Golden Grove

By B. S. Davies

Travelling toward Norwich through the worst snow storm in British history, James Humfries discovers an unknown village in the heart of Thetford forest.
The villagers there seem to living an idyllic life, seemingly separated from the rest of the world.
James has to tell them that their way of life is about to be ruined by the planned extension to the M11 Motorway linking Cambridge to Norwich ploughing through the middle of their village.
What can be done to save them?
What is the hold that the enigmatic Mr. Steal has over the village?
And why is everybody speaking Welsh?

• Language: English
• Publisher: B. S. Davies
• Release date: Mar 10, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370455409

B. S. Davies

B S Davies was born at a very young age on Halloween in 1958, the first offspring of Welsh parents. By the time his two sisters were born, the family had moved back to Wales, where his heart is (his lungs are in Norwich, his head is normally somewhere that does not appear on most maps). When he was old enough he joined the Royal Air Force, working in that well known contradiction in terms – Military Intelligence. He left in 1982 and worked at the University of East Anglia in Norwich as a cartographer. Life is a varied path from start to finish, and his has been no different, having worked as a frozen food packager, milkman, advertising executive, graphic designer, which once gave him the obscure opportunity of painting a check on the side of a cow! He is currently working as a freelance Graphic Designer and copywriter.

Book preview

For my family

Golden Grove

By Golden Grove ‘neath Grongar,

But let me choose and oh! I should

Love all my life and longer

To stroll among our trees and stray

In Goosegog Lane, on Donkey Down,

And hear the Dewi sing all day,

And never, never leave the town...

Under Milk Wood

Dylan Thomas

Chapter One

James was looking forward to spending the Christmas break with his family, but as the drive toward Norwich progressed, the dark clouds of blue-grey, the same colour as a Weimeraner dog, were sweeping quickly in from the east laden with the snow that they were silently delivering in yet another white wintery carpet over the whole of East Anglia. James wondered whether he would he make it in time for the family Christmas Eve celebrations the next day.

There would have been no question of completing this journey once the proposed new extension of the M11 from Cambridge to Norwich was built. But that was years away, still he should not complain; it was that project which was paying his wages so the longer it took, the better it was for his bank balance. After all, it was that healthy bank balance that was making the payments on his Christmas present to himself; the brand new Pacific Blue Jaguar XK8 convertible that he was attempting to steer toward Swaffham.

James Humphries was 26, six foot with dark red curly hair, hazel brown eyes and ambitious as hell. After completing his University BA (Hons.) degree in Land Economy in Cambridge he had walked straight into a job with his friend, Alan Jenkins, who (with his MP father’s money) had set up a Chartered Surveyors Consultancy on the outskirts of the City near the Airport. One of their first commissions, also probably with a little help from Alan’s father, was to explore the possibility of linking Norwich and Cambridge by extending the M11; a motorway was one thing East Anglia lacked, people only ever travelled too Norwich, never through it.

James was intending to take the A11 to Norwich, but the bad weather had already closed the Thetford bypass and therefore had necessitated this unwanted detour to Swaffham to meet the A47, but he had gone astray in the Brandon area and was so lost, even the Sat-Nav did not know where he was; no change there then. He had given up on the radio ten minutes outside of Cambridge; too Christmassy - when would people realise that Slade was not just for Christmas but all year round? He had only collected the car that afternoon and had not thought of bringing any music with him, so he was continued the journey in the silence that only snowfall brings.

The irony of the situation was not lost on James, he had spent years studying aerial photography and drawing maps, but just could not map read on the ground; he had tried it once on a Treasure Hunt in University.

The task had seemed a simple one; drive around the Cambridgeshire countryside armed with a sheet of twenty clues and an Ordinance Survey Map of the area, the clues would lead them to a designated spot where a barbeque had been set up, a cash prize going to the first team to arrive. His team partner had been some slim brunette girl that he could not even remember the name of now, she had decided to drive and he could handle the clues and the navigation duties, three hours of driving around in ever increasing circles, asking for inane directions from locals and receiving even more inane answers in return left them with no alternative than for them to telephone the organisers, getting someone to drive out to find them and lead them to the party. The embarrassment was made complete when some wag pointed out that the main error in their navigation was the fact that James had been holding the map the wrong way around, north facing south; no wonder they had got lost!

When, for years after it seemed to James, people would remind him of his orienteering disaster he would grumpily reply I draw maps, I don’t read them.

The falling snow was becoming more intense now and James started to consider seeking shelter for the evening. It was only three O’clock in the afternoon and he was already driving on full beam, but the light from the headlamps was reflecting back off the snowflakes sheeting down and was making for virtually non-existent visibility, he switched to low beam. It made a difference; but not much, so he reduced the speed of the Jaguar to fifteen miles per hour, the sleek sports car did not like that at all. The sky appeared to be getting closer to the ground with every minute and his tyres started to leave ruts in the snow covering the road, time to stop; but where?

A road sign appeared, barely readable through the fine snow that been blown by the wind onto it, informing him he was on the road to a place called Munford. Road signs normally meant that there was a turning off the road and, sure enough there was one to the right just a little closer than the sign. A dense line of trees either side of the road were sheltering the surface from the majority of the weather so James turned onto it without a second thought.

About a mile down the road was a bend to the right and a sign announcing Grime’s Grave away to his left, he slowed to get his bearings and it was then he saw a sign reading Geshtown Road – a town! He had never heard of it but it was somewhere to spend the night and re-assess the weather conditions in the morning. He recklessly increased his speed to 30mph and steered toward what was to become his destiny.

A mile further on the snow had obscured the road entirely, and he was not even sure he was still actually driving along it and as he strained his eyes to try and catch a glimpse or any indication of tarmac at all, he slipped and slid over the snow and hit a snow covered hump which sent him slewing between two trees. With his heart in his mouth he brought the car to a gentle stop, and turned to look at the path he had taken between the two trees and shook his head in amazement; there was barely enough room to get the car through normally, let alone slide through uncontrollably! The tyre tracks behind him showed exactly how close he had come to wrapping his nice new sports car around a large fir tree; as he looked he thought he could see a diffused blue glow filling the void he had just traversed, maybe it’s the shock or a trick of the light, he thought. He strained to look through the windscreen to find the outline of the road once more and once he had located it, he gently pressed the accelerator once more.

After crawling slowly around the next corner he saw lights and a few houses, it was a surprise to him to find any form of habitation as he had studied this whole area of the Thetford Forest closely on maps and photographs looking for the route of the motorway and had the entire area committed to memory and, even given his navigational skills (or more precisely, the lack of them), he would have remembered a village lying right in the way of the continuance of his bank balance.

In the half-light of the lampposts bathed the village green in their fluorescent orange glow which gave the traditional decorated Tree in the centre of it an eerie appearance. Cottages, butted to each other in pairs, ringed the green with a church with a steeple at one end and, most welcoming to James, a pub at the other. The only other feature on the green itself (apart from the neatly manicured grass, of course) was the village sign post, a carved dragon stood atop of it, tall and rampant but with no name below where it would normally have been, neither was there a date proclaiming the year the village was founded.

James parked the car in one of several allotted spaces outside the Copse and Shrubbery as the floodlit sign above the pub proclaimed. As he locked the door and armed the car alarm with his electronic key he looked skywards and could see the snow falling from what was very quickly becoming one of Britain’s worst whiteouts in history, but none of it was falling on the village!

Chapter Two

Hello sir! The welcoming cry came from the man behind the bar as he reached pre-emptively for a glass on a hidden shelf above the bar. What’ll you have?

James faltered slightly, he had always prided himself on not stereotyping people, but he had half expected to walk into a pub full of yokels who would stop in mid-conversation and stare at him as he walked in, very much like the pub in An American Werewolf in London. But there was none of that.

Given that it was only four O’clock in the afternoon, the place was quite crowded and he guessed that most of the village was in there, including the vicar, who was propped up at the bar with a half consumed pint in one hand and fussing with his crucifix with the other deep in conversation with a young man about James’s age. Other villagers were dotted around the tables in front of the enormous open fire place in which a wood fire flickered. A large ornately decorated Christmas Tree next to it and a couple were playing darts in one corner with another two playing pool in a separate room through an archway at the opposite end of the bar.

A large high definition television set mounted on the wall opposite the bar was tuned to a news channel which was reporting the terrible weather sweeping across the country.

Well, at least it hasn’t reached Wales yet. Said a voice from the other end of the bar, Which means the rugby should be OK.

Good! said the Vicar, We can all watch The Ospreys beat The Blues again! There was a small cheer from a minority of the patrons and some laughter.

In your dreams! said somebody.

No, replied the man of God, in my prayers. This prompted more laughter.

James was confused; here he was somewhere in Thetford Forest on the border of Suffolk and Norfolk, and everybody in this village appeared to be Welsh.

He turned back to the bar and spoke to the Landlord who was still standing there with an empty glass in his hand, Thank you, I’ll have a pint of lager, please.

Okay, bwt. (He pronounced it ‘but’ which means ‘friend’, or more exactly, ‘mate’ in Welsh), He poured a perfect pint and placed it on the bar in front of James That will be fifty pence please."

Sorry? asked James in amazement.

That will be fifty pence, sir. Said the Landlord apologetically, Sorry, but I had to put the price up last week to help pay for the new television. He pointed to the screen on the wall.

To bloody right you put the price up. Moaned the man sat on the stool next to James. Last week a pint would only have cost you forty five pence like it had for years, but now, just before the Christmas rush, he swept his hand around the bar, the price conveniently has to rise.

Well Dai, you’d be the one moaning that you can’t see ‘The Guns of Navarrone’ on Boxing Day if we still had that little portable black and white telly on the shelf. The Landlord pointed out.

True. Dai grudgingly conceded. And I could hardly hear Morecambe and Wise over the noise last year.

Well, said the Landlord, It’ll be in glorious surround sound, this year!

James spotted an empty bar stool at the end of the bar furthest away from the fire and the television so he paid the landlord with a five pound note and went to sit down. A few moments later the Landlord came to him and gave him his change. Where am I? he asked the Landlord.

You are in the Copse and Shrubbery. He was told.

And the name of the village? he asked.

It is called Pentref Gelli Aur. It’s Welsh for Golden Grove Village" The barman had slurred the double ‘ll’ with his tongue against the inside of his cheek.

James was still puzzled, So is the price of the beer a Christmas Special then? he asked.

Oh no sir, it’s going to have to stay at that price for the foreseeable future, that television cost over a hundred pounds you know!

I don’t want to sound, er, demeaning or superior; but do you know what year it is? James asked.

Why yes sir, it’s 2017. Oh, and by the way, my name is Evan; I own this place. He informed James proudly. With my wife Megan, of course. He added quickly.

Before James could ask any more questions the door of The Shrubbery flew open and a small fur enveloped shape strode into the bar and went straight to the fire. There, it pulled off huge woollen mittens, which looked like knitted boxing gloves, and rubbed bare hands over the heat to warm them then in a broad voice which was a fair imitation of Richard Burton’s quoted:

"It was always snowing at Christmas.

December, in my memory, is white as Lapland, though there were no

reindeers.

But there were cats.

Patient, cold and callous, our hands wrapped in socks,

We waited to snowball the cats. Sleek and long as jaguars

And horrible-whiskered, spitting and snarling, they would slink

And sidle over the white back-garden walls, and the lynx-eyed hunters,

Jim and I, fur-capped and moccasined trappers from Hudson Bay,

Off Mumbles Road, would hurl our deadly snowballs at the green of their

eyes.

The wise cats never appeared."

The systematic disrobing of layers upon layers of fur during the recital had revealed the figure of the shortest, and probably the most rotund, gentleman James had ever seen outside of a drawing by William Hogarth; he spoke again, staring at James, We have a stranger in our midst! and he advanced to the bar with his hand stretched out towards James. As he took the man’s hand his own was grasped with surprising strength and vigorously shaken up and down. Hello, lad, the name is Morgan Owens, but everybody calls me Mog. He told James.

Er, I’m James.

And what brings to this particular area of God’s Own Earth then? Mog enquired.

It might have been James’s heightened sense of strangeness, but the whole pub seemed to quieten a little and lean toward him slightly in anticipation of his answer. The weather really, he said, I’m on my way to Norwich from Cambridge. He went on, not sure he had satisfied the interest of everybody, and added meekly For Christmas.

The interest of most of the patrons satisfied they turned back to their drinks and chatter. But Mog could not leave the matter alone, All the way to Norwich? he asked, All the way to Norwich? Well that’s a journey and a half isn’t it? Especially with the Severn Bridge almost closed due to the snow and all.

Evan stepped into the conversation, No, Mog, We aren’t in Wales, bwt; we’re in East Anglia, England. He said as he placed a pint of bitter in front of the Welshman, Remember?

Mog looked blank for a moment, then smiled a faraway smile and said Oh yes, that’s right, keep forgetting that. Must have a word with Mr. Steal about that. He nodded to himself as if he had made a momentous decision and with a nod to James he went to sit down in front of the television.

James looked questioningly at Evan behind the bar, who said "It’s complicated; it’s much better if Mr. Steal explains it to you when he comes in.

By the way, with the weather like it is, you’ll be looking for some temporary lodgings I would imagine?

James had forgotten, he did need somewhere to stay for the night, Yes, I will. He agreed. Do you know anywhere?"

Oh yes. Evan answered, Old Mrs. Davey across the Green will have a room going spare, and Jack’ll be in soon for the rugby and then he’ll ask her, I would imagine.

Oh, great. Said James, Just one more thing, Evan.

Yes, bwt?