THE MORNING YEARS

It was late on in 1986 that I last thought of Rodney, Venus and Number 4, a long time ago and a long way from here. In fact I was in a small ship called VNQB67 and we were rounding the tip of Saipan so that we could run down the starboard side (looking North) of the island. Actually we were heading for Tinian where I had to meet a man about a new job for the Ducks *And Then There Was One - Alone, something to keep a few much needed dollars trickling into the bank account.

I remember Red bringing, of all things, an egg and mayo sandwich, to me in the wheelhouse - I know, not very exotic, but I used to love the old E & M sangers. When I was a very young chap eggs were about the only plentiful thing because my parent’s house had three tenant farms attached to it and every farmyard had a swag of chickens running around looking important.
The three farms had actually been left to run down by generations of Drakes, it was my father that got them up and running again. After the war (WW11) he took a big chance and let each of the farms to somebody he had been friends with in the army. One was let to an ex Major, one to a Sergeant and one to a Private who had a PhD in something or other. In later life I can understand what dad meant when he said they would have had trouble finding jobs - they had all been commandos and society no longer needed them. Anyway, strange to say, they took to farming very well and all three were soon paying their way and even making a bit of profit.

Now, my parents had one fanatical hatred and that was for ‘The Hunt’, as Oscar Wilde put it "The unspeakable chasing the inedible", they loathed and detested all who engaged in this barbaric pastime and did everything that they could to disrupt things.
They brought the holders of the three farms into the fold and that put a huge dent in the areas where the hunt could operate. In the past the hunt used to ride over anybody’s property thinking that, as Lords of The Manor, they could do anything - well that ended at the end of about a dozen shot guns filled with rock salt. Dad and his cohorts soon made it plain that this was definitely a ‘No Hunt’ area and as he was also the local magistrate none could challenge. The same applied to badgers, anybody that wanted to mess with the badgers on our land soon found themselves up to their necks in biiigggggg trouble.

Now there was one thing that I could never quite master and that was horse riding. Both my parents rode very well and dad had been part of the army equestrian team, he had even been asked to try out for the British Olympic team but declined saying that, when it got that serious, it lost its appeal. Heaven knows I tried to ride well, but it always ended up with me on the deck and a horse laughing its head off. However, I’m getting away from the story.

One day I heard the hunt in full swing; it was a few miles away but seemed to be headed in our direction. Dad was off like flash, soon to be joined by his partners from the farms - Thou Shalt Not Pass, that was the one rule for the hunt. I should mention that we kept a pack of Beagles as disrupter dogs. These chaps would hurtle in amongst the hunt hounds and start to play. Hunts often used beagles and as a friendly sort of creature often forgot all about what its role in life was supposed to be.
There were a few booms of shotguns being fired into the air and then it went quiet. Robin Hood Drake and his merry men came back to the house and soon large tankards of rather potent cider were being consumed.
About an hour later I was in the orchard (apple only I’m afraid) and I came a cross a small fox lying on its side panting, this was evidently what had got the hunt excited. He was a very young dog (male) fox not long out of the Kit stage. I didn’t try and get too close as it was obviously in the final stages of exhaustion and seemed to have a broken leg. My parents were called and the chap was taken to what, in past times, would have been called the stables, now there were only two horses, my mother’s, whose name I forget and Venus, dad’s huge mare and pride of his life. The leg was only badly strained not, thank god, broken. He was given a bed in the straw, water and food (the good thing about foxes is they eat just about anything).

The interesting thing was that, from the moment the fox entered his domain Venus took a shine to the chap. Some people say that horses only sleep standing up, that’s rubbish, they also sleep lying down, and Venus did that night, only a few feet from where the little chap was recovering. The bottom of the stable door was left open so that the Kit could take himself off when he was up to it but we needn’t have bothered, he was still there in the morning, sitting alongside a now standing Venus, his new best friend.

Over the next few months ‘Rodney the Fox’ became part of, not only stable life but also that of the house. First (naturally) to the kitchen and then as time went by he gradually claimed every lived in room as his own. I should point out that he was never restrained; he could have run off at any time. He also became great chums with ‘Number 4’, one of the beagles who had also wormed his way into the house. It was a bit odd seeing them sitting together in front of a fire on chill evenings, but Rodney always took himself back to the stable to spend the nights with Venus.

Then it was Christmas and back then that really meant something. Christmas Eve was actually a bigger event that Christmas Day. The holders of the tenant farms and their workers their families would pile up to the house. We had a long sort on banquet room that on one side was able to be opened up to the lawn by multiple French Windows. Everybody provided something for ‘the feast’ which went from around 7pm to midnight although there was no hard and fast rule, often there would be heaps of people there by mid afternoon and long into the small hours of Christmas Day. Heaps of ‘fun’ presents - you have to remember it took England many years to recover from WW11 and even when I was around 10/11 years old toys were rather scarce. I should mention that this was the only night of the year that the Long Dining Room was used - most of the time, like a big percentage of the house, it sat empty and unused.

I had though that all the people milling around would scare Rodney back to his stable, wrong, he was in the thick of it, that big grin of his going from person to person to see what sort of food they had (and to procure some for himself, naturally, aided by Number 4). Venus and mums horse (I wish I could remember his name) roamed the lawn and didn’t to too bad themselves - Venus, it seems, took a liking to plumb putting made with brandy.

There were a few more Christmases after this one, but I think we were the dinosaurs watching our world self destruct around us. This was the end of England when the word still meant something, not good, not evil, just England a tiny country that did so much at a time when there was much to be done.

It was after New Years Day when I was walking with a few friends on the Downs (for those of you who don’t know the two sets of hills that form the spine of England are called the North and South Downs - don’t ask I have no idea why), when I saw mum and dad on their horses literally thundering along to top of the Downs, they loved to race in the snow but only when they knew exactly what lay under the while mantle, no horse of theirs was going to fall.
It took me a few seconds to spot what was different. Dad always used a light saddle with no pommel, but now it had a small cage expertly mounted on the front of it and in that cage - you got it- ‘Rodney’ he was now far too lazy to run beside Venus, so dad had had a special ‘thing’ made so that Rodney could ride with them in safety. It had a padded floor and back, wire sides and a drop lid for when they were really racing; otherwise the poor chap might have shot out of the top. What a sight they made, the two horses pounding along like unstoppable giants chilled breath like smoke streaming from their nostrils, mum and dad almost flat along the neck (where possible) and that fox with the ridiculous name, a giant of a grin all over his face, lying across his box, the ruler of his little world, and, I suspect, also of ours.

Within a few short years it was all gone. The house had to be demolished as it never recovered from bomb damage. I can now tell you its name as I have checked Google and Yahoo and there is no mention of it. It was called ‘South Hanger’, no, nothing to do with aeroplanes. In fact it had nothing to do with the existing house which was built in 1747, or, probably the one before that 1490 (ish) but was named for the first house (they were all built on top of each other). A ‘Hanger’ was a large fortified house which ‘hung’ on the border between minor kingdoms (that shows you how old the original one must have been). So, South Hanger sat as a defence on the Southern border of some petty kingdom or other. The only difference this time was that when it was demolished no new ‘South Hanger’ rose in it’s place, the time of ‘us’ and our kind was over. Sadly I believe the local council acquired the land and built low cost housing, how very ... ‘working class’ of them.

The Island of Tinian was now to starboard. We would use a boat to go ashore no need mucking about with all the paperwork required if you actually tell people you are going to pay them a visit. It was now a dark night and unless one of the yank subs out of Guam was nosing around, none would know we were here.

I guess if you have managed to read this far you want to know what happened to all the four legged players. Well, I’m glad to say that there is little sadness in the ending.
As some of you know my parents were killed in a coach accident on the continent when I was 17.
Dad had willed the three tenant farms to the people renting them, so now they owned them outright. It was a ‘nice’ thing to do but some of that money would have come in handy for me in my declining years. Still, those guys and gals did the hard work and were a real part of our extended family, so it was only proper that they got what they so richly deserved.

The three farms were called ‘Valley Farm, Low End Farm and Beechcroft Farm and Major Lewis who rented (then owned) Beechcroft took Venus, Rodney and Number 4. The three of them lived together on the farm until they passed away from extreme old age - and all within three days of each other. Now, I can’t give you a happier ending than that can I?