I am an expert on the preservation and restoration of churches and have been so for many years
Sadly as I have travelled from place to place I have had no time to find a wife to accompany me
Just over two years ago I was asked to visit a church in Suffolk to oversee the placement of a rood screen which had been found derelict in a nearby manor house
The screen which had connections to Jane Seymour had been removed during the poor 1849 restoration of the church and had been considered lost
On a warm summers evening I was greeted at the village railway station by the vicar of St Michael’s who was called Robert Abbott
His family had lived in the parish for years and his father and grandfather had been vicars before him
As we drove towards the church where the rood screen was now located we passed a rural cricket ground
This was Robert’s other passion
Abbotsfield Cricket Club
He played as much as he could and was a famed compiler of cricketing obituaries
We parked the car and walked up the slight hill towards the church and were passed by a woman whose raven hair was as the darkest I have ever seen
She smiled shyly as Robert muttered a greeting
The rood screen was in better condition than I had anticipated as the preservation work had gone well although I realised that I would not be able to return it to its original position as the Victorian pews now infringed that space
It was agreed that the rood screen would honour the Lady Chapel
Over sherry that evening Robert handed me his book of his cricketing obituaries which had recently been published
Turn to page seventy-six and you will find an obituary which has connections to this village
THOMAS ARTHUR SIMMONDS – Died Port Talbot on 29th July 1932 aged 62. Thomas was not remembered as a cricketer of any great distinction having turned out infrequently for some of the minor counties
His main claim to fame is a romantic one as during a match between the County Clergy and a Wateringbury Eleven on the 15th of July 1899 he saved the life of a female spectator when she was in danger of being struck in the face by a cricket ball.
The incident happened when a mighty stroke by E S K Macbeth had cleared the boundary and was hurtling towards an unsuspecting Miss Burns who was preparing refeshment for the players
Without a thought for his own safety Thomas dived across a row of chairs and diverted the errant stroke from the fair maiden
Miss Burns was only struck by a glancing blow on her breast bone and after a faint asked the brave cricketer to marry her
Many romances have connections with the game but I doubt if there was one that started in such dramatic circumstances
Robert smiled at me
There is something that I did not mention in the book and that was the strange birthmark that has occasioned all female descendants of Fanny Burns
He reached into a drawer and handed me a photograph dating from the 1960s
It was a beach scene showing a group of girls posing for the camera
If you look at the girl second from the left what do you see?
She has a marked resemblance to you Robert
She was my mother but what else do you see?
She has what looks like a bruise on her breastbone
It is not a bruise but the birthmark I noted
What an unusual place for a birthmark
Ever since the incident each female member of the family has been born with this birthmark
What an unusual story why did you not include this in your book?
It is a story for another book
The actual placement of the rood screen was more difficult that I had originally expected as I continued to find the many deficiencies in the rushed Victorian restoration
During this time I met Robert’s sister Joyce who enthusiasically showed me her birth mark to my slight embarrassment
By the end of July my work was complete and the rood screen was in place
I was invited to the dedication service at which the Bishop of Norwich was to be present. I had also been invited to play in the County Clergy verses Wateringbury Eleven cricket match which was due to take place on the Saturday before the dedication
This famous match had been played every year for generations and created a great deal of interest locally
Although not an outstanding cricketer I had played for my school and university and had turned out occasionally for my village eleven when my work allowed me to
I was a competent batsman and normally batted in the middle order
On the day of the match there was not a cloud in the sky and the thermometer was well into the eighties
This attracted a large crowd many of whom watched the match from beneath coloured parasols
To my surprise I opened the order and had hit a quick twenty-one before my middle stump was taken out by a ball that I did not react to
As I sat in the pavilion drinking a cool glass of orange juice I noticed the raven haired woman I had seen on my first day in the village
She was wearing a dark blue cotton dress and was happily serving tea and other refreshments to the many people around her
Sadly my score of twenty-one was not exceeded by any other member County Clergy team and we were all out for eighty-six
After a break we took the field and I was asked to field on the boundary as I looked the most athletic
To my surprise our opponents were making heavy weather of chasing our moderate score and I found myself almost unoccupied
Then suddenly their burly ginger haired batsman caught a poor ball with all his might and the ball disappeared into the pristine blue sky
It was heading in my direction and as I prepared for the catch it I realised to my horror that ball was going to fly over me into the crowd
I ran blindly over the boundary rope in an attempt to push the ball away from the spectators and this was really my last memory of the event
My sweet brave man
These were the first words I heard
Keep still I think your nose is broken
It was then I realised that my face was covered with blood having come into contact with cricket ball
I could taste blood in my mouth and could only see out of one eye
The raven hared woman was cradling me in her lap and as she leant forward I noticed that on her breast bone she too had the birthmarkbut I did not study it for long as I passed out again soon afterwards
The match was abandoned as a draw as my injury was quite severe.I had not only broken my nose but the ball had damaged my eye socket which necessitated minor surgery
I was in hospital for nearly a week and was visited every day by the raven haired woman whose name I found out was Virginia
She was the cousin of Joyce and the great granddaughter of Fanny Burns
We were engaged before the month was cold and were married in the village church nine months later
The rood screen that had brought me to Abbotsfield had been finely decorated for the occasion and I looked at it with pride as we approached the altar
Our first born was a girl who we named Fanny and I noticed as she lay in her mother’s arms on the day of her birth that she had not inherited the birthmark of her ancestor
The cricket match had ended