Big Bang Theory
by Ian Curtress
We have had
lots of fireworks at the bottom of the garden
before, it was always great fun. We adults are as
excited as the little ones, we are all kids at
heart wanting to know what was the next one and
pretending to be frightened by the loud bangs.
But it was on the last big rocket, always
finished with a big rocket, that it happened
It was all open farmland behind the house looking
up to the Cotswold Way and when the rocket
ignited with a bang much louder than expected a
figure appeared in the flash.
Someone in the party gave a muffled shout and as
the light from the firework faded, so did the
figure
My first reaction was that a farm worker had
somehow crept along the wire fence, but dismissed
that as we would have seen him in the bonfire
light, also he was dressed In smart country style.
Just one of the children asked who was that man.
No one answered.
Everyone was rather subdued as we dampened the
embers and went inside to have jacket potatoes.
We discussed what we had seen, or thought we had
seen. A well dressed country figure with a
frightened expression.
We finished off the evening with a small
celebration drink but the usual good humoured
banter was missing.
After a while this faded from our memories until
six or seven months later an application was made
to build a cottage about eighty yards from my
boundary.
This I thought would be immediately rejected as
this is AONB and building is forbidden.
However, it seems there had been a cottage there
in the distant past and the application had to be
considered.
All this brought about interest in the past and
the cottage by a local historian.
Eventually, old documents were found which told a
strange and sad story.
The cottage had been occupied by a game keeper
and his elderly Mother.
He had to visit Oxford once a month staying
overnight and as there had been many robberies in
the area of late he rigged up a hidden shot gun (behind
my boundary)? and carried a trip line into their
cottage.
If his Mother heard noises she could pull the
wire and it would fire the shotgun and scare away
any potential intruders.
On this particular occasion he had gone into
Cheltenham to take the coach to Oxford late
afternoon and waited in the local alehouse where
he met farming friends who had been to the market.
Well they got a little merry and he missed his
coach so had no option but to return home.
It was dark now but he knew all the rough paths
so had no problem in finding his way and when he
came to his gun trap he bent to check it had not
been disturbed.
His Mother awoke upon hearing twigs cracking
under someone’s footsteps so quickly pulled
the trip wire setting off the gun. All went very
quiet after that and she returned to bed.
Early in the morning she looked out and saw what
appeared to her worn eyes was a pile of clothes
near the trap. She wrapped her heavy shawl around
her and went to check.
She was found the following day. Frozen with her
sons head wrapped in her shawl in her lap.
The cottage was pulled down shortly after and for
while locals put flowers where it had been but
now there was little sign of anything having been
there.
The application was withdrawn and the applicant
put just a small remembrance stone on the
proposed site.
There appears to be a story that if once more a
shot is heard where the trap had been they would
both find lasting peace.
I am not a believer in the supernatural…..
but the trap had been near my boundary…..that
rocket had been louder than any of the others……
there had been a figure…….
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