The Attenbury Emeralds Read online

  ‘ “A lovers’ tiff?” suggested Freddy, sotto voce.

  ‘ “If so, he’s a cool customer,” said I. For Reggie Northerby didn’t seem perturbed at all. He hadn’t been late coming down, he had had two glasses of champers at least before the gong went. And he was now regarding his girl with a combination of admiration and puzzlement, seemed to me. Granted, a man may smile and smile and be a villain, but it takes nerve. Anyway, I knew only too well how over-heated one can get in the feelings department when it’s young love at stake.

  ‘Dinner ran its course after course, and at our end of the table the talk was quite jolly. Freddy asked Amaranth what she thought of the emeralds. She turned her head to look down the line of candlesticks to where Charlotte was sitting, and thought for a moment. Then she said, “They’re big.”

  ‘ “Don’t know that they quite live up to their reputation,” said Freddy thoughtfully. “Isn’t that centre stone very famous? Reggie had better watch his step.”

  ‘ “It’s hard to see from here,” I said, kicking Freddy under the table. Mrs Sylvester-Quicke, who was sitting next to him, had a reputation as a terrible gossip. A friend of that woman columnist in the Tatler. And it was true – what with the silver and the candlelight, and the chiaroscuro from the Bohemian glass chandeliers overhead, we couldn’t see clearly. Though I thought I saw Charlotte’s eyes bright with tears.’

  ‘Doom, doom!’ said Harriet.

  ‘What?’ said Peter.

  ‘A comment on your narrative technique,’ said Harriet. ‘We have reached the Little did they know juncture.’

  ‘So we have,’ said Peter. ‘On, on. We got to speeches and toasts. Attenbury talked very nicely about Charlotte, the apple of her parents’ eyes, the very pineapple of perfection, as sweet-tempered as she was beautiful, to make a perfect wife for the lucky young man. Excellent fellow. Welcome addition to the family – that sort of thing. Reggie made a short speech expressing his thanks for the welcome he had received, and the trust reposed in him, above all by Charlotte whose love he would endeavour to deserve. He read out a telegram from his father and mother in Darjeeling, conveying pride and joy. Calloo, callay all round.

  ‘Then Lady Attenbury rose from her seat, and led the ladies off to the drawing-room, and the port and cigars were brought in. A lot of manly talk then – a bit of politics. Denver was worrying about the drought. The young wheat was dying in the fields, and even fruit orchards were dropping the prospective fruit. Ansel grumbling about the first woman to become a barrister. What was the world coming to? Pender wondering if Chamberlain would be tough enough on strikers. But of course by and by the talk came round to those emeralds.

  ‘ “It’s a damn generous wedding present, Attenbury,” said Sir Algernon Pender.

  ‘ “No more than she deserves,” said the proud father.

  ‘ “Course, people have a thing about emeralds,” Pender went on. “My wife prefers sapphires, thank God.”

  ‘Captain Ansel said to Freddy, “Aren’t you something of an expert about emeralds? Didn’t I read a piece of yours from my stockbrokers about investing in them?”

  ‘Freddy humphed modestly, and said that yes, advising on investing in gemstones was one of his lines.

  ‘ “Well, tell us all!” said Sir Algernon. “What’s so special about them?”

  ‘ “They are green,” said Freddy feebly, to gales of laughter. “No, I mean it. They are greener than sapphires are blue or rubies are red. And they are rare. Old emeralds all come from Colombia. The Spanish tortured the natives to find the location of the mine. That way they found the Chivor mine. Then they looked for others nearby, and they found the Muzo mine. They used native labourers in murderous conditions to dig the stones out. They couldn’t use explosives, because that would have shattered the stones. The suffering was horrible, but the stones were wonderful, the deepest green, clearest, gem-quality emeralds. These are called ‘old mine’ stones. They are the finest, and the original Muzo stones are the next best.”

  ‘ “You surprise me, Arbuthnot,” said Pender. “I’ve always thought of emeralds as coming from India.”

  ‘ “Ah, well, Pender,” said Freddy sagely, “The Colombian emeralds were all sent to Spain, naturally. But gems don’t stay put. They go where the money is. And at that time the wealthiest people on earth were the Indian princes, great maharajas and Mughal nabobs among them. They had acquired a taste for emeralds from the small bright stones found in Afghanistan or Egypt. They paid fabulous fortunes for the Colombian glories. So by the time the Colombian mines had given of their best the loot was in India, for the most part.”

  ‘ “That’s all very interesting, Arbuthnot,” said Captain Ansel. “But I still don’t see why emeralds are so expensive. Damn things cost more than diamonds.”

  ‘I had noticed that Mrs Ansel was wearing an emerald brooch, and I thought he was speaking with feeling.

  ‘ “It’s rubies that time is more precious than . . .” I offered, but nobody took me up on it. I needed a literary soul for that game, and there was none present. Freddy launched into an attack on diamonds.

  ‘ “There’s lots of fun in diamonds,” he was saying. “And they do come in various tints and colours. But the fashion is for clear-water stones, so the more valuable they are, the less distinctive. Whereas emeralds – highly recognisable. With large stones no two are the same.”

  ‘ “One can tell where they were mined, you mean?” asked Ansel.

  ‘ “Much more than that,” said Freddy. He was enjoying all the attention. “There’s no such thing as a flawless emerald. Emeralds have flaws and inclusions. Little crystals of pyrite, calcite and actualité. Drifting veils within the stone – the French call this jardin. Lots of personality. Someone who has looked closely at an emerald could tell it again even if it has been re-mounted, or carved or re-cut.”

  ‘By this time everyone within earshot of Freddy was listening to him. The estate talk continued at the other end of the table, where Gerald and Attenbury were deep in their landed concerns, but Northerby, who was sitting halfway down the table, was now riveted by Freddy, and leaning forward to catch every word.

  ‘ “I say, Arbuthnot,” said Pender, “do you mean to say that you could identify one of Attenbury’s emeralds even if it was out of the set, just from the stone alone?”

  ‘ “I couldn’t,” said Freddy cheerfully, “but I know a man who could. And if one of those stones were to go walkies, there would be a man in London who knew it by sight, and a man in Paris, ditto, and several chaps in Amsterdam, and someone in Geneva . . . need I go on?”

  ‘Northerby was giving Freddy a very fishy look, I thought. “Surely not, Arbuthnot,” he said. “Haven’t these things been kept in a bank vault since time began? Surely very few people indeed have seen them. Even the sort of people you refer to. What is all the excitement about, with the press at the gate, except that the emeralds are hardly ever seen?”

  ‘ “They’ve been seen to be valued for insurance, I imagine,” said Freddy.

  ‘And at that point Attenbury rose to his feet, and said, “Shall we join the ladies? Mustn’t keep Reginald too long from Charlotte.”

  ‘So that was that. Off we all trooped to the drawing-room, where Mrs Ansel was playing briskly on the piano the latest hits from Irving Berlin, and Charlotte was surrounded by a sisterhood, motherhood, and all rabbit’s friends and relations. It was Freddy who went straight across to talk to her, I noticed, while Northerby went to sit beside Lady Attenbury. Mrs DuBerris was the only lady available to be sat beside, so I thought I would rise above our little spat, and I sat beside her.

  ‘ “I hear you have seen two emeralds close up, this afternoon,” she said.

  ‘ “Yes. Attenbury asked me to.”

  ‘ “And the only difference between them was the inscription?”

  ‘I said that it was.

  ‘ “But you don’t read Persian, do you, Lord Peter?”

  ‘ “Fraid not.”

  ‘I was
distracted being stung by the strains of “Ain’t misbehaving, all by myself”, because it was all too true – I wasn’t, and I was. And I’d had much more than enough of my fellow men and women by then. I thought of pushing off to bed early, just for some solitude, but instead I went to the billiard-room to footle around a bit, and by and by Freddy joined me, and we played a round. Still absolutely oblivious of what was going on. Not a clue.’

  ‘That’s a good teaser, Peter,’ said Harriet appreciatively. ‘I’m enjoying this. I should stay home and demand a story from you more often.’

  ‘What precisely is a teaser?’ asked Peter.

  ‘Another form of doom. A page-turner. You were absolutely oblivious of what?’

  ‘Bunter shall tell you that, because he didn’t have the luxury of oblivion. But before he does I have one more remark of Freddy’s to get into the tale. I asked Freddy while being soundly beaten at billiards what he had meant about Northerby needing to watch his step, and he told me that Northerby was on hard times. Something about the tea trade that had gone wrong. “There’s been some raised eyebrows in the City about this match, because Attenbury is rolling in it, and Northerby is on cheese-ends. Of course the old chap can afford to bankroll a son-in-law, but mostly men in his position want the wench to marry wealth. Very generous of him, what?”

  ‘ “Well, he’s a soft-hearted fellow underneath all that barking formality,” said I. “With a particular soft spot for Charlotte.”

  ‘Freddy just looked at me enquiringly.

  ‘ “She’s a devil of a sport on a horse,” I told him. “Only one of the family to share Attenbury’s passion for hunting. I believe that’s how they met Northerby.”

  ‘Right. If you have no more comments to make I will hand over to Bunter.’

  ‘I have one comment, my lord,’ said Harriet. ‘Unless you have been making half of this up, you have an extraordinary memory. How long ago is all this?’

  ‘Thirty years. Of course I’m not remembering everyone’s remarks verbatim, I’m making a good deal of it up, but the drift of what they said, and when they said it is all right. There is no more such a thing as a forgetful sleuth than there is such a thing as a flawless emerald. Now, Bunter, old fruit, stand not upon the order of your going, or on those library steps. Come and sit down and relate matters as they befell on your side of the baize door. Here is Harriet, all agog. You are agog, Harriet, I take it? It doesn’t sound like a pleasant state to be in. What exactly is it?’

  ‘I am very much agog,’ said Harriet. ‘We shall look it up later.’

  ‘Well, my lady,’ said Bunter, ‘I cannot make claims for my memory such as his lordship makes, but as I remember, it was upon this fashion . . .’

  Goodness! thought Harriet. How like Peter Bunter has become . . .

  Chapter 4

  ‘When Lady Charlotte came to dress for dinner,’ Bunter continued, ‘she found that the emeralds laid out ready for her to wear did not include the carved central stone. They used to call it the king-stone, I believe. She at once rang for her maid. The maid was Jeannette, a French young lady who had been with the family some three or four years, ever since Charlotte graduated from the care of the governess. She came at once expecting to help her mistress dress, and was thunderstruck to find that the jewels were not complete on the stand, as she swore she had left them. She had fetched them from Lady Attenbury’s room, carried them down the corridor to Charlotte’s room, and laid them out ready only an hour since. The two women panicked – Jeannette with very good reason – and began to run around shouting for help.

  ‘The senior manservants of the household were in attendance on the guests assembling for dinner, but Jeannette fetched Lady Attenbury’s own maid, who opened the safe in Lady Attenbury’s bedroom of which she was trusted with the keys, to see if the emerald had become detached and was lying there loose, Jeannette all the while asserting passionately that it had been with the parure when she left it. When it was found not to be in the safe the panic escalated. Agitated voices reached me in my lordship’s dressing-room, and a couple of footmen and the valet of Captain Ansel had also heard the commotion. A little parliament of the servants assembled. At my suggestion we began a systematic search of both the bedrooms – Lady Charlotte’s and her mother’s – and along the corridor between the two, which by unhappy chance was carpeted in dark green Axminster.

  ‘Time was passing, and Lady Charlotte was distraught. She was supposed already to be downstairs among the guests. Jeannette suggested that she simply put on her pearls, and go down. The stone must be somewhere near, and it would be found before her father or mother could ask questions. This simply provoked anguish from Lady Charlotte. She had already incurred her father’s displeasure by reluctance to wear the emeralds; they had been brought specially from London for her, and if she showed her face downstairs without them her father would interpret this as flagrant defiance. He might even suppose that the very absence of the Mughal stone was a trick of some kind that she herself had got up to in order to avoid doing what he asked of her.

  ‘There was now only some five minutes left before the dinner gong would sound. Crying woe was not getting anywhere, and the Axminster was greenly refusing to yield a dropped jewel. Sarah, Lady Attenbury’s maid, a lady of about her mistress’s age and with long service in the family, solved the immediate problem. I think she was as much concerned to avoid a public debacle and a scandal, which would certainly get into the press, as she was about the whereabouts of the jewel.

  ‘ “Stop crying at once, Miss Charlotte,” said she. “You must wear the paste, and get downstairs immediately. Come here.” She produced the paste replica from a drawer of Lady Attenbury’s dressing-table, and put it round Lady Charlotte’s neck herself. “Run!” she said to the girl.

  ‘Meanwhile all the commotion had attracted the attention of the policeman who was posted on the upper corridor, who went and fetched Sergeant Parker, my lady—’

  ‘Goodness!’ said Harriet. ‘Charles?’ She was charmed to find that her brother-in-law had a part to play.

  ‘And he took over the direction of the search, which proceeded in an orderly manner. Of course he also reported the matter to Inspector Sugg.

  ‘When Sugg appeared, he was very confident. The gem could not possibly have left the house – he had men posted at every door. It would be recovered, and the culprit brought to justice. We might be sure of that. I must admit that I was not reassured very greatly by this, my lady.’

  ‘I should think not!’ said Peter indignantly.

  ‘You are running ahead of yourself, my lord,’ said Bunter reproachfully. ‘Until his investigation began you had no knowledge of Inspector Sugg, and no reason to think ill of him.’

  ‘Your capacity for being in the right is beginning to irritate me, Bunter,’ said Peter petulantly. ‘Shouldn’t you make a mistake or two, to soothe my feelings?’

  ‘I made a mistake at the time, my lord. But I do not recall your finding it soothing. You reproached me for it rather severely. You came to bed very late, and wearied by the unusual excitements of so much society. I did not tell you what had been happening until the following morning.’

  ‘At least you did tell me when I woke,’ said Peter. ‘The other guests learned only when they appeared for breakfast that the house was in purdah and that no matter what plans they had made, no matter who they were, they would not be allowed to leave until the mighty Inspector Sugg said they could. It was not a very jolly breakfast, that I do remember. It was a very troubled morning, come to that. Alarums and excursions on every side.’

  ‘Alarums indeed, my lord. But no excursions,’ said Bunter. ‘The whole household below stairs was thrown into crisis. If nobody could leave, then everyone including all their visiting servants required the usual three meals a day. The provisions had not been laid in for anything on that scale beyond breakfast of that day; the cook was distraught, the butler harassed, and those of us who were ourselves visitors, the personal servants of the up
stairs guests, were attempting to help and getting in the way. “One thing we may all be sure of,” Mr Harris, the butler, told me. “They’ll be trying to pin this on one of us. I wouldn’t be in Jeannette’s shoes for all the port in the cellar.”

  ‘There was confusion on every side. The hall was full of bags which had been packed the previous night, or very early that morning, ready for guests’ departure. I regret to admit, my lady, a small detail escaped my notice entirely at the time; that is, a set of very expensive golf clubs being carried through the hall just before all movement of the luggage was suspended. It turned out that nearly every one of the guests had a very urgent appointment to meet later in the day, and they all fussed and blustered and threatened at the thought of being detained. But Inspector Sugg stuck to his guns, so to speak, and there was a confrontation between him and Lord Attenbury in the lobby, with voices raised loudly enough to be heard in the hall where several of us were struggling to sort out the luggage. Mr Northerby’s man was in the hall, and it stopped him in his tracks. It was very entertaining, my lady. A major row in which one is not oneself directly involved has a theatrical quality, and is capable of giving a perverse sort of pleasure, like the pleasure conferred by the gruesome events of a Shakespearean tragedy.’

  ‘How very Aristotelian of you, Bunter,’ said Harriet. ‘You mean pity and fear, I suppose.’

  ‘I mean excitement, my lady.’

  ‘Well, do tell me,’ said Harriet, ‘what the row was about – no, wait, let me guess. It was because Lord Attenbury didn’t want his guests to be questioned.’

  ‘Exactly, Harriet,’ said Peter. ‘His lordship had reluctantly accepted that since no amount of searching had produced the emerald, there was a possibility it had been stolen. He was happy to have Sugg arraign the servants, any and all of them. But as for the smallest aspersion cast on any of his house guests, it was unthinkable that any of them were involved. They were under his roof, and under his protection and it was an outrage beyond bearing to subject them to questioning.