The Pride of the Peacock (3 page)

“Do come away, Jessica,” said Mama.

“I do declare you have a morbid streak.”

Called from the guns of Trafalgar I walked solemnly back to the Dower House, and it was later that afternoon when I wandered out through the gardens to the edge of the stream. I was still thinking of long-dead dave rings who had died so valiantly for their country and how John had fought the Roundheads in an unsuccessful attempt to keep his King on the throne, a struggle which had cost the King not only his throne but his head, and James fighting with Marlborough and Harold with Nelson.

We dave rings had taken our part in the making of history, I told myself proudly.

Following the stream I came to the end of the Dower House gardens.

There was a stretch of meadow-about an acre in which the grass grew long and unkempt. By the hedge grew archangel or white dead-nettle with its flowers just coming out. They would be there until December, and later the bees would be so busy on them that it wouldn’t be possible to get near them. Very few people ever came here and it was called the Waste Land.

As I walked across it I noticed a bunch of dog violets tied ;

up with white cotton, which was wound round their stems. I stopped to pick them up and as I divided the grass I saw that the spot on which they had been lying was slightly raised. It was a plot of about six feet long.

Like a grave, I thought. I How could it be a grave? Because I had been to the church1 yard that afternoon with Easter flowers my mind was on;

graves. I knelt down and pushed aside the grass. I felt round the earth. Yes, it was a mound. It must be a grave, and today someone had put a bunch of violets on it.

Who could possibly be buried on the Waste Land? I went and sat thoughtfully by the stream and asked myself what it meant.

The first person I encountered when I went back to the house was Maddy, who, now that I no longer needed a nurse, had become maid of all work. She was at the linen cupboard sorting out sheets.

“Maddy,” I said, “I saw a grave today.8 ” It’s Easter Sunday so I reckon you did,” she retorted.

“Oh, not in the churchyard. In the Waste Land. I’m sure it was a grave.”

She turned away, but not before I had seen that her expression was one of shocked horror. She knew there was a grave in the Waste Land.

“Whose was it?” I insisted.

‘now why ask me ? “

“Because you know.”

“Miss Jessica, it’s time you stopped putting people in the witness box. You’re too inquisitive by half.”

“It’s only a natural thirst for knowledge.”

“It’s what I call having your nose into everything. There’s a word for that. Plain nosiness.”

“I don’t see why I shouldn’t know who’s buried in the Waste Land.”

“Buried in the Waste Land,” she mimicked; but she had betrayed herself. She was uneasy.

“There was a little bunch of violets there—as though someone had remembered it was Easter Sunday.”

“Oh,” she said blankly.

“I thought someone might have buried a pet dog there.”

That’s as like as not,” she said with some relief.

“But it was too big for a dog’s grave. No, I think it was some person there … someone buried long ago but still remembered. They must have been remembered, mustn’t they, for someone to lay flowers there so carefully.”

“Miss Jessica, will you get from under my feet.”

She was bustling away with a pile of linen sheets, but her heightened colour betrayed her. She knew who was buried in the Waste Land, but, alas, she wasn’t telling.

For several days I worried her but could get nothing out of her.

i9 “Oh, give over, do,” she cried at length in exasperation.

“One of these days you might find out something you’d rather not know.”

That cryptic remark lingered in my mind and did nothing to curb my curiosity.

All that year I brooded on the matter of the secret grave until the following spring when there was activity across the stream at Oakland Hall and I ceased to think about it. I was aware that something was happening because suddenly tradesmen called constantly at the house, and from my seat by the stream I could hear the servants shouting to each other. There were regular thwacks as carpets were brought out of the house and beaten. The shrill feminine tones mingled with those of the dignified butler. I had seen him several times, and he always behaved as though he were the owner of Oakland Hall. I was sure be was not haunted by the spectre of Better Days.

Then the day came when I saw a carriage arriving and I slipped out of the Dower House to see it turn into Oakland’s drive. Then I hurried back, darted across the stream, crept close to the house, and hidden by bushes I was just in time to see a man lifted from the carriage and placed in a wheelchair. He had a very red face, and he shouted in a loud voice to the people around him in a manner to which I was sure the rafters of Oakland Hall had been unaccustomed during the Better Days.

“Get me in,” he shouted.

“Come on, Wilmot. Come out and help Banker.”

I wished that I could see better, but I had to be careful. I wondered what the red-faced man would say if he saw me. He was clearly a very forceful personality and it was, I felt, very necessary indeed for me to remain hidden.

“Get me up the steps,” he said. Then I can manage. Show ‘em. Banker.

”

The little procession went into the house at last, and as I made my cautious way to the bridge I had a fancy that I was being followed, perhaps because I felt so guilty to be on the wrong side of the stream. I did not look round but ran as fast as I could and it was only when I had sped across the bridge that I paused to look back. I was sure I saw a movement among the trees but whether it was a man or woman there I was unsure, but I did have the feeling that I had been observed. I

began to feel uneasy, wondering whether whoever had seen me would complain to Mama. There would certainly be trouble if he-or she-did. That I had stepped on to forbidden territory would be bad enough but to have been seen doing it would bring forth storms of contempt upon my head.

On my way to my room I met Miriam. The owner of Oakland Hall is back,” I told her.

May God preserve us! ” she cried.

“Now I suppose there’ll be entertaining, eating and drinking and all kinds of depravity.”

I laughed gleefully.

“It’ll be exciting,” I began.

“It’ll be disgusting,” she retorted.

“I think he’s had some sort of accident,” I ventured.

Who? “

The er . the one who took Oakland from us. “

“I’ve no doubt he deserved it,” she said with satisfaction.

She turned away. The very thought of them was obnoxious to her; but I was enormously interested.

I asked Maddy about them because she always gave me the impression that she could tell me a good deal if only I could make her break some vow she had made not to, and often, in fact, she did seem secretly as though she wanted to talk.

I said: “Maddy, a man in a bath chair was taken into Oakland Hall yesterday.”

She nodded. That’s him,” she said.

The one who bought it from us ? “

“He made a fortune. Never been used to such a place before. He’s what you call one of them new rich.”

“Nouveau riche.” I informed her grandly.

“Have it your own way,” she said, ‘but that’s what he is. “

“He’s an invalid?”

“Accident,” she said. That’s what happens to his sort. “

“His sort? What sort?”

Made a great fortune, he did, and he buys Oakland Hall and them that has lived in it for generations untold has to give it up. “

The Claverings gambled while he worked,” I said.

“It’s like the ant and the grasshopper. It’s no use blaming him. They both got their deserts.”

“What’s insects got to do with it? You’re what I call a hopper yourself. Miss Jessica. You’re no sooner on to one thing before you’re after another.”

This is all part of the same subject,” I protested.

“I’d like to get into the Hall. Is he going to stay here?”

You can’t get about all that easy when you’ve had one of your legs off. Still, he got the fortune, though it did cost him a leg. ” Maddy shook her head.

“It only goes to show that money’s not everything .. though in this house you’d sometimes think it was. Mrs. Bucket says she reckons he’s home to stay.”

Who’s Mrs. Bucket? “

She’s cook over there. “

What a perfectly glorious name. Bucket! Though that ought to have been the housemaid. The cook should be Mrs. Baker or Mrs. Stewer. So you know Mrs. Bucket, do you, Maddy?

“Considering that she was at Oakland when I was there it seems natural that I should know her.”

“And you see her now and then ?”

Maddy pursed her lips. I knew that she was visiting Mrs. Bucket and I was glad. A little careful prodding and I might learn something.

Well, it ain’t for me to stick my nose up in the air when I pass someone I’ve known for twenty years, just because . “

“It certainly is not. You’re an example…”

“It couldn’t be laid to Mrs. Bucket’s door, nor Mr. Wilmot’s neither. It wasn’t as though there was a place for them here. To expect them to throw themselves out just because …”

“I understand perfectly. So he lost a leg, did he?”

You’re on your cross-questioning again. Miss. I can see through that sure as eggs is eggs. It’s one thing for me to have a word with Mrs. Bucket now and then and it would be another for you to. So you make certain you keep on the right side of the stream and don’t go asking so many questions about things that don’t concern you. “

So in spite of the fact that Maddy had visited Mrs. Bucket I was not going to prise any more information out of her.

It was a sultry July day and I was sitting by the stream i looking over Oakland territory when suddenly it happened. A chair, with a man sitting in it, came into view. I started up because as the chair came towards me I realized that the occupant was the man I had seen arriving in the carriage. There was a tartan rug over his knees so I couldn’t make out whether or not he had one leg. I watched while the chair seemed to gather speed as it came towards me.

Then I realized what had happened. It was because the chair was out of

control that it moved so fast and it was gathering momentum as it came down , the slight incline towards the stream. In a few moments it would be there and would surely overturn.

I wasted no time. I ran down the slope and waded through the stream.

Fortunately we had had a drought and there was not a great deal of water, but willingly I splashed through what there was and ran up the slope on the other side just in time to catch the chair before it went down into the stream.

The man in the chair had been yelling: “Banker 1 Banker 1 Where in God’s name are you. Banker?” until he caught sight of me. I was clinging to the chair and it took all my strength to hang on to it and at one moment I thought it was going to carry me down with it.

The man was grinning at me; his face was redder than ever.

“Goodo!” be shouted.

“You’ve done it. A little shaver like you and you’ve done it.”

There was a kind of steering bar in front of him; he guided this, and the chair started to move along parallel with the stream.

There,” he said. That’s better. I’m not used to the perishing thing yet. Well, now I’ve got to say my piece, haven’t I? Do you know I’d have turned over but for you ?”

“Yes,” I said, coming round to the side of the chair. Tou would. “

“Where were you, then ?”

“On the other side of the stream… our side.”

He nodded.

“Lucky for me you were just at the right spot at that time.”

“I’m often at that spot. I like it.”

“Never seen you before. Do you live over there?”

“In the Dower House.”

“You’re not a Clavering?”

“Yes I am. What are you ?2 ” A Henniker. “

‘you must be the one who bought Oakland from them. “

The very same. “

I started to laugh.

“What’s funny?” he said; he had a rather sharp way of talking.

“Meeting like this after all these years,” I said.

He started to laugh too. I don’t know why it should have seemed so funny to us both, but it did.

“Nice to meet you. Miss Clavering.”

“How do you do, Mr. Henniker?”

“Quite well, thank you. Miss Qavering. I’m going to drive

my chair up a bit. It’s uncomfortable here. Up under the tree there in the shade. Let’s come and get acquainted. “

“Don’t you want… Banker?1 ” Not now. “

Tou were shouting for him. “

That was before I saw you. “

I walked beside the chair thinking what a marvelous adventure this was and I heartily applauded his suggestion for I had no wish for us to be seen. He brought the chaii to rest in the shade and I sat down on the grass. We studied each other.

“Are you a miner?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Gold, I suppose.”

He shook his head.

Opals. “A sudden shiver of excitement ran through me.

“Opals!” 1 cried.

“My name is Opal.”

“Well, now, is it? Opal Clavering. It sounds very grand to me.”

They never call me by it. I’m always Jessica. That’s rather ordinary after Opal, don’t you think? I often wonder why they gave me the name if they didn’t want to call me by it. “

“You couldn’t have a prettier name,” he said. The reddish tinge in his cheeks deepened, and his eyes were a very bright blue. There’s nothing more beautiful than an opal. Don’t start talking to me about diamonds or rubies. “

“I wasn’t going to.”

“I can see you know better than to do that to an old gouger.”

A what? “

“An opal miner.”

“What do you do? Tell me about it’ ” You smell out the land and you hope and you dream. Every miner dreams he’s going to find the most beautiful stones in the world. “

“Where do you find them ?”

“Well, there’s South Australia -Coober Pedy and Mooka Country, and there’s New South Wales and Queensland.”

“You’re from Australia,” I said.