That will be the deathwatch beetle....

I had never heard of the deathwatch beetle until one April day in 1998, when a group of villagers were helping to renovate St Swithins Church, Old Weston. There was soon to be a wedding taking place in the church and the father of the bride, Martin, wanted it to look its best.

Being a grade two listed building we had been given instructions by the church authorities. We had to use only the original materials, such as lime-wash and old-fashioned plaster, the kind that has horsehair mixed in with it. Forget any notions you may have about modern non-drip, quick-drying paint. Lime-wash was an entirely different matter.

My husband was going grey at the time, but with lime-wash in his hair and beard he looked about 90. In fact, even the walls looked grey until they eventually dried.

During the morning we had a visitor. An elderly lady carrying a basket popped her head in, and told us "I'll put this in the vestry as its not as dusty in there." We looked at each other, and then nodded at the woman. None of us knew who she was or what she was talking about.

Later, we discovered that she had laid a table with a red cloth, napkins, mugs and neatly wrapped sandwiches. In the centre of the table was a big bag of fresh tomatoes and a packet of chocolate biscuits.

We felt terrible as we hadn't thanked her for our impromptu picnic.

After lunch, we got back to work. Then we heard what sounded like rain outside. But the sun was still shining. Martin laughed at our puzzled expressions.

"That will be the deathwatch beetle" he informed us, and pointed at the floor. Wriggling around on its back was a brown insect with its legs waving in the air. Yuck!

The insects were currently enjoying the taste of the old, damp, oak beams in the church roof. They were making a curious ticking noise that really did sound like raindrops hitting a tin roof. In fact they were hitting their heads on the wood in an attempt to attract a mate.

At the words "deathwatch beetle" one of our older volunteers put down her brush and made for the exit. "They be counting down to the time of death" she muttered. "Not my time yet!"

One person down, we all got back to work. My husband kept stopping and seemed to be listening to something, however. Eventually he asked us if we could hear bagpipes. None of us could hear them. This continued for some time, and eventually Roger went outside to see if he could work out where the sound was coming from.

He came back inside and Martin asked him if he had found the grave resident who was playing the instrument underground! The mystery was later cleared up, when we discovered that a piper was playing at a wedding reception, on a farm in the next village.

So what with bagpipes and the chorus of deathwatch beetles we had an interesting day slapping lime-wash on the walls. I have to admit, that once it dried, the church did look a lot better.