Виктория Холт: The Black Opal

Miss Harley taught me my letters and I used to sit with Adeline, whom I soon overtook-and I was very contented during these sessions.

Outstanding in all my childhood memories was my first meeting with Uncle Toby.

I liked to go into the garden alone and my steps often took me in the direction of the azalea bush. I would imagine that March morning when I was placed there. I would picture a hazy figure stealing into the garden, creeping silently so as not to be heard. And there was I, wrapped up in a shawl. Carefully, lovingly, I should have been placed under the bushes and whoever had left me would kiss me tenderly, because she it must have been a she, for it was women who were concerned with babies must have been very unhappy at leaving me.

Who was she? A gipsy, Nanny had said. She would have big earrings in her ears and her hair would be black and curly, hanging down over her shoulders.

And while I stood there, someone came very close to me. He said:

“Hello! Who are you?”

I turned sharply. He seemed enormous. He was indeed very tall. He had fair hair bleached by the sun, I discovered later-and his skin was golden brown. He had the bluest eyes I had ever seen and he was smiling.

“I’m Carmel,” I said with that dignity I had learned to assume.

“Well, that’s fine,” he said.

“Now, I knew there was something special about you. What are you doing here?”

“I’m looking at the azalea bush.”

“It’s a very nice one.”

“It gave Tom Yardley a lot of trouble once.”

“Did it then? But you like it?”

“I was found under it.”

“Oh, so it was there, was it? Do you come here often to look at it?”

I nodded.

“Well, I suppose you would. It’s not everyone who’s found under an azalea bush, is it?”

I hunched my shoulders and laughed. He joined in my laughter.

“How old are you, Carmel?”

I held up four fingers.

He counted them solemnly.

“Four years old? My word! That’s a fine age to be! How long have you been it?”

“I came in March. That’s why I’m Carmel March.”

“I’m Uncle Toby.”

Whose Uncle Toby? “

“Henry’s, Estella’s, Adeline’s. Yours too, if you’ll have me.”

I laughed again. I was apt to laugh without any definite reason when I was happy; and there was something about him which made me so.

“Will you?” he went on.

I nodded.

“You don’t live here,” I said.

“I’m visiting. I came last night.”

“Will you stay here?”

“For a while. Then I’ll be off.”

“Where?”

“To sea … I live at sea.”

“That’s fishes,” I said disbelievingly.

“And sailors,” he added.

“Uncle Toby! Uncle Toby!” Estella was running towards us. She flung herself at him.

“Hello, hello!” He picked her up and held her up above him while they laughed together. I was jealous. Then Henry came up.

“Uncle Toby!”

He put Estella down and he and Henry started talking together.

“When did you come? How long will you stay? Where have you been?”

“All will be revealed,” he said.

“I came last night after you were in bed. I’ve been hearing all about you, what you’ve been doing when I wasn’t here. And I’ve made the acquaintance of Carmel.”

Estella glanced rather derisively in my direction, but Uncle Toby’s smile was warm.

“Let’s go in,” he said.

“I’ve got lots to tell you and lots to show you.”

“Yes, yes,” cried Estella.

“Come on then,” said Henry.

Estella clung to Uncle Toby’s hand and pulled him is towards the house. I felt suddenly left alone, and then Uncle Toby turned to me and held out his hand.

“Come along, Carmel,” he said.

And I was happy again.

Uncle Toby’s visits were the happiest times of my early days. They were not very frequent but all the more cherished for that. He was Mrs. Marline’s brother, which never ceased to amaze me. There could not be two people less like each other. There was none of her austerity about him. He gave the impression that nothing in the world ever bothered him. Whatever it was, he would overcome it, and he made one feel that one could do the same. Perhaps that was at the root of his charm.

The household was quite different when he was there. Even Nanny Gilroy softened. He used to say things to them all which he could not have meant. Lies, I thought? Surely that was not very good. But whatever Uncle Toby did was right in my eyes.

“Nanny,” he would say, ‘you grow more beautiful every time I see you.”

“You get along with you. Captain Sinclair,” she would say, pursing her lips and bridling. I think she really believed it.

Even Mrs. Marline changed. Her face softened when she looked at him and I continued to marvel that he could be her brother. The doctor was also affected. He laughed more. As for Estella and Henry, they were always hanging round him. He was kind and especially gentle with Adeline. She would sit smiling at him so that she really looked quite beautiful in a strange way.

What enchanted me was that he always made a point of including me. I fancied he liked me more than the others but perhaps that was what I wanted to believe.

He would say: “Come along, Carmel.” And he would take my hand and press it.

“You keep close to Uncle Toby.” As if I needed to be asked to do that!

“He is my Uncle Toby,” Estella reminded me.

“He’s not yours.”

“He says he will be my uncle if I want him to, and I do.”

“Gipsies don’t have uncles like Uncle Toby.”

That saddened me, because I knew it was true. But I refused to accept it. He never made any difference between me and the others. In fact, I think he made a very special point of showing that he wanted to be my uncle.

When he did come to the house, he always made a point of spending a great deal of time with the children. Estella and Henry were having riding lessons and he said I ought to have them too. He set me on a pony with a leading rein attached to it and led us round and round a field. That was the height of bliss to me.

He used to tell us stories of what he did at sea. He took his ship to countries all round the world. He spoke of places of which I had never heard: the mysterious East, the wonders of Egypt, colourful India, France, Italy and Spain.

I would stand by the globe in the schoolroom, turning it round, and would cry out to Miss Harley: “Where is India? Where is Egypt?” I wanted to know more about those wonderful places which had been visited by the even more wonderful Uncle Toby.

He brought presents for the children and wonder of wonders for me, too. It was useless for Estella to tell me that he was not my Uncle Toby. He was mine . more than theirs.

My present was a box in sandalwood on which sat three little monkeys.

He told me they were saying: “See no Evil, Speak no Evil, Hear no Evil,” and when the lid of the box was lifted, it played “God Save the Queen’. I had never possessed anything so beautiful. I would not let it out of my sight. I kept it by my bed so that in the night I could stretch out my hand and feel it was there, and the first thing I did on waking was to play that tune.

Commonwood House was enchanted territory when he was there; and when he went away it became dull and ordinary again.

Yet still it was touched with the hope that he would come back.

When he said goodbye I clung to him; he seemed to like that.

“Will you come back again soon?” I always asked.

And his reply was always the same: “As soon as I am able.”

“You will, you will?” I demanded earnestly, knowing the inclination of grown-ups to make promises they never intended to carry out.