Special Brew

Set in the East Anglian countryside, Potteringfield is probably the
most photographed village in England. Traditional English pubs and
teashops surround the beautiful village green and duck pond.
Overlooking the village from the east is the church of St John the
Baptist, which dates from the twelfth century and has some of the
oldest surviving stained glass in the country. To the west of the
village is one of the oldest windmills in the region. The windmill is
now a museum showing how life used to be lived in Potteringfield and
the surrounding area. It is open every day from March to October.
Anglian Views Magazine - 1999

Jack Deacon loved Potteringfield. His grandparents had lived there and
he fondly remembered the times he used to come and visit when he was a
boy.

For a week every summer he would come and stay with his grandparents.
His grandfather was the local butcher and knew almost everyone in the
village. Those that his grandfather didn't know, his grandmother did.
He looked forward to that week more than Christmas.

His parents would take him up to the village on the Saturday and would
leave just after teatime. After seeing them off at the local railway
station, Jack and his grandparents would walk back to the cottage past
the old windmill. Even then, before the Second World War, they called
it the old windmill and it had been quite a few years since it had been
in working order. He would spend the week walking in the woods with his
grandfather, feeding the ducks on the pond and playing games on the
green with the local children. The next Saturday, his mother and father
would arrive and, after tea, Jack would go home with them on the train
dreaming about next years trip.

He was about ten years old when war broke out. His mother had packed
him and his gasmask off to stay with his grandparents because she
thought it would be safer in the country than it would've been in the
town. She was right. Not only was it safer, but it was great fun
too.

Five miles or so down the road was Weatherford aerodrome. From the
early forties onwards it was home to the American Air Force and Jack
used to sit and watch the Stirling bombers and Dakotas fly in and out
of the base. He used to count them out and then back in and report the
losses to his grandparents over tea that evening. One Christmas bought
real excitement when over a dozen Lancasters were forced to land there
because their base in the north was fog-bound.

The Americans brought much needed custom to the local shops and pubs.
They had plenty of money to spend and were generous to a fault. Jack
and the other village children learnt early on that if they kept
friendly with them they'd never be short of sweets. And judging by the
number of local girls that were now wearing nylon stockings, the
children weren't the only ones being friendly.

Occasionally he would help his grandfather out in his shop. The
butcher's shop was at the side of the house and, first thing in the
morning, Jack would help his grandfather lower the large shutter over
the shop window, and hang up the various carcasses and meat cuts that
were for sale.

Helping out in the shop meant that Jack got to know almost all of the
locals, and he earned a few pennies now and again in tips.

There were two pubs in the village, the Fox and the Green Man. They
faced each other across the village green. The landlord of the Fox was
John Stevenson, a chubby, red-faced man in his late fifties. His wife,
Angela, helped out behind the bar and cooked the gorgeous home made
meals that became famous amongst the Americans at Weatherford. You
hadn't tasted England until you'd eaten at the Fox they would tell any
new airmen arriving at the base. The most popular dish on the menu was
Angela's steak and kidney pudding, potatoes and whatever other
vegetables were available at the time. The airmen loved it and the pub
always seemed to have enough supplies to keep it on the menu. Jack and
his friends had a theory that the airmen were bringing back German
livestock and vegetables during their bombing sorties over
Europe.

The Green Man specialised in local ales rather than food. Fred Roper
was the landlord. His wife, Iris had died a few years before the war
started and he ran it mostly to keep himself busy. Of the two pubs, it
was the least busy, attracting only a few locals, and it wasn't unknown
for him to shut early, if there weren't many in, and he and his
customers would go and join John and Angela at the Fox. Quite often, on
a busy night, Fred would end up helping out behind the bar.

Jack would often accompany his grandfather to the Fox and spend the
evening sipping his lemonade and listening the airmen telling the tales
of their latest adventures.

After the war had finished Jack went back to live with his
parents.

He was twenty-one when he next visited the village. It wasn't a happy
occasion. His grandmother had been taken ill and died quite suddenly.
Jack and his mother and father attended the funeral in the Church of St
John the Baptist.

On the way back from the church his grandfather said to him, 'Tell you
what young Jack, my lad. Lets go over to the Fox. In all the years
you've been coming 'ere, I've never bought you a beer. Now you're old
enough, I reckon we should go and remember the good times we used to
'ave.'

Jack turned round to his parents to make sure that it would be okay.
His mother nodded.

The Fox was a lot quieter now, Jack noticed. John Stevenson was still
behind the bar, his red face still as round as Jack remembered it. He
smiled at Jack's grandfather and muttered a few words of condolence.
Then he saw Jack.

'Bless my soul,' he said. 'It can't be young Jack, can it? We haven't
seen you for ages.'

Jack smiled. He'd been surprised at how many of the locals still
remembered him, and how many of the old faces at the church he knew.
He'd spent a lot of the day listening to the everyone telling him how
much he'd grown since they last saw him he had replied that they still
looked the same as ever. Come to think of it, most of them did.

'He works in the big city,' said Jack's grandfather. 'He hasn't got
time for the likes of us yokels.' He smiled at Jack and nudged
him.

'He's right,' replied Jack, 'I should make some time to come here more
often.'

'You should,' said the barman. 'So what do you do that keeps you so
busy?'

'I'm a journalist. I work for a paper in London. Boring stuff mostly.
Local court cases, the odd football match.'

'Sounds interesting.'

'It pays the bills. I'm still waiting for the big one. Now what about
that drink?'

'I've still some lemonade if you want it,' the landlord said. 'But I
dare say now you're old enough to try some of the 'ard stuff.'

'That's right John,' said Jack's grandfather. 'It's the first time I've
had a chance to sit and have a proper drink with 'im, so two pints of
whatever you've got on today please.'

'On the house,' said Stevenson putting two pints of beer on the bar,
'seeing as I couldn't make the service.'

Jack and his grandfather raised their glasses to the landlord and then
went and sat at a table by the window.

'I've been wondering lately,' began the old man, 'if I used to spend
too much time in here and not enough time with your gran.'

'She was probably glad to get you out of the house most times,' said
Jack smiling.

His grandfather laughed.

'You know, you're probably right. It gave her more time to gossip with
the locals.'

'Talking of which, where are they?'

'Who?'

'All the locals. This place used to be packed from what I
remember.'

'Most of them go to the Green Man now.'

'The Green Man? Why?'

The old man looked out of the window at the other pub.

'I guess the beer tastes better. Most of the yanks go in there now. Its
become quite popular since old Fred sold up.'

'He sold it?' said Jack. 'Who to?'

'Well, after the war finished, a lot of the yanks moved from the
aerodrome into the village. As well as the Americans, there were a
couple of refugee families that moved in as well, and one of them
bought the Green Man from Fred.'

'Refugees?'

'Yes. Polish or something I think they are.'

'Oh right. Do they serve some exotic foreign beer then?'

'I don't know. I ain't never been in there. I've seen the landlord in
the shop now and again, but I like the Fox and, to be honest, now it's
nice and quiet in here, I prefer it.'

'It does have a certain charm. Talking of which, I'm hungry.' Jack
smiled at his grandfather and turned round to the bar. 'Mr Stevenson,'
he called.

'John, if you please young Jack,' replied the landlord.

'Okay. John, does your good lady wife still do steak and kidney
pud?'

'I'm sure she can manage to rustle up something,' said the barman,
disappearing through the door that led to the kitchen.

*

Jack made several more visits to see his grandfather over the next five
years or so. His final visit was to the Church of St John the Baptist,
to attend his funeral.

The church was packed with local people for the service. Jack's
grandfather had been a popular figure in the village and was well
liked. Jack was astonished to see that most of the villagers he
remembered from his time here during the war still looked the same. In
fact most of them now looked about the same age as his parents. By
rights, thought Jack, some of them should be dead.

'He was a good man,' said a voice that snapped Jack back into reality.
He looked up.

'Oh, hello Mr Prendergast,' said Jack. 'Thanks, yes he was. Thanks for
coming. Are you going to come back to the house?'

'No, I won't if you don't mind. I'm not as young as I once was and I
must be getting back.'

Jack was reminded of what he was thinking earlier and looked at the man
he'd been talking to. He remembered how his grandfather had spoken of
'old Prendergast' and of the old man coming into the shop to buy his
Sunday joint. He'd always figured that Prendergast was older than his
grandfather, but he must have been mistaken. The figure standing in
front of him looked the same, no, younger than he remembered him. How
was that possible?

'You alright boy?' Prendergast asked.

'What? Oh, sorry. It's been a long day,' replied Jack shaking his head
again.

'Yes it has. S'not easy to say goodbye to an old friend.'

'No. Thanks again.'

Prendergast walked off. Not an old man's walk, stiff with arthritis
thought Jack, but a firm stride of someone a lot younger than
Prendergast looked. Jack looked around at the other guests. None of the
old people were stooped over, limping or shuffling like you'd expect
for people that, at the least, were approaching their eighties.

Jack made his way back to his grandfather's house. His parents were
already there, his mother was laying out some sandwiches and cakes for
the people that had been at the service.

'Hello Jack. You okay?'

'Yes thanks Mum,' he answered.

He looked at his mother. She was sixty years old, and looked older than
many of the people that were older than his grandfather had been.

'Mum?' he asked.

His mother looked up from the pile of fairy cakes that she was
currently constructing.

'Have you noticed all the old people?' Jack continued.

'Old people?'

'Well, look at Mrs Oswald from the Post Office. How old is she?'

Jack's mother looked up at the ceiling and her lips moved as she
counted silently.

'Oh, I don't know,' she said. 'Seventy? Seventy five?'

'At least. She must've been well past retirement when I was here in the
war. That was over fifteen years ago. Look at her.'

Jack and his mother looked into the garden where Mrs Oswald was walking
around chatting to some of the other villages. At one point she bent to
pick something from the ground.

'Look,' said Jack. 'She didn't event creak.'

'Must be the country air. They don't get the horrible smogs we get in
town. Everyone is much healthier in the country. Fresh fruit and veg,
fresh meat. What else could it be?'

'Dunno, it's just weird, that's all.'

'It's just that you remember it as it was when you were young.'

Jack shrugged and looked out of the window. From here he could see the
village green and the duck pond where he and the other children used to
play. The other children. Where were they? He realised that he hadn't
seen any of the people he used to play with. They'd all grown up now
and left the village to find work he supposed. He looked at the village
green. It was empty except for a few ducks taking a rest from their
swimming. Where were the children? He hadn't seen any in the village at
all. In fact the only people he remembered seeing in the village that
were less than retirement age were the day-trippers.

'It's a nice place to retire,' continued his mother. 'And I don't
expect there is much work for the likes of you youngsters, so I imagine
that most of them move out to find decent jobs. There's no
mystery.'

'Yeah you're probably right. It is a nice place to retire.'

*

When he came to retire, Jack remembered his youth and returned again to
Potteringfield. He and his wife Dora bought a small cottage near to the
Church of St John the Baptist.

'What's the matter Jack?' Dora whispered. She nudged him. 'Jack?'

The two of them had gone to the Sunday service at the church. Jack was
staring across the pews, his eyes fixed, his mouth open.

'It can't be,' he said. 'It can't be.'

'Can't be what?'

'Old Mr Prendergast. He can't be still alive, he can't be.'

'Well, quite plainly he is,' whispered Dora.

When the service had finished Jack and Dora were on their way out of
the church when the man that Jack had been staring at approached
them.

'It is you isn't it?' said the man. 'Jack Deacon, old Willie the
butcher's grandson?'

'Mr Prendergast?' said Jack.

Prendergast smiled and nodded. 'It's nice to see you back again. It's
been a few years eh? Why don't you come and have a drink down the pub
before lunch?'

Jack wasn't too sure, he felt as though he'd seen a ghost. He looked at
Dora. She nodded.

'Go on,' she said. 'I'll get dinner ready while you're out. It'll be
nice not to have you under my feet for a change.'

'Okay,' he said. 'Just a quick one.'

The two men wandered over to the Green Man.

'I always used to drink in the Fox when I was here,' said Jack.

'It's a tourist's pub now. All the locals drink in the Green Man.
That's where the good beer is. Vlad serves only the best ale. The
tourists at the Fox get the cooking lager.'

'Vlad?' enquired Jack.

'The landlord,' chuckled Prendergast. 'He's from Eastern Europe
somewhere so we call him Vlad, you know - Dracula'. Prendergast laughed
again and Jack joined him.

Prendergast returned from the bar with two pints.

'Sup up,' he said. 'It'll put a spring in your step.'

It certainly tasted good, Jack thought. There was something different
about it but he couldn't quite decide what.

'You're looking well,' said Jack.

'It's the beer,' said Prendergast and winked. 'Beer and country
air.'

'I reckon you must be right. You look the same as the last time I saw
you. That must be over thirty years ago.'

Prendergast laughed.

'Have another pint,' he said.

'You're looking well,' said Dora when Jack arrived home. He thought
back to earlier when he had said the same thing to Prendergast.

'Beer and country air,' he said. He grabbed Dora around the waist and
kissed her. Dora screamed in surprise.

'I'll have to send you down there more often,' she said to him.

Jack and Dora became regulars at the Green Man and both were surprised
at how active the old people in the village were. It wasn't long
however before they too were feeling a lot younger than their
years.

'So what's the secret then?' Jack asked Prendergast in the pub one
evening.

'I told you,' replied Prendergast. 'Beer and country air.'

'Yes, you said.'

'It's true. Look at me, I'm one hundred and fourteen years old. Dolly
Oswald over there, she's one hundred and nine. Most of the others in
here used to shop at your grandfathers place. It's old Vlad's secret
recipe.'

Jack sat there stunned, not able to believe what he was hearing, but
knowing it must be true because the evidence was there before his
eyes.

'Secret recipe?' he said.

'Like Colonel Sanders,' replied Prendergast smiling.

'Okay, so we've a village full of old people from the fifties, kept
young by some secret concoction in the beer. What happened to all the
children?'

'Ah, the children. The spirit of youth,' said Prendergast. A wicked
grin came over his lips. 'We love children here. We find that they keep
you young.'

He raised his pint and winked.

THE END