“Hey hun,” he said, “Found any trash?”
“Hey! Yes, as a matter of fact…” I fished the wrapped egg out of my handbag and carefully unveiled it. Sam eyed it skeptically.
“That’s it? That’s what you found?”
“Yes!” I cried, “isn’t it pretty?”
“What’s it for?” he asked turning the egg over in his hands. “I think it was a jewelry box,” I replied, “Do you see the little metal latch and the hinges?” I took the egg and tried to open it.
“I think it’s rusted shut,” Sam said, and then he turned the egg over. “No wonder, look! Made in Hong Kong!
How much did you pay for it?”
I felt myself blushing and retrieved the egg. “Ten dollars,” I admitted defensively, “But the man wanted $25.”
Sam laughed at me scornfully. “You were taken for a ride, AGAIN!”
I felt tears come into my eyes.
“Well, I like it!” I shook the little egg and heard something shift inside. “There’s something inside!”
Sam sneered: “Oh I’m sure it’s a diamond,” he mocked me, and he took the egg from my hand. With a deft twist of his powerful fingers, he pried the egg open.
Nestled inside was a tiny bundle of red silk. I took out the little bundle and carefully unwrapped it. Glittering in the folds of the red silk was a pair of earrings.
They were exquisite! Of course, they were faux, I thought, but beautiful copies. Sam took one of the earrings and looked at it closely.
The clear center stone was surrounded by a halo of green gems, and Sam breathed on it. He looked at the earing and he gasped. “Jen,” he said, “I think these are real!”
“What?” I asked, “What do you mean?”
“I saw this documentary about diamonds a while back, and they said a real diamond won’t fog up with your breath.
Look!” and he breathed on the big clear stone again. I peered at it. No fog.
I looked at Sam, then shook my head. “Hun look at the size of those stones. They’d be worth millions!
They’re just good fakes.”
But Sam was excited. “Let’s go to that jeweler at the mall, ask him to appraise them.”
“Sam,” I told him, “He’ll charge us for that!”
But Sam didn’t care, so we drove down to the mall and waited with bated breath while the man muttered over the earings and tested them. “These are diamonds, all right,” he said, “And 18-carat white gold.
These look to me to be emeralds. Old cut, all of it. These earrings are probably Art Deco, from the style and the workmanship.
You’re probably looking at about three hundred, depending on the quality of the stones it could be more.”
“Three hundred dollars?” Sam asked. “Three hundred thousand, minimum,” the jeweler replied. I felt the ground sway under my feet and had to clutch at Sam for support.
I’d found a REAL treasure! As it turned out, the jeweler was wrong. The earrings sold for three million dollars at auction.
The result is that we now have a lovely little nest egg in the bank, and the porcelain egg has pride of place on the mantel of our new house. As for Sam, he is now an avid antique hound, and he accompanies me to every single flea market and antique fair. We haven’t found that Van Gogh yet, but we have hope!
What can we learn from this story? One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Jen believed she’d find a ‘preloved jewel’ and she finally did, literally.
Respect other people’s interests. Sam mocked Jen’s passion for flea markets, but she ended up finding a $3 million pair of earrings.
