fading into the white of the porcelain around the edges of the pattern, the glaze was of the most shiny clear enamel.
I was back on the internet researching the origin of the bowls, the only references I could find seemed to repeat the Tang dynasty 581 to 907 AD and apparently only three other complete examples of this blue type salvaged from a wreck in Malaysia are known to exist although there are a number of shards in existence, my mind was somersaulting, if this was true I was sitting with probably the rarest of Chinese porcelain in the world, a single Tang bowl, not pure blue, sold recently for in excess of seven thousand US dollars, what value a set of eight?
It was time to travel.
Living in East London made getting a visa for visiting Britain very awkward as the only issuing offices are in either Cape Town or Pretoria.
After four months I arrived in London and made enquiries at Christies as to what provenance they required for Tang Chinese ware, They said any three expert valuations and opinions was good enough, provided there was no international notice of any articles having being stolen there was enough of the chinaware in the open market to avoid the necessity of a certificate of provenance or export or of it being removed from any archeological site being provided.
They kindly gave me a list of five experts that were world renowned when it came to verifying the authenticity of early Chinese ceramic ware.
So taking four of my bowls and the cylinder I visited each of the five in turn and after having the article receipted and photographed I left them with the experts to do the verification, I knew it could take a few weeks.
The common exclamation I received was that if the article was genuine it would be worth a fortune but that they would have to do their due diligence.
In the mean time I took the necklace to Bonhams so that I could have it valued by their in house antique jewelry experts, there was much excitement when I produced the necklace in its delicate chamois leather pouch.
The necklace sold for one hundred and twenty thousand pounds a week later which allowed me to travel a little until the valuations and opinions of the ceramics experts came in.
I did the usual tour of Britain, the Lakes District, Dover, Cornwall all the while keeping an eye on my email for a summons for the valuations, they all arrived on the same day.
Two of the valuers had consulted each other and finding that there were two bowls were very excited, when I eventually arrived to collect my prizes I said that in fact there were eight units and a storage cylinder that I would be putting on auction at Christies soon and they all promised to notify any collectors they knew to be on the look out for the notice.
A month later after much publicity the entire collection went on the block the value of the cylinder alone was five thousand pounds but the collection as a whole was valued at about five million pounds.
Bidding was brisk and the figure passed the estimate within a few minutes and climbed and climbed.
Eventually it was settled on a Chinese billionaire, bidding by phone, for forty five million pounds, it appeared that there were four of the new Chinese billionaires bidding against each other for the prize.
So although there was coin of gold the real value was in the eight ceramic bowls, my 'Pieces of Eight'
A year later, when I got back to East London to wind up my affaires, I made an appointment with Professor Johnstone to find out what he had found out.
He winked at me when he said that someone had been excavating on the dune and removed some items from a hardwood box but had not found the lead lined sea chest below it.
The chest contained the captain's log in more or less pristine condition along with a number of deteriorated clothes including shoes with silver buckles and a few bottles of rum.
Further excavations had indeed exposed some of the washed up timbers and other shipping paraphernalia but the prize was the almost intact bottom of the hull under the ballast stones, iron, brass and bronze cannon as well as two anchors all of which would be on display at the East London Museum after careful preservation.
The ship had been the same as in the manuscript, it was the Indiaman 'Eastern Sun Rise' and in the log there was a history of its last voyage.
Apparently they had been a lot further to the south west, even past Algoa Bay when a black 'South Easterly Gale' had blown them north, they had worn as best they could to the east but eventually it was clear that they were to be blown ashore, spying the beach and through the glass the gap between the 'Sisters and the rest of the rocks they decided that was where they would beach.
Just as Professor Johnstone had surmised, the captain had realized that this was their only chance because if they went on to the rocks they would stand no chance and the beach offered no better, but if they managed to wedge themselves between the rocks at the cove they would probably have a better chance of survival.
the log told of how the hull had been broached, completely ruining their cargo of tea and spices, when they hit the 'Submarine and the holds of the 'Eastern Sun Rise' had almost immediately filled with water and settled the now uncontrollable hulk on the bottom just on the shore side of this anomaly which did protect them from the worst of the force of the waves but most of the crew fearing they would sink had abandoned ship and drowned, fifteen of them had spent the night in the rigging waiting for the storm to pass just in case the high tide broke the hull up, it appeared the following morning that they had been over the 'submarine at high tide and the sea would do no more damage for a while so they waited a few days for the storm to subside until they could launch one of the dinghies and row the fifteen survivors ashore with their valuables.
The captain said he would bury his sea chest in the dune above the high tide mark before attempting to walk to Algoa Bay to seek rescue returning for it later if he could.
That was the last entry in the captains log.
The Professor then told of how the manuscript continued saying that none of the survivors ever came that way again, but a little snippet was that one of the survivors who had buried a box with the captains chest was suspected to be a bit of a brigand, it was rumored that he had stolen some articles from one of the Harem Palaces home to Concubines of the Mugal Emperor Shah Jahan.
He had fled and had boarded the ship by being rowed out in a lighter as they were weighing anchor, he was in a desperate hurry to leave India.
The captain had recorded in the manuscript that he had later heard of the death of this suspected brigand in a knife fight at the docks in Gibraltar.
Nobody in East London knew that I was a multi millionaire and I still had the ten Gold Mohur and the handful of diamonds to sell, they were stored along with all the cash from the auctions in a safe deposit box in a bank in a quiet area of Bromley, a suburb near London, where I could visit from time to time without attracting any undue attention.
Of the four Mohur that were put on display in the East London Museum, I later heard that they were stolen, it was suspected that one of the staff had done it but nobody could prove it, the theft was only noticed much later when the coins on display were proven to be cheap plastic imitations.
If you enjoyed this short story Everard Bromley has published two other full stories, "DIDYMUS" and "the BEAST of BIKO BRIDGE" as well as another free short story "A Real surprise"
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