… you’re sure of a big surprise.

I’ve seen and come across various things in our local piece of woodland over the years, as I go on my nightly perambulations with the dog: money (over seventeen pounds, so far); modelling shoots and rutting teenagers to name but a few, but yesterday was a new one for me.

At this time of year, it gets dark early and in the woods it gets even darker, even earlier.

I carry a small torch with me, but I tend not to use it, preferring to walk in the darkness. There is usually just enough moon and starlight for me to make out the footpath I am following and I tend to just follow the white fur of the dog’s backside: she knows the route.   Interestingly, I’ve also found that I can see better in the dark without my glasses, so they go in my top pocket until we come back out into the light of the streetlamps.

It’s rare that I’ll see anyone in the woods when it’s dark, but I do see and hear the occasional dogwalker crashing their way through, usually shining one of those super-bright torches ahead of them.

Last night, as Saber and I walked along the path that runs parallel with the main road, I saw a bright light ahead of us and I could hear voices  and could vaguely make out some shadowy shapes.  Unlike a dog walker though, these were stationary. Sixty seconds later, I was upon them.

Under the bright light of their torch and without my glasses, my vision was slightly blurred, but I could make out four blokes. Two seemed to be kneeling on the floor and the other two looked like they were intimidating them.  My first thought was that they were shooting a scene for a  film – several times I have seen students from the local college doing just that.  I startled them slightly as they hadn’t seen me come up behind them.

I stopped and spoke to them. “Everything all right?” One of them came up close to me. “Fine”, he said, “Everything’s fine”.  I stared into his eyes – which was pretty much all I could see, as he was wearing a black hooded top and a black face mask. Something didn’t feel right. My Masher Sense™ was tingling.

With the torch light shining at me, I couldn’t see what was going on behind the imposing figure standing before me, but I could hear scuffling and the sound of someone’s voice being muffled.

“What’s going on here?” I asked, warily

Then a voice from behind the torch shouted “HELP ME!!”, before being quickly muffled again.

“What are you doing?” I said, a bit forcefully.

His eyes glared at me and I could see anger in them. “Everything is fine”, he repeated.

Suddenly, I didn’t feel safe. From the corner of my eye, I could see my soppy German Shepherd Dog in her flashing pink collar, sniffing around a tree and paying absolutely no attention to what was going on.

Then I remembered that I was holding my walkie-talkie in my hand, as I had been chatting with a couple of local hams as I walked round. I spoke into it: “Just standby two, I’ve got a bit of a situation here”, I said.  That was enough to make them think  I was someone I wasn’t and they turned and fled out of the woods onto the main road.

“Thanks man. You saved my life”. The voice came from a young Indian chap, his face bloodied and bruised from where they had beaten him up. Blood stains covered his clothes.

I questioned him for a couple of minutes. They had threatened him with a machete – though neither of us had actually seen one – and had taken his money and mobile phone. It seems they were after more money, but he wouldn’t go into details. It also seemed that his ‘friend’ who had been on the floor beside him, had also fled… most likely, he believed, this had been a set up.

Several times I suggested calling the police, but he didn’t want them involved, so I called him a taxi to take him home. I waited with him until it arrived, as – understandably –  he didn’t want to be left alone at the side of the road.

The more I think about this, the more I think it was probably drugs related.

I should have called the police.