The Lost Diamond
ALFRED DAINIK

Rossy opened the door right away and waited for my arrival. She greeted me with a slight smile, which was a relief.

“I want to introduce you to Alfred Dainik, my father,” she said as soon as we entered.

It was a major surprise, her father!

In the distance, from one of the armchairs farthest from the entrance, the man stood up and advanced a few steps toward me. He had an impeccable image, elegant to the point of exaggeration, well-dressed, well-groomed, exuding respect with his gaze, and his posture resembled that of a Roman general, enough to identify him in a crowd of thousands.

We shook hands and sized each other up with our eyes. He was as expert in his field as I was in mine. We might have used different measurement systems, but both he and I created a complete map of each other within seconds. I didn’t replace many differences between him and Rossy; both had to accept the role of being children of an immensely wealthy family and carry the burden of their surname. The obsession with perfection he grew up with was passed on to his daughter. Perhaps both jumped from childhood to adulthood without any stopping, driven by the sole goal of not failing the family and being responsible for their actions, even when they were not of the appropriate age to do so.

Rossy went upstairs and left us alone.

“I wanted to meet you,” Alfred told me. “Suddenly, everyone is talking about you, and I wanted to know why. I’ll be honest; I ordered an investigation into you, as I do with anyone who suddenly appears near my family members. My investigators didn’t replace any signs that you have a stable job; they say you’re a shaman or something like that. I admit I had to look up the word ‘shaman’ in the dictionary to understand what it means to be a shaman. You also don’t seem to have enough money to survive, and you live alone in a very small house. Beyond this, which I don’t see as a problem, none of my guys found anything to worry about.”

“There’s nothing in my life that I need to hide. What you found out from them, you would have known if you had asked me,” I replied.

“But I haven’t finished yet,” Alfred continued. “Next, I replace out that while they were at their best, even moving in together here, my daughter broke up with her boyfriend, just... just when guess who appeared... yes, the shaman. Then Rossy starts asking me about her grandmother. Suddenly, after more than ten years of not talking about her, my mother started to appear in almost every family conversation. In case you don’t know, at some point, my mother decided to return to the land of her birth and left abruptly without giving too many explanations or saying goodbye.”

Alfred Dainik had rehearsed the entire script of what he intended to tell me, so I felt it was better not to interrupt him and wait until the end. His way of speaking showed many years of experience in business, closing deals, and unmasking fraudsters.

“When I try to replace out what happened for my mother to suddenly become a topic of conversation, even to my daughter’s boyfriend, I replace out that you came to this cabin and supposedly saw her here. My mother! Very interesting, by the way! If I’m not mistaken, my mother should be over a hundred and five years old by now. However, they say that you saw her coming down the stairs perfectly normally. I hope I inherited that longevity from my mother. What do you say?”

“Well... I...,” I tried to elaborate a defense, but Alfred continued with his monologue.

“So, I talk to Rossy and ask her who you are, only to replace out that she also saw her grandmother in some way! So, I couldn’t help but say that I also must come to this cabin to ask my mother why she left almost without saying goodbye and never communicated with us again. But I’ve been here for more than four hours now, and I haven’t seen her! Mr. shaman, I don’t know what kind of magic you’re using, but I would like you to explain what you’re trying to do.”

With that level of detail, even I began to doubt myself; it seemed like everything had worked perfectly in this family until I arrived and disrupted the harmony and peace of the Dainik family. I couldn’t help but defend myself, but I also didn’t want to be disrespectful to the man.

“First of all, Mr. Dainik, maybe what I understand as wealth is not the same as what you understand. Life has given me an abundance of the things that are very important to me, and regarding the things that are not important, I also have more than I believe I need, despite what you may think. I came to this cabin because Mr. van Fjömm hired me, and indeed, as you said, I had a spiritual vision of a lady inside this house who could very well be your mother. Based on my experience and knowledge, I know that she shouldn’t still be among us, and if she is, it’s because something went wrong at the time of her death.

Alfred sat in one of the comfortable leather armchairs, crossed his legs, and put on a good attitude to listen to me. He had enough experience to recognize someone who only wanted to take advantage of his money.

“As for your daughter, getting to know her has been the greatest fortune I ever imagined having, but none of it is related to money. Lastly, my professional activities are varied and difficult to explain from a rational point of view. But if you’re interested in a more detailed description, in this case, my job is to be a psychopomp, which is a person who accompanies the spirit until it ascends to the spiritual world. I don’t expect you to understand me; I myself replace it difficult to explain some things, but there are times when one must accept things with faith and wait for the results.”

Meanwhile, Rossy came down the stairs and sat near her father. Alfred Dainik looked at me with resignation; he was about to say something to his daughter until he ultimately made the same decision any rational and moderately patient person would make with a fanatic: he abandoned the argument.

“So, young man, what is supposed to happen now... I don’t know, just to be prepared,” he said, shaking his head slightly.

In his world, he might have asked a different kind of question, such as how much it would cost to fix this problem, meaning how much money I needed to disappear, but he had already understood that the relationship with me wasn’t about money. And if it was, it wouldn’t be him who paid but his daughter. Alfred was not part of that business.

“I’m sure your mother wants to tell us something,” I said, “but the only time I could be in front of her, assuming that woman was your mother, she didn’t get to tell us anything. She stopped to listen to the piano and then cried with Rossy while caressing her hair. Then I stopped seeing her. Apparently, Rossy had a very vivid dream, and I’m sure that Jorik van Fjömm felt her presence on several occasions. Even from what he told me, he might have seen her. I wish he were here, but Mr. van Fjömm himself told me he would never come back to this cabin.”

“Look, young man... Can you remind me of your name?”

“Brandon Nagha.”

“Thank you... Look, Brandon, I’m a person who, despite being 75 years old, is still too busy. I wish I were retired, playing with my grandchildren like almost all my friends, but I don’t have grandchildren, and I have too many responsibilities. In short, since I see that you’re in control of all this, should I stay to talk to my mother, or should I go home?”

“I wouldn’t be able to tell you if your presence helps or not. It depends on the relationship you had with your mother. For example, if... if... Excuse me for asking you this question, what relationship do you have with a small... wooden... a very poor construction? I have a vision right now. There are trees... it’s a very poor shack... it must be very cold in winter... However... there’s a diamond inside... it’s a bright diamond…, it’s a wooden shack…, it’s a very poor place…, guarding a diamond, and there are trees around... in the middle of the night…, the diamond shines so brightly that it can be seen from outside, it’s a construction made of low-quality wood... That’s all; I don’t know what it’s about, but I’m sure that vision is related to you... not just to you, but to both of you.”

Rossy had been caught off guard by my revelation, but for her father, it was all still the performance of a professional charlatan. I couldn’t blame him; perhaps if I were in his place, I would have thought the same way. And there I was, telling him that I was a psychopomp to help his mother, what an silly idea to share with someone like him.

Alfred was a completely rational person with a sharp business acumen, adept at dealing with the miseries of this world and even profiting from them. How could he possibly understand that there really is life after this life, and that no bank in the world can transfer his money from here to wherever he will be once he leaves his physical body?

Spiritually, he was not a wealthy man, although it wouldn’t be fair to say he had a poor or dirty spirit, not much different from most of us. But if all human beings could travel, even for a day, to the spiritual world, we would understand the importance of love in our spiritual well-being, and we would also act desperately to make love the highest and absolute priority during our lives in the physical world.

Alfred didn’t have that opportunity; he was born a prisoner in a money-making machine, and only he would know if he truly loved his parents, his siblings, his wife, and finally, his children.

The beautiful Swiss clock on the fireplace struck one in the morning. Alfred said he was very tired and needed to sleep.

“And as for you,” he said to me, “I recommend you leave everything as it is. I don’t believe we need a guide like you to take us to the afterlife. At my age, many of my best friends have already died, and they all went alone. Go back to your life and your own abundance and leave my family alone... Leave my family in peace! Am I clear enough?”

He fixed his gaze on me as if to make it clear that he wasn’t joking, and he coldly whispered, “Take it as advice... or as a plea... or perhaps better, take it as a threat. Take it however you want, but I don’t want to see you again.”

“No... I don’t want him to go!” Rossy said in the distance. The wooden box he described is a place that is familiar to me. I don’t remember where or when, but as he described it, I felt like I had been there before. The problem is that I don’t remember when or where it is.

“I need to sleep,” Alfred said, and looking at his daughter, he said disdainfully, “I don’t want this individual here when I wake up.”

With that, he took a leather sports bag from one of the chairs and went upstairs, leaving us alone.