Havnot on Heat

The trouble began with a BBC alert, a thermometer in Gosport, and Alan Dobbs deciding that hot air was a threat to ecclesiastical good order.

By ten past nine, Judith Crowther had printed the news and placed it on the church noticeboard beneath the words HEATWAVE PROTOCOL: PLEASE DO NOT FAINT WITHOUT INFORMING A WARDEN.

“It says Gosport has broken the June temperature record,” said Sandy Lintel, arriving with water bottles, sun hats, and the expression of a curate already asked whether heat counted as an Act of God.

“Gosport,” said Judith. “Worryingly close. Heat spreads.”

“It is not measles,” said Tim Keen.

“No,” said Judith. “But Mrs Pidsley has rung to say her parrot has gone strangely quiet.”

"We can give thanks for small mercies," replied Tim.

That settled it. Within half an hour, St Faithful’s had become headquarters of the Havnot Heat Emergency Response Fellowship, formed without constitution or minutes, but with a parish map and too many coloured stickers.

Mary Adebayo organised the sensible part, as Readers so often do. Volunteers checked on older neighbours, closed curtains, delivered water, collected prescriptions, moved armchairs out of direct sun, and explained that a fan pointed at a Labrador was not hydration.

Leslie Griffin produced a spreadsheet, which no-one read and fewer people understood.

Horse Palmer produced a machine.

This was not unexpected. Horse’s relationship with weather was deeply agricultural. Rain was “coming in sideways,” frost was “a bit keen,” and extreme heat was “drying weather with opinions.” He arrived in the churchyard pushing a wheelbarrow, bicycle pump, guttering, a rotary washing line, and Imogen’s old blue paddling pool.

“What is that?” asked Tim.

“Cooling device,” said Horse.

“For people?”

“Mostly. Imogen might enjoy it too.”

The Palmer Parish Evaporator pumped water up through the guttering, across the rotary washing line, and down through tiny holes drilled with devotional irregularity. Anyone beneath it experienced either a refreshing mist, a sudden baptism, or a theological crisis.

“It’s like Lourdes,” said Mrs Rivers, watching excited children running through the machine's spray, “but with rather more swearing, to be honest.”

Dobbs was appalled.

“We cannot have people being sprayed in the churchyard,” he said. “It will encourage informality.”

“It will encourage not dying,” said Mary.

Dobbs conceded this was pastorally relevant, but only after placing a laminated sign beside the contraption: COOLING STATION. NO PADDLING. NO SHRIEKING. NO WET FOOTPRINTS IN THE NAVE.

Meanwhile, Clarence at the Little John was facing his own dark night of the soul. The BBC had advised people not to drink alcohol in the heatwave, which Clarence considered an attack not merely on his business model but on Englishness itself.

“It says alcohol dehydrates you,” said Kevin Keen.

“But beer is mostly water,” pleaded Clarence.

“So is the sea,” said Kevin. “You don’t drink Portsmouth Harbour.”

Clarence stared into the middle distance. “My grandfather survived the summer of ’76 on bitter and pickled eggs.”

“Your grandfather also thought sun cream was French,” said Kevin.

By lunchtime, Clarence had become remarkably entrepreneurial. The Little John began serving Emergency Hydration Specials: lime and soda, alcohol-free shandy, iced tap water with lemon, and something called a Responsible Pint, which was water in a pint glass with a beer mat placed respectfully on top. There was nearly a riot among the Havnot Male Voice Choir until Dennis Ackland pointed out that nobody sang well while unconscious.

The Havnot Heritage Railway was also in difficulty. Its rails had not melted, despite what Dobbs announced, but they had become “a bit expressive,” according to Abe Appleford.

The afternoon train from Havnot Halt to Shedlington Junction was reduced to walking pace at the insistence of Constable Rigid, on health and safety grounds. Rigid had no formal authority over railway operations but possessed a notebook and an expression of deep concern. This was awkward, as walking pace was also the normal speed of the Havnot Heritage Railway, but volunteers made a show of saying “thermal expansion” to anyone who approached.

Perry Wainwright suggested cancelling services.

“We did not preserve this railway in order not to run trains,” said Jerome Basington-Smythe, who owned both a peaked cap and a double-barrelled name and therefore had authority.

So the train continued, carrying four passengers, bottled water, and Mrs Shand’s cousin, who had boarded by mistake and was too polite to get off.

Back at St Faithful’s, Dobbs had become convinced that the greatest danger was hot air entering the Sanctuary.

“All doors must remain shut,” he declared.

“Dobbs,” said Tim, “the church is cooler than outside because of the stone.”

“Exactly,” said Dobbs. “Therefore we must defend the cool.”

“You defend it by opening doors early and late, and closing them in the hottest part of the day.”

Dobbs narrowed his eyes. “So hot air is allowed in at selected liturgical moments?”

“It is called ventilation.”

“It sounds like modernism.”

By mid-afternoon, he had stationed himself at the west door with a thermometer, a chair, and the air of a man guarding the Holy Sepulchre from draughts. He challenged delivery drivers, one tourist, and Sandy, who was attempting to bring in fans.

“Fans move air,” said Dobbs.

“That is their purpose.”

“But what if they move the wrong air?”

“Dobbs, drink some water.”

“I am not thirsty.”

“That is not the point.”

“It is usually the point of drinking.”

In the kitchen, Margaret Basington-Smythe and her enormous teapot were suffering a crisis of identity. The teapot, known as The Empress, had served baptisms, funerals, flower festivals, one disastrous quiz night, and a Lent course on simplicity which required eight packets of biscuits.

Now people were asking for iced tea.

“Iced tea?” demanded Margaret. “Tea is meant to be hot. That is why it is tea.”

“It can be tea and cold,” said Sandy.

“So can soup,” said Margaret, “but only if something has gone wrong.”

Eventually, under pressure from Sandy and open mutiny from the bellringers, Margaret agreed to experiment. The first batch was placed in the fridge, where it warmed the yoghurt. The second was poured over ice, causing The Empress to make a noise like a disapproving aunt. The third was served with lemon, mint, and sugar, and was declared by Mildred Reeks “rather foreign, but in a helpful way.”

By five o’clock, Havnot had entered a new theological settlement. Vulnerable people had been visited. Curtains had been drawn. Dogs had been watered. At the Little John, Clarence was considering taking out shares in soda water. The Heritage Railway had reached Shedlington Junction only eleven minutes late. Dobbs had accepted that air was not inherently wicked. Margaret had written ICED TEA on a label, then added IF I MUST.

And Horse’s cooling device had become the social centre of the parish. Children ran through it. Pensioners sat near it. The Havnot Male Voice Choir stood under it after rehearsal and discovered that Gwahoddiad sounded better when everyone was damp. Even Dobbs, passing too close, received a light misting across the forehead.

He froze.

Everyone froze with him.

Then he wiped his brow, looked at the sky, and said, very quietly, “I suppose even Horse can get some things right.”

Tim smiled.

“No shrieking,” said Dobbs, because grace has limits.

And across Havnot, as evening came down, people opened windows, checked on neighbours, drank something cold, and remembered the old truth that extreme weather reveals a parish. Not because everybody behaves sensibly. Obviously not. This was Havnot. But beneath the fussing, laminating, inventing, guarding, brewing and muttering, they had done the thing love always does.

They had noticed who might be in danger.

And then, they had formed a committee.