The Ka of Gifford Hillary (44 page)

When I had done she stretched out a hand, shook her husband and said urgently:

‘Wake Harree,
mio
! Wake! Here is a ghost who talks with me.’

‘A what!’ the man muttered sleepily, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

‘A ghost,’ she repeated. ‘What you call spirit. Look, ‘e stands at the end of my bed.’

The young man stared straight at me, then shook his head. ‘I can’t see anything. You’re imagining things, darling.’

‘No, no! Crosses on my heart! I see ‘im clearly.’

He switched on the bed-side light, brushed back his tousled hair and exclaimed triumphantly: ‘There! You can see for yourself that you were mistaken.’

‘But I see ‘im still,’ she protested. ‘’E is a big man, tall, an’ wears a black bow-tie with a smoking jacket.’

‘Really, my sweet; you’re suffering from an hallucination.’

‘Not at all. I have tell you before, Harree, that as a young girl I often see things. I am what you call psychic. This ghost ‘e come here because ‘e is much worried.’

‘What about?’ enquired Harry with a smile, evidently now deciding to humour her.

It was only then I realised that in my anxiety to get my messages through to her I had made a stupid blunder. I had overrated her capacity to take in my thoughts as swiftly as I transmitted them. In consequence she had received them only as a jumble. She thought that I was worried about an R.A.F. officer who had turned spy and was attempting to poison someone. She mispronounced Sir Charles’s surname and that, added to the probability that they were newcomers to the district, caused it to fail to ring a bell with Harry. When he had heard her out he said:

‘It doesn’t make sense, darling. How long is it since you have seen a spook?’

‘Seven years; eight per’aps,’ she admitted. ‘I was still at my convent. A poor servant girl there, she get put in the pood, as you say. She drown ‘erself an’ she come back to me.’

He shook his head. ‘That’s a long time ago, poppet. If there were anything here I’d see it too. Honestly, Lolla, you’ve been dreaming.’

‘But I see ‘im still, Harree. ‘E is trying again to make ‘iself understand. Now we talk though, I get less ‘is meaning.’

‘Your brain is overtired, darling, that’s what it is. You’ve built up a fantasy in your mind owing to this wretched insomnia you suffer from. Still, we found one cure for that on our honeymoon, didn’t we?’

With a smile he switched out the light, then scrambled from his bed into hers, took her in his arms and gave her a long passionate kiss on the mouth.

It was a bitter defeat, but I had to accept it.

By this time dawn had come. I tried another five houses in the village without success; then, not knowing how early Sir Charles would have his breakfast, and gnawed with anxiety about what might happen when he did, I decided to return to his cottage.

In my wanderings from house to house during the night I had come further from it than I thought, and as I could progress at no faster pace for any length of time than a quick walk, it was half past seven before I got there. Maria was in the kitchen and just about to take Sir Charles’s breakfast up on a tray. I had intended to learn the best or worst by watching her prepare it, but having lost that chance I could now
only accompany her upstairs, still sick with apprehension.

After knocking at his bedroom door she went in, set the tray down beside his bed, then drew the curtains. He was already awake and wished her a cheerful ‘good morning’. As she returned his greeting, in her slightly guttural voice, I studied her face closely. It showed no sign of agitation and she left the room unhurriedly.

Quickly I switched my attention to Sir Charles and the breakfast tray. On it there was a pot of tea, some slices of toast, butter and a pear. I cursed myself for having delayed so long in the village. I had intended to return while he was still asleep, so as to be present at the moment of his waking as, if he was at all psychic, that would have given me a better chance than I had had the night before of getting through to him. But that forlorn hope was now gone. I could only wait on tenter-hooks to find out if he would be dead within the next few moments.

With what seemed to me maddening slowness he picked up a piece of toast, buttered it and took a bite. About the result of that I had no fears. A liquid poison could hardly have been inserted in either toast or butter. Neither could it in the pear. It was what might happen when he drank his tea that caused me to break out into a mental perspiration.

I could hear the clock ticking on the mantelpiece. As he slowly ate the toast another two age-long minutes went by. At last he picked up the tea-pot and poured himself a cup. It was pale golden in colour and looked very weak. He put two lumps of sugar in the cup and lifted it to his lips. Suddenly I realised that there was no milk on the tray, which would have been another vehicle for poison. Evidently the tea was fine China and he preferred not to destroy its bouquet by adding either milk or lemon.

He drank; but neither attempted to spit the liquid out, nor was taken with an immediate seizure. My relief was unconveyable. Yet I still had to wait for some minutes to be certain that he had escaped, as the poison might have been tasteless and needed longer to take effect than it had had on a small animal like the cat.

Gradually my agitation subsided and my confidence increased. Without showing any sign of illness he finished his breakfast, then he jumped out of bed and spent five minutes
doing physical exercises. By then my mind was at rest—but only for the moment.

There were two good reasons why Maria should have refrained from attempting to poison him that morning. Firstly, he had had no cooked breakfast; so there had been nothing but the tea in which she could readily have put the poison, and, as no poison is entirely tasteless, the odds were that, detecting the unusual flavour, he would have spat it out before swallowing enough of it to kill him. Secondly, as a good part of his day was spent at meetings, at which he must usually be the most important person, if he did not arrive at his office when expected enquiries would be set on foot soon afterwards, and his death would probably be discovered by midday.

Evidently Maria meant to wait until he came down again for the night; she would be able to give him the poison in whatever she cooked for his dinner and have a clear twelve hours afterwards in which to make her get-away.

When, I wondered, would that be?

It was on the previous Sunday morning that I had seen him in his office, so it seemed probable that he had spent the Saturday night at some late conference or function. If so, that made it all the more likely that he would have kept the coming Saturday evening free so that he could come down here. If his daughters or a friend came with him that would be some protection; so, unless Maria was prepared to commit a double or triple murder, the presence of others in the house would both make it more difficult for her to administer the poison to him and, should she succeed, ensure the discovery of the crime much sooner. On the other hand, if he did come down alone Saturday was, for her, the most favourable night of all; with luck, up to nearly forty hours might elapse before the hue and cry started after her.

And today was Friday. Seeing the appalling handicap I was under in my efforts to get an intelligible warning to him, the time at my disposal was, once again, all too desperately short.

When he had bathed and dressed he went downstairs and collected his brief-case from the sitting-room. In the hall Maria was waiting to see him off. As he took his hat from her he confirmed my worst fears, by saying to her:

‘Unless I telephone to the contrary I shall be down on Saturday evening. Don’t get a lot of food in as there will be no one staying the week-end, and I shall be out to lunch on Sunday.’

Miserably, I wondered if he would still be alive for that meal.

Accompanying him round to the garage I got into the small Morris with him and we set off for London. For me the whole of the journey was a blank. My endeavours throughout the night had utterly exhausted me, and there was nothing further that I could attempt for the time being; so as soon as we were out of the drive, I closed my mental eyes and at once sank into oblivion.

I must have been roused by the slamming of the car door. On taking in my surroundings I saw that the Morris was drawn up in Storey’s Gate facing towards St. James’s Park, and that Sir Charles had already left it. A glance through its back windows showed his tall figure striding across the broad pavement towards the great bronze doors through which he had to pass to his office.

I followed at once, for I was still of the opinion that I stood a much better chance of getting a warning to him through somebody who could approach him without difficulty, than through some contact made at random.

Catching him up, I ascended with him in the lift to the second floor and, refreshed a little by my recent rest, set about making further endeavours to find someone who would react to my presence.

For over two hours I invaded room after room, presenting myself in turn to officers of the Joint Planning Staff, men clerks, girl typists and elderly messengers, willing them to see me.

In one case only did I meet with any response. A rather handsome man, with greying hair and a weatherbeaten face, whom I put down as probably a Captain R.N., suddenly sat back at his desk and said to his three companions who were also sitting at desks in the room:

‘You know, chaps, if I did not know that it was only eleven o’clock in the morning, and that I was stone-cold sober, I’d be inclined to believe that I was bloody tight. I’d
damn near take my oath that I can see a man’s face standing out from that map of Palestine on the wall, there.’

‘Eye strain, old boy; eye strain,’ replied one of his companions, who had an airman’s moustache. ‘As long as we are in this dump it is part of the sentence that we should have to read round about fifty thousand words a day of mostly roneoed stuff or typescript. And you’ve been here for eighteen months, so what can you expect?’

‘That’s about it,’ agreed the Naval type, taking off and wiping his spectacles. ‘I’ll have to get my oculist to ante up these; otherwise, when I do get to sea again, I’ll not be able to tell the difference between a corvette and a Thames coal barge.’

The third man, whom I took to be the soldier of the party, grunted: ‘You are darned lucky to be nearly through here, Jerry. I’ve had only three months of it, but I’d willingly drop a pip to get back into the open.’

‘Oh no you wouldn’t, Arthur,’ remarked the fourth man, who had ‘Foreign Office’ written all over him. ‘You’d just hate to be a major and back on the barrack square again. This is the forcing house for high command later on; and every bright little warrior who is posted here knows that he’s darn lucky to be in it.’

The sailor put his specs on again and once more gave his mind to the papers on his desk. And that was that.

By midday I gave up. I was so tired from the strain of willing one person after another to see me that my powers of concentration were giving out. Moreover, during the past two and a half hours I had had a crack at nearly everyone in this small, select Ministry, so its possibilities seemed exhausted. Going out into the Park, I drifted down to the edge of the lake with the idea of resting there for a while before considering what my next move should be.

But I did not rest for long. Within two minutes of my arriving at the water’s edge a pretty dark-haired girl leading a poodle walked briskly past me. Something about her bronzed good looks reminded me of Lolla, the foreign newly-wed wife, to whom I had succeeded in appearing early that morning. Instantly my brain again began to tick over.

Too late, I realised that accompanying Sir Charles to London had been the action of a half-wit. Only my extreme tiredness
after a night of unflagging mental effort could excuse it. Having found a channel through which I could communicate I should, instead, have returned to that charming little Georgian mansion. Although Lolla had imperfectly understood me at the time, there was no reason at all why she should continue to do so. She had shown willingness, even eagerness, to receive my thoughts; so, unlike Daisy, there was no reason to suppose that she would drive me away if I appeared to her again. I had only to get her alone during a quiet hour of the afternoon and proceed with patience. If need be I could dictate my message to her word by word while she wrote it down.

Imbued with a new surge of energy at the simple means of discharging my terrible responsibility, I set off at once, passed down Great George Street and picked up a bus at Parliament Square which took me over the bridge to Waterloo. I was just in time to catch the twelve-twenty-seven for Farnham.

While in the train my weariness nearly caused me to black out again; but fear of being carried past my destination kept me sufficiently alert not to miss it, and soon after half-past one I was impelling myself swiftly down Farnham High Street.

It was not until I reached the main cross-roads in the little town that I was suddenly confronted with a new and annoying problem. I did not know the name of the village near which Sir Charles’s cottage was situated. While accompanying him and his distinguished companion on their drive down the previous evening I had been too engrossed in listening to their conversation to take much notice of the route the car had followed. It was only by chance that I had recognised a stretch of it as the Farnham by-pass where it cuts through the edge of the town. After that the car had carried us another six or eight miles along a second-class road and then through a succession of twisting country lanes. And on the return journey that morning, for the whole way, my mind had been blacked out. Except for the belief that the village I wanted lay somewhere to the south, I had not a clue how to find it.

The afternoon proved as infuriating in its disappointments as had the preceding night. As an unseen passenger in lorries, tradesmen’s vans and private cars, I must have covered
scores of miles. In each I travelled for anything from five to twenty minutes probing the country to the south, west and east of the town.