Forgotten John (from The Rule Book)

The Rule Book, based on the 300-year history of a Lake District pub called The Golden Rule, contains around 50 anecdotes and mini-adventures, all based in or around the pub, and all either told to me at the bar or discussed there over the years. Here’s Forgotten John, one of my personal favourites – and after it there's a video of me reading it on the boat; and not, sadly, in the pub.

Thursday, January 7, 1954

Old John’s seat had been carried outside the pub, because that’s where Old John wanted it. For more years than anyone could remember, it had been to the right of the fire, where Old John sat as often as he cared to, and others moved out the way each time.

Tall Alan came down the hill from The Struggle, and stopped for a moment by Old John on his seat. ‘Why are you out here?’ he asked. ‘There’s snow on the tops – you’ll catch your death!’

‘Already caught it,’ Old John replied, sipping his ale.

Hillsides Pete came out of the door as Tall Alan went in. ‘You should move indoors, John. This is no night to be outside.’

‘It is for the one as I’m waiting for,’ Old John said.

Young Alfie came up Smithy Brow from the road to Grasmere. ‘Come on inside, John,’ he said. ‘It’s going to be a cold one tonight.’

‘Colder for me,’ Old John replied. ‘I’ll soon be following you along that road – in a coffin.’

Inside the pub, the row of regulars stood facing the wall behind the bar. ‘You can’t tell him anything at his age,’ said Big Martin. ‘He knows it all.’

‘Happen he does,’ Butcher Sid agreed. ‘When you’ve lived the years and worked the days he has, you’re entitled to say and do as you want.’

‘What age is he, anyway?’ Alfie asked.

‘Eighty eight,’ said a regular.

‘Ninety four,’ said another.

‘Hundred and two, I make it,’ said a third.

‘God knows,’ sighed a fourth.

‘That’s just what’s getting to him,’ Sid announced. ‘He thinks God doesn’t know. Thinks God’s forgotten him.’

‘I’m going to get him in,’ Alfie said.

‘Might as well take him this,’ Tall Alan told him, handing over a fresh pot of ale.

Outside the temperature had dropped noticeably. There was frost in the high skies and the snow-covered hilltops glowed in silver-blue moonlight, while the first rolls of fog began to billow down The Struggle from Kirkstone.

Alfie waited while Old John finished his ale, then took the empty from him and replaced it with the full. ‘You need to come in, John. God knows how cold it’s going to get.’

‘There’s a lot of things God knows, and a lot of things he seems to have forgotten,’ John replied after a moment. ‘Like me. Here I am, older than the lot of you, and still working my days better than a lot of you. Langholm’s gone, Fazakerley’s gone, Sandy’s gone, my old wife… It’s my turn tonight.’

‘Don’t talk like that!’ Alfie said sharply.

‘I’ll do as I please, at my age,’ Old John muttered. ‘There’s plenty of you and your type have told me how to behave, and I’ve seen you all off. But I’ve had enough. So, tonight ––’ he opened his scarf a little, as if to speed up the process –– ‘Tonight, I’m sitting out here till God remembers me, and takes me with him.’

‘As if he’d have you,’ Alfie said quietly, and received a non-committal grumble in response.

‘I was going to hand in my notice in the morning,’ the old man continued. ‘Hand in my cards. Then I thought, ‘Why bother? Let God do it. He owes me that at least, doesn’t he?’’

Alfie sighed and went back inside. ‘Says God will take him tonight,’ he told the regulars. ‘Opened his scarf up, he did, to let the cold in. Says he’s sick of seeing everyone else to their graves. He was going to hand in his notice ––’

‘He’s been saying that once a month since I met him forty years back,’ Tall Alan bellowed.

‘Well, this time he means it,’ Alfie replied, then, more quietly, added: ‘I really think he means it.’

‘Born to work, that one,’ Sid observed. ‘Started when he was eleven, still doing dawn till dusk on the roads near a hundred years on.’

‘Maybe God has forgotten him,’ Alan suggested.

‘Or maybe God’s waiting for another who has the same good sense about hard work,’ Sid said. ‘There’s not many. Him, and me.’

‘Away!’ Alan cried. ‘You’ll never make a hundred and whatever. You’ll retire the first moment you can, with your sons to run the shop for you.’

Sid ignored him. ‘Work then drop,’ he said into his drink. ‘There’s many who’d call that a life well lived.’

‘Well, not me,’ Alfie said. ‘I’m off to bring him in. I’ll lift him if I have to. Sid, Alan, come on.’ He marched to the door, and the others followed without complaint.

Outside it was colder still. Loughrigg to the west was lost in the fog, with little points of yellow light from the houses on Smithy Brow fading into the ice clouds, which crawled over from above and behind, slowly blotting out the moonlit snow.

And Old John’s seat was empty – except for the ale pot.

‘He’s gone!’ Alfie said. ‘It’s… happened!’

‘Do you think…?’ Alan whispered. ‘Do you really think…?’

‘Don’t be daft!’ Sid bellowed. ‘God doesn’t take you like that!’

‘Someone else might,’ Alan said darkly.

‘Now don’t you –– look!’ Sid abandoned his argument as he pointed up the hill, where the vague pillar of a shadow appeared to be moving, slowly, away from them. Its shape billowed and wove, lit from a streetlight behind, as the freezing fog rolled around it.

‘John! John!’ Sid shouted. ‘Is that you, John?’

The shadow took a different form – it thinned, then vanished, then grew wider, and suddenly taller. ‘Aye, it’s me!’ came a muffled voice wrapped in the depth of night.

‘Are you… are you all right?’ cried Sid.

‘I am that!’ Old John shouted. ‘I can’t be sitting drinking with you all night –– I’m up for work in the morning! Good night!’

He vanished into the mist. Alfie picked up the pot and Danny picked up the seat, while Tall Alan held the door open, and the three went back inside.