Return

by Brian Freemantle

  Of all the reactions so far, that caused the biggest pandemonium. It came from the public gallery and the media, and McLeash was on his feet, unnecessarily protesting because Lockyer was already shouting to be heard above the noise, not to quell it, but to Jonathan Fry. The only person, apart from Taylor, to remain quiet and unmoving was Janet Hibbs. She stood frozen, her face, which had begun to crumple, set firm again.

  ‘Mr Fry!’ the judge managed at last, still having to shout. ‘Unless you can justify this line of questioning to my total satisfaction I am going to take a very serious view!’

  ‘I believe I can, My Lord,’ said Fry, although hesitantly. ‘I would ask the court’s forbearance for just a few more minutes.’

  ‘Take care, Mr Fry,’ warned the judge. ‘Take the very greatest care not to fall into an abyss of your own making.’

  ‘You had every reason to believe you were going to marry Mr Taylor, didn’t you?’ persisted Fry.

  ‘I have already told you that.’

  ‘So you’d slept together, hadn’t you? Had sexual relations?’

  Janet Hibbs laughed loudly, apparently genuinely, not once but several times, extending her arm to point across the court but crooking her index finger limply. ‘We occupied the same bed, yes. But he couldn’t do it! He’s impotent! A sad, little impotent man …’

  ‘No!’ roared Taylor, on his feet, clutching the dock rail, pulling at it in his fury. ‘Her fault! She blew—’

  ‘Look!’ jeered Janet, shouting over him, limp finger still extended. ‘Poor little impotent. Two heads but no penis …’

  Taylor had no awareness of trying to climb over the dock rail to get to her until he felt the hands upon him, pulling him back and because he was unbalanced he fell and the two warders came down with him, on top of him and then there were others in the dock, police, and one put handcuffs on him. He couldn’t see the court any more, just a line of faces raptly gazing over the edge of the high public gallery – and then Fry at the dock rail – but he heard the judge, already hoarse, shouting, ‘Take him down, take him down!’ and realized the worst thing of all. She’d made him lose control: cheated him again.

  As they filed from the hastily adjourned court Amy said, ‘Nothing could compensate for what she went through. But as revenge that was pretty effective: certainly put the hot poker up his ass.’

  ‘Her big fear was being humiliated,’ remembered Powell.

  ‘She wasn’t. He was,’ said Amy.

  It was obvious from his strutted re-entry into the dock that Taylor still felt so, too. It was heightened by the judge’s immediate warning that if there was a repetition of his outburst Taylor would be sent permanently to the cells and the case continued in his absence. That was just as quickly followed by the judge’s refusal to allow Janet Hibbs to be recalled for further cross-examination after Fry – the jury removed for the legal argument – set out his intended line of questioning, which the judge instantly rejected as unnecessary and salacious prattle contributing nothing to Taylor’s defence.

  The hearing developed a familiar, murder trial pattern. Further to spare the embarrassment of an already relieved Janet Hibbs, McLeash tightly led Jeri Lobonski and the British squad through their evidence of arrest, extracting what was necessary for his case but nothing more. He rehearsed Amy about admissibility, which she studiously observed but there was still enough to show it was Amy who’d located Taylor from three and half thousand miles away and led police to him in time to prevent Janet Hibbs’s murder. Amy dominated that day’s coverage with huge photographs and headlines such as COMPUTER SUPERCOP and MISS MISSION IMPOSSIBLE. The next day Powell followed Basildon and Townsend into the witness box formally to produce, in full for the first time, Taylor’s statement. It was carried, verbatim, in virtually every newspaper.

  To each man McLeash put the same question: ‘As far as you have been able to ascertain, are the facts and the details the accused gave you about the five men he claims once to have been all totally accurate?’

  And Powell, Townsend and Basildon each replied, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ promised McLeash at the conclusion of that day’s hearing, ‘I will be calling the first of my expert religious witnesses on the subject of reincarnation.’ And taking my place in all the legal textbooks of the English-speaking world, he thought.

  In his remand cell Harold Taylor meticulously added to his already bulging newspaper files. One was devoted entirely to the names and identification of every person who had given evidence against him.

  Chapter Thirty

  The court was so satiated with surprise that Ian Conway’s request to affirm rather than swear an oath upon the Bible caused scarcely a ripple. It took the professor of religious philosophy, a neatly bearded man in roll-necked sweater and jeans pressed with a centre leg crease, almost five minutes to recite qualifications that included English and American philosophy doctorates, both with distinction, two periods occupying visiting chairs at American universities and authorship of ten books, three acclaimed as definitive studies of religious mysticism.

  All Hector McLeash’s early doubts about taking the case had long ago been washed away on the tidal wave of publicity and in anticipation of this precise moment – presenting Conway’s evidence as the coup de grâce, the first and best of the expert witnesses whom no-one yet knew were going to make the unbelievable believable, reality unreal. McLeash was actually shaking with expectation, fortunately only slightly, as he stood waiting for the religious philosopher to undertake to tell only the truth.

  ‘You are acknowledged, are you not, Dr Conway, as England’s foremost authority upon worldwide religion, both ancient and modern?’

  ‘In Europe,’ expanded the man, didactically. ‘I am also called upon frequently for my opinion and knowledge in the United States.’ He had a mellifluous voice tinged with just the slightest trace of an Irish accent and talked looking directly at Harold Taylor, although not defiantly like Janet Hibbs but as a scientist or anthropologist approaching a previously unknown species.

  ‘Then the court is indeed fortunate to have the benefit of your vast experience,’ the barrister flattered him. Prepared for the affirmation, McLeash said: ‘You don’t believe in God?’

  ‘I believe in a Supremeness.’

  McLeash supposed he had to go along with it but he didn’t want to be sucked down into a swamp of esoteric philosophy. ‘Could you explain what you mean by that?’

  ‘Paradoxically though it may seem, placing the two concepts side by side, all religion developed from ancient paganism, which became the mysticism of shamen,’ said Conway, with a coherence drawn from a hundred lectures. ‘All religions, whatever their title, share common paths. One of those original, most vital, paths was introspection: finding oneself. A belief – a god, if you like – does not have a physical shape or image. It lives within each person, belonging individually to each person. Needing an object to look at and pray to – like believing Heaven is among the clouds in the sky and Hell in the furnace of the earth – brings everything full circle, back to paganism.’

  The verbal treatise was understandable enough but McLeash decided that was prescisely what it was: enough. He had headlines to provide, not ideology. ‘Do you believe in reincarnation?’

  ‘There is persuasive evidence of it. For obvious reasons it is a basic tenet of every major religion in the world.’

  ‘What’s the persuasive evidence?’

  ‘The overwhelming number of people, of every creed and culture, with recollections of previous existences, sometimes going back thousands of years: Egyptian times, ancient Rome. It’s particularly convincing with claimants who undergo regressive hypnosis.’

  Taylor was nodding, with approving condescension.

  ‘The reason for the belief being held by major religions isn’t obvious to me.’

  Conway smiled. ‘Believing it’s possible to be reborn takes away the fear of death, doesn’t it?’

  The movement – today’s revelation –
in the court was at the sudden awareness that what until now had largely been presented as supernatural – which meant it couldn’t be true or real and that no-one therefore needed really to be frightened – was being calmly discussed as an accepted fact by an academic holding every achievable philosophical credential and honour. And shouldn’t be nervously laughed at as absurd after all.

  Powell leaned close to Amy and said, ‘Why have we all been too scared to admit it?’

  ‘I wasn’t,’ she said. ‘It was all you macho guys.’

  ‘Still not scared of him yourself?’

  ‘Not of him. I’m beginning to wonder where this is all going to end and I don’t mean this or any other trial. I know now why he wanted to see you before he made a statement; what he meant by seeing your face.’

  ‘Identify for the court the religions that believe in reincarnation of some sort or another,’ McLeash was saying.

  Conway’s recitation was immediate and almost casual, another well-remembered tract from countless lectures. ‘Everyone who believes has a religion, sometimes only their own. But all the major religions of the world accept reincarnation – Hindu, Buddhist, Zen, Tao, Jewish Cabbalists, the early Christian Gnostics and Cathars, the Islamic Sufi. Members of an ancient Hindu religion sweep the ground in front of them as they walk, to prevent stepping on a reincarnation in the lowest insect. Both Buddhists and Hindus believe that karma is created around everyone by their actions in mortal life: cause and effect, if you like. For every good act, a person gets good fortune; misfortune for every bad act. The Hindu believes we repeatedly reincarnate into a human body the experience the karma built up in previous lives. The Druze Arabs of the Lebanon – a breakaway Muslim sect – unquestioningly accept the arrival of children, complete strangers, identifying themselves as reincarnations of dead relatives. Their present biological parents surrender them, sometimes to return to their previous environments.’

  ‘You have been in court to listen to the evidence of this trial so far?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And heard read out the statement made by the accused, claiming to have reincarnated at least five times?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you find that preposterous, the raving of someone suffering mental delusions?’

  ‘Not at all. My only surprise is the apparent total recall, of every existence. I have never before encountered or discovered any evidence of such perfect memory, not even under regressive hypnosis.’

  ‘But you are not saying you consider it impossible?’

  ‘No. Just that I’ve no previous knowledge of its manifestation.’

  ‘In his statement the accused talked of being promised eternal life by a teacher named Tzu. Does that have any significance to you?’

  ‘It’s a Chinese word, meaning “master”. The founder of the Taoist religion was Lao-tzu, which means “Old Master”. He was born in 604 BC and is known to have led a mortal life. He was the court librarian of the Chou state of China and a contemporary of the Buddha and Confucius. There is also accepted teaching within the Taoist faith of a great falling out between Lao-tzu and his foremost disciple, who it was claimed was using the teachings and rituals of their religion for evil, not good.’

  ‘It sounds remarkably like the Western religious parables of the battle between God and Satan?’ suggested McLeash.

  ‘I think it is a parallel rather than a parable,’ agreed Conway.

  Taylor was smiling and nodding vigorously, gazing around the court as if something was being proved.

  ‘Have you ever heard before of someone claiming to be reincarnated provably having the same fingerprints, handwriting, blood group, DNA or facial characteristics of someone they were in a previous existence?’ Were, realized McLeash. He was accepting rebirth as a fact. He guessed a lot of others were, too. Or would, after today.

  ‘Not altogether, in a single reincarnation.’

  McLeash had been looking down at his notes, methodically working his way through his list of prepared questions. Abruptly he looked up. ‘Was that a qualified answer, Dr Conway?’

  ‘There have been suggestions of handwriting becoming the same in the case of possession. I know of no other occasions when it’s been forensically possible to make DNA or fingerprint comparisons, as it has been here.’

  The groundswell of incredulous noise was heaving again, bringing the judge’s head up sharply, although he didn’t call for quiet.

  He’d never again have such high-profile exposure, McLeash recognized: already, on the strength of this case, he’d been offered four lucrative briefs. He had to risk the irritation of Mr Justice Lockyer – who at the moment didn’t look irritated anyway – to milk this milch cow of every last drop. ‘Possession?’ he queried, seemingly unsure.

  ‘The occupying of a person by the spirit of another,’ supplied Conway, patiently. This was his most public exposure, too, and he wasn’t in any hurry to leave the stage.

  ‘How does orthodox, established religion regard possession, Dr Conway?’ asked the barrister. ‘Occult nonsense, to be derided? Or something to be taken as seriously as, from what you’ve already told us, reincarnation is viewed?’

  ‘The Christian church – Protestant as well as Catholic – believes it is possible for a person to become physically possessed by a spirit, good or evil,’ said Conway. ‘Both churches have prescribed religious ceremonies of exorcism in the case of evil possession. The Catholic Church actually has priests who specialize in exorcism.’

  McLeash caught the first shift of impatience from the judge. Quickly going back to his prepared list, he said: ‘In the recorded cases of reincarnation, have you ever before heard of or accept to have been proven a reincarnated person transmogrifying at will, to assume the features of the person they were in a previous existence?’

  ‘No I have not.’

  ‘Do you believe it to be possible?’

  ‘Not unless I personally witnessed it. Or saw convincing photographic evidence.’

  Yet again McLeash produced the freeze frames. ‘Would you consider that convincing photographic evidence?’

  ‘They would appear to be. I cannot explain them.’

  ‘So your expert testimony, to this court, is that all major religions accept that reincarnation – rebirth after a previous death – is possible? Just as it is possible for a person to become possessed with evil?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Conway. ‘That is the established position and teaching of many churches.’

  The question came unprompted to McLeash and he was glad. ‘What about one becoming confused by the other? Have you ever learned of a person believing themselves reincarnated who was, in fact, possessed? Or of someone who was possessed being reincarnated?’

  ‘No,’ admitted Conway. ‘But if we accept – as established religions accept – that both manifestations are possible then I do not see why there should not be an interchange, one for the other.’

  ‘Have you ever heard of such a thing?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Would it surprise you, if you did?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you believe in ghosts, Dr Conway?’

  ‘Not those who wear bedsheets and go “whoo” in the night,’ smiled the philosopher. ‘I can accept the survival of a spirit, at the end of a mortal life.’

  The two religious witnesses who followed were a bishop named William Stevenson recognizable from frequent television appearances and newspaper contributions on Church of England doctrine and Monsignor Patrick Shere, the English authority on Roman Catholic dogma.

  Both men confirmed the belief of their respective creeds in reincarnation and possession. Monsignor Shere graphically described attending a service of exorcism to free a devout priest, psychiatrically found to be suffering no mental illness, of a spirit under whose possession he’d attacked and physically injured fellow priests at a retreat. Bishop Stevenson almost indignantly insisted that evidence of reincarnation would neither be anti-religious nor would it contradict any Christian
teaching.

  ‘It would be proof of the existence of God,’ he said.

  The latter part of the week was occupied by the evidence of three psychiatrists, all of whom were adamant that Harold Taylor did not suffer delusion and showed no evidence, psychiatrically or clinically, of brain or mental abnormality. One, German-born Gerhard Pohl, had taken Taylor back through each of his five previous lives under the regressive hypnosis described by Ian Conway. Taylor had not deviated in any detail or fact from the accounts he had given in his statement.

  ‘Do you believe he was each of these men, in a previous life?’ asked McLeash.

  ‘Yes,’ said Pohl, at once.

  Another psychiatrist, Robert Porter, said: ‘He implicitly believes the need for sacrifice, the shedding of human blood, to be necessary for his repeated and continued existences. But he knows at all times what he’s doing. He’s responsible for his actions.’

  Porter’s evidence concluded the prosecution conveniently on the Friday afternoon. That evening Taylor released the tension created by holding himself back from interrupting the psychiatrists by concentrating upon his newspaper files, taking particular care to add the reports of the psychiatrists.

  On the Saturday, Powell bought Amy her engagement ring, a diamond flanked by emeralds. That night they telephoned Beth, by arrangement, at the summer camp. She’d got hives from some poison ivy but was all right now and was hesitant when Powell said he didn’t think they’d be in England as long as he’d first expected.

  That means I don’t get to come to London.’

  ‘Maybe we’ll bring you back on our honeymoon,’ said Powell.

  On the Sunday the American group was introduced by Ross Kirkpatrick to Cedric Solomon, the English barrister who would make the extradition application. Solomon was a large, fleshy man who liked a quick profit from briefs for which he could command the highest fees, and the case of Harold Taylor qualified on all his criteria.

  ‘Don’t imagine the slightest problem,’ he said, after reviewing the evidence. ‘Practically a formality.’