“What other tests?” I asked sarcastically. “Do you think this guy went to some forensic laboratory?”
“Well, he used an ultra-violet light, and he has a friend at a hospital. He might have other friends who could help him. There could have been fibres from the silk wrapping stuck in the corners, or something.”
“I cleaned it out fairly well,” I replied.
“But still, there could be tiny traces.”
“We could tell him that the Chinese guy I purchased the box from might have found whatever was in there,” I offered. “After all, the bugger did know about the three small drawers under the ink and pen slots.”
“I don’t think that’ll satisfy him,” she replied.
The discussion had got us as far as the kitchen. I sat down at the table across from my wife and tried to figure out what I could do that could keep both her and John Jenkinson-Smythe happy.
“Okay, then,” I finally said. “I’ll tell him that we found the three pieces of jade in the box. I’ll email pictures to him, and tell him that he can go to hell because I’m keeping them. I’ll tell him that I found them at the same time as we found the unfinished letter from Captain Monty to his wife. By the time he offered to buy the box, they were no longer a part of it.”
“What about the letter and the map? Do we tell him that there were some papers but that they were rotten and fell to pieces, or something?”
“No, we don’t mention anything about any message, or anything else personal from the Captain.”
“What if he claims that the jade belonged to Captain Jenkinson-Smythe and should go to his family?”
“He’d have a hard time making a claim,” I replied. “What could he say? Excuse me, Judge. My distant relative stole those items in China and therefore they belong to me! I don’t think he’d get anywhere. In the first place, Monty’s widow and her descendants would have first claim on anything that actually belonged to Captain Jenkinson-Smythe and, in the second place, the items are most probably loot. They belong to whomever they were looted from.”
“But couldn’t the widow say that they were purchased by Monty?”
“Who from? From some Chinaman, or some other soldier who looted them in the first place? The whole thing would be a dog’s breakfast. Anyway, there’s no way that John Jenkinson-Smythe is going to make a claim through the courts. The claim would have to be made through Captain Monty’s family, through his widow, through his kids, or his grandchildren or maybe even through his great-grandchildren. We don’t even know whether Captain Monty left any direct descendants. John Jenkinson-Smythe has no direct claim. I used to be a lawyer, remember? He’s trying to bluff and bully, that’s all.”
“You were a solicitor, in a small country practice.”
“Yeah, well, I still remember some of the law they taught me at university. He hasn’t got a claim.”
“So, what do we do?” she asked.
“The first thing we do is to find out what the bits of jade are worth. There’s no sense in starting a big argument over the jade only to find out that they’re not worth much. The most important thing I learnt during my law career was that there’s no sense in going to court to argue over something of little value. It makes much more sense to settle a dispute out of court, and it’s much cheaper.”
“So,” she replied. “Do we list them on the internet the same as we’ve done with the cross?”
“No, we do it the easy way. There’s a Chinese antique shop over near the airport. Why don’t we take the three jade pieces there in the next day or so and see what they can tell us about them.”
“They’ll probably tell us that they’re modern and offer us ten dollars for the three.”
“If they do, then we’ll go somewhere else.”
“Okay,” she agreed. “Why not.”
Three
“That was refreshing,” I said to Sue as we exited the antique shop.
“Yes,” she replied. “I almost felt like apologizing to the lady.”
We had walked into the shop and presented the three pieces of jade to her, and been offered a cup of coffee. While we sat and sipped at the coffee, the Chinese woman had examined each piece, referred to a book and then smiled.
“They are early nineteenth century,” she had said, her English good, but with a strong Asian accent. “They are nice pieces, but fairly small. They are good quality but not worth a lot of money because of their size. I can give you a written value for insurance if you want, although I will have to charge you for the valuation.” I asked what the cost of a valuation would be, and decided against it. She had gone on to tell us about jade, its different qualities, and its role in Chinese society. “If you want to sell them, I would be willing to buy, but not at the same price as an insurance valuation. My price would be quite a bit below that as I have to make a profit when I sell them.”
“How much?” I had asked.
“Five hundred dollars for the three pieces.”
“We’ll think about it,” I had replied.
“Okay,” she had said brightly. “I have two others similar to yours. Would you like to see them?”
She had reached into the cabinet at the side of her desk and lifted out two other pieces of jade. I could see at once that they were very much like ours. The price on one was three hundred dollars. I couldn’t see the price tag on the other one.
As I started the car engine I turned to Sue. “Did you see the price on both of the ones she showed us?”
“Yes. They were three hundred dollars each.”
“Do you want to try another shop?” I asked. “Just to verify what she was telling us.”
“No, I think she was honest, and she seemed to know what she was talking about.”
“Yeah, I’ll go along with that.”
“So, what now?” she asked.
“We offer to sell them to John Jenkinson-Smythe for three hundred dollars each.”
“Why not keep them?” she asked.
“Because they’re nothing special,” I replied. “Captain Monty no doubt put them in the secret compartment of the writing box because they were small, not because they were valuable. Anyway, he probably wouldn’t have had an idea as to what was valuable and what wasn’t.”
“Well, why not keep at least one of them? You never know. Someone might have found the chest long ago, and there’ll be nothing for us to find. At least this way we’ll still have something.”
“We’ve got the cross and the three small gold pieces,” I replied. “And we need something to get John off our backs.”
“Tell him that he can buy one of them,” she said. “Tell him that we found the three pieces of jade, that we are keeping two of them, and that if he wants one of them it’ll cost him five hundred dollars. We’ll pay the postage. He can choose which one he wants.”
“Okay, if that’s what you want.”
We sent an email off to him, with detailed pictures, and made the offer. He demanded all three, without payment. We stood our ground and dragged the whole exercise out over the next few weeks. I finally told him that the deal was off. He threatened legal action and I told him to send any correspondence to my old law firm. Up to that point he hadn’t known that I had been a member of the legal profession.
He finally caved in, selected the most intricate piece, and sent the five hundred dollars. We sent the jade to him by registered post.
“I hope he gets it valued,” Sue said.
“He won’t be too happy if he does,” I replied. “But at least he’s got part of the family heritage. It should keep him off our backs for a while, if not for good. I hope he does get a valuation. He’ll realise that it’s not worth chasing the other two pieces.”
Two days later Sue came down to the rumpus room late in the evening as I was watching television. “You better come up and see this,” she said. “There’s another message from that second crowd, the one that wanted our telephone number.”
I set the machine to record the rest of the
movie I had been watching and followed her upstairs.
We had been getting regular messages from them on the collectors’ website, perhaps two a week. They had been repeats of their earlier message where they simply wanted our telephone number or an email address, or a postal address, or any way that they could contact us. But this message was different.
We have been polite and gracious with our requests to you, but you have ignored our pleas to furnish us with your contact details. It is imperative that we learn more about the cross and its history with you. You have told us that it is a family heirloom. We need to know how your family acquired this cross. We need to know when your family acquired this cross. Would you please give us these details. Once again, and we implore you on this, please give us your address, or a mode of communication so that we can be made aware of your address so that we can come to Australia and talk with you about the cross. We beseech you. Truecross.
“How the hell do they know we’re in Australia?” I exclaimed.
“Same way I thought they might be in Europe,” Sue replied.
“But we could be in New Zealand, or Fiji, or any one of a dozen other places in the southern hemisphere. Why Australia?”
“Maybe they’ve managed to get into the website’s systems and they have our email address,” Sue replied.
“But if they had that they would have emailed instead of sending a message through the website.”
“Maybe they only know the name of the email server.”
“Yeah, maybe. But I thought that the collectors’ website was totally confidential, unless you wanted it to be otherwise?”
“So,” she replied. “They’ve possibly hacked in.”
“How long before they hack in further and get all our details?”
“How would I know?” she replied. “But that’s beside the point. What do we tell them?”
“Buggered if I know!”
“Why not tell them the truth?” she replied.
“The truth?”
“Well, not all of it,” she said. “We could tell them that the cross came into the family about a hundred years ago. We could tell them that we’re going to put it up for auction in six or so months, and if they give us their email address, we’ll give them all the auction details when we have them. If they don’t want to give us their email address, then we tell them that they’ll just have to watch out for it, and if they miss it, well, that’s their problem.”
I thought about what she had said for a few moments and realised that it made sense. We were going to sell it. There was no sense in keeping it. It wasn’t the kind of antique that you could hang on the wall and show off to friends. It was the kind of antique that had to be kept in either a safe-deposit box at some bank, or even in the vault of some bank. If we sold it, the proceeds could more than take care of the rest of my retirement. The cross hadn’t come into our family a hundred years ago, but it had come into Montgomery Jenkinson-Smythe’s family about then, or rather to Monty as the head of the family, so the lie wasn’t all that far-fetched. And then I had another thought.
“We’ll tell them that it came into the family about fifty years ago,” I said.
“Why fifty and not a hundred?”
“It takes it away from China. If we say a hundred years then that links it to the looting that took place during the Boxer rebellion, which was only ten years earlier. I’d rather try and keep it removed from any suggestion that it was looted, and especially from China.”
Sue sat down to the computer and switched it on. “What will I tell them about where it came from, and how we got it?”
“You could say that my uncle collected antiques and he must’ve bought it some time after the Second World War,” I replied. “I know, tell them that your aunt left it to you in her will.”
“Okay. It sounds feasible.”
“It’s strange that we haven’t had any replies about that Asian gold piece you put on the net,” I said.
“Not really,” Sue replied. “I’ll let you go through the website after I’ve posted that reply to Truecross. There’s hundreds of enquiries about all sorts of things. It just depends on what people are interested in. Maybe nobody’s interested in Chinese gold.” She turned back to the screen and logged on to the other website. “Hey!” she exclaimed. “Wouldn’t you know it? We’ve got a comment about the gold piece.”
I looked over her shoulder to see what had been said.
You have been conned feller. That piece of gold you placed on the site is a modern reproduction, probably made about 1970 or 1980 in Hong Kong. I’ve seen a few of them myself from time to time. The gold is probably genuine, but probably only about 12 carats. If you bought it anywhere local, then go get a refund. If you bought it from overseas, then bad luck. Kentucky.
“That’s interesting,” I said. “Made in 1980 and found in a secret compartment that hasn’t been opened for over a hundred years. I don’t think so.”
“Maybe we’d better go back to Nundah and see that Chinese antique dealer again,” Sue replied. “What do you think?”
“I think that might be a good idea. How about right now?”
“I’m ready if you are.”
I took the two pieces from the safe, and we were out at the antique shop half an hour later.
“Do you want to sell your jade?” the woman asked as soon as we walked through the doorway, a genuine smile on her face.
“Not just yet,” I said. “But we’d like your opinion on these, if you don’t mind. We’ve been told that they’re reproductions.” I wasn’t going to tell her that they had been hidden away for the past hundred or so years. I wanted to give her the opportunity to continue the story that the guy on the internet had fed to us. If she was honest, she would contradict that story, and her valuation might be something we could rely on.
She picked them both up, one in each hand, turned them over several times, went out into the back courtyard of the shop into the sunlight and studied them again. She came back into the shop, weighed them in her hands once more and then looked up at us. “They are old ones. They are not reproductions. Who told you that?”
Sue told her about the website.
“Those people are rubbish,” she replied. “These two pieces are old. I don’t know exactly how old, but I think maybe late Ming dynasty.”
“How old is that?” I asked.
“Maybe three to four hundred years old.”
“Bloody hell!” I exclaimed, and heard Sue gasp behind me. After a pause while I got my breath, I asked: “Are you sure? Three to four hundred years?”
“Yes, I think so. They would have to be tested by experts to be certain. But they are not reproductions. They are very old.”
“But, are they Chinese, or from somewhere else?” Sue asked from over my shoulder.
“Definitely Chinese.” She smiled again. “Do you have a price that you want for them?”
“Not really,” Sue replied. “What do you think they’re worth?”
“I don’t really know, but much more than the jade that you showed me the other day. If you let me take some pictures, I will think about it for a while and then maybe offer you a good price. I need to check on some auction catalogues and some other books first.”
“No,” Sue replied. “I think we’ll keep them for a while. How much do we owe you?”
“That’s okay. But if you decide to sell, please sell them to me.”
“We’ll keep you in mind,” I replied. “And thanks, we really appreciate your help.”
“Where did you get them?” the woman asked.
“From my aunt,” Sue said quickly. “She died about six months ago and left some jewellery to me.”
“You are very lucky,” she replied. “Are there any other pieces?”
“No,” I said, and probably just as quickly. “There were just the pieces of jade we showed you, and these two.”
“Okay, but remember, if you decide to sell, then sell them to me. I give you a good price.”
“It makes you wonder what else might be in the chest that Captain Monty buried,” Sue finally said. “There was the Jesuit cross, possibly Spanish, with a South American stone, together with the gold medallion and chain, which is probably European, and maybe Spanish as well; and the Chinese jade and the two gold ornaments.”
“So?”
“So, maybe the chest contains two separate treasures, a European one and a Chinese one.”
“More than likely,” I replied. “The Boxers probably looted a number of places; churches, rich people’s houses, temples. They would’ve grabbed whatever was to hand, although the chest itself might’ve been stolen from some church by the Boxers and only had church property in it. Monty might have picked up the other Chinese gold and jade pieces from somewhere else.”
“Yes, it could be like that. That’s the problem. There’s so much that we just don’t know.”
“We know that there’s a chest full of valuable antiques buried in the courtyard of that temple, and we know that it’s ours!”
“Not yet it isn’t,” Sue said sharply. She was quiet for a few seconds and then: “You know, Ben, maybe we should forget about the chest.”
“What!” I exclaimed.
“Maybe we should forget about it. Leave it where it is, if it’s still there.”
“Why?”
“Well, from the look on that antique dealer’s face, the two pieces of gold are worth a good deal of money; and we know that the cross would probably fetch a hell of a lot more, possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars. Why not just be satisfied with what we’ve got?”
“No,” I replied, taking my eyes off the road and jerking my head towards her. “That chest is just sitting there, waiting for us. We know where it is, just us, and nobody else. Nobody else even knows it exists. If what we have is a sample of what’s in that thing, then the rest of the stuff is worth millions.” I turned back to the road. “But it’s not just the money. I want to be the one who finds it. I want to be the one who holds it in his hands for the first time in one hundred and ten years. I want to look at it. I want to own it.”
Dark Eye of the Jaguar Page 6