Tom Slemen's Haunted Wirral column: The wishing ring

This week, a dangerous piece of jewellery.

FOR legal reasons, I have had to change a few names in this strange story.

In September 1960, a bank clerk named Brian Calvin was looking in the window of an antiques shop on Birkenhead's Chester Street when he noticed something very exciting: a rare Burmantofts faience vase.

The price label said £25, but Calvin knew his antiques and he knew that this Burmantofts (so-called after the Burmantofts district of Leeds where the pottery makers were first based in 1845) vase was worth many hundreds of pounds.

Brian Calvin had exactly £25 in his wallet and went into the shop, confident he could haggle the dealer to sell it to him for £20.

But there was a queue in the shop because a tall thin red-haired woman was arguing with her husband, a stocky rough-looking bald man with tattoos of anchors, mermaids and playing cards all over his arms and the back of his hands.

He wanted to buy a solid gold lucky horseshoe lapel pin and his wife was having none of it.

"For heaven's sake, Mr and Mrs Snowbanks," said the antiques dealer, "can you please settle this matter? There are people waiting to be served here."

As Calvin waited for the Snowbanks to either buy or leave the golden horseshoe, his patience started to wear thin; there was a little unruly girl of about seven or eight in a green dress running about and Calvin suspected she was the daughter of the arguing couple.

This tiny terror was running amok in the shop, laughing loudly and at one point the noisy child grabbed Calvin’s right hand and thrust a ring onto his little finger.

"We are married!" laughed the little girl, and Calvin gritted his teeth and tried to remove the ring but it wouldn't budge.

The Snowbanks started to fight and then Mrs Snowbank threw the money at the antiques dealer and yelled: "Here! Let him have it then!"

The queue then moved on and as Calvin gazed at the vase in the window. He wished the dealer would just accept his offer as he was in no mood for haggling.

He just wanted to get out of this store and take the vase and resell it for its real worth.

The dealer suddenly shooed people away from the counter and said to Calvin "May I help you?"

"Yes, I'd like that vase in the window," said Calvin, without mentioning it was a Burmantofts vase, and the dealer said, "The £25 one?"

Calvin nodded but said he only had £20 – and the dealer said, "Very well, £20 it is."

The vase was wrapped in layers of tissue and put in a box, and Calvin was so excited at his latest acquisition he walked out of the shop and was halfway down the street when he realised he still had the amethyst ring the child had put on his little finger.

The vase was later auctioned and earned Calvin £350.

But before then he realised something very strange; whenever he wished for an object or for something to happen, his wishes were granted.

A new manager had come to the bank where Calvin worked and had been making his life a complete hell. Calvin had glared at the bank manager and thought, "I wish you’d drop dead," and he had meant it.

Not long afterwards there were screams from the manager’s office as his secretary saw the manager clutch his left wrist and then fall to the floor dead from a heart attack.

Brian Calvin knew it was a ridiculous thought, but did at one point wonder if the amethyst ring might be granting him wishes.

He had removed it, but replaced it on his little finger a day later, thinking it looked rather nice. He believed the ring to belong to the Tudor era.

In October there was an engagement party held by a junior bank clerk named Scott and his fiancée Ivy at the home of the girl on Claremount Road, Wallasey. Although Brian Calvin was almost forty and Ivy had only just turned eighteen, Calvin had always secretly desired Ivy.

On this night at the engagement party, Calvin decided to see if his theory about the Tudor ring granting wishes had anything going for it. He rubbed the amethyst of the ring with a tissue as he gazed at the beautiful, radiant Ivy and whispered, "I wish Ivy would find me attractive."

From that moment on, Ivy wouldn’t leave Brian Calvin alone.

She wanted to constantly dance with him and at one point when Calvin was sampling the punch in the kitchen, Ivy tiptoed in, put her index finger to Calvin’s mouth and said "Sssh! We are going in the garden!"

She then dragged Calvin out of the kitchen into the chilly back garden and started to passionately kiss him. Ivy told Calvin she wanted to have his babies and Des, a chief clerk at Calvin’s bank, intervened and dragged Ivy off Calvin.

At that moment, Ivy’s fiancé Scott came rushing out of the kitchen and charged at Des. He threw a punch and Des was knocked clean out.

Now Calvin knew that the ring he was wearing was indeed granting him whatever he so desired, and he wondered if he had a limited amount of wishes.

He wished for money and his premium bonds came up and he received £1,000.

Calvin wished the beautiful wife of his neighbour would fancy him and when he saw her at the local supermarket she kept following him and when he left the supermarket she asked Calvin if he’d like to go for a drink with her one night and said she had always admired him from afar.

Calvin became very selfish and could not stop wishing for things.

He wondered if he should wish to become the manager of his bank and whilst pondering this took out his handkerchief and polished the stone of the vintage ring and started to think about Miss Bates, a pretty young schoolteacher who often came into the bank.

Instead, Calvin saw the shadowy form of a figure in a long robe appear in the corner of his living room.

"Return the ring to me," said the apparition, which was in pure silhouette.

"Who – who are you?" Calvin asked, and was so afraid by the figure, he wanted to flee his house but his legs felt weak with fear.

"That ring was not made for the likes of you," the entity told him and reached out with its dark claw-like hand.

Calvin tried to get the ring off his little finger but it wouldn’t budge. "I can’t get it off!"

"I'll take you with it, then!" said the unearthly being. Calvin could see the visitor a bit clearer – it had a ghastly skeletal face, and he had the unsettling impression he was looking at the evil genie of the ring.

Its bony icy hands grabbed his hand and tried to pull the ring from his finger, but it wouldn’t budge.

The thing broke his finger and Calvin screamed in agony as the ring slid off – and then that silhouetted form vanished, leaving an awful sulphuric odour behind.

The women who had been attracted to him because of the power of that ring no longer wanted Calvin and in a way he was glad the ring had gone, as it had exercised a corrupting influence upon him.

He asked the antique dealer at the shop on Chester Street about the Tudor ring. 

The seller said he could not recall such a ring being in his stock and that Mr and Mrs Snowbanks, the couple who had been arguing in the shop that day when the vase had been bought, had no little daughter.

So who was the child who put that ring upon Brian Calvin?

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