De Engelse taal heeft er een mooi woord voor: accountability. Hoewel, het Nederlandse woord verantwoordingsplicht is ook erg mooi.
Dat ik een boek schreef, of wilde schrijven, hield ik lange tijd voor me. Hier op het blog vertelde ik er wel over, sporadisch vertelde ik er wat over op het werk, en binnen de familie nooit.
Mijn zwijgzaamheid werd groter naarmate de banden nauwer werden.
Maar dat verandert. Zweeg ik er voorheen over omdat ik niet wilde hoeven zeggen dat ik al tijden niet aan mijn boek geschreven had, of omdat ik niet af wilde gaan als geen uitgever het zou willen hebben. Ook zweeg ik omdat ik niet wilde dat een ander zou denken dat ik het te hoog in mijn bol zou hebben. 'Poepoeh...denk jij dat jij een boek kan schrijven?!'
Nu merk ik dat er ook voordelen aan zitten wanneer je anderen hebt vertelt dat je aan een boek werkt. Het houdt je bij de les. Als er iemand naar vraagt, dan voel je je gezien, er wordt belangstelling getoond. En wat is een mooier reden om alle bescheidenheid en gêne aan de kant te schuiven en vol enthousiasme over je werk-in-wording te vertellen?
Wanneer je – zoals ik – met lange tussenpozen werkt aan het redigeren van je manuscript, omdat je je tijd moet verdelen tussen baan, gezin en boek, omdat de onzekerheid toeslaat, omdat je het druk hebt, je door twijfel wordt verlamd, of omdat je redigeren gewoon niet het leukste onderdeel van het schrijven van een boek vindt, dan willen personages wel eens vervagen.
It is a tale worthy of one of Agatha Christie's most intriguing mysteries.
A seemingly innocuous trunk bought for £100 appears to have produced some of Christie's family jewels worth thousands of pounds, including her mother's engagement ring.
When Jennifer Grant, an Agatha Christie enthusiast, bought the battered canvas trunk at a sale of the contents of Greenway House, the author's former home in Devon, she had no idea of its hidden treasures.
The trunk, which bears the initials 'C.M.M.' – those of Christie's mother, Clara Margaret Miller – was sold by the auctioneers Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood in September 2006, two years after the death of Rosalind Hicks, Christie's only daughter, who lived at Greenway until she died.
But when the trunk was delivered, Ms Grant discovered that it also contained a locked box.
Curiosity recently got the better of Ms Grant while she was having building work done in her house, and she asked a builder to prise open the box with a crowbar. She was amazed at what she discovered inside.
"There was a hoard of sovereigns – 35 gold sovereigns and 17 half-sovereigns – in a small crocheted bag, a diamond ring and a beautiful buckle-shaped brooch wrapped in crumpled tissue paper in a cardboard box," she said.
In her autobiography published in 1977, a year after her death, Christie, the best-selling author of all time, described some of her mother's jewellery that she and her sister, Madge, admired and hoped to inherit.
She wrote: "My mother's valuable jewellery consisted of 'my diamond buckle, my diamond crescent and my diamond engagement ring' ... They were all earmarked for the future on my mother's demise.
"Madge was to have ... the diamond crescent ... I was to have ... the diamond buckle."
It is not known whether Christie inherited the items and chose to store them in the trunk, or whether she kept the trunk without ever realising that the jewellery was inside.
"I was thrilled that I had something that touched Agatha Christie's life," said Ms Grant, who contacted Homes & Antiques magazine, which features the jewels in its April issue, published on March 3.
The magazine arranged for a valuation of the jewels by John Benjamin, a jewellery specialist and contributor to the BBC's Antiques Roadshowprogramme.
Mr Benjamin valued the coins at £5,500; the ring, which is set with three brilliant-cut diamonds, at £2,500 to £3,000; and the brooch at £5,500 to £7,000.
However, he said the items could be worth much more if evidence emerged of the story behind them.
He said: "If we can prove these are indeed the Christie family diamonds, who knows what someone will be willing to pay?"
Mathew (corr sp) Prichard, Christie's grandson, who runs the Agatha Christie estate, said that the new owner of the trunk "has been lucky - and good luck to them".
He added: "I suppose if those particular jewels came on the market I would be interested in buying."
Laura Thompson, Christie's official biographer and the author of Agatha Christie: An English Mystery, described the discovery of the jewels as "absolutely thrilling".
She said: "I wrote much of my book at Greenway, and it was glorious chaos, with things being turned up all the time that the family didn't know about.
"The whole family were hoarders who kept everything and there was a huge amount of material at Greenway that simply never got sorted, so it is highly possible that these are indeed Agatha's mother's jewels. In fact, it seems a bit rich if they are not.
"It is a poignant discovery, as Agatha's mother was the most important person in her life."
Andrew Thomas, a senior consultant at Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood, who oversaw the Greenway sale, said: "This is a surprise to me, and if it's true, I'm not pleased.
"As an auctioneer representing a client, one always does one's best to extract the last bit of value out of everything you handle.
"I am perplexed, but if we have made a mistake, I will be my first to put my hand up, though I still find it almost unbelievable."
