BACK TO MENU

HORSE & HOUND - JUNE
This is the time of year when we used to have our Barn Dance. I use the past tense, because the Barn Dance is now in the past; history; or perhaps more aptly - toast. Few amongst us mourn its passing, except, perhaps, the Hon Treasurer because it made a lot of money. In most hunts 'making money' really means recycling money between the pockets of hunt supporters. The beauty of the Barn Dance was that it extracted money from the 'Toonies' - people who would never dream of putting a hand in a pocket to help the local hunt. In particular, the dance attracted the gilded youth from two local market towns. All very jolly and bucolic you might think, well yes… up to a point.

Under the placid surface of this area run deep and dangerous currents. This was the country of the 'Border Reivers', where old feuds, based on murder, rapine and the 'lifting' of other people's livestock and 'insight' are embedded in the local psyche. This means that the youth of, say, Otterbury feel obliged to offer violence to the youth of, as it might be, Rothburn - it is in the blood. To prevent too much of this blood being smeared on the floor, the hunt enlisted the help of the larger and more physically robust amongst our hill shepherds as stewards. As I was then large and looked physically robust and was also the MFH, I was appointed 'OC Stewards'. There was also a significant presence of 'Northumbria's Finest'. The barn in question was a large hay barn, which was generally empty of hay at the time of the Dance. It was unfortunate that in the year in question, there was still a fair bit of old hay stacked at the back of the barn. Came the night, I donned my Steward's arm band, had a chat with the 'polis' and was introduced to the 'Timber Wolf' - it was disguised as a German Shepherd, but it was attached to its handler by what looked like a length of anchor chain.

This duty done, I took up a strategic command post at the far end of the bar where I had good 'room domination' and a ready supply of whisky. The dance began decorously enough. The Great British Public had turned up in droves and what it may have lacked in social polish it more than made up for in the amount of ironmongery that it had inserted in various parts of its collective anatomy. If we had been expecting a bit of trouble we were not disappointed. A few preliminary bouts were dealt with by the tact and diplomacy of our corps of stewards - "a firm grip on the throat, oft turneth away wrath," as the Good Book saith. The main bout of the evening began by a small spat between two ladies ('cherchez la femme' is always a sound maxim when looking for the cause of a problem.) It seemed that the Rose of Otterbury - Ms Slack Alice - took the huff at the amount of attention her beau was bestowing on Ms 'Fag Ash' Sharon - The Lily of Rothburn. This led to an argument and some verbal abuse. Ms Alice reinforced her claim by forcibly removing a couple of intricately beaded plaits from Ms Sharon's head. Ms Sharon responded by deeply scoring Ms Alice's face with her fingernails. This led to unpleasantness and a fight began. At the first sign of major trouble, I made a decision to shorten my lines of communications and made a tactical withdrawal to a forward observation position - underneath a trestle table. I felt that my presence would raise the morale of our Stewards. By this time, there was a fine old ruction going on, with shouting, snarling and the crash of breaking glass. It seemed that both tact and persuasion had packed up and gone home - I cannot blame them.

It was at this point that the 'polis' reluctantly stubbed out its fag and decided that its time had come. It brought the Timber Wolf with it, straining at its cable. Above the ruckus a single voice was heard. It said 'WOOF! WOOF!' and for good measure: 'WOOF!' The Timber Wolf was ready to play. I don't know if you have ever seen people going 4 deep out through a single door, but it is quite amazing how quickly a large space can be cleared by this method. In a very short time the barn was empty of revellers. Then came a still, small voice - it said - "Fire!" and then "FIRE!" and the first orange tongues of flame could be seen licking up the hay bales at the back: "EVERYBODY OUT!" I bellowed then I realised that there was nobody left but me. Everybody else was outside watching the 'sparks fly upwards'. I gave myself permission to leave my post and left. That was the end of the Barn Dance and the Barn. There is a nice new barn on the site, but no dancing - the insurance company is quite firm on that point.

BACK TO TOP

BACK TO MENU