An Alternative Remembrance of Plymouth Hoe by Ron Trill (March 1997)

Incidents sometimes occur when cycling. We take them in our stride and then forget them. Only later do they return to our consciousness to form part of a rich pattern of memories.

One such incident occurred in Plymouth in the early 1950’s, I think. Approaching from the North, I had a puncture while still in the country, just before the built-up city outskirts. There was trouble with the pump. It was old, battered and unreliable. I had had trouble with it before, so I rode on to the Youth Hostel in Plymouth with a rear tyre not quite as hard as it should have been and a determination to buy a new pump the next day, it being a Monday.

I found a cycle shop the next morning, The Argyle Cycle Stores, tucked away in a side street but very close to the Hoe. Just the proprietor in the shop. A pump was soon found and also a small tin of 3 in 1, the two items coming to thirteen shillings and sixpence, or 67 and 1/2p in today’s money. It was a long time ago.

I gave the proprietor a £1 note, but the phone rang and I did not see what he did with the note when he went off to answer it. He obviously could not remember either because when he came back he was searching for it, lifting up this and that from the counter and finally looking questioningly at me.

“No”, I said “I haven’t taken it back. It must be here somewhere” (or words to that effect) and together we searched the shop, beginning with the counter, the area behind the counter and extending either side of the counter. No £1 note. A few minutes searching and I was beginning to doubt whether I had in fact given the note to the proprietor or had just dreamt it. Time was running on and it slowly became obvious that there was only one way to end this farcical situation, or I should be there all day, so I gave the proprietor another note and my home address. I carried on with the tour, feeling that I had stupidly lost £1, but put the incident behind me and soon it had faded from my memory.

Some ten days later, when I arrived back home, there was a letter with a Plymouth post mark. Inside was a £1 note and an explanation. When the phone rang, the note had been placed under a large carton containing, of all things, tubes of Durofix. The note had adhered firmly to this carton, so that every time it was lifted, up came the note with it. No one looked at the underneath of the carton until later in the day when it was moved to a higher shelf. It was nice to be proved right. I had intended to revisit that shop sometime when I was down that way, but for one reason or another I did not get round to it.

Click here to go back to Salisbury Section Home Page

StatCounter.com counter: