“Lightning Ridge is black opal, the other place Cooper P that’s white translucent opal. Also there’s the mud brown opal from Queensland, not so valuable but easier to mine. Mud-stone is soft.” Nick hooked his pick and pulled down sharply, a long oblong piece fell into the barrow and cracked into two. He picked them up, and examined them. They were about twelve inches long almost perfectly square at each end, they glistened under Ash’s torchlight.
“Valuable?’
“Yes, I’ll put them aside for our souvenir of the dig. I’ll see if I can do that again with the pick, the seam is rich here but peters out toward the face over there.” Nick wielded the pick upwards to create a hole then dug in at an angle as Ash pushed the barrow forward and a fresh piece landed on to into the barrow with a soft thud, Ash had bundled his shirt in to save the fall. Nick picked it up a piece fifteen inches long, just narrowing at the very end.
“This one we sell Ash, better empty the barrow a the bottom of the shaft, we’ll take up what we’ve got, so you’ll find a Hessian sack in the tent, tie a rope around and we’ll get as much of the good stuff into the Nissan. That means sitting on our haunches and sorting. Tomorrow we’ll continue to pick the rest but as you can see with the large piece is narrowing so its odds on it will peter out by the time we hit the end of this drive. To think I’ve been digging away for the last year and it was just above me all the time.”
After lunch with a celebratory beer each they stowed away their three large pieces under the rear seat of the Nissan. Then they returned to the heap below and both sorted three heaps the pure opal fragments, rock with ingrained opal and rubbish. Ash went up top and they hauled the bag of opal fragments.
The next day they followed the seam right to its end. Initially they
used the barrow with the sack inside to limit the fall of good stick opal, they
unloaded the barrow and bought the opal to the surface tucking it away into the
Nissan. Returning to the shaft they Ash
shoved from the floor any rock with opal in it while Nick finished his search
for any other seams. After pushing numerous loads of opal rock Ash went down to
the other drive where Nick was studying the roof.
”I don’t think so Nick.”
“Well you do wonder Ash if there’s more up on this side, Perhaps we’ve only seen the tail end of a massive seam?”
“Well that is something you are going have to dream about, Murray is coming tonight and we’ve got all that opal rock to bring up. How much do you think we’ve got?”
“In weight, at a guess about a half ton. You are half right about dreaming, but not opal, something richer. We both know what that is.”
“To get you out of this crazy mine and patch you up, look at all the scratches and bruises, a holiday for us both maybe, by the sun and surf.”
“You got money to spend on that?”
“Too right I have, honestly I do not want to be down here any longer than I have too. Come on Nick, a beer and a rest and hard work tonight.”
Murray came at nightfall as he promised, he had thoughtfully bought a steel pulley with him, which they tied with a chain then passed his tow hook and cable down to Nick who was filling the sack. A call from Nick, Murray would pull up the bag, Ash And Murray would carry it over and between them lift and dump it in the Nissan passenger well, then throw the sack down for Nick to refill. The night began to cool down and they all worked feverishly sometimes changing positions to aid tired muscles. They continued until dawn and the last bag was ready to pull up.
“Don’t put that in the Nissan, that goes in Murray’s tow truck.” Nick climbed up the shaft and pulled the rope ladder up with him. “Just help dismantle the tripod and we’ll use the timber and the spare planks to cover the shaft.” Murray hauled in his cable then he and Ash took his sack to his tow truck.
“Then we’ll push some rocks onto the wood to hold it in place and I suggest we knock in the your tent poles around so people know its an shaft Nick.” Ash stripped down the tent and took out the poles.
“What about the barrow, pick and shovel Nick?”
“I think they are best left underground, the end of my adventure in the desert, but we will take the blankets and the tent, and put the tarpaulin over the opal Ash.”
Murray shook hands with them both, and handed Nick a piece of paper,
”That’s the address I promised you Nick, by he way this is yours I suspect.” Murray had found a small four inch oblong piece of pure opal, he tried to hand it back, “I’m very happy what’s in the sack Nick, its much more than a nights work.”
“Ash and I thought a souvenir from two stupid brothers. One more thing, Ash has an envelope for Gary; it’s a little something for keeping me alive the last few months. This way Murray, he’ll owe someone else and not the other way about. I reckon he’ll enjoy the thought. We’ll rest up down the track until midday find a hotel or pub and have a shower.”
“No you won’t, you’ll shower at my place, have a decent breakfast, lie low, have a sleep I’ve two bunk beds in the dugout. Then get away in the afternoon. Better store the Nissan in the garage and I’ll lock up, I have to stay in the office for call outs as I’m a registered tow driver, but I can kip in my easy chair.”
So they drove out of the lease down to the Ridge and after a clean up, breakfast and a sleep they drove on to Sydney with a heavy load and a full tank plus two jerry cans of diesel. Driving the first night and morning, sleeping in hotels, they covered the distance in three days so not to overheat the old Nissan.
They found an Internet café on the Monday morning for Ash to do a
transfer into Nick’s Australian bank, Ash was over and hour but he came out
with a broad smile. Nick then drove directly to Murray’s step brother Lee who
had been waiting for them since the break of day.
”Hey you guys Murray told you’d be here first because of the load you are
carrying, here you come in at half ten! Back the Nissan into my garage, right
at the back you’ll see a big metal skip with a cover, I suggest the opal is put
in there. One of you unloads into the barrow, I check and do my calculation and
the other then tips it into the skip. I’ve borrowed my next-door neighbours
barrow as well so we can keep the transfer going. Agreed?”
Nick and Ash nodded and once the Nissan was tucked close to the skip, they commenced to unload. Lee whistled in amazement as each load reached him and then he would stir the opal and rock with his gloved hands and jot down a chalk figure on a small blackboard beside his chair.
“Murray warned me this was going to be a big load, and he sure wasn’t kidding. Nick I’m not going to be able to pay for this lot, it will have to be split and sold to other dealers.”
“No Lee I only want you as the dealer, no one else, I did tell Murray.”
“He must think I’m a multimillionaire Nick, but I can pay you in dribs and drabs until the whole lot is moved, Its best we don’t flood the market, how does that suit?”
“Fine with us.”
They continued emptying the Nissan until only the three sticks of opal were left. Nick left the two smaller pieces and bought out the long one.”
“Hell that’s for auction, it’s the best I’ve seen. I’ll go my usual ten percent after auctioneers commission if that’s agreeable. Ten percent of course on the rest but an extra two percent distribution and insurance.”
“Insurance?”
“A rental lorry in front of the garage as added protection plus a security man I know to run around with me making deliveries. I’ve never handled so much good stuff before there are bound to be questions. How about the authorised owner for the auction house, they’ll need some details.”
“Solicitors and bank references, official legal owner?” asked Ash.
“You got it in three mate.”
“All done, I’ve contacted our UK solicitors Mason Brothers and Nick is owner of the Mallings estate, the bank in the UK have been asked for a reference and Nick can get one from his OZ bank. Oh we can give you as photostat of the lease holding licence.”
“So that’s why you were so long in that café?”
“Well I had to rent a beach cottage for us up the Northern Beaches, first for us to recover and secondly for the solicitors to send the documents to us from the UK.”
“If that suits you Lee we will send them on, Ash will give our address in case you or the auction house need to see or contact us. I don’t want to hurry you but can we have an estimate?”
“Hard to say Nick but it could be well over million and a half if we release the opal slowly, say a year or two at most. The piece for auction could be over a quarter of a mill.”
“Best if you bought the lorry then rather than hire one.”
“What do I do with it afterwards?”
”Give it to Murray with our best wishes.”
“OK guys we now go to my bank and I will give you fifty grand bankers cheque, which you take straight to your bank Nick. Leave me the details of your bank account and I will arrange a term deposit into your name linked to your account every month being the sum of the sale for that month. I will pick out more carefully the really high-grade opal free of rock. That also may need to go to auction. But it’s my decision I don’t want to be ringing you guys everyday. You agree?”
“Agreed.” They all shook hands, Nick drove the Nissan out onto the road and Lee locked up, rang his security friend, and then took them to his bank.
xxx
Chapter Fourteen. A sea view, a healing process and a battle in the dark.
It was late afternoon when they finally picked up the keys for the beach house, they had banked Lee’s cheque, bought some clothes, and paid the full rent to the agent in cash plus a ten percent deposit to cover breakages. All this came via Ash, and Nick wondered whether this was Malling money. Ash assured him it wasn’t. They drove into the beach house garage and went inside. The view of the sand and sea made them stop in their tracks, and after dropping all their luggage in the lounge they ran out over the deck and onto the sand heading straight for the water where they stamped though the shallows and ultimately dived fully clothed in. Returning dripping wet they soon showered and changed, went out to a celebration dinner at a local seafood restaurant.
Returning late evening they sat on the deck looking at the glowing sky.
“Come on Ash, tell me how you accumulated all that cash, it certainly wasn’t by investing the pocket money I left for Dunning to hand out to you!”
“Nor by mining some old vacant patch of earth.”
“OK, but I didn’t want to return to Mallings with my hand out and my tail between my legs. I should have asked, what’s happened to you and the others over the past three years, but you were right when I left, I can be a selfish whatnot, and on the lease, all I could think of was it’s down here, the next pick strike will find it.”
“Right strip off we can talk whilst I attack you with this herbal lotion. I popped out to the chemist when you were paying the bill.” Nick did as he was told whilst Ash spread a dry towel over the bed sheet, then helped Nick onto it. Ash saw how emancipated Nick had become with running sores on his legs and scratches to his back. He used cotton wool balls to impregnate the lotion into the cuts, but the seawater had cleaned the two sores nicely and he left those alone just placing plasters over them. Before he turned Nick over he smacked his rump hard,”
“What was that for?”
“You did it once to me after dressing that welt on my bum, but I’m getting my own back about that Acton woman!” Ash continued smoothing the lotion over Nicks torso. There were old and new scratches and cuts, and he applied the healing ointment liberally.
“Better put the light out and I’ll you all about it.” Ash undressed and put a bathrobe on then lay on the bed with a deep sigh.
“Yes I was jealous of her, she took you away from me, I had always loved you, at first it was hero worship.”
“I thought it might be something like that. After all you were pretty shaken up and I felt it better to ignore any deep feeling I could have had or you, you were so young and needed security as well as love and affection.”
“So you chose affection and security, but it was when you washed me in the Dunnings laundry tub, that I knew mine was a both physical security need and a mental love combined. I found it hard, on one hand I wanted you to find happiness and gave the Acton woman the benefit of the doubt, she was a pretty petulant little madam.”
“Do we need this discussion, I was a simple fool, I guessed your true affection but ignored it because I was intrigued my this strange impetuous creature. I soon learnt she wasn’t your normal affectionate person. Remember I went over to her place, her father talked incessantly about money and I soon grasped which way the wind was blowing, roaring towards my hard earned cash. I saw how she dealt with her staff remembering how the Mallings looked after theirs. I had no intention of joining their little game and became positively repulsed by her machinations, but I couldn’t just drop her like a brick. Years ago in my teens the same thing happened to me and I was heart broken, probably why I ultimately fled to OZ. So history repeated itself when you locked me out of your life” Nick rested his head on Ash’s chest.
“I’m sorry Nick, but I needed space to try to sort myself out. I talked to Alex about my feelings and he suggested to me that if you truly missed me you would return. Of course Alex doesn’t know your proud stubborn nature like I do. So I finished High school, got fed up waiting for you to come back, obtained a passport and came out searching for this wonderful rotten person that you are.”
“And am I glad you came, I guess a few months more I would have called it quits but would I have had the possibility of hurting you again by my presence, probably I would have crept back into some corner of England and laboured. How come you found the money?”
“Long story, lets leave it till tomorrow, we’ll take a few beers and a beach brolly onto the sand. I’ll tell you and anybody else on the beach how I made a few hundred thousand.” Ash switched off the sidelight.
“Before I go to sleep how are people at home?”
“I thought you’d never ask, Jack is engaged to Betty Smallwood, Uncle Ted has finished upgrading Molly’s house, after a deal of trouble I might add, the Mallings are all fit and well, and we have a new old lodger, Dunnings great grandfather, HE’s fathers old steward no less, lives in a secret room over the portico, you’ll have to meet him. The rooms are now mostly finished with the exception of the attics, Joan and Aunt Celia told me what and when to buy, so all in all the manor’s fit for prince now. I still live in number three cottage, but I’ve called it Welcome cottage in case you did come back.” Ash put his fingers through Nicks hair, it had grown long and strayed over his face and shoulders, so he prised it away, Nick was asleep, Ash held him until he also fell asleep with the surf rolling nosily onto the beach through the open sliding window. A large grey shape drifted through the breeze blown curtains, swept up onto the bottom of their bed and nestled its large head by Ash’s feet.
After breakfast Ash cut back Nick’s hair, then they found some canvas deck chairs in the garage and hauled them out onto the sand. Ash had found a working computer in the small study and worked for an hour whilst Nick cooked breakfast. Then they carried a can of Fosters each and collapsed into the chairs, it was warm but hazy so they left the brolly in the house.
“So Molly didn’t kick up a fuss about the renovation, I mentioned it to her and she objected strongly.”
“Well she didn’t want strangers around, like the Thatcher who did our cottages, so Uncle Tom and Jack had to do all the work. As you know thatching is a skilled job and they made several attempts because if Molly wasn’t happy that he reeds would be on the ground the next day!”
“Well that being so why couldn’t Molly put it up herself if she had that sort of ability.”
“Jack reckoned she used some of the reeds to make her broomstick, he told me he was thinking this as he was passing up the reed bundles to his Dad. Imagine his surprise went one of the pitching forks whacked him on the shin! Tom and Jack have moved into number one cottage, we’ve left number two spare so you can decide what we do with that.”
“Well there’s Jason to consider, I think he’s got a family even though he’s divorced, maybe we could hold it open for him?”
“I think Alice is pleased to have him under her and Dunnings roof, but in the meantime it could be used as a temporary place for visitors, maybe work people, whatever.”
“Whatever, now Mr. Millionaire your accounting!”
So Ash related how Trenchard had been charged with assault of both Ash and the previous lad at the college. Both Trenchard’s colleagues had turned Queens evidence by their parents, scared by HE’s solicitors Mason Brothers who were going to prosecute a civil action against all three. The Dean had removed Robertson from the school on some trumped up charge. Mason Brothers handled the civil action for that as well.
“Of course all roads led to Lord Acton and he was the culprit so HE through myself and Dunning, who would accompany me, told Mason Brothers to do there best with no expense spared.” Ash swallowed some lager and continued.
“So Mason’s organised everything with Sergeant Ferguson’s unofficial
help. Initially the Crown Prosecution were going to hold up the case though
some political interference but fortunately the Gazette got hold of a private
note from you know who and that forced them to back on the prosecution.”
”Alex doing his burglary tricks?”
”The very one, stop interrupting Nick and let me come to the climax! Trenchard
got one hundred hours community service, of course that’s what we expected, the
magistrate being an old golfing companion to Acton.”
Ash then related how the Mason’s forced the civil actions in one combined case against the college, the Trenchard’s and the Gore Williams lads. The case took several weeks with top highly paid silks. The Mallings account funded the action so as HE had requested no expense was spared. The result was a clean sweep for us all. Apparently after the case was won the Acton’s chose the wrong judge to try to limit the damages. Without success, we were awarded full costs, Robertson was paid one hundred grand from the Dean and college, the fag before me and I received five hundred grand each for our trouble. The combined amount of the damages was exceeded by the legal costs, which we were also awarded.
“So really the lawyers won Nick, as they always do.”
“I would have expected Acton to contest.”
“He couldn’t, not with the community service already accepted and served out. That went uncontested, which meant they were in a corner with no where to go.”
They both went inside as the breeze had picked up and rain was spotting down. They grabbed another lager and sat down in the lounge.
“That’s not all though.” Ash looked dreamily up at the ceiling recalling a more disturbing incident.
“OK I don’t like to ask but something tells me it’s to do with revenge, vengeance.”
“You read my mind Nick!”
“No Ash I can’t, unless we both mind read together, so lets try that to see if works for us again!”
So they sat quietly sipping their lager whilst Ash related in mind read the happenings at Mallings, in the attic corridor.
‘It happened the year before last in autumn about four months after the costs and damages had been settled and the money was safely banked. I had moved back into the manor and was in HE’s study showing how he could use the web for investigation of hobbies, gardening, antiques, famous people. HE was interested in catching up with history. Aunt Celia with furniture and household stuff. She came in to join Uncle and I. I sat between them and eventually they tried their hand. It was an eye opener for them both and I left them happily clicking away on their mouse. Peter, Joan and Alex were away so I drifted outside wondering whether Alex had taken the dogs. I called Ben and both rushed over from the cottage to where I was on the steps. I walked around the manor checked that number two and three cottages were padlocked. Jack was out with his girl and Uncle Tom over with the Dunnings. So I came inside, locked the door and went to our room to bed.
About three in the morning I felt a growling, long and low, a knock on the door and Uncle came in and shook my shoulder. He asked me if I was awake, and I said it was Ben growling at him, he said no we had invaders. To be honest Nick I didn’t quite know what Uncle was talking about, but I hurriedly dressed and he shooed me up to the attic to stay with Dunning senior. I knocked on the door quickly and he hauled me in, and then slid the door shut. He told me to climb the ladder and lie over the ceiling battens of the attic corridor. He unsheathed something made of steel climbed up beside me. He vanished for a moment and took the dogs with him, and then he came up through the ceiling with his finger to his lips. Then pointed to his ear. Shortly I heard footsteps creeping up the stairs and low voices like a low hum. It sounded like two voices the corridor door opened with a tiny squeak and footsteps padded slowly along the corridor until they were right under me. I heard a can dropped to the floor and Trenchard’s voice. Gore he said, these houses of stone and marble have one huge disadvantage and that’s a wood beam roof with lots of smaller battens, these rotten piglets won’t know what’s hit them. Suddenly Old Mr Dunning vanished and I heard the attic stair door slam and locked with sliding bolts. Then from the other end the dogs charged and the louts were screaming as the visions appeared, Mr. Dunning grabbed his steel stick, slid through the ceiling, his steel handle makin