The Loner, page 17
Time fled, and then it was closing time. The Liverpool cavers stepped out of the warm bar, into the windy, cold, moist darkness of a not untypical Yorkshire winter’s night. They got into the van and drove uphill to Storr’s Common, which lies above the town on the road to Hawes. An unmade and uncared for rocky track led from the road to a small hollow which looked as though it might once have been a tiny quarry. Dave drove the van up the track slowly, wincing as he felt the vibrations shake the vehicle’s ancient chassis. He watched the jagged stones, which protruded from the well-worn ruts in the track, and silently prayed that none would touch the sump, or any other vital part of the machine.
They arrived safely with the van intact. There was a smooth, circular space for camping, protected from the wind by a low cliff – perhaps once the quarry wall – and the limbs of the hill. They jumped out, and Mark watched as the bell tent was laboriously manhandled to a suitable place, torches flashed, mallets were produced, and the guy ropes were unwound. He felt the cold more keenly now, and was aware of the steady drizzle which threatened to soak them before they could erect their shelter.
The bell tent canvass was unfolded, the pole, inserted, and the tent raised by slow degrees to the accompaniment of much cursing and confusion. No-one seemed to be in charge; everyone seemed to know what to do. The main reason for the confusion seemed to be the darkness. At the same time, Mark noticed that more cars had arrived and other smaller tents had been pitched. The owners of these were not only luckier than the occupants of the bell tent, in that they had lie-lows and other modern conveniences, but several of them had feminine company too! Mark saw Bob erecting one of these tents with the help of Susan.
Then the bell tent was ready for moving into. They took their rucksacks and sleeping bags, and Mark unloaded his suitcase. They hurried to seize the best places – if there ever can be any best places in a circular tent!
Finally, when everything else was in place, Bob called for help with the barrel, treating the matter as solemnly as a priest arranging for the movement of the sacrament.
The barrel was rolled with all due reverence into the waiting tent. The doors were closed, and someone lit a paraffin stove to provide warmth; paper mugs were distributed, and as the party progressed, all thoughts of the icy chill of the ground, and of the dampness outside were driven from their minds.
Pablo set the mood of the party. He waited until they were all settled. Then he took Bob’s guitar from its case. He struck a note, and paused for silence. The conversation died down. Thereupon Pablo made a mock formal speech:
“Well, ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “We all know why we’re here, what this barrel is, who’s donated it, and whose birthday it is. So let’s all raise our voices, and show our appreciation in the usual way.”
He strummed a few chords and they all shouted in chorus:
“Why was he born so beautiful?
Why was he born at all?
He’s no Bloody use to anyone;
He’s no Bloody use at all!”
Bob stood up, as straight as the slanting roof would allow him. He replied: “You’re a miserable crowd to insult me like this. So just fill your cups and drink; that should cheer you all up a bit! And, if you can’t sing better songs than that, Pablo, I’ll fill you in and break my instrument over your head!”
Mark drew back when he heard this challenge, as he expected some kind of trouble. Everyone else roared with laughter, and some volunteered to help Bob carry out the threat. Mark began to understand that the two were the best of friends, and it was a mark of their friendship that they could abuse each other without giving or taking offence.
Pablo had noticed the uncomfortable look in Mark’s eyes, and happened to see the suitcase at the same time. “Do I see a young gent with a suitcase?” scoffed the apprentice. “Are you sure you’re in with right crowd, lad? Suitcases are for hotels – not tents. They take up too much room.”
Mark smiled. “I-I haven’t got a rucksack,” he said.
“Then buy one. You’ll not come caving with us if you bring suitcases with you.”
There was laughter, and the laughter was infectious. Mark found he was smiling, even though the joke was at his expense.
Someone called for the “Wild Rover.” Bob hesitated, not sure he wanted to play it or not. Someone else cried:"Not again!,” but he was too late as the musician had already started strumming the chords they all knew too well.
As the music went on, Bob’s girl friend, Susan, did not notice Mark secretly watching her. Mark saw her sitting next to Bob, her eyes glistening and fixed on him, as if there was no-one else in the tent. Mark felt no envy. He just wished he could deserve that kind of appreciation.
And so the party continued with music and good humour, often at each other’s expense. There were limericks, rhymes, and stories, while the beer kept flowing. The party lasted well into the early hours of the morning, when they slid into their sleeping bags, and after more laughter and jokes, fell asleep. Mark sensed the ground under him was frozen solid. This did not stop him from going to sleep; he had enjoyed the night’s entertainment so much, and had had so much to drink, that the discomfort was barely perceptible.
Mark woke up to the smell and hiss of sausages and bacon. Dave was busy cooking breakfast. Mark felt hungry, and then realised he had brought no food with him.
He sat up. There was a dull ache in his head. He sensed the cold ground under him, and opened his sleeping bag. A sudden draft of frozen air at once forced him to retreat into the comparative warmth of the bag, which he drew up round himself again.
Dave Wise was half-dressed. “I’m going to take the van to Bernie’s,” he said. “Is anyone coming with me?”
Mark asked what Bernie’s was. On being informed that this was Ingleton’s cafe, he volunteered at once, shot out of his sleeping bag, and dressed so quickly that it seemed he was afraid of being left behind.
As he left the tent, he saw the beer barrel was not far from it, and noticed Paul Johns and a few others standing round it with cups in their hands.
It was apparent from the paleness of Mark’s face, and the slowness of his movements outside the tent, that the night’s revelry had not passed without after-effects. Someone laughed.
“Did you enjoy last night?” Paul asked politely.
Mark said he had.
“How are you feeling then?”
“Awful!”
“There’s a good old remedy for that,” Paul observed. “If you wake up with a hangover, have a few more with breakfast. There’s nothing better for it. Here, take a cup!”
Mark accepted it.
Then Mark saw Pablo and Bob standing in the middle of another group. They had an air pistol between them, and were taking turns firing at empty beer cans, which were lined up on a rock ledge. The rest of the group were their supporters, and cheered and jeered as they hit or missed the target.
Mark heard the van’s engine roar into life. Bob heard it too, and ran over to it, gun in hand.
“Where are you going?” Mark heard him ask Dave. “Bernie’s? Right, I’m coming too. Sue, are you coming to Ingleton for breakfast?”
Dave drove Bob, Mark, Susan and a few others down the hill to the town.
Now that it was day, Mark was able to form a clear impression of Ingleton. It was a small country town, built near the bottom of a wide glacial valley. The fells above the town were crowned by Ingleborough Hill, a sugar-loaf peak resting on a limestone plateau.
While waiting for his breakfast in the cafe, he thumbed through the tourist leaflets which were in racks fixed to the wall. He discovered that Ingleton was an ancient town nestling in the Dales; the hill fort on top of Ingleborough Hill was the original settlement; a large 800 year old church testified to the town’s importance in bygone times. The town had seen coal mining and quaries. In the twentieth century, its prosperity would have vanished, if it had not been for the tourist trade, the famous series of waterfalls, its place close to the Yorkshire Dales national park, and the growth of potholing. So the town still kept some shops, including a cafe and a fish and chip shop and several pubs.
Bernard’s cafe was in the centre of the small town. Simple unpretentious furniture, football and other games machines invited the town’s youth, the walkers, the potholers, and the students to a snack meal at a very reasonable price. A native of the town, Bernie was always cheerful. He would stand all day behind the counter serving tea and coffee, while his family seemed to have a limitless capacity for satisfying every order for food very quickly. Young people were always welcome at Bernie’s cafe.
Mark was sitting down, and feeling rather hungry after ordering his breakfast. As he looked around, he noticed many other youths with much the same appearance as his friends. They all seemed to be either talking about caves, or reading magazines about caves, or to have ropes and other potholing equipment. So he asked: “Are there m-many caves around here?”
“Hundreds,” Dave replied. “This is the biggest caving district in the country.”
“W-why’ s that?”
Dave paused. It was rather early to begin a long scientific dissertation on the geological structure of area. He felt rather tired after the night’s festivities.
Bob Smith, on the other hand, was in high spirits. Geology was one of his hobbies, and a surge of enthusiasm suddenly swept over him. He asked Mark if he knew anything about Geology. He was surprised to learn that Mark, whose ignorance of the simplest matters sometimes seemed complete, did know something about the subject, and that it was the only part of Geography which had ever interested him.
So Bob explained: “All the caves are in Limestone. Limestone is a porous rock – that means water can pass through it. Yorkshire limestone is sandwiched between layers of non-porous rock. When water passes through limestone, it disolves rock away, and then the streams which enter the cracks formed in this way, scour the rocks, and make caves.”
Susan yawned. “Isn’t it early for all this science?” she said. “It’s so serious for breakfastime. Bob, you’ll have to get yourself a job as a guide!” Bob was not to be put off. “Just because I’ve told you all about it, doesn’t mean I shouldn’t tell Mark,” he rejoined, firmly but politely. “Anyway, I like talking about caves,” he continued. “It’s interesting! There are two things that make Yorkshire caves the best in England. First there’s a big fault which has raised the hills – you can see it best by Settle. That means the water has further to drop and so makes big passages. Then there are the peaks of Ingleborough, Pen-y-Ghent and Whernside. These aren’t porous, and so the water collects under the peaks in streams before it goes underground in shake holes. The streams make entrances that are big enough for us. So, in Yorkshire we go down into caves”
Mark’s head was spinning. He could barely follow all these technical terms – however good his knowledge, acquired at school, of elementary concepts such as rift valleys and block mountains. He was not sure if he followed this explanation, but said he grasped the general idea. Then he asked which cave they intended to go down that day.
Dave yawned and looked quite bored. “I don’t think we’ve decided,” he observed.
Paul, who had been very quiet up to that moment, said he had only come for the beer – and for Bob’s birthday party.
Bob looked at Mark, as if he were quite out of his mind. “You don’t mean to say you want to go potholing?” he asked. “Come on – there are far better things to do than go underground!”
“But I want to see a cave.”
“Oh!” said Paul to Bob mischievously. “I think our Mark wants to go down a cave.”
“Well, I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said Bob with a grin. “We’ll take you to a cave, and wait while you go underground. How do you fancy that, Mark?”
That idea did not suit Mark at all.
“Why don’t we just go for a ride,” Bob continued. “I’ve got Pablo’s gun in the van. I could do with some target practice.”
So, after breakfast, they got back into the van. “Let’s try Kingsdale,” Dave suggested.
They agreed and drove up Kingsdale.
A steep road led up to an upland rounded valley with a low hill at one end, which Dave pointed out as one of the best examples he knew of a terminal moraine. The road wound along by the valley floor, before rising up to the top of the fell. The fields were bounded by dry stone walls; there were few trees, but a magnificent view stretched before them. The road along the valley floor lay parallel to the bed of a narrow bubbling beck. Quite suddenly Mark noticed the bed of the beck was dry. The dry bed was joined by a torrent which gushed from an opening hidden in the hillside.
The clouds had magically disappeared, and it was now a bright sunny day. Rocky outcrops, still damp from the night’s rain, glistened in the light of the morning Sun. It was so bright and sunny that they scarcely noticed the icy chill in the wintry air. Occasionally someone would point eagerly to the tracks or dry stone walls which led to familiar caves. Mark thought this enthusiasm was rather strange, considering their apparent determination to avoid going underground.
They turned back, after they had reached the top and taken in the view. Then Bob produced Pablo’s gun.
“I always fancied myself as the Lone Ranger,” he said, with an affected American accent. “Hi! Ho! Silver! Away!”
As the van gathered speed on its downhill journey, he threw open the sliding door and fired the gun. A tiny bird, perched peacefully on a dry stone wall, was startled and rose in terror as his peace was shattered, first by the rattle and roar of the old vehicle and the screech of its brakes, and then by the pellet which ricocheted off the stone under his feet.
“Bob, no!” Sue cried.
“This is what I like,” Bob exclaimed, undeterred by Sue’s concern,“a moving target!”
The old van careered downwards past the moraine, down onto the steep descent from the hanging valley to the plain below. Mark clung on to the back of Bob’s seat, as if his life depended on it, while Dave flung the machine hurtling round the sharpest corners at an alarming speed, and they cheered as they made each turn.
Bob’s spirits were now thoroughly aroused, while Dave urged the vehicle to faster speeds yet, to make the adventure more exciting.
Bob closed his eyes, as they survived one more bend, and then opened them again. “I see sheep,” he cried. “I see dinner!”
“Bob, you’ll have the police after you!” the girl remonstrated. But the police were the last thing for Bob to want to worry about at that moment.
Everyone laughed, except Mark who was feeling dizzy, as Bob let fly a volley of shots in the direction of the sheep. Bob had no wish to harm the animals, but they all cheered as the sheep fled in panic.
Bob raised his weapon again. “This is better than beer cans,” he roared. “Now, do I see a bandit before me? It must be a bandit – he’s in disguise!”
A road sign loomed in front of them, advising the revellers that the next section of road was steeper still. Bob fired.
Dave slowed, and put one hand to his forehead. “Jesus! You’ve hit it!” was his horrified cry, as a dent appeared in the centre of the sign.
Bob gave a whoop of triumph. “Bullseye!” he exclaimed at the top of his voice.
“Good God! No!” said Bob as the van returned to the campsite. The object of his horror was the scene which met their eyes; nearly everyone they had left behind was busy putting on old clothes for potholing. “Oh no!” he continued. “It looks as if we’re going to have to go underground after all!”
Paul noticed Pablo, now without his open tee shirt, busily checking the caving gear, and other people’s personal kit. He called across to him: “Is this your doing, Pablo? You’re too keen! That’s your trouble. Who needs to go potholing, when it’s nearly opening time?”
Pablo grinned and nodded across to a group of female figures, who stood watching and laughing. “It’s not my fault,” he said. “I told everyone this was a quiet weekend – a party and nothing more. But the girls wouldn’t have it! They insisted on seeing a cave. And I don’t know about you, Paul, but I don’t quite fancy waiting in camp and cooking dinner while the birds go underground!”
“Well, if that’s what’s happening,” Bob called from behind Paul, “where the birds are going is good enough for me!”
So they put on their old clothes and boiler suits, and donned their miners’ helmets, heavy walking boots, and carbide lamps. It was the standard caving gear of the mid-sixties: the age of neoprene wetsuits, NIFE cell and lead acid batteries had not quite dawned on the world of Yorkshire caves.
Sunset Hole had been chosen, because at that time it was not a hard cave and was the kind that would suit most of the group.
They packed their bags, with their ordinary clothes uppermost, and loaded these into the van, together with wire ladders and synthetic ropes.
Dave drove the van along the road to Hawes. Mark thought the road went up and down like a switchback at Blackpool. Dave was careful to drive just fast enough to give them a thrill, without damaging the ancient vehicle’s delicate suspension. His passengers whooped and cheered, as they felt the momentary effects of zero-gravity.
At last Mark knew they were approaching their destination. The van slowed, as a debate opened between Dave, Bob and Pablo, as to which was the best place to stop. They studied the map in the Penine Underground guidebook, and endeavoured to distinguish from the many drystone walls, the one they had to follow up onto the Fell. At length Pablo pointed at the stream bed, on the other side of the road, and mentioned something about “God’s Bridge.” Mark would have liked to know more about this feature, but it ended the argument, and Dave promptly drew over onto the verge. Mark had heard stories of how cavers sometimes lose their way underground; so now he wondered if the way to the entrance was more difficult to locate than the way out!
