The Wrath of a father is nothing to trifle with

Disclaimer: I do not own Foyle´s War, the tv-series belongs to the ITV and the produktion Company if it isn´t produced in the house. Any recognisable caracters also belong to them. All I own are my ideas and my original caracters.

Author´s notes: I watched an episode of Foyle´s War during which a Mr. Henderson of the MI5 arrested and bullied people. The thought came to me, what would happen if he met someone made of sterner stuff than those he arrested and bullied. Then another thought popped up, if Mr. Henderson sr had a few choice words about his son´s posting and wanted that changed what would he do? This fic is the child of those thoughts.

Chapter 1, I thought I had seen everything

Time: 17th of May, 1940 at teatime
Place: A Magistrate Court in London

When Mr. Michel Edwards came to the Magistrate Court´s tearoom for a much deserved cup of the strenghening brew he was frowning. Noticing the odd looks from his colleagues he said "I thought I had seen everything during my more than 30 years here but apparently I hadn´t".
"What happened" asked Mr. John Nichols, "I thought you said nothing lay before you save regular cases?"
"I did", Mr. Edwards answered "and almost all cases have been regular. Including Mr. McGregor." Everyone nodded since they had all met Mr. McGregor at one time or other. Andrew MacGregor, born and raised in Dundee in Scotland was a normally mildmannered man, very proud of his skills as a carpenter. His one weekness was that he was very fond of the ale brewed at the local pub. Everyone agreed that the brewmaster was very skilled, consequently it was understandable that Mr. MacGregor sometimes had a pint or three too much of it. That didn´t change the fines meted out after those occations.
"What happened this time?" asked Mr. Nicols.
"When the pub had closed, he walked along the road singing a bawdy song at the top of his voice and off key" Mr. Edwards answered. "According to the police report it was a toss-up among the neighbors whether the bawdyness, the volume or the off-key singing was the worst part of it."
"It should be said in his defence" added Mrs. June Connors "that he payed his fines with a lot more grace than most who come here, not to mention that he didn´t swear while doing so." Everyone nodded in agreement, most who came before them uttered the most horrible profanities when they were sentenced and also when they payed their fines.

"What happened then?" Mr. Nicols asked.
"A case came before me" Mr Edwards answered "conserning Disobedience of a Police Officer in the Exekution of his Office. Which does happen at times but usually involves young men, not middle-aged women." Everyone in the tearoom sat up when they heard that. "To add to the unusualness it was one of the foreign women with a name that is hard to pronounce, but she helped by saying her name means 'Honurcrown' which made spelling a lot easier."
"Very conciderate of her" Mr. Nicols commented and the others nodded in agreement.
"After the pleasantries I read out the charges against her" Mr. Edwards continued "and asked her how she pleaded. She replied that she declared herself not guilty of the charges. I asked her to explain that and she told me that to begin with she doesn´t regard anyone as a Police officer simply because he, or she, says so. Anyone who wants to be regarded as a Police officer by her has to do at least one of two things. If said person did both, that would be preferable but one is good enough. I asked her what they are and why she doesn´t demand both of them at all times and she said that depending on the case a police officer works on it is impossible to demand both at all times, one of them is however possible at all times and that was the one she demanded. She added that one of the two things was that a police officer should wear a proper uniform by which she didn´t mean the black leathercoat outfit of an SD agent. The other was that the Police officer should show a genuine Police badge because she doubted any Scoutcourps would provide badges for Police officers."
"Scoutcorps?" Mr. Nicols asked. "Why on earth would they do such a thing?"
"Beats me too" Mr. Edwards told him. "She described the badge and said that the text on the bottom end of it had read Lond … Outcorps which certainly doesn´t indicate any Constabulary or the Scotland Yard. The center had held an image of an eagle, a full length profile looking left to right and none of the contries that have such an emblem has any power here. The top end had been covered by his fingertips, probably to cover his name. He had named himself Henderson but the only person by that name she knows is in his late fifties, works for the Foreign Office and wouldn´t want to be seen dead in such an outfit."
"That sounds strange", Mr. Peter White commented. "What did you do then?"
"I asked her to describe the events of april 17th and she began by going through the morning routines which included the morning school run. After that she had two appointments before she went home, sorted out the finances to make sure they could pay the salaries on the 25th. She went to the biweekly meeting of the Wive´s group where they discussed all kind of matters from global to local. After that she went to the meeting of a parish commitee dealing with what her husband refers to as the 'after service coffee hour' since there were matters that needed to be discussed. After that meeting she had been on her way home when she had seen a man in a black leathercoat near a black car that looked like a London Cab without the signs with two more men inside it and her SD-alarm had started to ring. She knew she had three choices, she could turn around and walk in the other direction but that would make her look obvious and she was sure there were other men nearby looking for such actions. Then she could continue in the same direction and on the same pavement but that would have made it easier for the person inside the car to grab her. So she chose the third option, crossing the road and continuing on the opposite pavement. She did so and was almost parrallell with the car when this "Henderson" approached her and demanded that she should get inside the car. 'Says who' she replied and the man named himself Henderson and showed her the badge. She saw that it was not a police badge so she didn´t move, instead she declared that the MI he had mentioned probably ment Mutilation International. He hadn´t mentioned that he was a police officer before that but at that time he told her she would be arrested if she didn´t follow orders but she refused and told him she wouldn´t be arrested because he wasn´t one. The stalemate was then broken up by an Army Attaché who told her he would escort her to the Embassy. When Mr. Henderson told the Attache his Ambassador would be informed of his interference with police matters the Attaché merely said that it would not be needed as he would inform the Ambassador about the attempted kidnapping of his wife and also said that both Whitehall and Sofia Albertina would be informed about the matter. Then the pair left the scene."

All of them were amazed by the tale. This Mrs. Honourcrown was apparently made of steel in order to face a man who tried to kidnap her with such calm. "What did you do then?" Mr. Nicols asked.

"I declared her not guilty" Mr. Edwards answered "since she could prove that the man had neither dressed nor acted as a Police officer. Nor had he showed her a genuine police badge which he should have been able to do if he was the genuine article. She looked quite relieved when she left."

Everyone found the case quite odd to put it mildly. What on earth was going on? Men going around in the city calling themselves police officers and forcing people to go with them, probably taking then goodness knew where and doing heaven knew what with them. Surely the world was near the end.

TBC