The Posh Paw Blog

It was one of those soft, hopeful Saturdays where the sun made even the cracked paving stones of the vicarage garden look quaint. Mum had insisted we “make an appearance” at the church flea market—her words, not mine. And by “we,” she meant the full Beaumont duo: herself, regal in cream gloves and her “social shoes,” and me, Luce, who regretted the wedge heels by stall three.

Naturally, anything involving tea urns, tartan picnic blankets and passive-aggressive small talk meant Grandma was already there. Sat by the jam stall like a throne made of gingham, she was keeping a keen eye on the foot traffic, the vicar, and more importantly, the foot traffic near the vicar.

“I’ve already spotted three things wrong,” she announced before we’d even said hello. “One, that Victoria sponge has come from Tesco. Two, that man over there is selling costume jewellery as ‘vintage’. And three—” she nodded in the direction of the vicar, who was trying to wedge a collapsible sign into the grass— “he’s wearing that cardigan I gave him for Lent.”

Mum whispered, “Don’t get her started, Lulu. We’ll be here all morning.”

The stalls were charming in that vaguely chaotic way only British flea markets can be: a table with mismatched teacups next to a stall offering dubious jam jars labelled in what appeared to be eyeliner. A raffle table boasting prizes including a novelty foot spa and what looked like a single croc (the shoe, not the reptile). Children dashed around clutching plastic dinosaurs and half-eaten fairy cakes.

Meanwhile, Grandma had—somehow—set up her own stall. It wasn’t part of the official layout, but when has that ever stopped her?

“Everything for charity, darling,” she told me with a wink. “Which one? Well. Let’s not spoil the mystery.”

She was flogging a mink stole, three porcelain poodles, and a vintage handbag I’m certain once belonged to our Auntie Marjorie.

Mum was already browsing nearby, bartering hard over a sugar bowl shaped like a duck.

“I’m not paying five pounds for that,” she snapped at a nervous-looking teen. “This duck has a chip on its beak and trauma in its eyes.”

By half past eleven, things had reached peak vicarage. The raffle was in full swing (“Ticket 342? No? Going once…”) and the vicar was carefully explaining to a toddler why jam and hymn books do not mix.

That’s when it happened.

Gerald, clearly on the hunt for something to report, turned too sharply near the bake sale and caught his foot on a picnic rug. He flew forward with a dramatic oomph—landing, face-first, in a treacle tart.

The gasps were magnificent.

Grandma leaned over to Mum and whispered, “I could swear Morris nudged that rug.”

And there he was—Morris, standing cool as you like beside the tombola, holding a clipboard of his own and sipping from a mug that read Official Parish Oversight Unit. He gave Gerald the kind of nod that said don’t even try.

“All clear, Gerald,” he said.

And then another very familiar voice broke the silence ”Now now, Gerald, you finally made your first strike,” Geoff said, I could see he was trying so hard not to laugh.

I sit and talk to God,” the vicar murmured, surveying the rumble, “and He just laughs at my plans.”

Meanwhile Gerald brushed himself off with the dignity of a man who had fallen into baked goods before and would, statistically, do so again. Muttering something about “regulatory breaches and jam entrapment,” he stormed toward the vicarage gate, huffing and puffing like an old kettle left on the hob.

Just outside, diagonally straddling two parking spaces and half, sat a British racing green Mini—rear left tyre kissing the curb like it owned it with the window slightly cracked.

Across the road, seated casually at a café table under a red-striped awning, were PC Brinkley and Emily, both sipping from identical white mugs.

Brinkley raised his to his lips, hid the smile that tugged the corners of his mouth, and murmured, “Told you he’d trip.”

Emily didn’t even look over. Just tilted her head slightly, shades still on, and said, “He always does.”

Brinkley’s CB crackled and Morris’s voice came trough ”Another one for the Narnia file”

And that, darling, is just another quiet Saturday in Saffron,
Luce 💋