Mr Choppy And Mulberry Fuelled Mice

Zum Beamer

Dec 29

28th December 2022.

I mean, gawd's sake, it was little Wiveliscombe. Last I thing I imagined was having PCSO Louise appear at the cottage door in official copper uniform. Gently cupping the bloom of the year's last yellow patio rose in her paw and sniffing its perfume she began to talk business. "What's been done, well, …" She blew out her cheeks. A petal fell to ground. Others followed. "is so… naughty. We're taking it very seriously!"

I shall bleat the fill-in details. About chainsaw happy 'Mr Choppy'.

"Course you can stay! Come, come!" invited the missus, sat chatting on her phone on a sunny St Peter Port morn. She was talking to Ana, the daughter of our Romanian friends Mica and Lulu. And she meant come to Somerset not Guernsey. So I'd crossed my fingers. We'd been away a while. Very lax of us. However, I sent a neighbourly advance email warning of our imminent return. It proved bothersome.

Neighbour Aggie's return message had been rapid: "Sadly your bay tree is taking over both ours and next doors (sic). We would like your permission to cut a lot of the branches." "I'll have a look at the bay soonest. Nothing should be unsolvable," I replied, thinking nowt more of the matter because I could simply say no. I should have paid better heed to Aggie's politic use of 'we'.

"Don't even dare think about calling the girls fang-farriers," warned the missus, wagging a warning index digit. I held up my hands.

The girls, Ana and her best friend Ioana, are dentists. Their smiles beatific. Borne of perfect nashers. And they are the kind of attractive that has wolfish self-considered Lotharios offering their slow passing 'you-all-rights'. Each meets Ioana's dismissive nod and Ana's chortles. Both originally from Iași and now Walton-on-Thames based, they were all for a pre-Christmas away weekend splodging about Lothario free Tarr Steps, the Exmoor clapper bridge. Bronze age say some. All 17 spans of it. Stretching 55 pulse-racing metres across the River Barle. "Bet you'll love it more than Stonehenge," I'd said.

Within 72-hours I'd find out.

The missus and me barely had time to prepare our proper home across the sea. Its neglect a worrying distraction from wondrous events in Pakistan. Where, in Rawalpindi, Multan and Karachi, Somerset spinner Jack Leach twiddled and twirled bamboozling cricket balls. The result? Captain Stokes' England had beat their hosts three-zip. A feat previously not achieved by any other touring Test team. And there was a miracle closer to home.

Neptune's white horses were amazingly stabled as the ferry out of Saint Peter Port crossed a becalmed English Channel toward Poole.

"Your phone still got that blurry Saint Apolline's chapel photo to show them?" the missus nudged from her cabin seat.

"Yep," I reassured. St Apolline being the patron saint of dentists, the fourteenth century chapel, a Sarnian treasure, had relevance. An early Dominican monks' prayer beseeches the saint to help grotty toothache. "Found out the chapel became a Victorian cattle barn. Bet the island's sugar beet was great for moo-moo teeth. Not. Anyway, you sure the fang-farr…girls might be interested it's back to communion wafers getting stuck in Guern dentures?"

The missus could only shrug. "They'd be keener on your homemade Sarmale."

"It's what cabbages are grown for. Hope the oven's dicky element survived the damp. Reckon on an orison to Saint Apolline for the girls' sake?"

"Love, it'll be fine," said the missus, a quaver betraying a hint of doubt. "Anyway I'm looking forward to seeing what Luke's achieved." A true craftsman in carpentry and metalwork, Luke had been doing his best magicking the cottage to rights.

Blackbirds chack-chacked their dimpsey daylight chorus by the time we admired the fresh exterior coat of white lime wash. Still, sat in the window, our good old wooden puffin. My grandma's cherished clangy bell, her bygone lunch summoner, hung from an iron wall bracket of clever artistry. A Luke surprise. "Picked the bell out the mud," he said.

Wow, our bolthole did look bonza. A yaffle glared a gimlet eye upon being told to leave the new soffits alone. And an unfamiliar front door hobnailed the traditional Somerset way boasted a snug cill. Gone was the wildlife highway offered between the old shambly door and the foot-worn brick doorstep.

We made a downstairs forensic sweep. A fluffy duster and dusty chair did for the welcoming spider web garlands. Then, result! No more slug and chuggypig (woodlouse) trespassers on the carpets. Frogs squatting on the firelighters beside the cold sitting room stove were but past memory. No newts in the downstairs loo either. Bit of a cliché but absence really had made the heart grow fonder.

"Odd. The top garden looks less gloomy for this time of arvo," the missus observed looking out the kitchen window.

"Um, you thinking what I'm thinking."

Leaving the missus to check on the upstairs bedrooms I went for an outside gander. And, merde! More gappy than the gob of a sweet-toothed brat the venerable bay tree, the second tallest example in the county the council tree expert once said, was a shadow of its former glory. Multiple majestic limbs AWOL. Nowt left but a sap-seeping, mediocrity. On 'next door's' side lay the amputations. Logged. Neatly stacked. Evidence enough of liberties taken for a splendiferous view of the sheepy distant hills. The season of goodwill had encountered a hiccup.

"It's a blooming crime," grumbled missus having joined me. "Another one. Poor tree."

"I'm not letting this rest." I said. "Not when a wee of jar of Waitrose bay leaves cost four quid. Mr Choppy next door's become as flush as Musk."

Looking down at spot of trampled ground elder and creeping ivy coated with sawdust, the missus ire went from simmer to boil. "Sacrilege! The effing cat's not allowed to rest either." There, beneath the sod, lay our long-ago passed-on tortoiseshell mouser in a silk pillow case shroud. "Poor Bilbalina. How I miss her."

"Sweetheart mine, you said 'another'. What another?"

"Mice," she groused.

Her upstairs nose had sniffed them out. They had flourished with low cholesterol and on high dose Vitamin C. Thanks to a gurt bag of dried Uzbek mulberries stashed in the spare bedroom in the days of yore. Snoozy nests laced with poopings and piddle-pongs skunked the duvet. The mattress, too, hadn't escaped the binges. Best not mention that to our awaited guests.

Nor mention St Apolline hadn't aspired to 'elemental' level on ovens. Cabbage coleslaw didn't cut the mustard.

"How's about we take a room at the pub? A maybe book another? I suggested. "Their fish and chips are yummskovich."

"I'll forewarn Ana," said the missus standing on tiptoe for a phone signal…

"What I really want is the rascal to see your uniform. And you wagging a vigorous finger. Always works," I said to PCSO Louise. "Oh, and letter of apology."

"That and more," she said handing me a biro and an important piece of paper to sign. "I'm going to give him an antisocial behaviour warning. All part of the Criminal Damage Community Resolution… Sorry, about your rose. It was ever so lovely."

From Mr Choppy and Aggie we haven't since heard a peep. "We'll be back early in the new year, yaffle. At least, try behave yourself," I called to the bird as the missus and me tugged ourselves away for the Guernsey bound ferry.

On the up side, the missus has splashed out on an air-fryer. Although I'm unsure whether it cooks Sarm

As Jack Leach might say: "You can't take your eyes off the ball." Not for one blessed second.