Indian Antique for Sale

            St. Giles is a street in Norwich on a rise which, in Norfolk, could be called a hill. It is a gentle walk up from the flinty Guild Hall, past the ancient church fringed with wisteria to the great Roman Catholic cathedral from whose upper works can be seen the sea. Or so they say; I have never been up there so I cannot confirm this. I can confirm that halfway up St. Giles there are substantial Victorian buildings one of which was once an antique shop owned by a Mr. Tatling. It had been owned by the Tatlings and used for the same purpose for a generation or two. I had heard there were cellars there, full of inestimable antiques.

            Mr. Tatling was a middle-aged man of impeccable character, sober habits and a sound constitution or so I thought. He often had Chinese or Japanese things for sale at honest prices. I had found the occasional netsuke there to add to my collection and a nice pair of Ming vases. So I went in there hopefully one day to see what was new or rather what was newly arrived, old, Eastern and attractive.

            Norfolk folk are not excitable as a rule so I was surprised to find Mr. Tatling in an animated, almost bouncy mood with a large smile on his face. Before I could greet him with the usual enquiries he started telling me about his latest acquisition. I had to listen patiently for some time.

            That very morning, an hour ago, he had taken possession of what he described as an Indian statue, an Eastern, god-like thing. It was almost life-sized and very heavy. Two strong men were required to lift it into the premises. It was jointed so the limbs could move. It was partly enamelled, partly gilded or possibly, his expert eye told him, it was of gold. The most remarkable thing about it, he told me, was its condition: perfectly undamaged. This was indeed surprising, considering the rest of his account.

            He described how someone he had never met before, a local farmer, had come in a day earlier and asked if he ever bought Indian statues.

            'I'll buy anything that's a genuine piece,' Tatling replied 'Why don't you bring it in and show it me?'

            'It weighs a lot, ' said the farmer 'I would have to bring two of my chaps and a trolley to move it from the car.'

            'You can unload from the road outside so long as you are quick.'

            'You would want to see it first I suppose?'

            'Oh yes.'

            You could come out to my place and see it?'

            'When?'

            'Tonight?'

            Tatling shook his head 'Not tonight I can't.'

            'I've got to come into town tomorrow. If I bring it with me could you come over and look at it?' He mentioned a car park several hundred yards away.

            'Yes, I can shut the shop for ten minutes and come over. Give me a call when you are ready.'

            The reason for the farmer's visit next day was to pick up his new car, a Rover of the type some famers can carry pigs in. He had two men with him plus the Indian antique in his immaculate new vehicle when he got to the car park. His phone battery was flat so he had to walk the three hundred yards to St. Giles.

            'I locked the front door and we went out the back way to see it' said Tatling 'And when we got to the car park there was a crowd round this brand new Rover. A truck had run into it. The truck driver had gone through the windshield with fatal consequences. Naturally the farmer was anxious about his boys. Luckily they were not in the Rover when the truck veered into the park.'

            Having found there was no more to be done than arrange a breakdown truck to carry the Rover back to where he had collected it that morning the farmer surprised Tatling by wrenching open a twisted door and signalling him to come and take a look inside.

            I thought it was a bit odd,' said Tatling 'Most people would have forgotten about antique dealing in the midst of such a mess. He was so anxious for me to see what it was like; whether I wanted it. Anyway there it was! I had a chance to examine it closely and…'

            'Something else was odd?'

            'There was not a scratch on it.'

            'That is strange,' I said.

            'He asked me what it was worth and I said I didn't know.'

            'Of course.'

            'Well I didn't..'

            'Naturally.'

            'So he said ''Make me an offer'' and I did. A very small one.'

            'Of course.

            'And he grabbed i.'

            'No bargaining?'

            'No!'

            'Unusual for a Norfolk farmer.'

            'You are right there.'

            'Although they are rich.'

            'Mostly! So we shook hands on it. Then do you know what he said to me?'

            'No?'

            'He said ''If you had offered me a fiver I would have taken it''. So I had paid out a lot more cash there and then than I needed to.'

            I was beginning to feel uncomfortable with this story but Tatling wanted me to hear the whole of it.

            'That damn thing,' said the farmer according to Tatling 'Has cut a swathe of destruction through my family. It has gone through a long trail of relations starting with the most distant cousins.'

            By nature Tatling was always more of a listener than a talker.

            'For us the story started in the Second World War. One of my mother's remote relations was serving in the army as a major general. Out in India. Somehow he acquired, ''liberated' was the appropriate expression at the time, this ancient relic and decided to have it boxed up and shipped home. On the way the ship was torpedoed and sunk with great loss of life but the crated idol somehow survived.'

            'Odd,' said Tatling.

            'Quite so,' said the farmer 'To cut a long story short, it eventually came to me or rather to my wife who, it seems, had somehow become the unfortunate heir to the estate of somebody she hadn't seen for years.'

            'It happens.'

            'Quite so! The day that idol crossed our threshold the disasters began. Foot and mouth wiped out the cattle herd, fowl pest got the chickens and my wife slipped over in the kitchen and broke her thigh.'

            'And now your new Rover!' suggested Tatling.

            'Quite so!'

            'And the poor truck driver!'

            'Yes but he was only one of many. My wife was lying in hospital the night before last and she began to think. She put two and two together and wrote it all down. She traced that idol through a string of relations with dates and everything…'

            Clever woman!'

            'She is. And the moment I came to her bed in visiting hours she said ''Simon! Get rid of that wicked idol immediately if not sooner'' and I went to see you the next day.'

            'Well I never!'

            'She had the family history and the doings of that damned idol all worked out. Every arrival of it presaged death and disaster.'

            When Tatling finished this account I looked about the shop, its polished counter, its carefully arranged antiques, its works of art and curios, with a feeling of foreboding.

            'Would you like to see it?' Tatling asked but I had read Rudyard Kipling's yarns about artefacts from India and declined as politely as I could with a glance at my watch.

            'No! Thank you. I have things I should be doing. Aren’t you a bit scared of something like that?'

            'Scared? Not me!' he said confidantly 'I buy and sell all sorts of things.'

            'What will you do with it?'

            'Oh I've already sold it, he said 'For a good price too.'

            That sounded more like the Tatling I knew.

            I said goodbye and left. I remember wondering at the whiteness of my knuckles as they gripped and turned the big brass knob on the door that led into St. Giles.

            For the next week I was out of town but before I left I had related this yarn to a friend in Norwich who was also an acquaintance of Tatling's. A week and a few days had passed when I met my friend again.

            'You remember that story you told me about Tatling?' he asked meaningfully.

            'I certainly do,' I said with a laugh.

            'He died last week.'

            'Died! Of what?'

            'Dunno! He just dropped dead it seems.'

            Coincidence of course! A few months later I noticed an article in a legal column of The Times newspaper concerning a dispute over a venerable work of art allegedly stolen from a temple in a remote corner of India. Its sale in a London auction house was put on hold. I never heard any more of it.