Poor Johnny. Even if, as no direct evidence could be brought against him, they gave him the benefit of the doubt, his career would be irretrievably ruined. And all because, in my eagerness to win over my co-directors, for a quarter of an hour I had let my tongue run away with me.
I could not help but feel that Sir Charles had been much to blame. Having taken me into his confidence he should have specified precisely what I could or could not divulge as an aid to getting my board to agree to his project. I suppose the fact of the matter was that he was used to attending conferences at which other officials, who were not privy to vital secrets, had to be persuaded to agree to measures by the disclosure of only limited knowledge of what lay behind them. No doubt, when he had given me powers of discretion, he had credited me with the same facility, not realising that I had had no experience of that sort of thing.
All the same, I could not exonerate myself from blame. My fatal pride in my powers of advocacy had carried me away. It was not the first time that had happened, and occasionally it had later caused me to look slightly foolish, but never before had it had such heart-rending results.
My grief and distress were made infinitely more acute by the knowledge that I was powerless to do anything about it. If only I could have come to life again in that room for two minutes I could have cleared Johnny completely. Even if I could somehow have got a message to Sir Charles, that this miscarriage of justice was about to take place, it is certain that he would at once have taken steps to exonerate Johnny from all blame. But in my state as a Ka I could do neither.
Yet, as I wrestled with this seemingly insoluble problem of how to get through to Johnny’s superiors, it suddenly occurred to me that there was still one possibility. I had twice made contact with Daisy. If I could do so again I might get her to give Sir Charles a message from me. The fact that it came from the so-called ‘spirit world’ might amaze him; but it would make no difference, because he knew the truth.
Without a moment’s delay, I passed through the Air Ministry window and descended to the street. Drifting quickly along to Parliament Square I turned the corner, entered Westminster Station and rode free of charge in the Underground to Hammersmith. Unjostled by pedestrians, I made my way to Daisy’s flat, arriving there soon after half-past four.
To my annoyance she was not in, so I waited in her sitting-room with such patience as I could muster. After about a quarter of an hour I heard the key turn in the lock and in she came. To my relief she was alone; but she looked very different from when I had last seen her.
There was nothing of the glamour girl about her now except her pretty face and good figure. Her hair was scraped back and she had no make-up on; she was wearing an old soiled raincoat and shabby shoes, and was carrying a string bag filled with eatables.
It took me a moment to realise that her present sluttish appearance was due to her living a very different life from most other women. The Club at which she worked did not close till four in the morning, so it would be five before she got home and to sleep; and still later on the occasions when she brought a boy-friend back with her. Most days it would probably be two o’clock before she got up and cooked herself some breakfast. Then she had to tidy up her flat, so she would not get round to her morning’s shopping until the late afternoon. Obviously she had just returned from shopping and she would soon set about preparing her lunch before dolling herself up for the evening.
I lost no time in concentrating on her but she walked right through me into the kitchen. Having hung up her old coat behind the door she set to work on her purchases. Among them were a chop, two tomatoes and some runner beans, and sitting down to the small table she began to slice the latter. I took up a position opposite her and started to call her by name over and over again.
She was humming cheerfully to herself and for a while she remained completely unaware of my presence. Then she appeared to become uneasy, stopped humming and glanced up at me several times. In spite of that the vague look in her blue eyes told me that she still had not seen me; but I felt that if I kept on willing her to do so she soon would.
Unfortunately, by then she had come to the end of her bean slicing and had also trimmed the chop; so she broke the beginnings of the rapport I was establishing between us by standing up, going to the stove, and putting her meal on to cook. Next she went into the bathroom, took down some lingerie that had been hanging up to dry over the bath and, carrying it back into the kitchen, began to iron it. Again I tried to compel her to see me but now she did not even glance up; so I came to the conclusion that I would have to wait until her mind was no longer fully engaged by some definite task.
As soon as her meal was cooked she sat down to it; so, feeling that the circumstances were now more propitious, I made another attempt. Almost at once she showed herself more receptive by again casting uneasy glances in my direction. Then her eyes widened, her hand holding the fork began to tremble, and she exclaimed:
‘Go back! Go back from where you came!’
Instantly I threw out the thought: ‘Don’t be frightened, Daisy, I only want to talk to you.’
‘I won’t let you!’ she cried, dropping her fork with a clatter on to her plate. ‘I won’t let you!’
‘I must,’ I insisted. ‘It’s terribly important.’
‘No! No! Get out! I won’t have you here!’
‘Please!’ I begged. ‘For God’s sake don’t shut your mind to me as you did before. Johnny is in serious trouble and …’
Cutting across my thought, she broke into a shrill tirade: ‘I don’t believe you! You’re evil! You’re not Sir Gifford. You’re someone from the Left. You thought to trick me last time; but you didn’t succeed. I’ll have nothing to do with you. Go from here! Go!’
Losing my temper I did the equivalent of shout at her. ‘You little fool! You’re deceiving yourself. I’ve done no harm to anyone, and I’ll do none to you. But you must listen to me. Johnny’s whole career is at stake. You have got to take a message from me to …’
‘I won’t!’ she broke in. ‘I won’t! By appearing to me at all you’ve caused Johnny to worry himself silly, as it is. Go back where you belong.’
‘The message is …’ I began, in an attempt to force it on her. But she sprang to her feet, her eyes wide and glaring. As she raised her hand I willed her to lower it, but in vain. She swiftly made the sign of the Cross and cried loudly:
‘Avaunt thee, Satan.’
As had happened before I felt no effect whatever; but her expression at once became relaxed, and dropping back into her chair she sat there panting slightly. The mysteries of the human mind are unfathomable, but there are many well-proven cases of faith working miracles. I could only suppose that her faith in that age-old conjuration was so strong that it enabled her to believe that she had driven me away.
After a few minutes she recovered sufficiently to go on with her meal and by the end of it, although I was still facing her, she had clearly dismissed me altogether from her mind; for as she began to wash up her dinner things she broke into a cheerful little song.
From my experience to date it looked as if her utterance of the conjuration was only a temporary defence; so that she could not prevent me from appearing to her again after, perhaps, an interval of a few hours. That idea led me to contemplate haunting her, in the hope of wearing her down to a state in which she would agree to take a message from me to Sir Charles as the price of freeing herself from me. But I soon saw two snags to entering on such a campaign. In the first place to break her will might take several days, and time was precious. In the second, there was nothing to prevent her taking the line of pronouncing her conjuration immediately every time I appeared; in which case I would get no further and tire of such a pointless conflict before she did.
For a while I remained miserably in her sitting-room, then another idea came to me. Daisy was by no means the only person with psychic powers among the vast population of London. Perhaps I could find someone else who would get a message to Sir
Charles for me. The trouble about that was that, never having dabbled in psychic matters, I had no idea how to set about finding a medium.
Mr. Tibitts I dismissed at once as, from the long conversation he had held with Johnny, it had become clear to me that he was not psychic himself; he was simply an investigator and a debunker of hoaxes. From what he had said that also applied to the other members of the Society for Physical Research; so it would be a poor bet to go and hang about at their headquarters.
Then another idea came to me. It was a long shot, but there was just a chance that Sir Charles might be psychic. Or if he himself was not, one of his household might be. I admitted to myself that the odds against that were very long, but there was one point which carried considerable weight as I contemplated the matter. If, by spending the night bobbing about in scores of bedrooms at random, I succeeded in getting through to a back-street medium or some comparatively humble person, the likelihood that either would have the courage to beard a Cabinet Minister in his office, and tell him that a ghost had appeared to them with a message for him, was decidedly remote. Whereas if I could show myself and convey my thoughts to one of Sir Charles’s relations, servants or staff, it was certain they would tell him of it.
Slender as the hope might be of succeeding in this design, so desperately concerned was I to save Johnny that I clutched at it as a drowning man would a straw. Leaving Daisy’s flat I made my way back to Westminster and hurried through King Charles’ Street to Clive Steps. I was just about to turn left and enter the Ministry of Defence when I caught sight of Sir Charles. He must have just left it and, brief-case in hand, was on the edge of the broad pavement about to get into a car.
Checking my momentum I swerved in his direction and came up beside him. That neither he nor his chauffeur became aware of me was not in the least surprising; and, for the moment, I did not even attempt to make either of them realise my presence. Sir Charles got into the back of the car but did not drive off; so I concluded that he was waiting for someone to join him.
While I hovered nearby I was facing towards St. James’s Park. It was a pleasant evening and considerable numbers of people were scattered about its grass and walks; for at this hour its usual contingent of idlers had been augmented by many business people crossing it on their way home from their offices. At the sight of them I felt a sudden pang of envy but my thoughts were soon otherwise engaged—and very busily. The sound of quick footsteps on the pavement behind me made me turn. Approaching from the direction of the private-garden entrance to No. 10 Downing Street was a tall slim man who appeared to be in his late fifties, and whom I would have recognised anywhere.
Having greeted Sir Charles with a cheerful good evening, he got in beside him, I joined them, and without further orders the chauffeur set the car in motion.
‘It is very good of you to spare me an evening,’ Sir Charles opened up.
‘On the contrary,’ replied his companion, ‘it is a most welcome change. I only wish I could come down to your cottage more frequently as I used to. It must be delightful there at this time of year. You have no idea how lucky you are to have such a retreat. I have to spend most of my nights these days in houses that are so full of people coming and going that they are more like railway stations.’
The car was a big one and had a plate-glass partition between the chauffeur and his passengers. Stretching out a long arm, Sir Charles closed the sliding panel in it, so that he and his companion could talk freely.
Never before have I been driven so swiftly out of London. That was not due to the pace of the car, which kept to quite a moderate speed, but to the extraordinary efficiency of the police. Every officer on point duty seemed to catch sight of the special number plate immediately, and without any fuss open the way when the lights were against it, or smooth its passage through congested traffic. Within twenty minutes it had passed out of the inner suburbs and with increased speed was heading down into Surrey.
Meanwhile, the talk of its passengers ranged over a score of subjects: the riots in Cyprus, the latest F.O. telegrams from our Ambassador in Moscow, the financial conference in Istanbul, the effect that the raising of United States tariffs might have on British trade, the take-over by Sir Gerald Templar as C.I.G.S., the dangerous situation which now faced the French in Morocco and Algiers, and a dozen other matters.
Many of the names they mentioned were unknown to me and the interchange of ideas between these two first-class brains was so swift that I had difficulty in following the drift of their conversation. Nevertheless it was, for me, a fascinating journey.
I was so occupied in trying to set a value on every word they uttered that I took scant notice of the direction in which we were going. But about half-past seven we passed through Farnham, and ten or twelve minutes later entered a woodland drive to pull up in front of a small country house, rather than a cottage, which from its long sloping roof looked as if it might have been designed by Sir Edward Lutyens a little before the First World War.
When the two passengers had got out, the chauffeur drove the car away towards another, smaller building about a hundred yards off, in which no doubt he had his own quarters above the garage.
At the door of the house the arrivals were met by a plump woman of about forty-five. She was wearing an apron and had wispy reddish grey hair. Throwing up her hands in protest she said, with a strong foreign accent, to Sir Charles:
‘Why did you not let me know you come tonight! That is bad of you, Sir. How do you expect me to make the good meals for your guest if you no notice of your coming have given?’
He favoured her with his boyish grin. ‘Don’t worry, Maria. My friend gets plenty of rich food, so he will enjoy a simple meal for a change. Make us one of your beautiful omelettes and some cheese straws. There is certain to be plenty of fruit from the garden to follow; on that we’ll do very well.’
The woman turned towards the guest, whom she evidently knew. Bobbing to him like an old-fashioned continental servant she said with a mixture of respect and familiarity: ‘Küss die hand, Excellenz. Nice to see you again. I hope you are well. You forgive please this small meal.’
He smiled at her. ‘Nothing could be nicer than one of your omelettes, Maria. I am already looking forward to it.’
‘There is no hurry,’ added Sir Charles. ‘We shall take our drinks out in the garden; so in about an hour will do.’
The two men left their things in the hall and went through into a long, low sitting-room. From it, french windows led to a paved garden in the centre of which there was a large oblong lily pool. At its far end stood a small summer-house furnished with a swing hammock and a teak table and chairs. Maria brought in some ice, Sir Charles fixed the drinks and they carried them out there.
After two months of wonderful weather there had been some rain during the past few days, but now another fine spell seemed to have set in. The warmth of summer still lingered in the evening air, and the silence was broken only by the chirruping of birds in the surrounding woods. It certainly was a perfect spot for two public men burdened with great responsibilities, and perpetually harassed for decisions on one thing or another during every hour of their long working days, quietly to talk over their affairs.
As soon as they had settled down they got on to the subject of Egypt and the threat to the security of the vast British-built installations on the Suez Canal, owing to Colonel Nasser’s having entered into friendly relations with the Iron Curtain countries in order to secure armaments from them. This was very much Sir Charles’s province, and I would greatly have liked to listen to his views. But I felt that I ought to lose no further time in attempting to get through to him, so I had to give my thoughts entirely to willing him to see me.
For ten minutes or more I remained stationary in front of him, but he talked on without showing the slightest reaction. Moving round the table I spent a further ten minutes opposite his companion, but with equally barren results. So I had to conclude that if either of them were psychic, his mind was
much too fully occupied at the moment for me to break in on it.
I knew that Sir Charles was a widower; but he had two daughters in their teens, and on the way down to the car I had hoped that one of them might, perhaps, prove a sensitive. As Maria had made no preparations for serving a dinner it was clear that they were either out for the evening or living elsewhere; so Maria herself became the next object of my attentions.
Leaving the garden for the house, I soon found her kitchen and set about tackling her. But I had been concentrating on her only for a few minutes when she left it and went into the sitting-room. After a quick glance out of the window at the two men on the far side of the lily pool, she picked up the telephone and dialled a number.
When she was answered she asked if Mr. Klinsky was in. There was a pause, presumably while Mr. Klinsky was being fetched, then she said: ‘Is that you, Jan? It is Maria. He is here. And at last you have luck. He has brought his big friend with him. I give dinner to them in twenty minutes.’
Replacing the receiver she went through to a small dining-room and laid the table for two; then she returned to the kitchen and began to make the omelette. Recalling my recent experience with Daisy during her culinary operations I decided that to make a further attempt on Maria for the moment would be to tire myself to no purpose; so I took the opportunity to have a look round upstairs.
Apart from Maria’s room there were only three bedrooms, and none of them had the appearance of being regularly lived in, so that settled the question of Sir Charles’s daughters. They were not out but living elsewhere, and Maria was evidently the only permanent resident at the cottage.
Hearing her call to her master that the omelette was ready, I went down to the dining-room hoping that during the meal I might have better luck. But unlike Daisy, who had eaten alone, the thoughts of Sir Charles and his friend did not drift. They continued an animated conversation which blocked any chance of my impinging on the consciousness of either, even had both been sensitive to psychic phenomena. By the time Maria put the cheese straws on the table I had resigned myself to awaiting again a more favourable opportunity and, having ceased to concentrate, I was free to listen to what they were saying.
The Ka of Gifford Hillary Page 32