Tom Hill and I were slightly late for choir practice one evening, as we had had to wait for Tom’s son, George, who had been delayed, to convey us there. We had assumed that the choir would begin without us, for it was not unusual for someone to be late most weeks, since at least half worked on the farms around the village and cows calving and escaping hens are no respecters of choir rehearsal times. However, to our surprise, we heard no singing, but instead the new curate looked disapprovingly at us, and said, “Good, we can now begin. Please take your places without any further delay.”

We were rehearsing for a special service for St James Day, our church name day. We struggled through the opening hymn, with the curate stopping us several times to correct pronunciation. To my mind this was a pointless exercise, we are in the middle of rural Sussex and most of the choir managed to revert to their usual accents every time we started a new verse.

The curate then handed out the music he had chosen for the anthem. “We shall be singing in four parts,” he said. “Please look through your part and we will practise the first section tonight. As you can see, this is in four sections, and we shall therefore need additional rehearsals before the service.”

There was general mutterings about this. We normally fit in a few extra rehearsals before Christmas and Easter, but summer evenings are too important to give up extra time. Many who are at work during the day will be in their gardens in the evening, tending to not only their flowers, but also the vegetables which will be important to their families for the autumn and winter. In addition, both our cricket umpires sing in the choir, and they would therefore not miss midweek matches.

The curate seemed oblivious to these protests and instead, after a few minutes said, “Right, we will try the first ten bars.”

He started to conduct, and everyone waited patiently. “Why aren’t you singing?” he snapped.

“We’re waiting for you to sing the tune to us,” the church warden said.

“I’ve given you the music, what more do you need?”

I realised the majority of the choir members were looking at me, so reluctantly I explained. “Most of the choir don’t read music. You need to sing the tune and then they’ll copy it.”

“How did they get to be in the choir? This is ridiculous. I’m going to speak to the vicar.”

He stormed out but had failed to realise the vicar’s cat had strolled into the church earlier and had been enjoying the evening sunshine as it came through one of the windows. Hearing the footsteps coming down the aisle, the cat leapt up and made a dash for the door, tripping the curate up in the process.

Having picked himself up, the curate left the church.

“He should have rehearsed his exit,” one of the basses sitting behind me said.

The choir decided unanimously to head for the Red Lion before the man should return.