It is time for the annual match for the coits championship between Aidensfield and Holinsby. Jack Abbott is playing for the Holinsby team and at the same time having an affair with his team captain's wife Annie. When his own pregnant wife Jean finds out by accident, she drives off in their car, and Jack has to go home on the team bus. Donald Smethwick loses control of the bus, which runs off the road and down a slope. Ruby has managed to patch up the relationship between Nick and Jo, and Jo has decided it is time to introduce him to her parents. Jo's mother is not pleased to learn that Nick is a village bobby and a widower with a daughter.

Joyce Jowett has just lost her husband when a stranger called Nigel Wheeler turns up in Aidensfield asking for him. He is a financial advisor and while he is in the area he might as well visit other potential customers. One of them is Jo Weston and PC Rowan decides to take a closer look at him. George Ward and other villagers have received malicious letters. The only lead is that they are all written on the same typewriter.

PC Bellamy surprises a burglar at the Kettley's Coaches bus company, and he and PC Rowan apprehends Keith Megson, an old friend of the police. Megson disposes of the loot before they catch him, and Megson's sleazy lawyer Sellars demands his immediate release. Megson is released on bail in the custody of the well-known pillar to society Claude Jeremiah Greengrass. There is a series of break-ins at older people's homes, and Megson claims the police are trying to pin them on him. Greengrass, who is fed up with the situation, cannot supply him with an alibi and decides never to let him out of sight. Not even when Megson visits his wealthy fiancée Marilyn. Gina is alone in the pub because her uncle has been taken ill. Nick and Jo are getting married and soon it is the worst kept secret in Aidensfield. As expected her mother is not too thrilled about the idea.

Somebody has "deposited" a truckload of pig manure in the driveway of special constable Hector Cowley. He correctly blames his neighbour "Sweaty" Betty Sutch and her son Simon and goes to their farm to sort out the matter. The next morning the coat of his uniform is found in their pigsty unlike himself, who is nowhere to be found. When his boots, trousers and other items belonging to him are found at the same place, rumour has it that he has been eaten by the pigs. Greengrass has a surprise visitor, Ellen Birley, an old friend from his past. She moves in with him and soon he enjoys the pleasure of well-cooked meals and clean clothes. But before long he misses the good old days, when they were only himself and Alfred.

Bag-snatchers are at large in Ashfordly and the police know that Ian 'Duster' Murray and Robert 'Red' Broadbent are the perpetrators, but cannot prove it. When they attack Phil Bellamy's grandmother he takes it personally and gets determined to see them behind bars at any cost. Greengrass is also in great demand. Mr. Braithwaite has died and his daughters Joan and Norma are convinced that he hid his will in his stuffed prize ram and that Greengrass knows where it is. Jo's mother has become ill and she does her best to make Jo feel bad about it, because she will not break up her engagement to Nick and Fiona Weston cannot keep up appearances when her daughter is married to a common village bobby.

A tobacco warehouse has been raided and a van used by the raiders is found burned-out on Berley Moor. The police manage to close off all the roads in the area and the perpetrators, Ned and Pete, hideout at Greengrass' house. When he finds out what they have been up to he wants them out of the house, but Ned leans on him to give them shelter. Clive Thompson is in Aidensfield to paint. He discovers that his daughter Cathy is in love with the landlady's son Stephen and he takes her home the next day, but she makes off to meet him. Jo convinces her mother to go to hospital for some test to find out what the matter is with her.

Jean Lightfoot believes she is being followed and she receives mysterious phone calls. One day she finds a strange, well dressed woman at her doorstep, Susan Williamson, who claims to be an old sweetheart of Jean's husband Derek, but he says he has never seen her before. The Australian couple Len and Julie Wilcox is in Aidensfield to look for relatives. When Greengrass discovers they have plenty of money he offers his services to them - for a small fee of course. He also discovers that they are distant relatives of his and tries to sell them "valuable heirlooms". Jo and her father have to cope with her mother's death and take care of funeral arrangements.

Charlie Fenton has just picked up his girlfriend, Lisa, from the train station, when they nearly run down a little boy Justin, who is saved at the last moment by his grandfather Alec Oxley. Oxley reports the incident to the police because he smells alcohol in Fenton's breath. When PC Rowan lets Fenton off with a warning, Oxley takes matters in his own hand Greengrass gets a very unwelcome visitor, his big brother Cyril. Cyril is on the lookout for a weekend cottage. But his wife Edith does not necessarily need to know. Claude is more interested in taking a ride in Cyril's Rolls Royce. Gina has got a new boyfriend, Steve, who is helping out at the pub. Nick is concerned about his future father-in-law, who seems to have lost his will to live after his wife's funeral.

Greengrass has a soft job cleaning Lord Ashfordly's lawns for moles. To ensure a lasting employment him and David puts the moles back again at night. One night they are surprised by his lordship's sister Patricia, who is drunk as a skunk. It soon becomes clear that she has a drinking problem, and she is convinced that the law against drunk driving does not apply to nobilities like herself. She also has a soft spot for Steve's father Harry, whom she had a crush on when they were young. When Lord Ashfordly is away hunting for a couple of days Greengrass decides "to put Ashfordly Hall on the map" as he calls it and he organizes a poaching party in his lordship's absence.

The day of Nick's and Jo's wedding has arrived. To calm his nerves Nick takes a ride in his car when he is flagged down by a woman because of an accident. Suddenly the woman drives away in his car and Nick is stuck miles away from everywhere on the moors with an injured man on his hands. He manages to get the man to hospital, but time is getting short if he has to make it to the church in time. Sergeant Blaketon's day of retirement is nearing and he has applied for a year's extension of service, but the news from his medical exam is not good. News is not all bad though because they will also get a new police constable in Ashfordly.