Harvey Cottrell buys furniture at almost stealing prizes. He shows great interest in Alice Stanton's Greek figurine and the next day it is gone. The same thing happens to an old mirror belonging to John Salter, and Cottrell turned really nasty when she would not sell him that. The villagers of Aidensfield have to elect either Oscar Blaketon or Joyce Jowett as the parish representative for the counsel and the candidates do everything they can to outdo and discredit each other. Many villagers find it hard to get to the village hall to vote and Blaketon offers to take them there in David's taxi. Dr. Summerbee thinks that exercise will improve general health in Aidensfield and organizes a fitness class. But fitness may not be too good to herself because she collapses after the class.

Important things are about to happen in Aidensfield. The annual cricket match against Scarsdale is coming up, and if Scarsdale wins again this year the trophy is theirs for keeps. Oscar Blaketon is the head of the Aidensfield team, but turmoil is raging the village and he must leave many of his best players out of account. And he has excluded the women beforehand, because their job is to see to the food and the tea. The police have problems of another kind. They have been tipped off about a raid on an armoured transport. They catch one of the raiders, Dave Dooley, but his brother Ray and Ray's girlfriend Connie get away with the loot. Ray is not the kind of guy who lets his brother rot in prison and they kidnap PC Walker and threaten to kill him if Dave is not released.