Bridge Club ( VILLAGE TALES EP. 41 )

Villages often create their own entertainment. Societies and clubs abound but under the innocent facade of say, a bridge club, turbulent waters stir and it doesn’t take much for a storm to brew. Sometimes it turns out to be just a passing squall, on other occasions, a tempest in which everything perishes.

Village clubs and associations come and go. There are many reasons why they are started, but a dearth of members is usually why they expire. How that comes about can be quite revealing.

 Milton Peacock, who found the ‘three pound coin’, was the founder member of the village sailing club. Bearing in mind that the sea is some distance away and neither Milton, nor any of the other members had a boat; or was in the habit of sailing. It lasted for nearly a year and was disbanded after Milton’s wife, Shirley, had followed them to Poole and confronted them in a nightclub on the quay. She had suspected for some time that it was just a ruse to legitimise a fortnightly exploration of coastal nightlife. Attempts to inaugurate the village hang-gliding club by the same members were quickly rumbled by Shirley and the other wives. They threatened to retaliate by forming a Chippendales fan club and attending every performance the male strippers put on in the South of England. Consequently the hang gliding club never even got off the ground. 

Groups run by men, particularly if they are predominantly men, inevitably gravitate towards the Drum. The skittle alley provides some privacy and if booked in advance there is no cost so long as food and drink is arranged by the pub. With most men’s groups the inclusion of food is considered a distraction from the importance of whatever business is the focus. Alcohol, on the other hand is essential if evenings are to proceed in line with expectations. The expectations are primarily to do with alcohol and its drinking, if anything else occurs that’s considered a bonus. 

Groups that have a predominance of women usually meet in the village hall, or one of the member’s houses. As much secrecy surrounds women’s groups as it does the men’s groups, the one thinking that all they do is drink, and the other thinking all they do is gossip. Having seen the aftermath of the women’s baking and sewing circle and the number of wine bottles shared amongst the seven members, I have to conclude there is little difference between the groups whatever gender they might be. However before one presumes that all groups are merely devices for intoxication, the same cannot be said for those groups that attract both sexes. Alcohol in the past has been the least of their problems. You may remember how the village cycle club had to be disbanded after several affairs threatened to partition the village entirely. That was started innocently enough by Herbert Strong commenting a little too loudly on why being last in any ride gave him a better view. It seemed the view he was referring to was Celia Portman’s rather ample figure who he was following. This was overheard by a friend of Celia’s husband, a trouble maker called Ross, who embellished the comment implying that Herbert Strong and Celia Portman were always at the rear of the pack so they could exchange ‘sweet nothings’ in privacy. George Portman, Celia’s husband, not being a member of the cycle club due to a heart condition, was drinking in the Drum one busy Sunday lunchtime when he overheard the story. Fuelled with bitter, he announced quite loudly that the the cycle club was, ‘no more than an excuse for the lascivious ogling of the middle aged clad in day glow bodystockings which left nothing to the imagination’. He then spilled the beans, as well as his pint, and in a fit of peak said that he had heard that Gerald Marshal was paying far too much attention to an occasional member of the cycling club, a PE teacher from Shipston. Ross demanded her name and George said it’s ‘Ruth’. As by this time his speech was somewhat slurred, ‘Ruth’ sounded like ‘Struth’, nevertheless the cat was out of the bag.

Ordinary friendships between opposite sexes, and two between the same sex, took on a suspicion until there was no member of the cycle club that was without a dubious interest in another. Hardly a day went past when the rumour of another couple divorcing wasn’t doing the rounds. No one was ever caught ‘inflagranti’ however this enabled the gossip mill to run unhindered by any boundaries. A meeting of the cycle club at the Drum was adjourned after only twenty minutes when, and you will understand why I can’t name names, when ‘W’ said that any affair with ‘X’ was preposterous when all anyone had to do was take one look at her. ‘X’ then chucked her wine over ‘W’, or tried to, but caught her elbow on ‘Y’s’ shoulder, she had stood up, as ‘Y’ was about to, so most of the wine went over ‘Z’. ‘Z’, so we found out later, had bought her outfit that very afternoon in an attempt to encourage, A. N. Other, into converting their occasional cycling dalliances into something more permanent. Dripping in a rather good Malbec she left in tears, shortly followed by everyone else other than a new member who had just arrived, and no one had even noticed. That was the end of the cycle club.

A month or two later and things had quietened down, Ruth, the PE teacher, was seen by one of her students in Shipston in the company of a man, the description of which matched the bearded Gerald Marshall. Pennies dropped when it was recalled their fitness enabled them to disappear well ahead of the other members, but were always lagging behind when those members arrived at the Drum. Gerald has since moved out of the village and his ex-wife to be, is the moving force behind the creation of the bridge club.

The founding members of the Bridge club, were besides Penny Marshall, Liz Wintern, who’s Cocker Spaniel, Dante, is the Cocker in our first Cockapoo, Donald Spears and Pearl Cummings who are also members of the bell-ringers group. When I heard of the bridge club being formed, and particularly Donald and Pearl, I was reminded of their flirting in the Drum whilst the bell-ringers were debating the qualities of their recent acquisition, the fifth bell. I thought no more of it as they were married, but as it was not to each other I began to wonder. I couldn’t decide whether their enthusiasm was for playing a round of cards, or maybe just playing around. After the cycle club fiasco a suspicion of ‘extra curricular activity’ accompanied all and every association however innocent it might appear on the surface. 

Monday evenings was the proposed bridge night and Penny Marshal hosted the group at Brambles, a fifties bungalow that was still owned by her and her estranged husband, ‘Bluebeard’ Gerald Marshal who, it was confirmed, had shacked up with ‘Struth’ the nick name given to the Shipston ‘PE harlot’. 

Donald and Pearl had lobbied for Monday nights being that there was nothing on TV. Hardly a wholehearted endorsement of the game of Bridge however, Monday night it became. Dean Cummings, Pearl’s husband, was attending art evening classes at Shipston Community College on a Monday and Pearl, being left on her own, decided Bridge would pass the time. She told Paul this at the shop, who knew more about what her husband was doing on Mondays than she did. Donald Spears told Constance, my next door neighbour, that he and his wife, Daisy, were no longer on speaking terms, had separate bedrooms, and for the most part, separate lives. Betting on that ‘form’, the imminent union of Donald and Pearl was a dead cert, and the Bridge club would be disbanded as soon their relationship became public knowledge. Fortunately gambling has never been a compulsion of mine.

Dean’s evening art classes, so Paul told me, were actually ‘life drawing classes’ and involved naked models. The cosmopolitan amongst us may think this hardly ‘risqué’ but some village folk have enough trouble looking someone in the face, let alone staring at their naked body for hours on end. What began the demise of the bridge club was Pearl’s discovery of ‘cash’ and a college receipt in Dean’s clothing. This prompted an animated discussion culminating in Dean’s admission that rather than paying for the art classes, he was being paid, as a model. Pearl, not being the most worldly of women, called him all sorts of names, ranging from prostitute to ‘rent boy’ which considering Dean’s age was a little far-fetched. I do not claim to know how the female, or any mind, works, however the thought of her husband’s naked body being on display each Monday night awakened some of Pearl’s dormant urges making her bridge night seem rather ‘passé’. Couple that, if you’ll excuse the phrase, with her noticing the attention Liz Wintern was getting from Donald Spears, it made her realise he was just an incorrigible flirt. 

Left partnerless, pub Dave says Penny Marshal is starting a singles dining club. Now that’ll be interesting.

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Written and read by Barkley Johnson.