In the meantime she would begin her research on the families.

Saturday morning found Rachel on the road to Charlton Ambrose on her way to visit Cecily Strong again.

She had phoned first thing, to see if she might call and Cecily, pleased to hear from her, had invited her to come round for coffee. Rachel readily accepted. Since her research in the
Chronicle
archive she had some more, specific, questions she hoped the old lady could answer. With luck, Cecily would be able to put Rachel on the trail of some of the other families still living in the village.

Over her breakfast coffee, she had looked up the surnames from her list in the phone book. Several of the names were listed, but whether they were actually the same families, only time would tell.

Rachel parked outside Cecily’s cottage, but before she called there she went to the church to look for the memorial Tim had mentioned. The church was old, its golden sandstone smooth and mellow. Huddled all round it, like chicks about their mother, were the gravestones of the people of Charlton Ambrose, a higgledy-piggledy mixture of stones and crosses and two large sarcophagus tombs, one on each side of the path. The winter grasses straggled between the stones and grassy mounds. There were one or two graves with fresh flowers, an occasional Christmas wreath, but several were marked only by withered stems standing spikily in jam jars, or long-dead, skeletal pot plants.

The old oak door was open and when Rachel pushed it wider, she found two women inside, cleaning the church. They werehatting to each other as they worked and took little notice of Rachel as she wandered round cthe church looking at the various memorial tablets and plaques.

She found what she was looking for at the back, beneath the large west window. The first was a brass plate which said:

T
O
THE
G
LORY
OF
G
OD

AND
IN
LOVING
MEMORY
OF
THOSE
BRAVE
MEN
FROM

C
HARLTON
A
MBROSE

WHO
GAVE
THEIR
LIVES
FOR
K
ING
AND
C
OUNTRY

IN
THE
G
REAT
W
AR
1914–1918

C
APTAIN
F
REDERICK
C
HARLES
H
URST

P
TE
H
ARRY
C
OOK

P
TE
J
OHN
D
AVIES

P
TE
W
ILLIAM
A
RTHUR
S
TRONG

P
TE
A
LFRED
J
OHN
C
HAPMAN

S
GT
D
ANIEL
D
AVIES

S
GT
G
EORGE
H
APGOOD

C
PL
G
ERALD
W
INTERS

T
HEY
LIVE
ON
IN
THE
HEARTS
OF
THOSE
WHO
ARE
LEFT
.

Underneath on a different plaque, almost as if it had been wedged in as an after-thought, was a second plate on which was inscribed:

A
LSO
THOSE
MEN
WHO
DIED
FOR
K
ING
AND
C
OUNTRY
IN

T
HE
S
ECOND
W
ORLD
W
AR

1939–1945

S
IMON
B
RADWELL

P
AUL
A
NDREW
C
ARR

S
TEPHEN
D
REW

D
ONALD
S
TEWART

J
ACK
T
URNER

G
ORDON
D
AVID
B
LUNT

H
AROLD
C
HAPMAN

C
HARLES
F
INCHAM

T
HOMAS
S
WINFORD

G
EORGE
J
OHN
W
EST

L
EST
WE
FORGET

Rachel read through the names on both tablets, before taking out her camera and photographing them. The flash drew her to the attention of the cleaning ladies and one called to her, “There’s a postcard of the west window in the stand by the door.”

Rachel turned round. “The west window?”

“Yes,” the woman pointed to the window above the memorial tablets. “There’s a postcard of that if you want to buy one, and a history of the church too.”

“Oh, thank you,” Rachel replied. “It was actually the war memorial I was looking at, not the window. Though,” she added hastily, “it’s very beautiful.” She raised her eyes to look properly at the stained glass and found that it was indeed a beautiful window. Even without benefit of sunshine to illuminate it, the colours were rich and strong, depicting the story of the Good Samaritan; the man lying injured at the side of the road and the Samaritan tending him, holding a cup to his lips, while the donkey the Samaritan had been riding waited patiently on a windswept road.