Tomy and the Planet of Lies (23 page)

That night was a long one. We discussed many things and shared our memories of Tomy. In the early hours—sometime around seven o'clock, since at this time of year it is still dark—the doorbell rang. Elisabeth went and answered it in her dressing gown. She escorted three policemen into the house and then came and woke us.

“We had a call,” began the senior officer, who was in plain clothes, “that a young man had been murdered here.”

I feigned innocence; the others said nothing at all. “How on earth did you come by such an idea, officer?”

“Your housemaid, Edith, was at the station house. Her statement was unambiguous. Would it be all right if we looked around?”

I had a sense of foreboding. But Edith didn't know anything about Tomy's grave—or so I thought. So I told the police officers that Edith was a lovely girl and had probably fallen in love with my younger brother, but he had left the country the previous night.

The plain-clothes man gave me a severe look and shook his head slightly with a what-kind-of-fools-do-you-take-us-for? expression on his face. The officers searched the villa from cellar to attic. One of them discovered Tomy's passport lying on a chest of drawers. The plain-clothes man flicked through it. He put it in his pocket finally and promised us—ominously—that we would be hearing from him.

“Crap!” swore Otto.

Elisabeth said we should have followed Tomy's advice and not lied.

It was obvious to me that it wouldn't take the authorities long to find out that the passport wasn't kosher. No Anton von Däniken had ever been born on April 24, 1954, in Zofingen. What was I to do? How was I to explain Tomy's existence and disappearance to the Swiss detectives? I knew from my late brother-in-law that they were well trained, highly capable and stubborn, and thorough and patient into the bargain. Elisabeth was all for telling everything. We should show the police Tomy's grave. After all, we were all witnesses to what had really happened. But, as usual, things didn't turn out as expected.

We hadn't quite finished breakfast and I was still slurping my morning tea when two police cars pulled up. Six men armed with shovels and pickaxes got out, preceded by Edith who led them directly to the spot in the trees where Tomy's body lay.

“This is where it is,” she said with a pinched smile. The triumph in her voice was unmistakable. I could have strangled her.

Despite the drizzling rain, the traces of candle wax from the night before were still plain enough. It wasn't particularly difficult for the police diggers to remove the loose earth from the grave and in no time at all they were almost done. I was ready to confess everything, but didn't want to do it in front of all these men. Then one of them men struck pay dirt. They all jumped in and swiped aside the remaining earth with their hands. They revealed Tomy's black shoes and socks, his dark blue pants and the blue-red striped shirt. All of it soaking wet as if it had just been pulled out of a bath. Where did all this water come from? It couldn't have come from the rain. That would have all drained straight through into the ground below. I expected to see Tomy's mud-streaked hair at any second, but there was no head, no hands, and no legs, either. Nothing at all. The sopping wet clothes were simply empty. As was the plastic tablecloth that we used to lower Tomy into the grave, which still—I was convinced—smelled of whisky with a touch of magnesium. No body, not a single hair. Just water and a highly strange aroma.

The officers stood up, brushing the dirt from their hands. “What's all this about?” asked the chief with the serious face.

“I told you that there wasn't anybody here,” I countered, not knowing if I should laugh or cry. The policeman ordered his men to dig deeper, but there was nothing to find.

The chief turned again to me, a grim look on his face.

“So tell me, why did you hold a candlelit burial for a bunch of soaking wet clothes?” he asked.

“Have you never heard of a cenotaph? It's an unfilled grave, like they had in ancient Greece and Egypt. An empty monument to a departed friend, so to speak.”

“So where's the real grave?”

“There isn't one, because nobody is dead. We celebrated my younger brother's departure last night.”

“You think you're so very clever, Mr. von Däniken” said the detective contemptuously, adding a “tsk, tsk.” “We will be initiating proceedings against you and your companions. No one is to leave the house. And you—Mr. von Däniken—are coming with me.”

In the station house in Solothurn the questioning began. I insisted that an examining magistrate be called in from the very beginning. He arrived a half an hour later, rather grumpily, it seemed to me.

“So, Mr. von Däniken,” he said, in an attempt at civility, “you are a clever man and have written lots of books. So make it easier on yourself and for us. Every lie you tell us just draws out the time you spend in custody.”

“Am I under arrest then?”

“That can be arranged with a simple signature. So come on, don't beat around the bush!”

I could have demanded a lawyer, but he would have been just has perplexed as the examining magistrate. So I requested that the clerk, who was writing everything down for the file, be sent out of the room.

I said that they could leave the tape recorder running and I would tell them everything: the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And then sign the statement without any protest. And that was exactly what happened.

I spoke from 8 a.m. till around three in the afternoon. Only stopping to drink mineral water and eat a sandwich. The magistrate had grinned, hammered his fists on the table, changed the cassettes, prowled round the room and repeatedly asked me if I was completely normal, stating that he was convinced that someone like me should be in a psychiatric clinic.

“Mr. Kellerhans,” as the examining magistrate was called, “we could make all this a lot shorter if you were to interview Marc and my wife. If they tell the same story, then we must all be crazy!”

“You could have all got your stories straight beforehand,” said Kellerhans unimpressed. “But we'll get you, don't worry. So let's start again—from the beginning.”

He left the room for a moment, gave some orders, and returned with an unidentifiable grin on his face. I started telling my story again from the beginning. After an hour or so, he stopped me and decided to take a break. He ordered me not to leave the room. But at least he had some tea sent in.

He didn't return until two hours and 18 cigarettes later. This time he had Elisabeth, Marc, and Otto with him.

“I could have all four of you arrested,” he announced arrogantly and then shifted nervously from one foot to the other. “But as yet, we have a murder with no body. Your statements could have all been worked out together. We will check every single detail.” He looked sternly at me: “Bearing in mind your standing, your fixed residence here and the particular circumstances of this case, and under advice of the state prosecutor, I am going to let you go home—for the time being. On the condition, Mr. von Däniken, that you and the other three remain in Solothurn. Any contravention of this and I will order your immediate arrest!”

I thanked him insincerely, but was immensely relieved to have gotten out of this tricky situation, at least for now.

In the following days specialists from the forensic unit and the police's scientific department went through the villa and grounds with a fine-tooth comb. They didn't just turn Tomy's room inside out, they checked out every armchair that he'd ever sat in. Any object he'd ever touched was confiscated, especially all his clothes, even underwear. Again and again I had to trudge into town, to the police station, often accompanied by Marc, Otto and Elisabeth.

We were always interrogated separately. I lost count of the amount of times that I was asked the same questions. But the faces didn't remain the same: psychologists, secret service agents, scientists all turned up. Their expressions always became increasingly serious, more confused, and sometimes even angry. Finally, after a break of five days in a row without having a single summons, I humbly asked the examining magistrate if he would allow me to travel to St. Moritz and spend a week in the Suvretta House Hotel. I really needed a break.

“There are conditions,” he warned sternly, “You are not to leave St. Moritz. You are to report in every day by telephone and you are to speak to no one—I repeat, no one!—about this affair.” We were given an explicit order to treat the case as “secret.”

So it was, at the beginning of December in the year 1987 that I traveled to the winter wonderland of Engadin. Before I invited Marc to join me, I asked the examining magistrate if it would be OK. He had no objection.

“But only him!” he warned me. “Apart from him, you are to talk to no one. Is that understood?”

 

Marc and I are now back home. I managed to type 263 pages of this report into my computer while I was at the Suvretta House. On the very first day after our return Mr. Kellerhans, the examining magistrate, summoned me to his office. This time he was much friendlier than he had been at the earlier interviews. The scientists had discovered exonerating evidence; the Swiss secret service had contacted their colleagues in Iran. Because Switzerland had excellent diplomatic relations with Iran and what's more were representing the U.S.A. in the country many things seemed possible that I would not have believed before.

“From the very first day that we interviewed you, we started trying to locate Mr. Shubika…”

“Who on earth is that?” I interrupted him.

“The four-star general from the barracks in Taftan. It is not acceptable for foreign agents to be active in the territory of the Swiss Confederation. Let alone commit murder.”

“So you believe me now?”

Kellerhans turned to me: “Belief is the domain of religion. I believe nothing. But I and several of our experts do not preclude the possibility that your version of events is true.”

“And? Have you found the general? And how does that help you?”

The examining magistrate rocked in his chair, spread his fingers, and laid his hands on his desk. Tilting his head slightly, he said:

“The general was taken over by Tomy in Taftan, so you said. That means, he can confirm Tomy's existence. What's more, he killed Chantal. Why?” Kellerhans leaned forward and raised a finger: “He is the key to this case.”

He looked at me with an uncharacteristically friendly expression on his face. “Anyway, we still haven't found Ms. Babey's body. And neither have the French.”

Again sworn to secrecy, I was told that the Swiss secret service had gotten involved and had been in contact with some of their highest-ranking counterparts in both France and Iran. In both cases, the circle of those in the know was kept extremely small—the case could not be allowed to become public. An incident such as this was not only one for the astronomers who have been searching in vain for extraterrestrial life for decades, but could throw the general public into panic. I should just think about it, he said, and I would know he was right.

“Has Tomy contacted you again since his…erm …departure?”

“No,” I answered truthfully. “To be honest, I am expecting him at any moment.”

“When he … erm … arrives, could you perhaps ask him if he would take me over?”

“
You?
” I stared at Kellerhans slack-jawed.

“Just think about it, Mr. von Däniken,” he said. “If Tomy can take
me
over then
you
are completely off the hook. Do you understand? Then I will close your file and bury it.”

I scratched my chin. Tomy should take over the examining magistrate? For the time being, I didn't have any idea where

Tomy was. Since that evening when he had taken his leave of us, telling us that he was returning to his quiescent state in a Buddhist monk, we hadn't heard a peep. So I promised Mr. Kellerhans that I would pass on his request as soon as Tomy made contact. I still had one question for him, though. How long was he expecting to keep this case under wraps?

“That's not for me to decide,” he replied. “But the usual period of time for cases like this is twenty years.”

Nineteen years have now passed since that day. One year more or less can hardly matter now. I have decided, regardless of my obligations, to tell the whole story. Even if it is only in the form of a novel.

* * *

It had gotten cold outside. Even the lowlands—Solothurn was only a few hundred meters above sea level—were covered in snow. A roaring fire burnt every night in the hearth of the Villa Serdang on the road from Feldbrunnen on the outskirts of Solothurn. Every now and again Marc turned up for dinner. The housemaid, Edith, had long since handed in her notice. She couldn't live under the same roof as murderers, she wrote in her resignation letter. The examining magistrate gave me permission to leave my property and move freely around Switzerland. I hardly went to my office at all, only dealing with those things I absolutely had to. I read a lot of newspapers, or went Christmas shopping with Elisabeth. We had told my sister Leni all about Tomy's demise and hammered into her that some high state office had ordered that the whole affair remain secret. But inside, I remained churned up and agitated. Why didn't Tomy get in contact? What could have happened to him?

Christmas Eve went off as it always did. Leni and Elisabeth cooked various vegetables, made salads and desserts: I was responsible for the deliciously browned turkey. Our entire extended family, including brothers- and sisters-in-law and associated children feasted merrily around a large oval table. Candles flickered, reflecting in the glasses, and the scent of pine needles drifted pleasantly through the house. Presents, laughter and thank-you kisses and hugs were the order of the night. In the background, Christmas music played softly over the speakers of the stereo.