“My own message was equally cryptic, but I did not understand. I don’t understand it now. I have not been too fortunate in money matters, and it refers to that, no doubt. He said: ‘you will seek fortune, and find it not. Where the rose blooms beneath the palm, there awaits your treasure.’”
“‘Where the rose blooms beneath the palm!’” Vanna repeated the words in a breathless whisper. “But how thrilling—how exciting! What could he mean? Aren’t you anxious; aren’t you curious? Don’t you go about daily waiting to see what will happen?”
Mr Gloucester laughed with boyish abandon.
“Rather not! It is a good eight years ago, and it has less chance of being fulfilled at this moment than it has ever had before, for I have said goodbye to the land of palms. I should never think of it again but for the fact,”—his face sobered swiftly—“that two out of those five prophecies did, as a matter of fact, come true. Three out of the six men who were there that evening I have never seen again. I can’t tell you what happened in their cases, but by the most absolute chance I ran up against the barrister fellow two years ago. We talked about our last meeting, and he said:
“‘You remember what that fellow said to me? It came true to the very hour. I had to speak in my first good brief that morning. I made a hit, carried the case, got a heap of kudos, and have never looked back from that hour.’ The second man was the one who had said he did not believe in such trickery. He—”
“Yes?”
“He died. Within a year from our meeting.”
Vanna shivered, and drew her scarf more closely round her shoulders. There was silence for several minutes, while the beating of invisible wings seemed to throb in the air around. Her thoughts strayed away on a long, rambling excursion, from which a sudden crash of music from the band awoke her with a shock of remembrance.
“You look quite scared. I hope I haven’t depressed you with my reminiscences. It was an uncanny experience, but you said you were interested.”
“And I am. Immensely. Thank you so much for telling me. I only hope your fulfilment, when it comes, may be as satisfactory as your barrister friend’s. Are you sorry to leave India and settle at home? Most men seem to find it difficult to get back into the old ways.”