The Ka of Gifford Hillary

by Dennis Wheatley

  He shook his head unhappily. ‘I’m sorry, but you can’t expect me, of all people, to swallow that. I know your writing as well as I know my own, and I naturally got in touch with the police as soon as I heard of your arrest. They have shown me all the exhibits in the case. Much as I should hate having to do it, if I were called on in court to identify the writing in that letter I would have to swear to it being yours.’

  ‘Then you would be wrong. I tell you it was Ankaret who wrote it.’

  ‘What possible proof can you advance in support of this extraordinary statement?’

  ‘Unfortunately none; except that I know her to have been an expert forger.’

  ‘Ankaret a forger! So’s my Aunt Sally! Sorry, Giff, I didn’t mean to be rude; but really, old man … Still, go ahead. What sort of things did she forge? Have you any examples of her work that you can produce? How many people can you bring to testify to this unusual activity of hers?’

  I made a wry face. ‘That’s just the trouble. The only visual evidence we can produce lies in her drawings, which show the extraordinary ability she had for copying anything she set her mind to with minute exactness. She did have a scrap-book into which she copied the handwriting of a number of famous historical personages; but I haven’t seen that for years, and I’ve no idea what she did with it. As for people knowing about this peculiar talent that she had, we are little better off; because she had no occasion to use it. Her father and brother might, but I doubt if anyone else would. It is ages since the subject has even been mentioned between us, but when we were first married she used to joke about it. I remember her saying once that one day she might have to forge a really big cheque to get me out of a mess. Poor darling, she little thought then that her gift would land me with my head in a noose.’

  Eddie was looking extremely uncomfortable. After a moment, he said: ‘If I were not a personal friend of yours, and you insisted on sticking to this line, I should tell you that you must get some other solicitor to conduct your case. As it is I’m much too fond of you to do that. But I implore you, Giff, to abandon all thought of basing your defence on the contention that Ankaret wrote that letter. I want to get the very best man I can to act as your counsel, and I had in mind Sir Bindon Buller; but no one approaching his eminence would accept the brief if he has to fight on such a wildly improbable assumption. Please let’s forget all that we’ve said in the past three-quarters of an hour, and start again at the beginning.’

  ‘That is all very well,’ I replied. ‘I greatly appreciate your loyalty, Eddie, and the last thing I want is to make things difficult for you. But you must see that the letter is the crucial factor in the whole issue. Apart from it, there is not one scrap of evidence against me. You have already agreed that my theory about Evans putting me in the Solent and Ankaret killing him afterwards is quite plausible. But whether that is accepted or not makes no material difference to my case, provided it can be proved that I did not write that letter. If I did not, the person who did would have done so only after he or she believed me to be dead, and with the object of fastening the murder of Evans upon me. Ankaret alone could have had a motive for doing that, and to my knowledge she was capable of forging my writing. That is my case, and I mean to stand or fall by it.’

  He nodded. ‘Very well, Giff. If that’s the way you feel there is no more to be said. Of course, you are dead right in your contention that if the letter could be proved a forgery that would put you in the clear. But I’m afraid it will be the devil’s own job to get a jury to believe us. Naturally the last thing I would suggest is that you should confess to a crime you did not commit; but, to be honest, when I came here I was hoping you would instruct me to enter a plea of homicide committed under intense provocation. I think we might have got you off then with a ten-year sentence.’

  ‘Ten years!’ I gave a bitter laugh. ‘No thanks! I have been too near death this past week to have any fear of a quick one. I prefer to gamble all against nothing. Get all the handwriting experts whose opinion is worth a damn to examine that letter against genuine examples of my writing. Have Ankaret’s things at Longshot searched to see if you can dig up that historical scrap-book of hers, and collect all her drawings which are copies of others. Ask Bill and her brother Roc if they ever remember her forging anything. That’s what I want you to do.’

  ‘All right,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll do my best about the letter. Now, how about the rest of this awful business. I’d be interested to hear your views, particularly on Ankaret’s suicide. It has been generally assumed that she took her life during a fit of acute depression resulting from your death. But, accepting for the moment your theory that it was she who killed Evans, she might have done so for a very different reason. If she did, and we could prove it, that would immensely strengthen your case.’

  If only Johnny had succeeded in retaining possession of Ankaret’s trial forgeries nothing else would have been needed to prove my innocence; but, most unfortunately for me, he had been robbed of them by the fire that Ankaret had started. Still worse, he had never been aware of their existence; so he could not even testify to having seen them. It was only through my Ka that I knew them to have been among the papers he had taken from my desk, so all I could reply to Eddie was:

  ‘I believe you may be right about that. From something Johnny Norton said to me when he was bringing me up to London I gathered that he knew about Ankaret’s infidelities, and suspected that, owing to a love affair she was having with a man unknown to any of us, she was in part responsible for my death. That, of course, was simply speculation, and had no foundation in fact. But she may have made some slip; and, guessing that Johnny suspected her, feared that he was on the point of finding her out. If that was the case it is quite on the cards that rather than face the music she decided to quit. We will never know for certain, though; so there doesn’t seem much point in pursuing the matter.’

  ‘No; but all the same we’ll produce it as a theory,’ Eddie said quickly. ‘Now that we are committed to basing our defence on the letter having been forged by Ankaret we can’t afford to neglect anything which would help to bear that out. And fear of being charged with murder is a much stronger motive for suicide than the loss of a husband, however well beloved. Tell me, now, about Johnny Norton. His having pulled you out of your grave has no bearing on the case, but I am curious to know what led him to believe that you might not be dead.’

  ‘I suppose it was a hunch more than anything,’ I replied guardedly. ‘He says that when he saw me put into my coffin I didn’t look dead. Of course, he knew about my fear of being buried alive, and the air-holes and all that. The idea that those precautions might have been ordered by me as the outcome of a premonition occurred to him, and he could not rid himself of it. Eventually he decided that he had simply got to find out. He did and saved me from a most agonising death; so whatever may happen now I can never be sufficiently grateful to him.’

  Eddie nodded. ‘I take my hat off to him for his pluck in going to a graveyard and opening up a coffin in the middle of the night. In addition to all else it is, of course, a serious offence. I’ve no doubt that in view of the result I’ll be able to get him off; but if you had been dead and he had been caught in the act, he would have got a prison sentence.’

  ‘Do you mean to say that a case is being brought against him?’ I cried in angry surprise.

  ‘Yes. According to the law they had no option. The breach of the Official Secrets’ Act charge against him was withdrawn on Monday; but the civil police took him over and preferred this charge of unlawfully interfering with a grave. But you don’t have to worry about him. No court could possibly convict him for having gone to the rescue of a man whom he believed to have been buried alive, when it turned out that he was right.’

  ‘Thank God for that! I would like to see him as soon as possible. Can you arrange for him to be allowed to come and visit me?’

  As I asked the question I endeavoured to conceal my eagerness. I felt that I had done as well as cou
ld be expected with Eddie, and that I could now rely on him to instruct counsel for the defence on the lines which offered me my best chance of an acquittal. But it seemed to me of the utmost importance that I should have a talk with Johnny so that we could work out together exactly what each of us was going to say, and not contradict one another should he be called as a witness at my trial.

  To my alarm Eddie shook his head. ‘I’m afraid that is out of the question, Giff. The police won’t allow you to have any visitors who are in any way connected with the case.’

  On second thoughts I became easier in my mind. It was a sure thing that Johnny would not say anything to anyone about Daisy and how it was her seeing my Ka which had really determined him to come to my grave. He would confirm what I had said about his simply having a hunch about that I was not dead. He would confirm, too, that he had had his suspicions about Ankaret; and that would be all to the good. As for what had happened after he had rescued me, if our stories differed somewhat that could be put down to my version being incorrect owing to my mind not having fully recovered from the effects of my ordeal. Anyway, as I saw it then, no discrepancies in our accounts of my resurrection could have any bearing on the case against me for a murder committed in the previous week.

  Eddie’s next question to me was on that very subject, and to it I replied: ‘When Johnny got me out of my coffin I was unconscious, and for many hours afterwards I regained consciousness only for short intervals; so naturally my memories are fragmentary and confused, but this is more or less what happened.

  ‘He took me back to Longshot and garaged the car with me in it. Evidently he realised at once that having come alive again I was liable to be charged with Evans’s murder, and he wanted to give me a chance to recover before letting anyone else know about my resurrection. From the house he fetched things to revive me and plenty of warm clothes. Having brought me round and dressed me he gave me a couple of pain-killers and tucked me up in the back of the car, then left me to sleep.

  ‘When I next came round it was mid-morning and we were on the road to London. He gave me some more pain-killers and I dozed off again. I woke when we pulled up outside his rooms in Nevern Square. He got me upstairs and put me to bed. It was while doing so that he told me about the deaths of Evans and Ankaret, and gave me an outline of what had been going on. Then he had to leave me because he had had an urgent summons to the Air Ministry. I slept again.

  ‘About five o’clock he returned to pack a suit-case while another officer waited in his sitting-room. He had not wanted to trouble me with his own worries before, but he told me then about the accusation Sir Tuke Waldron had made against him, and that he had been placed under close arrest. I told him that I could get Sir Charles to clear him, and having enjoined me to stay where I was, off he went.

  ‘But when he had gone I began to worry about him. You must remember that I had been out of my grave for only about fifteen hours. As I had slept for a great part of that time I was more or less recovered physically, but my mind was still far from normal. Sometime during our drive up to London Johnny had told me about the letter I was supposed to have written, but that, and Ankaret’s death, all seemed to be a part of a prolonged nightmare and I had not yet grasped the fact that I was liable to be charged with Evans’s murder. You see, as I was innocent it never occurred to me that I was in danger until I was actually arrested in Sir Charles’s office on Sunday afternoon. On the other hand Johnny’s arrest was fresh and clear in my mind, and I became obsessed with the thought that it was incumbent on me to waste not a moment in clearing him.

  ‘In consequence I got up, dressed, telephoned Sir Charles’s office and learned that he was on his way down to his cottage in the country. Johnny had left me money to give his landlady to buy me food. I used some of it to go to Waterloo and take a train down to Farnham. From there I hitch-hiked out to the cottage.’

  Having got so far in my blend of fact and fiction I told Eddie the truth about the events there which had been witnessed by my Ka, then went on:

  ‘After I had shadowed Klinsky to the farmhouse, I meant to return to the cottage and warn Sir Charles of what was going on, but I lost my way in the wood and eventually struck the village two or three miles away from it. There I cadged a lift from a man with a car. He had just come out of a pub and no sooner had we set off than I realised that he had had several over the odds. About a mile outside the village he took a corner too fast and we came to grief in the ditch. Both of us struck our heads on the wind-screen and passed out.

  ‘When I came to he was still unconscious and my right hand had somehow become a nasty mess. I managed to struggle out and stagger away in the darkness bent on getting help. But this last shock proved too much for my already-overburdened brain. It was then I lost my memory. I haven’t the faintest idea where I was or what I was doing during Friday and Saturday. Probably I was wandering in the woods again or for most of the time lying unconscious in some barn or outhouse. It wasn’t till Sunday morning that I found myself on the road between Thursley and Godalming. I had no idea what day it was and the one thing that had stuck in my mind was the urgency of warning Sir Charles that his house-keeper meant to poison him. I felt ravenously hungry, so I had a meal in the first wayside café I came to, went on to Godalming, caught the next train to London and took a taxi to the Ministry of Defence. You know the rest.’

  As I finished I felt that I had put up a very good show. Johnny had given me the idea of saying that the injury to my hand had occurred in a car smash, and I had already told Sir Charles that it was having been in one that had caused me to lose my memory; so it fitted in excellently and enabled me to explain away the two days unaccounted for between my Ka’s visit to his cottage and the actual night of my rescue.

  Eddie took in all that part of my story without a murmur; then he set about drafting for the police a statement of my version of what had occurred. As soon as he had done, Inspector Watkins was called in, it was read over and I signed it. Then, when the Inspector had gone, Eddie said.

  ‘There is one thing that still beats me, Giff. How on earth could the doctors have passed you for dead when you were not?’

  I shrugged. ‘Ask me another. Only Johnny seems to have had any doubts about the matter, and that was two days later, when he saw me put into my coffin. Still, there is one possible explanation. You may remember me telling you sometime or other that after I was shot down in Burma I was invalided back to India suffering from a wretched nervous disorder. As the British doctors failed to cope with it I went to an Indian, and he prescribed various exercises in Yoga. He taught me how to put myself into a self-induced trance, in order to rest my nervous system. I became quite good at it, and he said that I would make an excellent subject for attempting long comas, such as the Fakirs practise to disipline themselves. I can only suppose that when Evans knocked me out I passed into one instead of coming round, and that the doctors mistook my suspended animation for death.’

  With a quick nod, Eddie said: ‘I think you’ve got something there. Looking at it from their point of view, they would have been pretty astonished if they had found you alive when they had been told that you had been washed ashore after spending a night in the Solent. Their minds would have been further prejudiced, too, from knowing about the letter, in which it was said that you meant to take an overdose of some Indian heart dope as a prelude to committing suicide. I don’t think doctors often make mistakes like that; but in your case, now you have told me about this coma business, it certainly seems that they had grounds for doing so.’

  We talked on for another hour or so, and I think my insistence that the suicide letter had been forged by Ankaret eventually convinced Eddie that I was innocent; and that the events following my death must have taken more or less the pattern I had described.

  Anyway, having promised to do his utmost for me, he left in a far more cheerful frame of mind than he had arrived. I, too, felt much more optimistic about my chances, for I had brought off a terrific tour-de-force
in reconstruction, and succeeded in explaining away the almost inexplicable.

  At least, I thought I had. I had yet to learn the terrifying thoroughness of a police investigation, which was utterly to destroy my house of cards; and the wrong but appalling conclusion they would come to as the result of it.

  * * * *

  Eddie Arnold has proved a true friend. Since that first talk we had in the prison infirmary he has worked night and day on my case. Sacrificing every other matter connected with his large and valuable practice he has been up and down between Longshot and Brixton a dozen times, interviewed scores of people, and spent many many hours with myself, with counsel and at Scotland Yard. But he has been fighting a losing battle.

  The day following that on which I made my statement I was taken down to Southampton in a Black Maria, and formally charged before a magistrate. I pleaded not guilty and reserved my defence. After I had been committed for trial at Winchester Eddie accompanied me to Southampton prison and we had another long talk.

  The first thing he asked me was if I were prepared to confirm absolutely definitely that it had been on the Wednesday night that Johnny had rescued me. Then he added:

  ‘Before you answer me I ought to tell you that Johnny Norton has been questioned and he declares categorically that it was Saturday night; or, rather, during the early hours of Sunday morning.’

  I pretended surprise, and replied: ‘How very extraordinary. Worry over this wretched business must have addled his wits even more than it has mine. Anyhow, at least I am clear on that point I am prepared to take my oath that it was Wednesday.’

  Eddie gave a couple of his vigorous nods. ‘I felt sure you would be. It was obvious to me that Norton could not be right otherwise it would have been impossible for you to be down at Sir Charles’s cottage on Thursday evening.’

  That, of course, was the crux of the whole matter. Whether Johnny had succeeded in getting back undetected into camp early on Sunday morning, I did not know. But I did know that if he had he would wish to continue to protect Tinegate, if that were possible. Moreover, I had told him about my Ka’s visit to Sir Charles’s cottage, so I had counted on his realising that unless I said I had been there in my physical body I should never be believed. Finally, if he had said it was Wednesday nobody could have contradicted him, because that was the night on which he had actually been in the churchyard on his abortive attempt to find out if I was still alive; and, as far as I could see at that time, it made not a ha’p’orth of difference to his own case which night he said it was.