Виктория Холт - The Pride of the Peacock

But what of me?

I began to see very clearly that I stood in the way.

Several weeks passed. My nights were uneasy. Fears beset me me during my nights and they only disappear with the light of the day and when I went into the town I could push them to the back of my mind. I tried to forget my apprehension by concentrating more and more on the business and was able to take part in the discussions round the boardroom table and even make one or two suggestions not about the actual work, of course, but sometimes about the conditions of the workers. I was aware that my prestige was growing and that the deference shown to me was not only because I was Joss Madden’s wife and co-shareholder. I had the great good fortune one day, in that room where : the sorting was done, of selecting one piece about which I had what I can only call a hunch. I asked that it be worked on next because I just had a feeling that under the potch was something rather special.

I was humoured and some work was set aside that the merits of this particular piece might be explored. To my great joy-and I must admit to a crowing delight in the fact -the experts were more than a little astonished when it turned out that I had picked a winner. There, revealed by the facing wheel, was as fine a piece of opal as had been seen for many months.

“She’s got it!” cried Jeremy Dickson excitedly.

“Mrs. Madden, you’re a real opal woman.”

In my triumph I forgot my growing anxieties for a few hours.

But they were soon coming back to me. In the town was the Reward Notice to remind me. Fifty pounds for anyone who could give information regarding the killer of Ezra Bannock. Then I thought of Isa smiling secretly at Joss and the argument I had overheard and the fact that Ezra had ridden out from Peacocks to his death.

I had to know what was thought and being said in the town and whether there were suspicions that Joss was Ezra’s murderer. I made a habit of going into the Trams’ cook shop for a mid-morning cup of coffee. Ethel always left what she was doing to come and chat with me. She had clearly taken a fancy to me. Moreover she was a born gossip and had her finger on the pulse of the town. She would know what was being said and how people felt about everything. When Joss laughed at me for my regular visits I retorted that it was as well to know what people of the town were thinking and there was no better way than chatting with Ethel.

“I can see you’re going urmg a new company,” he said.

“Don’t you think that would be good ?” I asked.

“Let’s wait and see,” he parried, and I fancied I saw a shadow of concern on his face. Was he afraid of what I might learn about him? I wondered.

As I sat stirring my coffee and talking with Ethel the topic soon came round to the recent murder.

“I reckon Ezra has the Green Flash,” said Ethel.

“And I’m not the only one who thinks it. I reckon he stole it for his wife.”

“Surely you don’t think she has it now?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me. There was a regular to-do when she first came out here. Came from Home, she did. An actress, they said. He’d seen her at some theatre and fallen madly in love with her.”

“Why do you think she came out here? To marry Ezra. She thought he was going to make a fortune. She was young then. There wasn’t a man around who wasn’t crazy about her. They hadn’t seen anything like Isa Bannock out here in the Bush. They were all ready to be her slaves. Even James’s eyes would glitter at the sight of her. That just suited her. Of course Ezra did’ well. He was one of the top men in the Company under Ben Henniker and your husband, of course. But he never got as far as she wanted him to. Now this Green Flash. Mr. Henniker had hidden it all the time. Ezra was in and out of Peacocks, and, well”

“I can’t believe that Ezra was a thief.”

“It’s not the same stealing the Green Flash. It makes its own spell, that stone. People can’t help themselves. It’s some evil spirit that takes them over. Possession, they call it.”

I thought of my father who had loved my mother and promised to many her. Then he had seen the Green Rash and was ready to forget everything for its sake. Possession! Yes, that was the word.

“I reckon he took it for Isa, and when it was his he got the bad luck it always brings. The bushranger was waiting for the first who came to Grover’s Gully and because his luck had turned, that one was Ezra Bannock. People are saying that the Green Flash ought to be found.”

She was eyeing me speculatively, and I felt there was more in her mind than she, gossip that she was, would tell me.

“All this mystery about its whereabouts makes talk,” she added.

“I’m sure you’re right,” I said.

When I went back to the office. At the door I met Joss.

“Well,” he asked, ‘been feeling the public pulse ?"

 "Yes,” I replied. There’s a lot of talk going on.”

“Naturally. There always is.”

This is about Ezra and the Green Flash. “

“I don’t see the connection.”

“People evidently think there is one.”

What have you discovered? “

“It’s being whispered that Ezra stole the Green Flash because Isa wanted it. It would have been his for a while and because of this the legendary bad luck sent him to Graver’s Gully at the precise moment when the bushranger was there.”

I saw the tightening of his lips and the steely look I dreaded come into his blue eyes.

“Nonsense,” he said.

“Absolute nonsense.”

“At least,” I went on, looking straight at him, that’s one theory. “

He shrugged his shoulders impatiently and I thought: How far is he involved? Was he the one who had taken the Green Flash from its hiding place that he might give it to his mistress ? How far had his infatuation led him ?

I felt sick and afraid.

I sat on the terrace as I often did when I returned from town and Mrs. Laud and Lilias would bring me out a drink. It was usually Lilias’s homemade lemonade.

On this day Mrs. Laud brought it.

‘you look disturbed,” she said.

“Has anything upset you?”

“No, not really. But I wish we could solve this mystery of Ezra Bannock. He was such a genial man.”

“Is there really a mystery? Wasn’t it a bushranger? His purse was stolen after all.”

"Yes, I know. “

‘you don’t seem to think that’s what happened. “

“It appears obvious, of course.”

"You’re worried. You mustn’t let all this upset you, Mrs. Madden. I get quite concerned about you.“

"You’re always so kind and helpful, Mrs. Laud. You have been ever since I came out here. “

“Well, why not? And you the mistress of the house. I think you should put all this out of your mind. That would be the best way.”

“I can’t. Did you know that some people have an idea that the murder has something with Green Flash?"

” Whoever thought that ? “

There’s talk in the town. “But what could Mr. Bannock’s death possibly have to do with the Green Flash? It’s missing, isn’t it? Mr. Henniker put it somewhere and it’s been stolen.”

That’s the point-and perhaps we ought to do something about finding it.”

“How, Mrs. Madden?”

“Make every effort. The Green Flash was stolen from this house. We should find out how and when it was taken. Mr. Madden’s against it. He doesn’t want enquiries about the Green Flash and old legends revived.

He doesn’t want people to think that opals are unlucky, which they always do when the Green Flash is talked of. “

“He’s right. Jimson says that sort of talk is bad for business.”

“We needn’t stress whether it’s lucky or unlucky. What I want is to find out the truth. I must know what’s happened to it.”

“What will you do, Mrs. Madden?”

“I’m not quite sure, but I’m going to start ferreting around.”

“By yourself?"

” If I can get help, I will. You might be able to help, Mrs. Laud. “

You can be sure I’ll do all I can. “

You know who came to the house. “

“Well, you saw at the treasure hunt-there are hundreds of them. People are in and out of Peacocks all the time.”

The fact; remains, Mrs. Laud, that someone came into this house, found the hiding place, and took the Green Flash. “

“You really think it could have been Mr. Bannock!”

“I find it hard to believe that of him. I liked him very much although I had known him such a short time. He seemed such a happy man. It doesn’t seem possible that he could have anything on his conscience.”

“Yes, that’s very hard to believe. So you’re going to start making enquiries."

” Discreetly, not openly-because Mr. Madden doesn’t want it. “

"No, I see he wouldn’t. ” She stopped suddenly as though she had said more than she had intended to.

Why? ” I asked sharply.

“He … er … wouldn’t want enquiries …” She looked a little distressed.

‘It's all about talk about opals being unlucky,” I said firmly.

“Oh yes, of course. That’s the sole reason. That’s what I meant, of course.”

She was protesting too much. I thought I understood what was in her mind. She knew of Joss’s infatuation for Isa. Isa was like one of those princesses in the fairy-tales of my youth. To win my favours you must bring me the . ” and then would follow the seemingly impossible task which the prince always accomplished in the end.

It was becoming obvious. She loved opals.

“I want my collection to be the finest in the world ..” How could it be if it lacked the peer of them all? "You must find it for me, bring it to me and then . my hand in marriage . ” Wasn’t that how it went in the fairy-tales?

But they had not been free for marriage. Isa was free now, though.

Joss wasn’t. not yet “You’re shivering suddenly,” said Mrs. Laud.

“Are you cold?”

“It’s nothing … someone walking over my grave, as they say at Home.”

She smiled at me strangely, enigmatically. I asked myself then: Are we thinking the same thing?

A few days later I made an alarming discovery.

During the last weeks the house had seemed to oppress me. I had the uncanny feeling that there was something there from which I must escape. I thought a great deal about Ben because his personality was stamped on Peacocks. Lately, I suppose because I was in a rather nervous state, I had fancied I sensed his presence there. I believed that if there had been a close bond between people it did not necessarily end with death. He was after all the only person who had really loved me. For a short while I had been happy in that love, and when he died I realized how alone and desolate I was. I suppose everyone longs to be loved, and those who do so most are those who have missed the good fortune of enjoying that which I have come to believe is the most desirable thing in life. My childhood had been loveless. I was an encumbrance from the first. My own mother had found life intolerable and had left me. I could not say that my life in Dower was unhappy because it was not in my nature to be unhappy, and in those days I had not missed what I had never known. In fact, it was having been loved and cherished by Ben that had taught me what I had missed. Perhaps that was why I felt this special bond between us, and I fancied that his spirit was in the house warning me in some way because I was in danger. Everything had certainly not turned out as he had planned it should. He had bound joss and me together, but such interference in the lives of other people could be dangerous. Had he really known how far Joss would go to get what he wanted? Had he ever thought that I might be the wife who was in the way of a ruthless man and because of this I could be in a situation of acute peril?

Who was it who crept up to my room at night and would on the last occasion have come in if the door had been unlocked? Why? For what purpose? Was it Joss? I believed it was. Had he come to plead with me to let us begin a new life together? No, he was too proud for that. He had always said he would not force himself on me. Then why? And what did it mean?

Was I right in thinking that there was some element in the house which was trying to warn me ?

So when I came in and found Peacocks quiet I often had the desire to get out of it. Sometimes I sat in the pond garden but more often I chose the peace of the orchard. There among the lemon and orange trees I could relax and think about my day at the offices and what I had learned. I would then admonish myself for my foolish fancies, and there among the oranges, lemons, and guavas I felt a return to common sense.