The Annam Jewel (2 page)

“Peter,” she said, in a little soft voice, “isn't it over? Oh, Peter de—ah, I really, truly, can't keep scrooged up any longer. Oh, Peter darlin'—”

“Rose Ellen!” said Peter in an awful voice. Then he addressed the prisoner:

“Laura Augusta Belladonna—” he began, but in an instant Rose Ellen was on her feet, eyes and ears wide open. She snatched Augustabel from the gallows foot, clasped her to a much stained pinafore, and fixed Peter with a glance of most deadly reproach.

“Not my Augustabel—I never said you might have my Augustabel,” she said, the words hurrying with just the faintest suspicion of a lisp. “You said Teddy, and it wouldn't hurt him, because he hadn't got a head at all. And then to go and take a dreadful advantage like that just because of my eyes being shut and—and my ears, when you know perfectly well that I can't possibly bear to look even when they haven't got heads …” She paused, took a sobbing breath, and concluded:

“Oh, Peter de—ah!” she said.

“A fat lot your ears were shut,” said Peter.

“They were.”

“Then how did you hear your precious Augustabel's name?”

“Only just at the end I did. Oh, Peter de—ah, only just at the very, very end of all.”

Rose Ellen was a good deal like a doll herself. Her mouth closed more firmly than Augustabel's did, but she had the same biscuit-china complexion and the same close golden-brown curls. It was in the eyes that the greatest difference lay: the eyes of Augustabel were hard and blue; the eyes of Rose Ellen were very soft and brown.

“Come on, give her to me,” said Peter, and then, in deep and awful tones, “Justice must be done.”

At the last word he plunged forward, snatched at Augustabel, caught his foot in the gallows, and came down sideways on the top of the grandstand with a resounding crash.

Peter shouted, Rose Ellen shrieked, the head of the wax doll Maria rolled across the floor, and the door opened. An untidy maid stood on the threshold and surveyed the scene.

“Lor,' you children!” she said in a good-natured drawling voice. “Who's going to pick all that up? Not me. Master Peter, you're wanted downstairs.” Then she was gone again.

Peter made a hideous face, removed the scarlet dressing-gown, and went downstairs, his heart a little heavier at every step. He supposed one
had
to have relations. He supposed they had to come bothering. That was the sort of thing that was bound to happen when one's mother—Peter choked, jumped the last four steps, and burst rather vehemently into the dining-room.

Somebody said, “Good gracious!” Somebody else said, “Gently, gently, my boy.” He caught a whisper of, “Boys have no feeling, absolutely none, my dear”, and his Uncle Matthew said, “Shut the door, Peter.”

Peter shut the door, came to a standstill about a yard away from it, and surveyed his relations. The room seemed to be quite full of them. He wondered whether other people had as many. The women had black dresses; the men wore black ties. They alluded to his mother as “Poor Olivia”. One naturally hated people who did that.

Peter fished a bit of string out of his left-hand trouser pocket. It was rather sticky because there was an old peppermint bull's-eye, some greaseproof paper, a rabbit's tail, and a candle-end in the same pocket.

“Don't fidget, Peter,” said Miss Charlotte Oakley, who was a second cousin.

But Peter took no notice. He looked frowningly at his bit of string, undid the knot that he had tied, and made another, a different sort of knot, very complicated.

If Peter had but known it, his relations were all suffering from the sort of embarrassment which makes the temper uncertain. Each of them was between two highly unpleasant alternatives. None of them wished to do anything for Peter, but each of them shrank from saying so. An almost penniless Peter; a great hulking boy clumping into one's house with muddy boots; that dreadfully mannerless boy of poor Olivia's; a creature that would simply eat you out of house and home—thoughts like these had reduced Peter's relatives to a condition in which everyone hoped that somebody else would speak first.

At the head of the table sat his father's surviving brother, Matthew Waring, a prosperous country solicitor. He had just undertaken to defray the cost of Peter's education, and felt that his conscience had no business to be troubling him with the suggestion that he might also make Peter's holidays his affair. “Plenty of room in the house, and it would liven things up,” said his conscience unreasonably, but with some insistence. “Nice enough lad, don't like 'em namby-pamby myself, but of course Emily would never hear of it,” was his reply. Emily sat next to him, a woman with a red face and a light, hard eye. Matthew Waring feared her a good deal more than he feared his conscience. From the moment that she had whispered, “Think of his boots on the carpets,” the matter had been settled.

Emily Waring liked her brother Matthew, but she loved her own way, and regarded boys as a wholly unnecessary evil. Boys in general were bad enough, but this boy of poor Olivia's—well, look at him!

All the relations looked at Peter. A well-grown boy of twelve; of noticeably sturdy build; thick, colourless hair standing on end; a smudged and freckled face; dilapidated clothes; a stocking with a gaping tear, and shoes that were out at the toes; grimy hands that fiddled perpetually with a disreputable piece of string. There really was nothing very attractive about Peter.

“He certainly doesn't take after his father,” said Emily Waring grimly. “Poor Henry was one of the handsomest young men I ever saw.”

“He is not in the least like our family,” said Miss Oakley. She tossed her head a little, and added, “Poor Olivia was considered a lovely girl.”

“The question is, the holidays,” said Matthew Waring; but his sister Emily interrupted him.

“Your Uncle Matthew has most kindly undertaken to send you to school, Peter,” she said. “He was naturally under no obligation to do this, but out of respect for your poor father—”

“Now, Emily, now, Emily,” said her brother.

He had seen a scowl pass over Peter's face, rendering it considerably less attractive than before, and he spoke uneasily.

“Allow me to finish what I was saying, Matthew. Your uncle, as I said, is going to educate you, and we think that some of your mother's relations may be able to offer you a home during the holidays.”

Miss Charlotte Oakley flushed. Her married sister, Mrs. Spottiswoode, coughed and looked at her rings. They were very handsome rings, and she was a well-jointured widow, with a soft enough heart. She did not dislike Peter, not really; though, of course, he would be a great nuisance in the house, and Charlotte would be put about. She looked at her sister, and half opened her lips as if to say something.

“We are only cousins, Miss Waring,” said Charlotte Oakley in a high, protesting voice.

“Though brought up with dear Olivia—and I'm sure I was always as fond of her as if she were my own sister, and fonder.…” Mrs Spottiswoode began to dab her eyes with a very small handkerchief which diffused an almost suffocating odour of heliotrope.

Emily Waring sniffed disapprovingly.

A little dried-up man, who had not spoken before, leaned across the table and whispered to Matthew Waring. His name was Miles Banham, and he was Olivia Waring's stepbrother.

“The money's the difficulty, of course,” he said. “I haven't got a sou myself, as you all know, and I'm off to Japan again next week. But somewhere …” His voice sank lower. “It's just a chance—why not ask him?”

The scowl on Peter's face deepened. He had made six knots in his piece of string, and was beginning a seventh—one he had learnt from Jane's brother, who was a sailor; he was never quite sure of it. Suddenly he became aware that he was being addressed. His Uncle Matthew was leaning forward, looking at him intently. Everyone was looking at him.

Matthew Waring drummed on the table, and said in rather a loud voice:

“Peter, did your mother ever speak to you about the Annam Jewel?”

Peter stopped looking at his piece of string—he stopped in the very middle of a knot—and looked at his relations instead. His Cousin Charlotte had a very flushed face. She was saying:

“Poor Olivia had a secretive nature, she never would tell
me
a word about it, though we were like sisters. Not a word, I do assure you, Miss Waring, though I implored her to give me her confidence. I felt—Ruth and I both felt—that it was only right for someone on her own side of the family to know the
facts
, but not a word could I get out of her. Now I only ask you, is it likely that she would tell that boy what she wouldn't tell me?”

Miles Banham's eyes twinkled. Matthew Waring continued to drum on the table, and said dryly:

“I'm sure I don't know, Miss Oakley. Peter, however, can tell us Come, Peter,
did
your mother ever speak to you of the Annam Jewel?”

Peter frowned. His eyes went from one face to another. Cousin Ruth Spottiswoode was wiping her eyes. Uncle Matthew had a red face and grey hair. He didn't like Aunt Emily—he felt sure that he would never like Aunt Emily. Uncle Miles was the best of the lot; he didn't jaw, and he didn't say, “Poor Olivia!”

Miles Banham put out a sunburnt hand to him. “Come on, Peter,” he said; “did you ever hear of the Annam Jewel?”

Uncle Miles had eyes like a monkey, little, and bright, and brown. Peter met them full, and said gruffly:

“Perhaps.”

“No manners at all,” said Charlotte Oakley quite audibly.

But with that one word Peter had gained the respect of his Uncle Matthew and the affection of his Uncle Miles.

Miles Banham laughed.

“Won't be pumped, eh? Quite right, too. Better take him into your business, Waring. Soul of discretion, eh? Well, look here, Peter, you won't be pumped, but will you do a swap? All on the level, and between gentlemen. You tell us what you know, and I'll tell you what I know. I do know something,” he added, with a nod that included everyone at the table. “Well, is it a bargain?”

Peter had dropped his piece of string. He dived into his right-hand pocket, rejected a slate-pencil, a stick of sealing-wax, and an apple, and produced about a yard of crumpled pink ribbon. He nodded at Miles Banham and began to make knots in the ribbon.

“She did tell him something, then,” said Emily Waring in a sharp whisper, every word of which reached Peter's ears.

“I was quite sure of it.” Miles Banham's tone was curt. “Well now, Peter—”

“You first,” said Peter, struggling with his knot.

“What nonsense!” said Emily Waring. “Peter, if your mother ever told you anything, it's your absolute duty to let us know what it was. It's most important. A little boy like you cannot possibly understand how important it is, but you
can
understand that it is your duty to tell us everything that you know at once. And do, for goodness' sake, stop fiddling with that horrible piece of pink ribbon,” she ended sharply.

“Peter, come here,” said Miles Banham. His voice sounded cool and easy after Emily Waring's rasp.

Peter came nearer warily. He hated being touched; but Miles Banham merely twinkled at him and said:

“So you want to hear me first? And after that you'll tell us what you know? Honour bright? All right. I don't mind.”

He was sitting with one elbow on the table, leaning hard against the arm of his chair, which he had pushed askew. His little brown face was covered with fine lines. He was clean-shaven, and had lost two of his front teeth.

“Well, here's my yarn,” he said.

Miss Oakley leaned forward. Mrs. Spottiswoode let her handkerchief fall into her lap. The scent of heliotrope hung in the air.

“The story begins with your Uncle James.” He coughed slightly, threw a whimsical glance over his shoulder at Matthew and Emily, and again addressed Peter. “He—er, was what is called wild; rather like myself, in fact; didn't pass his exams; didn't get into a profession; didn't write home very regularly; in fact—er, all that sort of thing. Well, twelve years ago your Uncle James was in Annam—don't ask me how he got there, or what he was doing, because it's a case of least said soonest mended—but he was there, for some weeks at any rate. We know that for certain, and we also know, or I should say believe, that whilst he was there he came into possession of a very remarkable stone, known as the Annam Jewel. We don't know that for certain, but the evidence is tolerably convincing. We don't even know for a fact that there is or ever was, such a stone. I've heard rumours of it for twenty years; and I've met old men who had heard the same stories when they were young, but I've never met anyone who had actually seen it.

Peter had dropped the pink ribbon. His deep-set eyes were fixed on Miles Banham's face, his grubby hand pressed against Miles Banham's knee.

“What is it?” he said. “The Jewel?”

“No one knows,” said Miles Banham in his quick, cool voice. “No one knows, because no one has seen it. They call it the Annam Jewel; and Annam means ‘The Hidden Way'. It was a hidden thing, a sacred jewel, kept in a most secret place. I believe James Waring had it in his possession. He is known to have gone inland. He had two companions, a man called Henderson, and a man who went by the name of Dale—it wasn't his real name, I believe. They quarrelled and parted.

“Now we come to another part of the story. Your father, Henry Waring, was at that time a captain in the Gunners at Hong Kong. He and your mother had been married about six months. He had no idea of his brother James' whereabouts until he got a cable from him. It was in a cipher which they had made up and used when they were schoolboys. It told him to come at once to Tourane, which is one of the ports of Annam. It said that he had secured a great treasure, but had no money and could not get it away alone. It besought Henry to come without delay. Your mother didn't want him to go. She didn't want him to go at all, but he overbore her and went. They were very hard up, and he wanted to make money for her. She hated the East, and he wanted to get her out of it. He wanted to settle at home in the country with a bit of land, and horses, and dogs; and the idea of the treasure got hold of him.