I took up the Green Lady in my hands and studied her. Then I laid her gently back in her soft velvet case.
“And look here, Miss Jessie. Look at this heart-shaped cabochon. See the violet in it. It’s Royal Purple, this one. Look at the color. Fit for a royal crown she is.”
I was fascinated, and he opened more boxes and I saw a variety of stones, from the milky kind flashing their reds and greens to the dark blue and black variety with their stronger colors.
He talked about them all, pointing out their qualities, and I was caught up in his enthusiasm.
One box he took out was empty. It was smaller than the others, for it was meant to cushion one single stone, and in the center of the black velvet was a hollow somehow almost accusing in its emptiness. He stared at it in a melancholy way for some moments.
“What was there?” I asked.
He turned to me. His eyes had narrowed, his mouth hardened, and he looked murderous. I stared at him, astonished by his change of mood.
“Once,” he said, “the Green Flash at Sunset was there.”
I waited but said nothing. His jaw protruded and his mouth was set and angry.
“It was a specially beautiful opal?” I ventured.
He turned to me, his eyes blazing. “There was never such a beauty,” he cried. “No, never such an opal in the whole world. It was worth a fortune, but I would never have parted with it. You’d have to see it to believe this, but you’d know it if you did. The green flash…it wasn’t there all the time. You had to watch for it. It was the way the light caught it…and the way you held it…it was something about you as well as the stone.”
“What happened to it?”
“It was stolen,” he said.
“Who stole it?”
He was silent. Then he turned to look at me, his eyes narrowed. I could see how the loss of the stone upset him.
“When was it stolen?” I prompted.
“A long time ago.”
“How long?”
“Before you were born.”
“And all that time you never found it?”
He shook his head. Then he slapped the box shut. He put it back in the safe with the others, and when he had locked the safe he turned to me and laughed. But there was a slightly different note in his laughter than there had been before.
“Now,” he said, “we’re going to have some tea. I told them to bring it precisely at four. So let us go back there.” He pointed to the drawing room. “You can pour out and entertain me, which is somehow right and fitting, as you’re the Clavering.”
The spirit lamp and silver teapot were already there, with plates of sandwiches, scones, and plum cake. Beside Wilmot stood a maid.
“Miss Clavering will pour out,” said Ben.
“Very good, sir,” replied Wilmot graciously; and I was glad when he and the maid had retired.
“All very ceremonious,” said Ben. “I confess to you I’ve never quite got used to it. Sometimes I say: ‘Enough of that!’ You can imagine how a man feels when he’s boiled his own billy can and cooked his own damper round a campfire. Today’s special though. Today’s the day when the first Clavering comes to be my guest.”
“But not a very important one, I’m afraid,” I said with a laugh.
“The most important. Never underestimate yourself, Miss Jessie. People are going to think you’re not up to much if you think that way yourself. You’ve got to find a nice way between because it doesn’t do to be too big for your boots nor for your hat. Then they won’t fit.”
I asked how he liked his tea, poured out, and when I carried it to him, he smiled at me appreciatively. I set his cup and plate on a table by his chair and felt very pleased with myself as I took my place behind the silver teapot.
“Tell me about this Green Flash at Sunset,” I said.
He was silent for a second or so and then he asked: “Have you ever heard of the green flash, Miss Jessie?”
“Only this afternoon.”
“I don’t mean the opal…that other green flash. They say that there’s a precise moment when the sun goes down—just before it disappears—that there is a green flash on the sea. You can only see it in tropical seas and then conditions have to be exactly right. It’s a rare phenomenon. It’s beautiful and exciting to see. People watch for it; some never catch it at all. If you as much as blink your eyes you could miss it. It’s there and it’s gone and you hardly know it’s been. You’ve got to be in the right spot at the right moment, looking in the right direction, and you’ve got to be quick to see it. I saw it once. It was on the voyage back to England from Australia. There I was on deck, and it was at sunset time. I was watching that great ball of fire drop into the ocean. It’s different in the tropics. There’s little twilight like we have here. And there was this peaceful scene…no cloud and the great sun so low that I could just bear to look at it. Then it was gone and there was this green flash. ‘I’ve seen it,’ I cried out loud. ‘I’ve seen the green flash.’ Then I went and looked at my opal. It was very valuable, the finest opal of all. I remember on that journey home I carried it about with me. I’d look at it now and then just to assure myself that it was there. Now this opal reminds you of the green flash at sea. You’d look at it, you’d see its beauty, you’d see the red and blue flashes. There was a darkening of color right across it so that it looked like the meeting of land and sea, and there was such red fire in it that it was like the sun, and if you were looking at the right moment and you were holding it at a certain angle and the light was right, suddenly the red would seem to disappear and then you’d see the green flash. First I believe it was called the Sunset Opal and then when I had caught the green flash that was it. She couldn’t be anything else but the Green Flash at Sunset.”
“And you loved it best of all your stones?”
“There was never one like it. I’d never known that green flash in a stone before. You had to watch for it. It was something that was rare, and you’d got to be ready for it. It was like no other green and if you missed it you might not get the opportunity again.”
“Did you ever find out who took it?”
“I had my suspicions. In fact everything pointed to him, the young devil. By God, if I could lay my hands on him…” He seemed to be lost for words, which was rare with him, and he was for the moment unaware of me. I guessed he was back in that time when he had opened the box and found the opal gone.
I went over to him, took his cup, and brought it over to refill it; and when I handed it back to him I said softly: “How did it happen, Ben?”
“It was here,” he said, “in this house.” He pointed over his shoulder to the room we had just left. “I hadn’t had the place long then. I was anxious to show it off, for I had a great pride in it. It was more than just a house. That’s how you’d feel about a place like this. I reckon your family felt it. Well, their loss was my gain. I used to have people stay here because I wanted to say: ‘Look what I’ve got. This is what all these years of toil and disappointments have got for me. Success at last.’ Some of them had never seen a place like this. It was pride, pride going before a fall, as they say. Look what I’ve got. Look at my mansion. Look at my opals. We went in there…” He pointed to the study door. “There were four of us and on this occasion I brought out my opals just as I have for you and that was the last I saw of the Green Flash at Sunset. I put her back in her box and put that in the safe. The next time I went there, the box was in its place…all the opals were there except one—the Green Flash at Sunset.”
“Who had stolen it?”
“Someone who knew the combination of the safe. It must have been.”
“And didn’t you know who it was?”
“There was one young man. He disappeared. I never saw him again, although I searched for him. He was clearly the one who had the Green Flash.”
“What a wicked thing t
o do.”
“There are wicked people in the world. Never forget it. Funny thing was I’d never have thought it of him. He had that dedication, that determination which almost always ends in success. But when he sets eyes on the Green Flash, that was his downfall. You see, there’ll never be another like her. She’s the Queen of Opals. The way you had to look for the flash and it never came for some, you see what I mean. And I’d lost her forever.”
“Surely the police could find him.”
“He was far away in next to no time. Sometimes I tell myself that one of these days I’m going to find him and the Flash.”
“Do you think he sold it?”
“It wouldn’t have been easy. She’d have been recognized. Every dealer knew her and would have reported the sale. He may have taken her with him…just to keep her to himself. She had a terrible fascination for everyone who saw her. In spite of all the tales of bad luck, everyone who laid eyes on her wanted her.”
“What tales, Ben?”
“Well, you know how these things get round. She was unlucky, they said. There’d been one or two people who’d owned her and misfortune had come to them. The Green Flash meant death, they used to say.”
“So you didn’t find it in the first place then?”
“Oh, dear me no. It had passed through other hands before mine. You might say I won it.”
“How did you do that?”
“I was always a bit of a gambler. Take a chance, that’s me. I’d always keep a reserve though. I’ve never gambled to my last coin like some. I liked to be rich and then do my gambling from there, if you know what I mean. There was old Harry Wilkins who’d got this stone, and from the moment he showed it to me I wanted it. I’d fallen under its spell, you might say and I was bent on getting it. Ill luck dogged Harry. They said it was the stone. His son had never been much good and one night he went out and never came back. He was found with his neck broken. He’d always drunk too much. Old Harry went to pieces after that. He was a great gambler. He’d take a bet on anything. A couple of raindrops falling down a window pane. ‘I’ll bet you a hundred quid the right one gets to the bottom first,’ he’d say. He just couldn’t help it. Well, I wanted that stone and it was about all he’d got because this son of his had robbed him right and left before he died. To cut a long story short, he staked the Green Flash for a fortune. I took the gamble and won. He shot himself a few weeks later. Disaster follows the Green Flash, they used to say.”
“And what about you?”
“I wouldn’t believe in the curse.”
“You lost the stone so perhaps you escaped it.”
“One day she’ll be back where she belongs.”
“You talk about the Green Flash as though she were a woman.”
“That’s how she was to me. I loved her. I used to take her out and look at her when I was downcast. I’d watch for the flash and I used to say to myself: ‘Times will change. You’ll find happiness as well as stones, old Ben.’ That’s what she’s telling you.”
Suddenly it seemed as though he could no longer bear to talk of his loss and he started telling me of the days when he had been a young man and had done what he called “a bit of fossicking” and how he had first felt the lure of the opal. Then he said he reckoned I’d like to see the house, and as he was not able to get around as fast as he’d like, he’d tell one of the servants to take me.
Much as I disliked leaving him, I did want to see the house, and as I hesitated—which seemed to please him—he said: “You’ll come again. We must make a point of these meetings, for there’s one thing that’s certain sure. You and I have quite taken a fancy to each other. I hope you agree with my findings.”
“Oh I do, and if I can come again and hear more, I’d love to see the house now.”
“Of course you would and so you shall. Then you can think what it would have been like if you’d lived your life here as you would have done if one of these get-rich-quick johnnies hadn’t come along and grabbed the ancestral home.”
“I shall always be glad of that now,” I assured him, and he looked very pleased.
He pulled a bell rope and Wilmot appeared immediately.
“Miss Clavering would like to see the house,” said Ben. “One of you must show her round.”
“Very good, sir,” murmured Wilmot.
“Just a minute,” cried Ben. “Let Hannah do it. Yes, Hannah’s the one.”
“As you say, sir.”
I went to Ben’s chair and took his hand. “Thank you. I have enjoyed it so much. May I really come again?”
“Next Wednesday. Same time.”
“Thank you.”
His face looked strange for a second. If he had been anyone else I should have said he was about to cry. Then he said: “Off with you. Hannah will show you round.”
***
I wondered why he had selected Hannah. She was the one who interested me most. She was a tall, spare woman with rather gaunt features and large dark eyes which seemed to bore right into me. She was clearly gratified that she was the one who had been chosen to show me round.
“I was with your family for five years,” she told me. “I came here when I was twelve years old. Then I stayed on, and when they went they couldn’t afford to keep me.”
“That happened with so many, I’m afraid.”
“Would you care to start at the top of the house, Miss Clavering, and work down?”
I said I thought that seemed an excellent idea, and together we climbed the newel staircase to the roof.
“You can see the turrets best from up here. And look what a fine view of the countryside.” She looked at me intently. “There’s a good view of the Dower House.”
I followed the direction in which she was looking, and there it was, nestling among the trees and the greenery. The house looked like a doll’s house from here. The clean lines of its architecture were very obvious and the smooth lawn looked like a neat square of green silk. I could see Poor Jarman working on the flower beds.
“You have a better view of us than we have of you,” I commented. “In summer Oakland Hall is completely hidden.”
“I often come up here and look around,” said Hannah.
“You must have seen us in the garden now and then.”
“Oh, often.”
I felt a little uneasy at having been watched by Hannah.
“Do you prefer it now to the days when my family were here?”
She hesitated, then she said: “In some ways. Mr. Henniker goes away a lot and we have the place to ourselves. It seems funny that…at least it did at first, but you get used to most things. He’s easy to work for.” I could see that she was implying that my mother was not. “Miss Miriam was only a girl when she lived here,” she went on.
“That was a long time ago. Before I was born.”
“They won’t be pleased to hear you’ve been here, Miss, I reckon.”
“No, they won’t,” I agreed and added: “If they find out.”
“Mr. Henniker is a very strange gentleman.”
“Unlike anyone I’ve ever known,” I agreed.
“Well, you just think of the way he came here. Who’d have thought a gentleman like that would take a place like this.”
We were silent for a while contemplating the view. My eyes kept going back to the Dower House. Poor Jarman had straightened himself up as Maddy came out and started to talk to him. I was amused that unbeknown to them I could watch them.
“Shall we go in now, Miss Clavering?” suggested Hannah.
I nodded and we descended the circular stairs and entered a room. I admired the molded beams of the ceiling, the paneled walls and the carved fireplace.
“There are so many rooms like this that you lose count of them,” said Hannah. “We don’t use them all even when there’s a house party.”
“Is there often a house party?”
“Yes, gentlemen come to talk business with Mr. Henniker. At least that’s how it was. I don’t know if it will be the same since his accident.”
“I suppose they come about opals.”
“All sorts of business Mr. Henniker’s engaged in. He’s a very rich gentleman. That’s what we say is so good about being here…in the servant’s hall, I mean. There’s never all this talk about economizing in, and wagers come prompt, not…”
“Not like it was when my family was here.”
“Most of the gentry have their money troubles it seems. I’ve talked to others in houses like this. But someone like Mr. Henniker…well, he’s got to have a lot of money to buy the place, hasn’t he, so it stands to reason he can afford to keep it up—not like someone inheriting it and finding it’s a drain.”
“I see that it must be a great comfort to work for Mr. Henniker after my family.”
“It’s all so different. Mr. Wilmot’s always saying it’s not what he’s used to, and I reckon he sometimes hankers for a house with more dignity. But it’s nice to know your wages are there…on the dot just when they’re due, and there doesn’t have to be all this pinching and scraping. He never locks up the tea or anything like that…never asks to see Mrs. Bucket’s accounts, but I reckon he’d know fast enough if there was any fiddling.”
We had come to a gallery. “Once,” she went on, “there were pictures of the family all along here. They were taken away, and Mr. Henniker never put up pictures of his own. A gallery’s not a gallery without pictures of the family, Mr. Wilmot says, but we don’t know much about Mr. Henniker’s.”
The gallery was beautiful, with carved pillars and long narrow windows, the stained glass of which threw a lovely glow over the place. There were curtains of rich red velvet at intervals around the walls. They hid the part which wasn’t paneled, Hannah explained.
“They say this is haunted,” she told me. “There always has to be one haunted room in a house like this. Well, this is it. No one’s seen or heard anything since Mr. Henniker’s been here. He’d frighten any ghost away, I reckon. They used to say that they could hear music here…coming from the spinet that was once there. Mr. Henniker had it shipped out to Australia. It meant something special to him, I heard. Mrs. Bucket says it’s a lot of fancy. Mr. Wilmot believes it though, but then he’d think that any family that didn’t have a ghost wouldn’t be fit for him to work for.”