Should you be so fortunate to have been blessed with a thick skin and a strong selfish streak, you will, mercifully, be unable to fully identify with the ageing but lucid pictures that continue to dog my slumbers.
It happened, indeed, forty years ago as an eight year old, one of a small gang of otherwise nice kids whose unprivileged lives were immeasurably enriched by an exciting boy’s environment of forests, fields and ancient ponds. Strange it was, then, that the particularly insalubrious trickle of the River Ingrebourne held such fascination for us; it ran not through woodland or a farmers field, but alongside a large area of wasteland, under the main road, then out through Central Park to Harold wood.
Make no mistake, the stream (as we called it) was little more than a rubbish dump in places and host to little more wildlife than sticklebacks and rats – but we loved it, spending morning till dark jumping its width, climbing its trees and pursuing its vermin with catapulted stones.
Alan Kendell hit one once, just as its rear end was disappearing up a drainage pipe. How cruel kids can be. On occasions, we’d cease actively hunting in favour of a stake-out, whereby each of us would sit patiently in the tall grass on the high bank with our catapults trained on the various exits, waiting for a whiskered nose to show itself. Our intention was, I suppose, deadly, but I think we’d have hung our heads in shame had we actually killed … And so to the day that keeps me awake in the year 2010.
Readers should know that the River Ingrebourne is not a tributary of the Severn, the Usk, the Wye or the Lugg. It is nowhere near Devon; it is a million miles from the Lake District and has no connection whatever with the clear, tumbling streams of Derbyshire or North Yorkshire. It is a running-water filled ditch that succeeds in lowering the tone of Harold Hill in Romford, Essex.
We were, as I remember, sitting cross-legged in the grass on the park side of the bridge, sucking on frozen Jubblys – or barley sugar sticks, perhaps – when Alan Kendell’s brother, Geoff, came rocketing up the bank, clearly worried and pointing back to where the stream took a sharp left turn by a surface-water outlet, the type with a one-way pressure flap. Eventually, Geoff got his breath back and his eyes settled a little more easily in their sockets.
‘I’ve just seen a giant rat!’ said Geoff ‘Just down there, by the pipe!’
Naturally, we laughed and ridiculed the poor boy, but Geoff was adamant that the rat he’d seen was three feet long! So earnest was Geoff’s expression, we just had to investigate, catapults at the ready and suitable sticks quickly found lest we should be attacked by this beast. (All boys knew that a cornered rat went for your throat) As expected, we found nothing and the jibes about Geoff being ‘mental’ resumed. Suddenly, the boy was at it again …. ‘Look!’ he shouted ‘There it is! Swimming under the bank!’
Like Lords of the Flies we leapt down to the waters edge, sticks held aloft and stones gripped tightly to confront the giant …and giant it was! As big as Geoff’s claim, the beast half-swam half-ran with the flow, keeping close to the bank and the little cover it provided.
‘Plooosh!’ A large stone rocketed into the stream, then another. The cry went up to ‘Get it!’ Desperately, the animal sought refuge in the long grass on the opposite bank and quickly disappeared. Nervously, we jumped the stream and began thrashing the grass with our long sticks until the wretched animal broke cover and buried itself in a small but dense blackberry bush. We had it surrounded, but none of us was yet brave enough to step forward to peer into the undergrowth; instead, we poked sticks and aimlessly fired stones into the bush to flush the creature out, and all the time there was shouting and screaming …..
‘What’s all the fuss about, lads?’
The voice came from a grown-up who’d been passing through the park and, naturally enough, was curious to know what the Hell was going on.
‘Bloody great rat!’
‘Big as a dog!’
‘Three foot long!’
We all gave our two penn’orth and urged the man to come and help us get it. He readily jumped the stream and cautiously approached the thorny bush with one of our sticks and slowly pushed it in……there was a rustling and a series of faint grunts, then louder rustling.
‘Look! There’s it’s head!’ shouted one of the kids, and we all clamoured round to see a large, whiskered face with a bloody nose. The man shouldered us out of the way and knelt to study the creature.
‘It’s an otter, boys ‘he announced ‘go on home and leave it alone’.
With the creature cornered and cowering, we could, of course, see that the man was absolutely right, but our knowledge of otters extended only as far as the picture card from Brooke Bond tea. And who in their right mind would even consider the possibility of an otter in Harold Hill?
It was as likely as a pine-marten in Port Talbot! Of course, it is no less immoral to terrorize a rat than it is an otter, but being human and prone to all the normal, irrational thoughts and feelings we have for the cuddly species, I felt rotten and, five decades on, no less so.
Cliff Hatton.
Previously published in Waterlog magazine.
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Not only is Cliff Hatton a great writer for FishingMagic and other journals, he is also a highly tallented cartoonist and has a number of books published by Medlar Press. They include: All Beer and Boilies, All Wind and Water, and soon to be published – All Fluff and Waders. Visit the Medlar Press site by clicking here and order your copies now! |
