View of High Street with East and Old Parish Church in Forfar, Scotland.
"W.S." is a short fantasy horror story with elements of metafiction by the British author L.P. Hartley. It was first published in 1954 as part of the anthology The White Wand and Other Stories. It is included in the 1983 anthology Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories.
The plot is set in motion when the author Walter Streeter receives a postcard from the Scottish town Forfar. The postcard appears at first to be a piece of fan mail, although it also includes some criticism of Streeter's work that he takes to heart. The initials W.S. are the only name that the writer of the postcard gives. In the weeks that follow, Streeter receives more postcards from W.S. that gradually become less friendly and increasingly more critical in tone. The postcards eventually become threatening and Streeter realizes that they are being sent from locations that are increasingly closer to where he lives.
Plot[]
The writer Walter Streeter receives a lot of mail from members of the public. He always replies to it, even though that takes away time and effort that he would prefer to put to use in writing his novels. He is therefore quite relieved when he sees that the postcard sent to him by someone who signs W.S. does not have a return address. The postcard is from the Scottish town Forfar. It is generally complimentary to Streeter's work, although it also asks, "Do you really get to grips with people?" Streeter takes note of the criticism. It strikes him that most of the characters he writes about are either projections of himself or the opposite of himself. He does not find the picture on the postcard very interesting so he throws it away.
The second postcard that Streeter receives from W.S. was sent from Berwick-upon-Tweed, the most northerly town in England, near to the Scottish border. It states that some people consider Streeter's fiction to be other worldly and that he should perhaps decide in which world his stories take place. Streeter wonders if what he has been writing is realistic. He also wonders if the postcard was sent by a man or a woman. The handwriting looks like that of a man but the subtle and probing criticism seems more like that of a woman. Streeter throws the postcard on his fire.
The third postcard that Streeter receives has a picture of York Minster, the cathedral in York, on it. W.S. comments on how Streeter is fond of cathedrals and is rather dismissive towards smaller churches. That is true and Streeter wonders how W.S. knows it. He had noticed before that W.S. had the same initials that he did. He did not think much of it. however, because the initials W.S. are not very uncommon. Walter Streeter shares them with the writers W. Somerset Maugham and William Shakespeare among others. For the first time, however, Streeter begins to wonder if he has a split personality and is sending the postcards to himself. The handwriting looks as if it might be disguised and looks a little like his own. Streeter shows the postcard to a friend. He says that the postcard was probably written by a woman who is mad but not dangerous. Streeter cannot bring himself to throw the postcard away and instead puts it behind the clock on his mantelpiece.
The fourth postcard is from Coventry. W.S. writes, "I have been rereading your novels, living in them, you might say." W.S. also comments on getting nearer to Streeter and on the possibility of coming to grips with him soon. For the first time, Streeter realizes that the postcards are being sent from locations that are increasingly closer to where he lives. With the help of an atlas, Streeter finds out that each new postcard was sent from somewhere eighty miles away from where the previous one was sent. The town where he lives in the West Country is ninety miles from Coventry.
Streeter goes to the police. The police take the threat against Streeter seriously and tell him to contact them if he receives any more postcards. Streeter is asked by the police if he has any enemies. He replies that he des not. On the way home, Streeter considers that he does not have any enemies because the only hate he ever directs towards anyone is done in his writing towards characters in his novels. Streeter has not written about many truly villainous characters recently because he does not think it is realistic. He believes that most people are neither completely good nor completely bad and that villains like Iago in Shakespeare's Othello do not exist in real life. Earlier in his writing career, however, Streeter wrote about some thoroughly evil people. He remembers a particularly nasty character from one of his early novels who eventually received the death penalty for his crimes. Streeter enjoyed directing all his hatred towards that character while he wrote. He cannot, however, remember the character's name. Looking at the novel again, Streeter sees that he named him William Stainesforth.
The fifth postcard is from Gloucester, the city where William Stainesforth went to prison in Streeter's novel. W.S. writes that he will see Streeter during the weekend and will come to grips with him. Streeter requests police protection over the weekend. It is Tuesday when Streeter asks the police for protection. He worries at first that he will have difficulty making it through the week. Streeter, however, has a highly productive week. He finds that he is writing more and better than he had done for some time. When Friday comes, however, Streeter starts to become anxious and asks himself, "When does a weekend begin?"
On Saturday afternoon, Streeter begins to feel safe when he sees a police officer in the street outside his home. He looks out of the window several more times and is relieved each time to see that the policeman is still there. Streeter once asks his housekeeper to look out and see if the policeman is still there. She says that she could not see anyone. Streeter is not overly concerned, however, he concludes that the policeman must have been walking about when she looked out of the window.
The doorbell rings. Streeter opens the door to find the policeman standing there. Streeter invites him in and offers him a drink. He notices that there are snowflakes on the policeman's cape and helmet. The telephone rings. Streeter goes into another room to answer it. The call is from the police station, apologizing for having forgotten to provide Streeter with any police protection. Streeter is told that the man currently inside his house was not sent by the local police station and that some real police officers will arrive there soon.
The man dressed as a police officer comes into the room. He says that, having been allowed to come inside the house, he is now free to go anywhere he likes within it. He says that he knows that because he was once a policeman. He has, however, also been other things, including a thief, a pimp, a blackmailer and a murderer. He adds, "You should know," and says that Streeter has written about him. Streeter says that he has never seen the man before and does not know him. The man replies that he is Streeter's creation, William Stainesforth. He asks Streeter what the character William Stainesforth would do if he came face to face with the father who allowed him to be hanged. He goes on to say that he will allow Streeter to live if the author can tell him just one good thing about his creation. Stainesforth says that, although he only has one arm, he can still strangle Streeter with it. Streeter goes through the entire novel that he wrote about Stainesforth in his mind. He cannot find anything good about Stainesforth in it. He then declares that Stainesforth was trying to trick him by getting him to whitewash his thoroughly evil character and that he would rather die than say anything positive about him. Stainesforth replies, "Then die!"
When police officers come to Streeter's home, they find the writer dead. He has obviously been strangled, and his attacker has gone. The most confusing thing is that there are snowflakes on Streeter's body even though it did not snow anywhere near where he lived.