The Ka of Gifford Hillary (32 page)

‘I must spend tonight in London,’ Johnny announced, ‘and I ought to be back at my job tomorrow. But in the circumstances I’m sure my master won’t cut up rough if I take an extra morning off. The earlier you can make it the better, though. I don’t mind at what hour I start, but I’d like to be back in my office early in the afternoon.’

‘Shall we say nine-thirty, then?’ James’s suggestion was greeted by a series of nods from the others, and, standing up, they all filed out of the room.

Ankaret was standing in the hall, her heavy veil now thrown back. She had just said good-bye to Eddie, and was on the point of going upstairs.

It was at that moment that Silvers emerged from the baize door leading to the servants’ quarters. Going up to Johnny he smiled and said:

‘I’ve some good news for you, Sir. When young Belton found his efforts to put out the fire in your room unavailing, he must have decided to save what he could before retreating through the window. I suppose the burns on his hands made it too painful for him to hang on to it for long and a minute or
two later he dropped it. But he succeeded in rescuing your suit-case. One of the men who is clearing up found it in the shrubbery, and I’ve just put it in your car.’

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It is pointless for me to attempt to describe the feelings of Ankaret, Johnny and myself. To all three of us Silvers’s innocently cheerful announcement spelt an immediate resumption of the shattering emotions that had swept over us the previous afternoon. Ankaret knew that once more her life hung only by a thread; Johnny could now be more confident than ever that he would shortly achieve the triumph of which he thought she had robbed him; I, after the bitter things they had said to one another while the fire was still raging, felt greater fear than ever that he would force her to pay the extreme penalty.

She had been about to go up to her room. At Silvers’s last words, as though she had received a physical blow, she stumbled on the first stair. Believing her stagger to have been caused by an ordinary mis-step, James hurried forward to help her. But, swiftly recovering, she waved him back, drew herself up to her full height and, turning her enigmatic smile on Johnny, said:

‘They say that it is better to be born lucky than rich. I thought that once; but now I’m not so certain.’

Yet, as it transpired, she was cavilling at Fortune before the fickle goddess had deserted her. Johnny murmured an inaudible reply. As she went upstairs the others exchanged a chorus of farewells, then I followed him round to the garage.

There a totally unexpected surprise awaited us. On the back seat of his car reposed a suit-case; but we had all jumped to a wrong conclusion. Instead of it being the old brown leather one into which he had put the papers, it was the smart blue canvas case he always used for week-ends.

As his glance fell on it he swore profanely; whereas I felt the sort of sensation that, had I had a body, would have been expressed by delighted laughter.

Five minutes earlier I had hesitated whether to follow Johnny or remain with Ankaret. Now I was no longer in doubt about which course to pursue. Ankaret had seen that blue
canvas case of Johnny’s a score of times. She must have realised that he had brought the brown one only as an extra in which to collect the papers from my desk. As soon as she could think up an excuse to send for Silvers she would ask him casually, in the course of talking to him on some other matter, which of Wing Commander Norton’s cases had been saved. Silvers’s reply would bring her the blessed knowledge that her awful fears were groundless, and that, after all, her defences had not been breached.

The appointment that Johnny was so set on keeping in London was, I knew, with Daisy; and they had planned that evening to try out her psychic powers in the hope that, while holding an object which had belonged to me, she would be able to furnish some pointers to the manner in which I had met my death. Naturally I was most keen to witness this experiment and now I was free to accompany Johnny without suffering constant anxiety on Ankaret’s account.

That Bill would give her a reasonably unbiased account of the dispute that rent the Hillary-Compton Board, I felt fairly confident; but even if he didn’t I had already told her a few hours before my death enough about its origin for her to form an independent judgement. And I had no doubt at all how she would react. Avarice had never been one of Ankaret’s vices, and even had money weighed with her there was no question of the Company’s risking bankruptcy; at worst her income might be some hundreds less for a few years. She was highly patriotic; so had fully approved, and even applauded, the line I had taken. Lastly, while she was beating Evans to death she had proclaimed aloud her deep love for me. Therefore it was as good as a certainty that she would inform her trustees that she wished them to use her shares to overcome the opposition of the Admiral.

Twenty minutes after leaving Longshot, Johnny pulled up in front of a men’s outfitters in Southampton. Taking a large cardboard box from the back of the car, he carried it inside. When he came out again a quarter of an hour later, he had changed from his hired funeral plumage and was dressed once more in his own grey lounge suit. As we left Southampton it began to rain, so the journey was rather a depressing one; but we arrived soon after six o’clock outside the dreary block of flats where Daisy lived.

Having climbed the stone stairs, Johnny rang her bell; and as he did so I could hear her singing to herself inside. Throwing open the door, she greeted him cheerfully, then explained:

‘My! What
have
you been up to? You look like something the cat left on the mat. Come in and I’ll fix you a drink.’

It was true enough that Johnny looked about all in. The previous day he had been up at five and had not got to bed till near three in the morning. On top of that he had had the unhappy duty of attending my funeral, his secret struggle with Ankaret, the row with the Admiral and the long drive up from Longshot.

Leading him into her strangely-furnished but friendly room, Daisy gave him a stiff whisky and soda. While he drank it he explained his haggard looks by telling her about the fire, but not its cause, and when she asked him if, as he had hoped, the inquest had thrown any fresh light on my death, he shook his head.

‘No; as the police appear to be satisfied that it was suicide the inquest could have hardly been duller; it was just a routine business. But I’m not satisfied. Far from it. One or two things that happened yesterday made me more convinced than ever that foul play of some kind was at the bottom of my uncle’s death. So I still want your help. In fact I’m counting on it to give me a new line.’

‘I wouldn’t do that, dear,’ she replied rather dubiously. ‘It’s ages since I’ve tried my hand at what my Mum used to call psychomatry, so I’m right out of practice. And even if the spirits are propitious, as the saying is, I’d be lucky if I could get more than a jumbled impression of the sort of man your uncle was. Still, I’ll do my best for you if you’ve brought me something he was wearing when he died.’

‘Here you are.’ Johnny produced from his inner pocket a black evening tie. It was crumpled and soiled from having been in the water, and evidently he must have managed to get hold of it somehow after my body had been prepared for burial.

Taking it from him Daisy ran it slowly to and fro a few times between her smooth pointed fingers, then she said: ‘If you don’t mind, ducks, I’d rather you weren’t with me while I work on it. You see, it’s easier to get the ‘fluence when one’s alone. I tell you what. I’m down to my last packet of cigs. Slip out and get me some at the pub on the corner,
there’s a dear. You needn’t stay away long. Either I’ll get something or know it’s no go within ten minutes.’

Johnny stood up at once. ‘Right! I’ll get you another bottle of Scotch at the same time.’

‘Thanks a lot.’ She gave him her ready smile, then fished in her bag and handed him her latch key. ‘Here, take this, so that you can let yourself in. If when you get back you find me lying on the divan with a dopey look on my face, and muttering, you’ll know I’m getting something. Don’t disturb me but just sit down quiet in the arm-chair. Your being here won’t interfere once I’ve made a contact.’

When he had gone she smoothed out the tie, held it lengthwise across her forehead then tied the two ends in a knot at the back of her golden hair. Lying down on the divan she relaxed and closed her eyes.

For a while I watched her, as I wanted to see whether she would get any results on her own; but she remained so still that after a time I felt sure that her efforts were proving futile. By then, as Johnny was due back shortly, and I might never again be given such a favourable opportunity to make contact with her, I decided that I must not let it slip; so I willed her to realise my presence.

Almost at once she opened her blue eyes, sat up, stared at me for a moment, then exclaimed: ‘Oh it’s you, dreaming again. You must be having a nap before dinner.’

In my mind I formed the words. ‘I am not dreaming. I am Johnny’s uncle; the man you were trying to find out about.’

She gave me a puzzled look and stammered: ‘No … no. You can’t be.’

‘I am,’ I insisted. ‘I’m Gifford Hillary.’

‘No you’re not,’ she snorted firmly. ‘You can’t be. He is dead.’

‘Yes, of course I’m dead.’ I endeavoured to thrust conviction on her; and our strange conversation, audible only on her part, continued more or less as follows:

‘Why should you think I’m not?’ I asked.

‘Because I don’t see you as a dead person.’

‘I can’t help that. Two doctors declared me dead three days ago, so I must be.’

‘Yes; if you were who you say you are. But you’re not.’

‘What can possibly lead you to suppose that I am someone
other than Gifford Hillary, and attempting to impersonate him?’

‘Because he is dead and you are only dreaming.’

‘I would to God you were right. But dreams don’t go on for the best part of four days.’

‘They may as far as the dreamer is concerned, even if in fact they occupy only a few minutes.’

‘Look; today is Tuesday, isn’t it?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Well, for me this dream, as you call it, started on Friday night. In actual time that is, not dream time.’

‘In your present state you’re not capable of judging actual time. What you really mean is that when you started to dream your mind went back to Friday night, and in your dream you have been reliving the past few days.’

‘I can’t accept that. This is too utterly unlike any dream I’ve ever had. What is more, your idea that I am not Gifford Hillary is positively absurd. If I were not how could I possibly be aware of all his interests, thoughts and emotions?’

‘You might if you had been a great pal of his. Perhaps his death came as a great shock to you. That could explain your having identified yourself with the tragedy in a dream and believing yourself to be him.’

‘It would not explain my knowing how he died, and all the circumstances that led up to his death.’

‘It could if you had been there at the time.’

‘I was. I tell you I am him.’

‘Nonsense. You are only imagining that because his death upset you. Stop pestering me, and go back to your body.’

‘I can’t. It is buried and as dead as a doornail.’

‘Not a bit of it. The odds are that you are one of Sir Gifford’s rich friends; so you’re probably snoozing in a comfortable study or a Club arm-chair.’

‘Damn it! If you don’t believe me, Johnny will. Anyhow I want you to give him a message. Tell him that he is right in believing that I did not commit suicide, and that my death was an accident. But it happened through a misunderstanding and no one was to blame; so I am very anxious that no one concerned in it should be convicted for concealing their knowledge and, perhaps, be sent to prison. To ferret out the truth now can do me no good and may do several innocent
people a lot of harm; so I want him to drop the whole business.’

Daisy suddenly came to her feet. Her eyes narrowed and the expression on her pretty face was a strange mixture of fear, anger, and repulsion.

‘So that’s your game, is it?’ she said in a low tense voice. ‘Sir Gifford is dead; so you can’t be him. But you are pretending to be because you were concerned in his death. Perhaps, even, you were his murderer and are now afraid of being found out. Anyhow, you are one of those people who have learned the secret of sending your mind out of your body at will. You must know that Johnny is already on your track, and you thought that by this trick you could get me to persuade him to stop trying to find out the truth. But it hasn’t worked. You are evil, evil, evil; and by this sign I abjure you to leave this place.’

As she raised her hand I shot at her the thought: ‘Tell Johnny I know that Belton saved the wrong suit-case.’

Even as I spoke she cried: ‘Avaunt thee Satan!’ and made the sign of the cross three times.

Presumably because I was not, as she supposed, an evil person who had acquired occult powers, her abjuration had no effect upon me whatever. But seemingly it did have the effect of raising a barrier between myself and her consciousness, as her eyes ceased to focus on me; and, although during the scene that followed I made several attempts to break through it, she clearly remained oblivious of my continued presence.

Her reaction on believing that she had rid herself of me was to turn away, collapse on the divan, and burst into tears. A few minutes later Johnny returned to find her still weeping and semi-hysterical. Having dumped the cigarettes and bottle of whisky in a chair, he strove to comfort her and get her to tell him what had happened.

At first she was capable only of incoherent mutterings between her sobs; but Johnny soon quieted her and after he had provided her with a drink she said:

‘I’ve had a horrible experience; horrible. It was no fault of yours, Johnny; I’ve only myself to blame for having laid myself open to it. But it just goes to show how right I was to give up meddling with the occult.’