Dennis Wheatley
"The Devil Rides Out"
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OCR by Sergey Gazizyanov, [email protected]
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*
First published by
Hutchinson & Co (Publishers) Ltd 1934
First Arrow edition 1954
Second impression 1958
Third impression 1958
Fourth impression 1959
Fifth impression 1963
Sixth impression 1964
Seventh impression 1965
Eighth impression 1966
Ninth impression 1968
This new edition June 1969
Reprinted November 1969
Reprinted September 1970
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Made and printed in Great
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THE DEVIL RIDES OUT
*
The Devil Rides Out is a
Black Magic story by Dennis
Wheatley, who writes: 'I,
personally, have never
assisted at, or participated
in, any ceremony connected
with Magic-Black or White.
Should any of my readers
incline to a serious study of
the subject and thus come
into contact with a man or
woman of Power, I feel that
it is only right to urge
them, most strongly, to
refrain from being drawn info
the practice of the Secret
Art in any way. My own
observations have led me to
an absolute conviction that
to do so would bring them
into dangers of a very real
and concrete nature.'
Contents
1. The Incomplete Reunion
2. The Curious Guests of Mr. Simon Aron
3. The Esoteric Doctrine
4. The Silent House
5. Embodied Evil
6. The Secret Art
7. De Richleau Plans a Campaign
8. Rex Van Ryn Opens the Attack
9. The Countess D'Urfe Talks of Many Curious Things
10. Tanith Proves Stubborn
11. The Truth Will Always Out
12. The Grim Prophecy
13. The Defeat of Rex Van Ryn
14. The Duke de Richleau Takes the Field
15. The Road to the Sabbat
16. The Sabbat
17. Evil Triumphant
18. The Power of Light
19. The Ancient Sanctuary
20. The Four Horsemen
21. Cardinals Folly
22. The Satanist
23. The Pride of Peacocks
24. The Scepticism of Richard Eaton
25. The Talisman of Set
26. Rex Learns of the Undead
27. Within the Pentacle
28. Necromancy
29. Simon Aron Takes a View
30. Out Into the Fog
31. The Man With the Jagged Ear
32. The Gateway of the Pit
33. Death of a Man Unknown, From Natural Causes
To my old friend
MERVYN BARON
of whom, in these days, I see
far too little but whose
companionship, both in good
times and in bad, has been to
me a never-failing joy.
D.W.
Author's Note
I desire to state that I, personally, have never assisted at,
or participated in, any ceremony connected with Magic-Black or
White.
The literature of occultism is so immense that any
conscientious writer can obtain from it abundant material for the
background of a romance such as this.
In the present case I have spared no pains to secure accuracy
of detail from existing accounts when describing magical rites or
formulas for protection against evil, and these have been verified
in conversation with certain persons, sought out for that purpose
who are actual practitioners of the Art.
All the characters and situations in this book are entirely
imaginary but, in the inquiry necessary to the writing of it, I
found ample evidence that Black Magic is still practised in London,
and other cities, at the present day.
Should any of my readers incline to a serious study of the
subject, and thus come into contact with a man or woman of Power, I
feel that it is only right to urge them, most strongly, to refrain
from being drawn into the practice of the Secret Art in any way. My
own observations have led me to an absolute conviction that to do so
would bring them into dangers of a very real and concrete nature.
Dennis Wheatley
1
The Incomplete Reunion
The Duke de Richleau and Rex Van had gone in to dinner at eight
o'clock, but coffee was not served tilt after ten.
An appetite in keeping with his mighty frame had enabled Van Ryn
to do ample justice to each well-chosen course and, as was his
custom each time the young American arrived in England, the Duke had
produced his finest wines for this, their reunion dinner at his
flat.
A casual observer might well have considered it a strange
friendship, but despite their difference in age and race, appearance
and tradition, a real devotion existed between the two.
Some few years earlier Rex's foolhardiness had landed him in a
Soviet prison, and the elderly French exile had put aside his
peaceful existence as art connoisseur and dilettante to search for
him in Russia. Together they had learned the dangerous secret of
'The Forbidden Territory' and travelled many thousand verts pursued
by the merciless agents of the Ogpu.
There had been others too in that strange adventure; young
Richard Eaton, and the little Princess Marie Lou whom he had
brought out of Russia as his bride; but as Rex accepted a long Hoyo
de Monterrey from the cedar cabinet which the Duke's man presented
to him his thoughts were not of the Eatons, living now so happily
with their little daughter Fleur in their lovely old country home
near Kidderminster. He was thinking of that third companion whose
subtle brain and shy, nervous courage had proved so great an aid
when they were hunted like hares through the length and breadth of
Russia, the frail narrow-shouldered English Jew-Simon Aron.
'What could possibly have kept Simon from being with them
tonight,' Rex was wondering. He had never failed before to make a
third at these reunion dinners, and why had the Duke brushed aside
his inquiries about him in such an offhand manner. There was
something queer behind De Richleau's reticence, and Rex had a
feeling that for all his host's easy charm and bland, witty
conversation something had gone seriously wrong.
He slowly revolved some of the Duke's wonderful old brandy in a
bowl-shaped glass, while he watched the servant preparing to leave
the room. Then, as the door closed, he set it down and addressed De
Richleau almost abruptly.
'Well, I'm thinking it's about time for you to spill the beans.'
The Duke inhaled the first cloud of fragrant smoke from another
of those long Hoyos which were his especial pride, and answered
guardedly. 'Had you not better tell me Rex, to what particular beans
you refer?'
'Simon of course! For years now the three of us have dined
together on my first night, each time I've come across, and you were
too mighty casual to be natural when I asked about him before
dinner. Why isn't he here?'
'Why, indeed, my friend?' the Duke repeated, running the tips of
his fingers down his lean handsome face. 'I asked him, and told him
that your ship docked this morning, but he declined to honour us
tonight.'
'Is he ill then?'
'No, as far as I know he's perfectly well-at all events he was at
his office today.'
'He must have had a date then that he couldn't scrap, or some
mighty urgent work. Nothing less could induce him to let us down on
one of these occasions. They've become-well, in a way, almost sacred
to our friendship.'
'On the contrary he is at home alone tonight. He made his
apologies of course, something about resting for a Bridge Tournament
that starts:'
'Bridge Tournament my foot!' exclaimed Rex angrily. 'He'd never
let that interfere between us three-it sounds mighty fishy to me.
When did you see him last?'
'About three months ago.'
'What! But that's incredible. Now look here!' Rex thrust the onyx
ash-tray from in front of him, and leaned across the table. 'You
haven't quarrelled-have you?'
De Richleau shook his head. 'If you were my age, Rex, and had no
children, then met two younger men who gave you their affection, and
had all the attributes you could wish for in your sons, how would it
be possible for you to quarrel with either of them?'
'That's so, but three months is a whale of a while for friends
who are accustomed to meet two or three times a week. I just don't
get this thing at all, and you're being a sight too reticent about
it. Come on now-what do you know?'
The grey eyes of almost piercing brilliance which gave such
character to De Richleau's face, lit up. That,' he said suddenly,
'is just the trouble. I don't know anything.'
'But you fear that, to use his own phrase, Simon's "in a muddle-a
really nasty muddle" eh? And you're a little hurt that he hasn't
brought his worry to you.'
'To whom else should he turn if not to one of us-and you were in
the States.'
'Richard maybe, he's an even older friend of Simon's than we
are.'
'No. I spent last week-end at Cardinals Folly and neither Richard
nor Marie Lou could tell me anything. They haven't seen him since he
went down to stay last Christmas and arrived with a dozen crates of
toys for Fleur.'
'How like him!' Rex's gargantuan laugh rang suddenly through the
room. 'I might have known the trunkful I brought over would be small
fry if you and Simon have been busy on that child.'
'Well I can only conclude that poor Simon is "in a muddle" as you
say, or he would never treat us all like this.'
'But what sort of a muddle?' Rex brought his leg-of mutton fist
crashing down on the table angrily. 'I can't think of a thing where
he wouldn't turn to us.'
'Money,' suggested the Duke, 'is the one thing that with his
queer sensitive nature he might not care to discuss with even his
closest friends.'
'I doubt it being that. My old man has a wonderful opinion of
Simon's financial ability and he handles a big portion of our
interests on this side. I'm pretty sure we'd be wise to it if he'd
burned his fingers on the market. It sounds as if he'd gone bats
about some woman to me.'
De Richleau's face was lit by his faintly cynical smile for a
moment. 'No,' he said slowly. 'A man in love turns naturally to his
friends for congratulation or sympathy as his fortune with a woman
proves good or ill. It can't be that.'
For a little the two friends sat staring at each other in silence
across the low jade bowl with its trailing sprays of orchids: Rex,
giant shouldered, virile and powerful, his ugly, attractive,
humorous young face clouded with anxiety, the Duke, a slim, delicate-
looking man, somewhat about middle height, with slender, fragile
hands and greying hair, but with no trace of weakness in his fine,
distinguished face. His aquiline nose, broad forehead and grey
'devil's' eyebrows might well have replaced those of the cavalier in
the Van Dyck that gazed down from the opposite wall. Instead of the
conventional black, he wore a claret coloured vicuna smoking suit,
with silk lapels and braided fastenings; this touch of colour
increased his likeness to the portrait. He broke the silence
suddenly.
'Have you by any chance ever heard of a Mr. Mocata, Rex?'
'Nope. Who is he anyway?'
'A new friend of Simon's who has been staying with him these last
few months.'
'What-at his Club?'
'No-no, Simon no longer lives at his Club. I thought you knew. He
bought a house last February, a big, rambling old place tucked away
at the end of a cul-de-sac off one of those quiet residential
streets in St. John's Wood.'
'Why, that's right out past Regent's Park-isn't it? What's he
want with a place out there when there are any number of nice little
houses to let in Mayfair?'
'Another mystery, my friend.' The Duke's thin lips creased into a
smile. 'He said he wanted a garden, that's all I can tell you.'
'Simon! A garden!' Rex chuckled. 'That's a good story I'll say.
Simon doesn't know a geranium from a fuchsia. His botany is limited
to an outsized florist's bill for bunching his women friends from
shops, and why should a bachelor like Simon start running a big
house at all?'
'Perhaps Mr. Mocata could tell you,' murmured De Richleau mildly,
'or the queer servant that he has imported,'
'Have you ever seen this bird-Mocata I mean?'
'Yes, I called one evening about six weeks ago. Simon was out so
Mocata received me.'
'And what did you make of him?'
'I disliked him intensely. He's a pot-bellied, bald-headed person
of about sixty, with large, protuberant, fishy eyes, limp hands, and
a most unattractive lisp. He reminded me of a large white slug.'
'What about this servant that you mention?'
'I only saw him for a moment when he crossed the hall, but he
reminded me in a most unpleasant way of the Bogey Man with whom I
used to be threatened in my infancy.'
'Why, is he a black?'
'Yes. A Malagasy I should think.'
Rex frowned. 'Now what in heck is that?'
'A native of Madagascar. They are a curious people, half-Negro
and half-Polynesian. This great brute stands about six foot eight,
and the one glimpse I had of his eyes made me want to shoot him on
sight. He's a "bad black" if ever I saw one, and I've travelled, as
you know, in my time.'
'Do you know any more about these people?' asked Rex grimly.
'Not a thing.'
'Well, I'm not given to worry, but I've heard quite enough to get
me scared for Simon. He's in some jam or he'd never be housing
people like that.'
The Duke gently laid the long, blue-grey ash of his cigar in the
onyx ash-tray. 'There is not a doubt,' he said slowly, 'that Simon
is involved in some very queer business, but I have been stifling my
anxiety until your arrival. You see I wanted to hear your views
before taking the very exceptional step of -yes butting in-is the
expression, on the private affairs of even so intimate a friend. The
question is now-what are we to do?'
'Do!' Rex thrust back his chair and drew himself up to his full
magnificent height. 'We're going up to that house to have a little
heart-to-heart talk with Simon-right now!'
'I'm glad,' said De Richleau quietly, 'you feel like that, be
cause I ordered the car for half past ten. Shall we go?'
2
The Curious Guests of Mr. Simon Aron
As De Richleau's Hispano drew up at the dead end of the dark cul-
de-sac in St. John's Wood, Rex slipped out of the car and looked
about him. They were shut in by the high walls of neighbouring
gardens and, above a blank expanse of brick in which a single,
narrow door was visible, the upper stones of Simon's house showed
vague and mysterious among whispering trees.
'Ugh!' he exclaimed with a little shudder as a few drops splashed
upon his face from the dark branches overhead. 'What a dismal
hole-we might be in a graveyard.'
The Duke pressed the bell, and turning up the sable collar of his
coat against a slight drizzle which made the April night seem chill
and friendless, stepped back to get a better view of the premises.
'Hello! Simon's got an observatory here,' he remarked. 'I didn't
notice that on my previous visit.'
'So he has.' Rex followed De Richleau's glance to a dome that
crowned the house, but at that moment an electric globe suddenly
flared into life about their heads, and the door in the wall swung
open disclosing a sallow-faced manservant in dark livery.
'Mr. Simon Aron?' inquired De Richleau, but the man was already
motioning them to enter, so they followed him up a short covered
path and the door in the wall clanged to behind them,
The vestibule of the house was dimly lit, but Rex, who never wore
a coat or hat in the evening, noticed that two sets of outdoor
apparel lay, neatly folded, on a long console table as the silent
footman relieved De Richleau of his wraps. Evidently friend Simon
had other visitors.
'Maybe Mr. Aron's in conference and won't want to be disturbed,'
he said to the sallow-faced servant with a sudden feeling of guilt
at their intrusion. Perhaps, after all, their fears for Simon were
quite groundless and his neglect only due to a prolonged period of
intense activity on the markets, but the man only bowed and led them
across the hall.
'The fellow's a mute,' whispered the Duke. 'Deaf and dumb I'm
certain,' As he spoke the servant flung open a couple of large
double doors and stood waiting for them to enter.
A long, narrow room, opening into a wide salon, stretched before
them. Both were decorated in the lavish magnificence of the Louis
Seize period, but for the moment the dazzling brilliance of the
lighting prevented them taking in the details of the parquet floors,
the crystal mirrors, the gilded furniture and beautifully wrought
tapestries.
Rex was the first to recover and with a quick intake of breath he
clutched De Richleau's arm. 'By Jove she's here!' he muttered almost
inaudibly, his eyes riveted on a tall, graceful girl who stood some
yards away at tbe entrance of the salon talking to Simon.
Three times in the last eighteen months he had chanced upon that
strange, wise, beautiful face, with the deep eyes beneath heavy lids
that seemed so full of secrets and gave the lovely face a curiously
ageless look-so that despite her apparent youth she was as old
as-'Yes, as old as sin,' Rex caught himself thinking.
He had seen her first in a restaurant in Budapest; months later
again, in a traffic jam when his car was wedged beside hers in New
York, and then, strangely enough, riding along a road with three
men, in the country ten miles outside Buenos Aires. How
extraordinary that he should find her here-and what luck. He smiled
quickly at the thought that Simon could not fail to introduce him.
De Richleau's glance was riveted upon their friend. With an
abrupt movement Simon turned towards them. For a second he seemed
completely at a loss, his full, sensual mouth hung open to twice its
normal extent and his receding jaw almost disappeared behind his
white tie, while his dark eyes were filled with amazement and
something suspiciously like fear, but he recovered almost instantly
and his old smile flashed out as he came forward to greet them.
'My dear Simon,' the Duke's voice was a silken purr. 'How can we
apologise for breaking in on you like this?'
'Sure, we hadn't a notion you were throwing a party,' boomed
Rex, his glance following the girl who had moved off to join
another woman and three men who were talking together in the inner
room.
'But I'm delighted,' murmured Simon genially. 'Delighted to see
you both-only got a few friends-meeting of a little society I belong
to-that's all.'
Then we couldn't dream of interrupting you, could we Rex?' De
Richleau demurred with well-assumed innocence.
'Why, certainly not, we wouldn't even have come in if that
servant of yours hadn't taken us for some other folks you're
expecting.' But despite their apparent unwillingness to intrude,
neither of the two made any gesture of withdrawal and, mentally, De
Richleau gave Simon full marks for the way in which he accepted
their obviously unwelcome presence.
'I'm most terribly sorry about dinner to-night,' he was pro
claiming earnestly. 'Meant to rest for my bridge, I simply have to
these days, to be any good-even forgot till six o'clock that I had
these people coming.'
'How fortunate for you Simon that your larder is so well
stocked.' The Duke could not resist the gentle dig as his glance
fell on a long buffet spread with a collation which would have
rivalled the cold table in any great hotel.
'I 'phoned Ferraro,' parried Simon glibly. "The Berkeley never
lets me down. Would have asked you to drop in, but er-with this
meeting on I felt you'd be bored.'
'Bored! Not a bit, but we are keeping you from your other
guests.' With an airy gesture De Richleau waved his hand in the
direction of the inner room.
'Sure,' agreed Rex heartily, as he laid a large hand on Simon's
arm and gently propelled him towards the salon. 'Don't you worry
about us, we'll just take a glass of wine off you and fade away.'
His eyes were fixed again on the pale oval face of the girl.
Simon's glance flickered swiftly towards the Duke, who ignored,
with a guileless smile, his obvious reluctance for them to meet his
other friends, and noted with amusement that he avoided any proper
introduction.
'Er-er-two very old friends of mine,' he said, with his little
nervous cough as he interchanged a swift look with a fleshy, moon-
faced man whom De Richleau knew to be Mocata.
'Well, well, how nice,' the bald man lisped with unsmiling eyes.
'It is a pleasure always to welcome any friends of Simon's.'
De Richleau gave him a frigid bow and thought of reminding him
coldly that Simon's welcome was sufficient in his own house, but for
the moment it was policy to hide his antagonism so he replied
politely that Mocata was most kind, then, with the ease which
characterised all his movements, he turned his attention to an
elderly lady who was seated near by.
She was a woman of advanced age but fine presence, richly dressed
and almost weighed down with heavy jewellery. Between her fingers
she held the stub of a fat cigar at which she was puffing
vigorously.
'Madame.' The Duke drew a case containing the long Hoyos from his
pocket and bent towards her. 'Your cigar is almost finished, permit
me to offer you one of mine.'
She regarded him for a moment with piercingly bright eyes, then
stretched out a fat, beringed hand. 'Sank you, Monsieur, I see you
are a connoisseur.' With her beaked, parrot nose she sniffed at the
cigar appreciatively. 'But I have not seen you at our other
meetings, what ees your name?'
'De Richleau, Madame, and yours?'
'De Richleau I a maestro indeed.' She nodded heavily. 'Je suis
Madame D'Urfe, you will 'ave heard of me.'
'But certainly.' The Duke bowed again. 'Do you think we shall
have a good meeting tonight?'
'If the sky clears we should learn much,' answered the old lady
cryptically.
'Ho! Ho!' thought the Duke. 'We are about to make use of Simon's
observatory it seems. Good, let us learn more.' But before he could
pump the elderly Frenchwoman further, Simon deftly interrupted the
conversation and drew him away.
'So you have taken up the study of the stars, my friend,'
remarked the Duke as his host led him to the buffet.
'Oh, er-yes. Find astronomy very interesting, you know. Have some
caviare?' Simon's eyes flickered anxiously towards Rex, who was deep
in conversation with the girl.
As he admired her burnished hair and slumbrous eyes, for a moment
the Duke was reminded of a Botticelli painting. She had, he thought,
that angel look with nothing Christian in it peculiar to women born
out of their time, the golden virgin to the outward eye whose veins
were filled with unlit fire. A rare cinquecento type who should have
lived in the Italy of the Borgias. Then he turned again to Simon.
'It was because of the observatory then that you acquired this
house, I suppose?'
'Yes. You must come up one night and we'll watch a few stars
together.' Something of the old warmth had crept into Simon's tone
and he was obviously in earnest as he offered the invitation, but
the Duke was not deceived into believing that he was welcome on the
present occasion.
'Thank you, I should enjoy that,' he said promptly, while over
Simon's shoulder he studied the other two men who made up the party.
One, a tall, fair fellow, stood talking to Mocata. His thin, flaxen
hair brushed flatly back, and whose queer, light eyes proclaimed him
an Albino; the other, a stout man dressed in a green plaid and
ginger kilt, was walking softly up and down with his hands clasped
behind his back, muttering to himself inaudibly. His wild, flowing
white hair and curious costume suggested an Irish bard.
'Altogether a most unprepossessing lot,' thought the Duke, and
his opinion was not improved by three new arrivals. A grave-faced
Chinaman wearing the robes of a Mandarin, whose slit eyes betrayed a
cold, merciless nature: a Eurasian with only one arm, the left, and
a tall, thin woman with a scraggy throat and beetling eyebrows which
met across the bridge of her nose.
Mocata received them as though he were the host, but as the tall
woman bore down on Simon he promptly left the Duke, who guessed that
the move was to get out of earshot. However, the lady's greeting in
a high-pitched Middle Western accent came clearly to him.
'Waal, Simon, all excitement about what we'll learn tonight? It
should help a heap, this being your natal conjunction.'
'Ha! Ha!' said De Richleau to himself. 'Now I begin to understand
a little and I like this party even less,' Then, with the idea of
trying to verify his surmise, he turned towards the one-armed
Eurasian, but Simon-apparently guessing his intention-quickly
excused himself to the American woman, and cut off the Duke's
advance.
'So, my young friend,' thought De Richleau, 'you mean to prevent
me from obtaining any further information about this strange
gathering, do you? Ail right! I'll twist your tail a little,' and he
remarked sweetly:
'Did you say that you were interested in Astronomy or Astrology,
Simon? There is a distinct difference you know.'
'Oh, Astronomy, of course.' Simon ran a finger down his long,
beak-like nose. 'It is nice to see you again-have some more
champagne?'
'Thank you, no, later perhaps.' The Duke smothered a smile as he
caught Mocata, who had overheard him, exchange a quick look with
Simon.
'Wish this were an ordinary meeting,' Simon said, a moment later,
with an uneasy frown. Then I'd ask you to stay, but we're going
through the Society's annual balance-sheet tonight -and you and Rex
not being members you know . . .'
'Quite, quite, my dear fellow, of course,' De Richleau agreed
amicably, while to himself he thought, That's a nasty fence young
sly-boots has put up for me, but I'll be damned if I go before I
find out for certain what I came for.' Then he added in a cheerful
whisper: 'I should have gone before but Rex seems so interested in
the young woman in green, I want to give him as long as possible.'
'My dear chap,' Simon protested, 'I feel horribly embarrassed at
having to ask you to go at all.'
A fat, oily-looking Babu in a salmon-pink turban and gown had
just arrived and was shaking hands with Mocata; behind him came a
red-faced Teuton, who suffered the deformity of a hare lip.
Simon stepped quickly forward again as the two advanced, but De
Richleau once more caught the first words which were snuffled out by
the hare-lipped man.
'Well, Abraham, wie geht es?' then there came the fulsome chuckle
of the fleshy Indian. 'You must not call him that, it is unlucky to
do so before the great night.'
The devil it is!' muttered the Duke to himself, but Simon had
left the other two with almost indecent haste in order to rejoin
him, so he said with a smile: 'I gather you are about to execute
Deed Poll, my friend?'
'Eh!' Simon exclaimed with a slight start.
To change your name,' De Richleau supplemented.
'Ner.' He shook his head rapidly as he uttered the curious
negative that he often used. It came of his saying 'No' without
troubling to close the lips of his full mouth. 'Ner-that's only a
sort of joke we have between us-a sort of initiation ceremony-I'm
not a full member yet.'
'I see, then you have ceremonies in your Astronomical Society-how
interesting!'
As he spoke De Richleau, out of the corner of his eye, saw Mocata
make a quick sign to Simon and then glance at the ormolu clock on
the mantelpiece; so to save his host the awkwardness of having
actually to request his departure, he exclaimed: 'Dear mel Twenty
past eleven, I had no idea it was so late. I must drag Rex away from
that lovely lady after all, I fear.'
'Well, if you must go.' Simon looked embarrassed and worried, but
catching Mocata's eye again, he promptly led the way over to his
other unwelcome guest.
Rex gave a happy grin as they came up. This is marvellous Simon.
I've been getting glimpses of this lady in different continents
these two years past, and she seems to recall having seen me too.
It's just great that we should become acquainted at last through
you.' Then he smiled quickly at the girl: 'May I present my friend
De Richfeau? Duke, this is Miss Tanith.'
De Richleau bent over her long, almost transparent hand and
raised it to his lips. 'How unfortunate I am,' he said with old-
fashioned gallantry, 'to be presented to you only in time to say
good-bye, and perhaps gain your displeasure by taking your new
friend with me as well.'
'But,' she regarded him steadily out of large, clear, amber eyes.
Surely you do not depart before the ceremony?'
'I fear we must. We are not members of your er-Circle you see,
only old friends of Simon's.'
A strange look of annoyance and uncertainty crept into her
glance, and the Duke guessed that she was searching her mind for any
indiscretions she might have committed in her conversation with Rex.
Then she shrugged lightly and, with a brief inclination of the head
which dismissed them both, turned coldly away.
The Duke took Simon's arm affectionately, as the three friends
left the salon. 'I wonder,' he said persuasively, 'if you could
spare me just two minutes before we go-no more I promise you.'
'Rather, of course.' Simon seemed now to have regained his old
joviality. 'I'll never forgive myself for missing your dinner
tonight-this wretched meeting-and I've seen nothing of you for
weeks. Now Rex is over we must throw a party together.'
'We will, we will,' De Richleau agreed heartily, 'but listen; is
not Mars in conjunction with Venus tonight?'
'Ner,' Simon replied promptly. 'With Saturn, that's what they've
all come to see.'
'Ah, Saturn! My Astronomy is so rusty, but I saw some mention of
it in the paper yesterday, and at one time I was a keen student of
the Stars. Would it be asking too much my dear fellow, to have just
one peep at it through your telescope? We should hardly delay your
meeting for five minutes.'
Simon's hesitation was barely perceptible before he nodded his
bird-like head with vigorous assent. 'Um, that's all right- they
haven't all arrived yet-let's go up.' Then, with his hands thrust
deep in the trouser pockets of his exceedingly well-cut dress suit,
he led them hurriedly through the hall and up three flights of
stairs.'
De Richleau followed more slowly. Stairs were the one thing which
ruffled his otherwise equable temper and he had no desire to lose it
now. By the time he arrived in the lofty chamber, with Rex behind
him, Simon had all the lights switched on.
'Well you've certainly gone in for it properly,' Rex remarked as
he surveyed the powerful telescope slanting to the roof and a whole
arsenal of sextants, spheres and other astrological impedimenta
ranged about the room.
'It's rather an exact science you see,' Simon volunteered.
'Quite,' agreed the Duke briefly. 'But I wonder, a little, that
you should consider charts of the Macrocosm necessary to your
studies.
'Oh, those!' Simon shrugged his narrow shoulders as he glanced
around the walls. 'They're only for fun-relics of the Alchemistic
nonsense in the Middle Ages, but quite suitable for decoration.'
'How clever of you to carry out your scheme of decoration on the
floor as well.' The Duke was thoughtfully regarding a five-pointed
star enclosed within two circles between which numerous mystic
characters in Greek and Hebrew had been carefully drawn.
'Yes, good idea, wasn't it?' Simon tittered into his hand. It was
the familiar gesture which both his friends knew so well, yet
somehow his chuckle had not quite its usual ring.
The silence that followed was a little awkward and in it, all
three plainly heard a muffled scratching noise that seemed to come
from a large wicker basket placed against the wall.
'You've got mice here, Simon,' said Rex casually, but De Richleau
had stiffened where he stood. Then, before Simon could bar his way,
he leapt towards the hamper and ripped open the lid.
'Stop that!' cried Simon angrily, and dashing forward he forced
it shut again, but too late, for within the basket the Duke had seen
two living pinioned fowls-a black cock and a white hen.
With a sudden access of bitter fury he turned on Simon, and
seizing him by his silk lapels, shook him as a terrier shakes a rat.
'You fool,' he thundered. 'I'd rather see you dead than monkeying
with Black Magic.'
3
The Esoteric Doctrine
'Take-take your hands off me,' Simon gasped.
His dark eyes blazed in a face that had gone deathly white and
only a superhuman effort enabled him to keep his clenched fists
pressed to his sides.
In another second he would have hit the Duke, but Rex, a head
taller than either of them, laid a mighty hand on the shoulder of
each and forced them apart.
'Have a heart now, just what is all this?' His quiet, familiar
voice, with its faint American intonation, sobered the others
immediately and De Richleau, swinging on his heel, strode to the
other side of the observatory, where he stood for a moment, with his
back towards them, regaining control of his emotions.
Simon, panting a little, gave a quick, nervous wriggle of his
bird-like head and smoothed out the lapels of his evening coat.
'Now-I'll tell you,' he said jerkily, 'I never asked either of
you to come here tonight, and even my oldest friends have no right
to butt in on my private-affairs. I think you'd better go.'
The Duke turned, passing one hand over his greying hair. All
trace of his astonishing outburst had disappeared and he was once
more the handsome, distinguished figure that they knew so well.
'I'm sorry, Simon,' he said gravely. 'But I felt as a father
might who sees his child trying to pick live coals out of the fire.'
'I'm not a child,' muttered Simon, sullenly.
'No, but I could not have more affection for you if you were
actually my son, and it is useless now to deny that you are playing
the most dangerous game which has ever been known to mankind
throughout the ages.'
'Oh, come,' a quick smile spread over Rex's ugly, attractive
face. 'That's a gross exaggeration. What's the harm if Simon wants
to try out a few old parlour games?'
'Parlour games!' De Richleau took him up sharply. 'My dear Rex, I
fear your prowess in aeroplanes and racing cars hardly qualifies you
to judge the soul destroying powers of these ancient cults.'
'Thanks. I'm not quite a half-wit, and plenty of spiritualistic
seances take place in the States, but I've never heard of anyone as
sane as Simon going bats because of them yet.'
Simon nodded his narrow head slowly up and down. 'Of course-Rex
is right, and you're only making a mountain out of a molehill.'
'As you like,' De Richleau shrugged. 'In that case will you
permit us to stay and participate in your operations tonight?'
'Ner-I'm sorry, but you're not a member of our Circle.'
'No matter. We have already met most of your friends downstairs,
surely they will not object to our presence on just this one
occasion?'
'Ner.' Simon shook his head again. 'Our number is made up.'
'I see, you are already thirteen, is that it? Now listen, Simon.'
The Duke laid his hands gently on the young Jew's shoulders. 'One of
the reasons why my friendship with Rex and yourself has developed
into such a splendid intimacy, is because I have always refrained
from stressing my age and greater experience, but tonight I break
the rule. My conscious life, since we both left our schools, has
been nearly three times as long as yours and, in addition, although
I have never told you of it, I made a deep study of these esoteric
doctrines years ago when I lived in the East. I beg of you, as I
have never begged for anything in my life before, that you should
give up whatever quest you are engaged upon and leave this house
with us immediately.'
For a moment Simon seemed to waver. All his faith in De
Richleau's judgment, knowledge, and love for him, urged him to
agree, but at that moment Mocata's musical lisping voice cut in upon
the silence, calling from the landing just below:
'Simon, the others have come. It is time.'
'Coming,' called Simon, then he looked at the two friends with
whom he had risked his life in the 'Forbidden Territory.' 'I can't,'
he said with an effort, 'You heard-it's too late to back out now.'
'Then let us remain-please,' begged the Duke.
'No, I'm sorry.' A new firmness had crept into Simon's tone, 'but
I must ask you to go now.'
'Very well.'
De Richleau stepped forward as though to shake hands then, with
almost incredible swiftness, his arm flew back and next second his
fist caught Simon a smashing blow full beneath the jaw.
The action was so sudden, so unexpected, that Simon was caught
completely off his guard. For a fraction of time he was lifted from
his feet, then he crashed senseless on his back and slid spread-
eagled across the polished floor.
'Have you gone crazy?' ejaculated Rex.
'No-we've got to get him out of here-save him from himself-don't
argue! Quick!' Already De Richleau was kneeling by the crumpled body
of his friend.
Rex needed no further urging. He had been in too many tight
corners with the Duke to doubt the wisdom of his decisions however
strange his actions might appear. In one quick heave he dragged
Simon's limp form across his shoulders arid started for the stairs.
'Steady!' ordered the Duke. 'I'll go first and tackle anyone who
tries to stop us. You get him to the car-Understoood?'
'What if they raise the house? You'll never be able to tackle the
whole bunch on your own?'
'In that case drop him, I'll get him out somehow, while you
protect my rear. Come on!'
With De Richleau leading they crept down the first flight of
stairs. On the landing he paused and peered cautiously over the
banisters. No sound came from below. 'Rex,' he whispered.
'Yep.'
'If that black servant I told you of appears, for God's sake
don't look at his eyes. Watch his hands and hit him in the belly.'
'O.K.'
A moment later they were down the second flight. The hall
was empty and only a vague murmur of conversation came to them
from behind the double doors that led to the salon.
'Quick!' urged the Duke. 'Mocata may come out to look for him any
moment,'
'Right.' Rex, bent double beneath his burden, plunged down the
last stairs, and De Richleau was already halfway across the half
when the dumb servant suddenly appeared from the vestibule.
For a second he stood there, his sallow face a mask of blank
surprise then, side-stepping the Duke with the agility of a rugby
forward, he lowered his bullet head and charged Rex with silent
animal ferocity.
'Got you,' snapped De Richleau, for although the man had dodged
with lightning speed he had caught his wrist in passing. Then
flinging his whole weight upon it as he turned, he jerked the fellow
clean off his feet and sent him spinning head foremost against the
wall.
As his head hit the panelling the mute gave an uncouth grunt, and
rolled over on the floor, but he staggered up again and dashed
towards the salon. Rex and the Duke were already pounding down the
tiled path and in another second they had flung themselves into the
lane through the entrance in the garden wall.
'Thank God,' gasped the Duke as he wrenched open the door of the
Hispano. 'I believe that hellish crew would have killed us rather
than let us get Simon out of there alive.'
'Well, I suppose you do know what you're at,' Rex muttered as he
propped Simon up on the back seat of the car. 'But I'm not certain
you're safe to be with.'
'Home,' ordered De Richleau curtly to the footman, who was hiding
his astonishment at their sudden exit by hastily tucking the rug
over their knees. Then he smiled at Rex a trifle grimly. 'I suppose
I do seem a little mad to you, but you can't possibly be expected to
appreciate what a horribly serious business this is. I'll explain
later.'
In a few moments they had left the gloom of the quiet streets
behind and were once more running through well-lit ways towards
Mayfair, but Simon was still unconscious when they pulled up in
Curzon Street before Errol House.
'I'll take him,' volunteered Rex. The less the servants have to
do with this the better,' and picking up Simon in his strong arms as
though he had been a baby, he carried him straight upstairs to the
first floor where De Richleau's flat was situated.
'Put him in the library,' said the Duke, who had paused to murmur
something about a sudden illness to the porter, when he arrived on
the landing a moment later. 'I'll get something to bring him round
from the bathroom.'
Rex nodded obediently, and carried Simon into that room in the
Curzon Street fiat which was so memorable for those who had been
privileged to visit it, not so much on account of its size and
decorations, but for the unique collection of rare and beautiful
objects which it contained. A Tibetan Buddha seated upon the Lotus;
bronze figurines from ancient Greece; beautifully chased rapiers of
Toledo steel, and Moorish pistols inlaid with turquoise and gold;
ikons from Holy Russia set with semi-precious stones and curiously
carved ivories from the East.
As Rex laid Simon upon the wide sofa he glanced round him with an
interest unappeased by a hundred visits, at the walls lined shoulder
high with beautifully bound books, and at the lovely old colour
prints, interspersed with priceless historical documents and maps,
which hung above them.
De Richleau, when he joined him, produced a small crystal bottle
which he held beneath Simon's beak-like nose. 'No good trying to
talk to him tonight,' he remarked, 'but I want to bring him round
sufficiently to put him to sleep again.
Rex grunted. That sounds like double-dutch to me.'
'No. I mean to fight these devils with their own weapons, as you
will see.'
Simon groaned a little, and as his eyes flickered open the Duke
took a small round mirror from his pocket. 'Simon,' he said softly,
moving the lamp a little nearer, 'look upward at my hand.'
As he spoke De Richleau held the mirror about eighteen inches
from Simon's forehead and a little above the level of his eyes, so
that it caught and reflected the light of the lamp on to his lids.
'Hold it lower,' suggested Rex. 'He'll strain his eyes turning
them upwards like that.'
'Quiet,' said the Duke sharply. 'Simon, look up and listen to me.
You have been hurt and have a troubled mind, but your friends are
with you and you have no need to worry any more.'
Simon opened his eyes again and turned them upwards to the
mirror, where they remained fixed.
'I am going to send you to sleep, Simon,' De Richleau went on
softly. 'You need rest and you will awake free from pain. In a
moment your eyes will close and then your head will feel better.'
For another half-minute he held the mirror steadily reflecting
the light upon Simon's retina, then he placed the first and second
fingers of his free hand upon the glass with his palm turned outward
and made a slow pass from it towards the staring eyes, which closed
at once before he touched them.
'You will sleep now,' he continued quietly, 'and you will not
wake until ten o'clock tomorrow morning. Directly you awake you will
come straight to me either here or in my bedroom and you will speak
to no one, nor will you open any letter or message which may be
brought to you, until you have seen me.'
De Richleau paused for a moment, put down the mirror and lifted
one of Simon's arms until it stood straight above his head. When he
released it the arm did not drop but remained stiff and rigid in the
air.
'Most satisfactory,' he murmured cheerfully to Rex. 'He is in the
second stage of hypnosis already and will do exactly what he is
told. The induction was amazingly easy, but of course, his half-
conscious state simplified it a lot.'
Rex shook his head in disapproval. 'I don't like to see you
monkey with him like this. I wouldn't allow it if it was anyone but
you.'
'A prejudice based upon lack of understanding, my friend.
Hypnotism in proper hands is the greatest healing power in the
world.' With a quick shrug the Duke moved over to his desk and,
unlocking one of the lower drawers, took something from it, then he
returned to Simon and addressed him in the same low voice.
'Open your eyes now and sit up.'
Simon obeyed at once and Rex was surprised to see that he looked
quite wide awake and normal. Only a certain blankness about the face
betrayed his abnormal state, and he displayed no aversion as De
Richleau extended the thing he had taken from the drawer. It was a
small golden swastika set with precious stones and threaded on a
silken ribbon.
'Simon Aron,' the Duke spoke again. 'With this symbol I am about
to place you under the protection of the power of Light. No being or
force of Earth, or Air, of Fire, or Water can harm you while you
wear it.'
With quick fingers he knotted the talisman round Simon's neck and
went on evenly: 'Now you will go to the spare bedroom. Ring for my
man Max and tell him that you are staying here tonight. He will
provide you with everything you need and, if your throat is parched
from your recent coma, ask him for any soft drink you wish, but no
alcohol remember' Peace be upon you and about you. Now go.'
Simon stood up at once and looked from one to the other of them.
'Good night,' he said cheerfully, with his quick natural smile. 'See
you both in the morning,' then he promptly walked out of the room.
'He-he's not really asleep is he?' asked Rex, looking a little
scared.
'Certainly, but he will remember everything that has taken place
tomorrow because he is not in the deep somnambulistic state where I
could order him to forget. To achieve that usually takes a little
practice with a new subject.'
'Then he'll be pretty livid I'll promise you. Fancy hanging a
Nazi swastika round the neck of a professing Jew.'
'My dear Rex! Do please try and broaden your outlook a little.
The swastika is the oldest symbol of wisdom and right thinking in
the world. It has been used by every race and in every country at
some time or other. You might just as well regard the Cross as
purely Christian, when we all know it was venerated in early Egypt,
thousands of years before the birth of Christ. The Nazis have only
adopted the swastika because it is supposed to be of Aryan origin
and part of their programme aims at welding together a large section
of the Aryan race. The vast majority of them have no conception of
its esoteric significance and even if they bring discredit upon it,
as the Spanish Inquisition did upon the Cross, that could have no
effect upon its true meaning.'
'Yes, I get that, though I doubt if it'll make any difference to
Simon's resentment when he finds it round his neck tomorrow. Still,
that's a minor point. What worries me is this whole box of tricks
this evening. I've got a feeling you ought to be locked up as
downright insane, unless it's me.'
De Richleau smiled. 'A strange business to be happening in modern
London, isn't it? But let's mix a drink and talk it over quietly.'
'Strange! Why, if it were true it would be utterly fantastic, but
it's not. All this hooha about Black Magic and talking hocus-pocus
while you hang silly charms round Simon's neck is utter bunk.'
'It is?' The Duke smiled again as he tipped a lump of ice into
Rex's glass and handed it to him. 'Well, let's hear your explanation
of Simon's queer behaviour. I suppose you do consider that it is
queer by the way?'
'Of course, but nothing like as queer as you're trying to make
out. As I see it Simon's taken up spiritualism or something of the
kind and plenty of normal earnest people believe in that, but you
know what he is when he gets keen on a thing, everything else goes
to,, the wall and that's why he has neglected you a bit.
'Then this evening he was probably sick as mud to miss our
dinner, but had a seance all fixed that he couldn't shelve at the
last moment. We butt in on his party, and naturally he doesn't care
to admit what he's up to entertaining all those queer, odd-looking
women and men, so he spins a yarn about it being an astronomical
society. So you-who've read a sight too many books-and seem to have
stored up all the old wives' tales your nurse told you in your
cradle-get a bee in your bonnet and slog the poor mut under the
jaw.'
De Richleau nodded. 'I can hardly expect you to see it any other
way at the moment, but let's start at the beginning. Do you agree
that after knocking him out I called into play a supernormal power
in order to send him cheerfully off to bed without a single
protest?'
'Yes, even the doctors admit hypnotic influence now, and Simon
would never have stood for you tying that swastika under his chin if
he'd been conscious.'
'Good. Then at least we are at one on the fact that certain
forces can be called into play which the average person does not
understand. Now, if instead of practising that comparatively simple
exercise in front of you, I had done it before ignorant natives, who
had never heard of hypnotism, they would terra it magic, would they
not?'
'Sure.'
Then to go a step further. If, by a greater exertion of the same
power, I levitated, that is to say, lifted myself to a height of
several inches from this floor, you might not use the word magic but
you would class that feat in the same category as the ignorant
native would place the easier one, because it is something which you
have always thought impossible.'
That's true.'
'Well, I am not sufficient of an adept to perform the feat, but
will you accept my assurances that I've seen it done, not once, but
a number of times?'
'If you say so, but from all I've heard about such things, the
fellows you saw didn't leave the ground at all. It is just mass
hypnotism exercised upon the whole audience-like the rope trick.'
'As you wish, but that explanation does not rob me of my point.
If you admit that I can tap an unknown power to make Simon obey my
will, and that an Eastern mystic can tap that power to the far
greater extent of making a hundred people's eyes deceive them into
believing that he is standing on thin air, you admit that there is a
power and that it can be tapped in greater degrees according to the
knowledge and proficiency of the man who uses it.'
'Yes, within limits.'
'Why within limits? You apparently consider levitation im
possible, but wouldn't you have considered wireless impossible if
you had been living fifty years ago and somebody had endeavoured to
convince you of it?'
'Maybe.' Rex sat forward suddenly. 'But I don't get what you're
driving at. Hypnotism is only a demonstration of the power of the
human will.'
'Ah! There you have it. The will to good and the will to evil.
That is the whole matter in a nutshell. The human will is like a
wireless set and properly adjusted-trained that is-it can tune in
with the invisible influence which is all about us.'
'The Invisible Influence. I've certainly heard that phrase
somewhere before.'
'No doubt. A very eminent mental specialist who holds a high
position in our asylums wrote a book with that title and I have not
yet asked you to believe one tenth of what he vouches for.'
'Then I wonder they haven't locked him up.'
'Rex! Rex!' De Richleau smiled a little sadly. Try and open your
mind, my friend. Do you believe in the miracles performed by Jesus
Christ?'
'Yes.'
'And of His Disciples and certain of the Saints?'
'Sure, but they had some special power granted to them from on
high.'
'Exactly! Some Special Power. But I suppose you would deny that
Gautama Buddha and his disciples performed miracles of a similar
nature?'
'Not at all. Most people agree now that Buddha was a sort of
Indian Christ, a Holy Man, and no doubt he had some sort of power
granted to him too.'
The Duke sat back with a heavy sigh. 'At last my friend we seem
to be getting somewhere. If you admit that miracles, as you call
them although you object to the word magic, have been performed by
two men living in different countries hundreds of years apart, and
that even their disciples were able to tap a similar power through
their holiness, you cannot reasonably deny that other mystics have
also performed similar acts in many portions of the globe-and
therefore, that there is a power existing outside us which is not
peculiar to any religion, but can be utilised if one can get into
communication with it,'
Rex laughed. That's so, I can't deny it.'
'Thank God! Let's mix ourselves another drink shall we, I need
it?'
'Don't move, I'll fix it.' Rex good-naturedly scrambled to his
feet. 'All the same,' he added slowly, 'it doesn't follow that
because a number of good men have been granted supernatural powers
that there is anything in Black Magic.'
'Then you do not believe in Witchcraft?'
'Of course not, nobody does in these days.'
'Really! How long do you think it is since the last trial for
Witchcraft took place?'
'I'll say it was all of a hundred and fifty years ago.'
'No, it was in January, 1926, at Melun near Paris.'
'Oh! You're fooling!' Rex exclaimed angrily.
'I'm not,' De Richleau assured him solemnly. The records of the
court will prove my statement, so you see you are hardly accurate
when you say that nobody believes in Witchcraft in these days, and
many many thousands still believe in a personal devil.'
'Yes, simple folk maybe, but not educated people.'
'Possibly not, yet every thinking man must admit that there is
still such a thing as the power of Evil.'
'Why?'
'My dear fellow, all qualities have their opposites, like love
and hate, pleasure and pain, generosity and avarice. How could we
recognise the goodness of Jesus Christ, Lao Tze, Ashoka, Marcus
Aurelius, Francis of Assisi, Florence Nightingale and a thousand
others if it were not for the evil lives of Herod, Caesar Borgia,
Rasputin, Landru, Ivan Kreuger and the rest?'
That's true,' Rex admitted slowly.
'Then if an intensive cultivation of good can beget strange
powers is there any reason why an intensive cultivation of evil
should not beget them also?'
'I think I begin to get what you're driving at.'
'Good! Now listen, Rex.' The Duke leaned forward earnestly. 'And
I will try and expound what little I know of the Esoteric Doctrine
which has come down to us through the ages. You will have heard of
the Persian myth of Ozamund and Ahriman, the eternal powers of Light
and Darkness, said to be co-equal and warring without cessation for
the good or ill of mankind. All ancient sun and nature
worship-festivals of spring and so on, were only an outward
expression of that myth, for Light typifies Health and Wisdom,
Growth and Life; while Darkness means Disease and Ignorance, Decay
and Death.
'In its highest sense Light symbolises the growth of the Spirit
towards that perfection in which it can throw off the body and
become light itself; but the road to perfection is long and arduous,
too much to hope for in one short human life, hence the widespread
belief in re-incarnation; that we are born again and again until we
begin to despise the pleasures of the flesh. This doctrine is so old
that no man can trace its origin, yet it is the inner core of truth
common to all religions at their inception. Consider the teaching of
Jesus Christ with that in mind and you will be amazed that you have
not realised before the true purport of His message. Did He not say
that the 'Kingdom of God was within us,' and, when He walked upon
the waters declared: 'These things that I do ye shall do also; and
greater things than these shall ye do, for I go unto my Father which
is in Heaven,' meaning most certainly that He had achieved
perfection but that others had the same power within each one of
them to do likewise.'
De Richleau paused for a moment and then went on more slowly.
'Unfortunately the hours of the night are still equal to the hours
of the day, and so the power of Darkness is no less active than when
the world was young, and no sooner does a fresh Master appear to
reveal the light than ignorance, greed, and lust for power cloud the
minds of his followers. The message becomes distorted and the
simplicity of the truth submerged and forgotten in the pomp of
ceremonies and the meticulous performance of rituals which have lost
their meaning. Yet the real truth is never entirely lost, and
through the centuries new Masters are continually arising either to
proclaim it or, if the time is not propitious, to pass it on in
secret to the chosen few.
'Apollonius of Tyana learned it in the East. The so-called
Heretics whom we know as the Albigenses preached it in the twelfth
century through Southern France until they were exterminated.
Christian Rosenkreutz had it in the Middle Ages. It was the
innermost secret of the Order of the Templars who were suppressed
because of it by the Church of Rome. The Alchemists, too, searched
for and practised it. Only the ignorant take literally their
struggle to find the Elixir of Life. Behind such phrases, designed
to protect them from the persecution of their enemies, they sought
Eternal Life, and their efforts to transmute base metals into gold
were only symbolical of their transfusion of matter into light. And
still to-day while the night life of London goes on about us there
are mystics and adepts who are seeking the Eightfold Way to
perfection in many corners of the Earth.'
'You really believe that?' asked Rex seriously.
'I do.' De Richleau's answer held no trace of doubt. 'I give you
my word Rex, that I have talked with men whose sanity you would
never question, an Englishman, an Italian, and a Hindu, all three of
whom have been taken by guides sent to fetch them to the hidden
valley in the uplands of Tibet, where some of the Lamas have reached
such a high degree of enlightenment that they can prolong their
lives at will, and perform today all the miracles which you have
read of in the Bible. It is there that the sacred fire of truth has
been preserved for centuries, safe from the brutal mercenary folly
of our modern world.'
That sounds a pretty tall story to me, but granted there are
mystics who have achieved such amazing powers through their holiness
I still don't see where your Black Magic comes in?'
'Let's not talk of Black Magic, which is associated with the
preposterous in our day, but of the order of the Left Hand Path.
That, too, has its adepts and, just as the Yoga of Tibet are the
preservers of the Way of Light, the Way of Darkness is exemplified
in the horrible Voodoo cult which had its origin in Madagascar and
has held Africa in its grip for centuries, spreading even with the
slave trade to the West Indies and your own country.'
'Yes, I know quite a piece about that, the Negroes monkey with it
still back home in the Southern States, despite their apparent
Christianity. Still I can't think that an educated man like Simon
would take serious notice of that Mumbo Jumbo stuff.'
'Not in its crude form perhaps, but others have cultivated the
power of Evil, and among whites it is generally the wealthy and
intellectual, who are avaricious for greater riches or power, to
whom it appeals. In the Paris of Louis XIV, long after the Middle
Ages were forgotten, it was still particularly rampant. The
poisoner, La Voisin, was proved to have procured over fifteen
hundred children for the infamous Abbe Guibourg to sacrifice at
Black Masses. He used to cut their throats, drain the blood into a
chalice, and then pour it over the naked body of the inquirer who
lay stretched upon the altar. I speak of actual history, Rex, and
you can read the records of the trial that followed in which two
hundred and forty-six men and women were indicted for these hellish
practices.'
'Maybe. It sounds ghastly enough but that's a mighty long time
ago.'
'Then, if you need more modern evidence of its continuance hidden
in our midst there is the well authenticated case of Prince
Borghese. He let his Venetian Palazzo on a long lease, expiring as
late as 1895. The tenants had not realised that the lease had run
out until he notified them of his intention to resume possession.
They protested, but Borghese's agents forced an entry. What do you
think they found?'
'Lord knows.' Rex shook his head.
'That the principal salon had been redecorated at enormous cost
and converted into a Satanic Temple. The walls were hung from
ceiling to floor with heavy curtains of silk damask, scarlet and
black to exclude the light; at the farther end there stretched a
large tapestry upon which was woven a colossal figure of Lucifer
dominating the whole. Beneath, an altar had been built and amply
furnished with the whole liturgy of Hell; black candles, vessels,
rituals, nothing was lacking. Cushioned prie-dieus and luxurious
chairs, crimson and gold, were set in order for the assistants, and
the chamber lit with electricity fantastically arranged so that it
should glare through an enormous human eye.'
De Richleau hammered the desk with his clenched fist. 'These are
facts I'm giving you Rex-facts, d'you hear, things I can prove by
eye-witnesses still living. Despite our electricity, our aeroplanes,
our modern scepticism, the power of Darkness is still a living
force, worshipped by depraved human beings for their unholy ends in
the great cities of Europe and America to this very day.'
Rex's face had suddenly paled under its tan. 'And you really
think poor Simon has got mixed up in this beastliness?'
'I know it man! Could you have been so intrigued with the girl
that you did not notice the rest of that foul crew? The Albino, the
man with the hare-lip, the Eurasian who only possessed a left arm.
They're Devil Worshippers all of them.'
'Not the girl! Not Tanith!' cried Rex, springing to his feet.
'She must have been drawn into it like Simon.'
'Perhaps, but the final proof lay in that basket. They were about
to practise the age-old sacrifice to their infernal master just as
your Voodoo-ridden Negroes do. The slaughter of a black cock and a
white hen-Yes. What is it?' De Richleau swung round as a soft knock
came on the door.
'Excellency.' His man Max stood bowing in the doorway, 'I thought
I had better bring this to you.' In his open palm he displayed the
jewelled swastika.
With one panther-like spring the Duke thrust him aside and
bounded from the room. 'Simon,' he shouted as he dashed down the
corridor. 'Simon! I command you to stay still.' But when he reached
the bedroom the only signs that Simon had ever occupied it were the
tumbled bed and his underclothes left scattered on the floor.
4
The Silent House
De Richleau strode back into the sitting-room. His grey eyes
glittered dangerously but his voice was gentle as he picked the
jewelled swastika from his servant's palm. 'How did you come by this
Max?'
'I removed it from Mr. Aron's neck Excellency.'
'What!'
'He rang for me Excellency and said that he would like a cup of
bouillon and when I returned with it he was sleeping, but so
strangely that I was alarmed. His tongue was protruding from between
his teeth and his face was nearly black; then I saw that his neck
was terribly swollen and that a ribbon was cutting deeply into his
flesh. I cut the ribbon, fearing that he would choke-the jewel
dropped off, so I brought it straight to you.'
'All right! you may go-and it is unnecessary to wait up- I may be
late.' As the door closed the Duke swung round towards Rex. 'Simon
must have woken the moment Max's back was turned, pulled on a few
clothes, then slipped out of the window and down the fire-escape.
'Sure,' Rex agreed. 'He's well on his way back to St. John's Wood
by now.;
'Come on-we'll follow. We've got to save him from those devils
somehow. I don't know what they're after but there must be something
pretty big and very nasty behind all this. It can't have been easy
to involve a man like Simon to the extent they obviously have, and
they would never have gone to all that trouble to recruit an
ordinary dabbler in the occult. They are after really big stakes of
some kind, and they need him as a pawn in their devilish game.'
'Think we can beat him to it?' Rex asked as they ran down the
staircase of the block and out into Curzon Street.
'I doubt it-Hi, taxi!' De Richleau waved an arm.
'He can't have more than five minutes' start.'
'Too much in a fifteen minutes' run.' The Duke's voice was grim
as they climbed into the cab.
'What d'you figure went amiss?'
'I don't know for certain, but there is no doubt that our poor
friend is completely under Mocata's influence-has been for months I
expect. In such a case Mocata's power over him would be far stronger
than my own which was only exercised, in the hope of protecting him,
for the first time tonight. It was because I feared that Mocata
might countermand my orders, even from a distance, and compel Simon
to return that I placed the symbol of Light round his neck.'
'And when Max took it off Mocata got busy on him eh?'
'I think Mocata was at work before that. He probably witnessed
everything that took place in a crystal or through a medium and
exerted all his powers to cause Simon's neck to swell the moment he
got into bed, hoping to break the ribbon that held the charm.'
Rex had not yet quite recovered from the shock of learning that
so sane a man as De Richleau could seriously believe in all this
gibberish about the Occult. He was very far from being convinced
himself, but he refrained from airing his scepticism and instead, as
the taxi rattled north through Baker Street, he began to consider
the practical side of their expedition. There had been eight men at
least in Simon's house when they left it. He glanced towards the
Duke. 'Are you carrying a gun?'
'No, and if I were it would be useless.'
'Holy Smoke! You are bats or else I am.' Rex shrugged his broad
shoulders and began to wonder if he was not living through some
particularly vivid and horrible dream. Soon he would wake perhaps;
sweating a little from the nightmare picture which De Richleau had
drawn for him of age-old evil, tireless and vigilant, cloaked from
the masses by modern scepticism yet still a potent force stalking
the dark ways of the night, conjured into new life by strange
delvers into ancient secrets for their unhallowed ends; but wake he
must, to the bright, clear day and Simon's chuckle-over a tankard of
Pim's cup at luncheon-that such fantastic nonsense should centre
about him even in a dream. Yet there was Tanith, so strange and wise
and beautiful, looking as though she had just stepped out of a
painting by some great master of the Italian Renaissance. It was no
dream that he had at last actually met and spoken with her that
evening at Simon's house, among all those queer people whom the Duke
declared so positively to be Satan worshippers; and if she was flesh
and blood they must be too.
On the north side of Lord's cricket ground, De Richleau stopped
the taxi. 'Better walk the rest of the way,' he murmured as he paid
off the man. 'Simon's arrived by now and it would be foolish to warn
them of our coming.'
'Thought you said Mocata was overlooking us with the evil eye?'
Rex replied as they hurried along Circus Road.
'He may be. I can't say, but possibly he thinks we would never
dare risk a second visit to the house tonight. If we exercise every
precaution we may catch him off his guard. He's just as vulnerable
as any other human being except when he is actually employing his
special powers.'
Side by side they passed through two streets where the low roofs
of the old-fashioned houses were only faintly visible above the
walls that kept them immune from the eyes of the curious, each set,
silent and vaguely mysterious, among its whispering trees; then they
entered the narrow, unlit cul-de-sac.
Treading carefully now, they covered the two hundred yards to its
end and halted, gazing up at the darkened mass of the upper stories
which loomed above the high wall. Not a chink of light betrayed that
the house was tenanted, although they knew that, apart from the
servants, thirteen people had congregated there to perform some
strange midnight ceremony little over an hour before.
'Think they've cleared out?' Rex whispered.
'I doubt it.' The Duke stepped forward and tried the narrow door.
It was fast locked.
'Can't we call the police in to raid the place?'
De Richleau shrugged impatiently. 'What could we charge them with
that a modem station-sergeant would understand?'
'Kidnapping! ' Rex urged below his breath, 'If I were back home
I'd have the strong arm squad here in under half an hour. Get the
whole bunch pinched and gaoled pending trial. They'd be out of the
way then for a bit, even if I had to pay up heavy damages
afterwards-and meantime we'd pop Simon in a mental home till he got
his wits back.'
'Rex! Rex!' The Duke gave a low, delighted chuckle. 'It's an
enchanting idea, and if we were in the States I really believe we
might pull it off-but here it's impossible.'
'What do you figure to do then?'
'Go in and see if Simon has returned.'
'I'm game, but the odds are pretty heavy.'
'If we're caught we must run for it.'
'O.K., but if we fail to make our get-away they'll call the
police and have us gaoled for housebreaking.'
'No-no,' De Richleau muttered. They won't want to draw the
attention of the police to then- activities, and the one thing that
matters is to get Simon out of here.'
'All right.' Rex placed his hands on his knees, and stooping his
great shoulders, leaned his head against the wall. 'Up you go.'
The Duke bent towards him. 'Listen!' he whispered. 'Once we're
inside we've got to stick together whatever happens. God knows what
they've used this house of Simon's for, but the whole place reeks of
evil.'
'Oh shucks!' Rex muttered contemptuously.
'I mean it,' De Richleau insisted. 'If you take that attitude I'd
rather go in alone. This is the most dangerous business I've ever
been up against, and if it wasn't for the thought of Simon nothing
on earth would tempt me to go over this wall in the middle of the
night.'
'Oh-all right. Have it your own way.'
'You'll obey me implicitly-every word I say?'
'Yes, don't fret yourself ...'
'Good, and remember you are to bolt for it the instant I give the
word, because the little knowledge that I possess may only protect
us for a very fleeting space of time.' The Duke clambered on to
Rex's shoulders and heaved himself up on to the coping. Rex stepped
back a few yards and took a flying leap; next second he had
scrambled up beside De Richleau. For a moment they both sat astride
the wall peering down into the shadows of the garden, then they
dropped silently into a flower-border on the other side.
'The first thing is to find a good line of retreat in case we
have to get out in a hurry,' breathed the Duke.
'What about this?' Rex whispered back, slapping the trunk of a
well-grown laburnum tree.
De Richleau nodded silently. One glance assured him that with the
aid of the lower branches two springs would bring them to the top of
the wall. Then he moved at a quick, stealthy run across a small open
space of lawn to the shelter of some bushes that ran round the side
of the house.
From their new cover Rex surveyed the side windows. No glimmer of
light broke the expanse of the rambling old mansion. As the Duke
moved on, he followed, until the bushes ended at the entrance of a
back yard, evidently giving on to the kitchen quarters.
'Have a care,' he whispered, jerking De Richleau's sleeve. 'They
may have a dog.'
'They couldn't,' replied the Duke positively. 'Dogs are simple,
friendly creatures but highly psychic. The vibrations in a place
where Black Magic was practised would cause any dog to bolt for a
certainty.' With light, quick, padding steps he crossed the yard and
came 'out into the garden on the far side of the house.
Here too every window was shrouded in darkness and an uncanny
stillness brooded over the place.
'I don't like it,' whispered De Richleau. 'Simon can't have been
back more than a quarter of an hour at the outside-so there ought
still to be lights in the upper rooms. Anyhow, it looks at if the
others have gone home, which is something- we must chance an
ambush.'
He pointed to a narrow, ground floor window. 'That's probably the
lavatory, and most people forget to close their lavatory
windows-come on!'
Silently Rex followed him across the grass, then gripping him by
the knees, heaved him up until he was well above the level of the
sill.
The sash creaked, the upper half of the window slid down, and the
Duke's head and shoulders disappeared inside.
For a moment Rex watched his wriggling legs, heard a bump,
followed by a muffled oath, and then clambered up on to the sill.
'Hurt yourself?' he whispered, as De Richleau's face appeared, a
pale blot in the darkness.
'Not much-though this sort of thing is not amusing for a man of
my age. The door here is unlocked, thank goodness.'
Immediately Rex was inside, the Duke squatted down on the floor.
Take off your shoes,' he ordered. 'And your socks.'
'Shoes if you like, though we'll hurt our feet if we have to
run-but why the socks?'
'Don't argue-we waste time.'
'Well-what now?' Rex muttered after a moment.
'Put your shoes on again and the socks over them-then you can run
as fast as you like.' As Rex obeyed the Duke went on in a low voice.
'Not a sound now. I really believe the others have gone, and if
Mocata is not lying in wait for us, we may be able to get hold of
Simon. If we come up against that black servant, for God's sake
remember not to look at his eyes.'
With infinite care he opened the door and peered out into the
darkened hall. A faint light from an upper window showed the double
doors that led to the salon standing wide open. He listened intently
for a moment, then slipping out stood aside for Rex to follow, and
gently closed the door behind them.
Their footsteps, now muffled by the socks, were barely audible as
they stole across the stretch of parquet. When they reached the
salon De Richleau carefully drew aside a blind. The dim starlight
was just sufficient to show the outlines of the gilded furniture,
and they could make out plates and glasses left scattered upon the
buhl and marquetry tables.
Rex picked up a goblet two-thirds full of champagne and held it
so that the Duke could see the wine still in it.
De Richleau nodded. The Irish Bard, the Albino, the one-armed
Eurasian, the hare-lipped man and the rest of that devilish company
must have taken fright when he and Rex had forcibly abducted Simon,
and fled, abandoning their unholy operations for the night. He
gently replaced the blind and they crept back into the hall.
One other door opened off it besides those to the servants'
quarters and the vestibule. De Richleau slowly turned the knob and
pressed. The room was a small library, and at the far end a pair of
uncurtained french-windows showed the garden, ghostly and mysterious
in the starlight. Leaving Rex by the door, the Duke tiptoed across
the room, drew the bolts, opened the windows and propped them wide.
>From where he stood he could just make out the laburnum by the wall.
A clear retreat was open to them now. He turned, then halted with a
sharp intake of breath. Rex had disappeared.
'Rex!' he hissed in a loud whisper, gripped by a sudden nameless
fear. 'Rex!' But there was no reply.
5
Embodied Evil
De Richleau had been involved in so many strange adventures in
his long and chequered career, that instinctively his hand flew to
the pocket where he kept his automatic at such times, but it was
flat-and in a fraction of time it had come back to him that this was
no affair of shootings and escapes, but a grim struggle against the
Power of Darkness-in which their only protection must be an utter
faith in the ultimate triumph of good, and the use of such little
power as he possessed to bring into play the great forces of the
Power of Light.
In two strides he had reached the door, grabbed the electric
switch, and pressed it as he cried in ringing tones: 'Fundamenta
ejus in montibus sanctis!'
'What the hell!' exclaimed Rex as the light flashed on. He was at
the far side of the hall, carefully constructing a booby trap of
chairs and china in front of the door that led to the servants'
quarters.
'You've done it now,' he added, with his eyes riveted upon the
upper landing, but nothing stirred and the pall of silence descended
upon the place again until they could hear each other's quickened
breathing.
'The house is empty,' Rex declared after a moment. 'If there were
anyone here they'd have been bound to hear you about. It echoed from
the cellars to the attics.'
De Richleau was regarding him with an angry stare. 'You madman,'
he snapped. 'Don't you understand what we're up against? We must not
separate for an instant in this unholy place-even now that the
lights are on.'
Rex smiled. He had always considered the Duke as the most
fearless man he knew, and to see him in such a state of nerves was a
revelation. 'I'm not scared of bogeys, but I am of being shot up
from behind,' he said simply. 'I was fixing this so we'd hear the
servants if there was trouble upstairs and they came up to help
Mocata.'
'Yes, but honestly, Rex, it is imperative that we should keep as
near each other as possible every second we remain in this ghastly
house. It may sound childish, but I ought to have told you before
that if anything queer does happen we must actually hold hands. That
will quadruple our resistance to evil by attuning our vibrations
towards good. Now let's go upstairs and see if they have really
gone-though I can hardly doubt it.'
Rex followed marvelling. This man who was frightened of shadows
and talked of holding hands at a time of danger was so utterly
different to the De Richleau that he knew. Yet as he watched the
Duke mounting the stairs in swift, panther-like, noiseless strides
he felt that since he was so scared this midnight visitation was a
fresh demonstration of his courage.
On the floor above they made a quick examination of the bedrooms,
but all of them were unoccupied and none of the beds had been slept
in.
'Mocata must have sent the rest of them away and been waiting
here with a car to whisk Simon off immediately he got back,' De
Richleau declared as they came out of the last room.
'That's about it, so we may as well clear out.' Rex shivered
slightly as he added: 'It's beastly cold up here.'
'I was wondering whether you'd notice that, but we're not going
home yet. This is a God-given opportunity to search the house at our
leisure. We may discover all sorts of interesting things. Leave all
the lights on here, the more the better, and come downstairs.'
In the salon the great buffet table still lay spread with the
excellent collation which they had seen there on their first visit.
The Duke walked over to it and poured himself a glass of wine. 'I
see Simon has taken to Cliquot again,' he observed. 'He alternates
between that and Bollinger with remarkable consistency, though in
certain years I prefer Pol Roger to either when it has a little age
on it.'
As Rex spooned a slab of Duck & la Montmorency on to a plate,
helping himself liberally in the foie gras mousse and cherries, he
wondered if De Richleau had really recovered from the extraordinary
agitation that he had displayed a quarter of an hour before, or if
he was talking so casually to cover his secret apprehensions. He
hated to admit it even to himself, but there was something queer
about the house, a chill seemed to be spreading up his legs from
beneath the heavily-laden table, and the silence was strangely
oppressive. Anxious to get on with the business and out of the place
now, he said quickly. 'I don't give two hoots what he drinks, but
where has Mocata gone-and why?'
'The last question is simple.' De Richleau set down his glass and
drew out the case containing the famous Hoyo de Monterrey's. 'There
are virtually no laws against the practice of Black Magic in this
country now. Only that of 1842, called the Rogues and Vagabonds Act,
under which a person may be prosecuted for 'pretending or professing
to tell Fortunes, by using any subtle Craft, Means or Device!" But
since the practitioners of it are universally evil, the Drug
Traffic, Blackmail, Criminal Assault and even Murder are often mixed
up with it, and for one of those reasons Mocata, having learnt that
we were on our way here through his occult powers, feared a brawl
might attract the attention of the police to his activities.
Evidently he considered discretion the better part of valour on this
occasion and temporarily abandoned the place to us- taking Simon
with him.'
'Not very logical-are you?' Rex commented. 'One moment it's you
who're scared that he may do all sorts of strange things to us, and
the next you tell me that he's bolted for fear of being slogged
under the jaw.'
'My dear fellow, I can only theorise. I'm completely in the dark
myself. Some of these followers of the Left Hand Path are mere
neophytes who can do little more than wish evil in minor matters on
people they dislike. Others are adepts and can set in motion the
most violent destructive forces which are not yet even suspected by
our modern scientists.
'If Mocata only occupies a low place in the hierarchy we can deal
with him as we would any other crook with little risk of any serious
danger to ourselves, but if he is a Master he may be able to strike
us blind or dead. Unfortunately I know little enough of this
horrible business, only the minor rituals of the Right Hand Path, or
White Magic as people call it, which may protect us hi an emergency.
If only I knew more I might be able to find out where he has taken
Simon.'
'Cheer up-we'll find him.' Rex laughed as he set down his plate,
but the sound echoed eerily through the deserted house, causing him
to glance swiftly over his shoulder in the direction of the still
darkened inner room. 'What's the next move?' he asked more soberly.
'We've got to try and find Simon's papers. If we can, we may be
able to get the real names and addresses of some of those people who
were here tonight. Let's try the Library first-bring the bottle with
you. I'll take the glasses.'
'What d'you mean-real names?' Rex questioned as he followed De
Richleau across the hall.
'Why, you don't suppose that incredible old woman with the parrot
beak was really called Madame D'Urfe-do you? That's only a nom-du-
Diable, taken when she was re-baptised, and adopted from the
Countess of that name, who was a notorious witch in Louis XV's time.
All the others are the same. Didn't you realise the meaning of the
name your lovely lady calls herself by-Tanith?'
'No.' Rex hesitated. 'I thought she was just a foreigner- that's
all.'
'Dear me. Well, Tanith was the Moon Goddess of the Carthaginians.
Thousands of years earlier the Egyptians called her Isis, and in the
intervening stage she was known to the Phoenicians as the Lady
Astoroth. They worshipped her in sacred groves where doves were
sacrificed and unmentionable scenes of licentiousness took place.
The God Adonis was her lover, and the people wept for his mythical
death each year, believing upon him as a Redeemer of Mankind. As
they went in processions to her shrines they wrought themselves into
the wildest frenzy, and to slake the thwarted passion of the widowed
goddess, gashed themselves with knives. Sir George Frazer's Golden
Bough will tell you all about it, but the blood that was shed still
lives, Rex, and she has been thirsty through these Christian
centuries for more. Eleven words of power, each having eleven
letters, twice pronounced in a fitting time and place after due
preparation, and she would stand before you, terrible in her beauty,
demanding a new sacrifice.'
Even Rex's gay modernity was not proof against that sinister
declaration. De Richleau's voice held no trace of the gentle
cynicism which was so characteristic of him, but seemed to ring with
the positiveness of some horrible secret truth. He shuddered
slightly as the Duke began to pull open the drawers of Simon's desk.
All except one, which was locked, held letter files, and a brief
examination of these showed that they contained nothing but
accounts, receipts, and correspondence of a normal nature. Rex
forced the remaining drawer with a heavy steel paper knife, but it
only held cheque book counterfoils and bundles of dividend warrants,
so they turned their attention to the long shelves of books. It was
possible that Simon might have concealed certain private papers
behind his treasured collection of modern first editions, but after
ten minutes' careful search they assured themselves that nothing of
interest was hidden at the back of the neat rows of volumes.
Having drawn a blank in the library, they proceeded to the other
downstairs rooms, going systematically through every drawer and
cabinet, but without result. Then they moved upstairs and tried the
bedrooms, yet here again they could discover nothing which might not
have been found in any normal house, nor was there any safe in which
important documents might have been placed.
During the search De Richleau kept Rex constantly beside him, and
Rex was not altogether sorry. Little by little the atmosphere of the
place was getting him down, and more than once he had the unpleasant
sensation that somebody was watching him covertly from behind,
although he told himself that it was pure imagination, due entirely
to De Richleau's evident belief in the supernatural, of which they
had been talking all the evening.
'These people must, have left traces of their doings in this
house somewhere," declared the Duke angrily as they came out of the
last bedroom on to the landing, 'and I'm determined to find them.'
'We haven't done the Observatory yet, and I'd say that's the most
likely spot of all,' Rex suggested.
'Yes-let's do that next.' De Richleau turned towards the upper
flight of stairs.
The great domed room was just as they had left it a few hours
before. The big telescope pointing in the same direction, the
astrolabes and sextants still in the same places. The five-pointed
pentacle enclosed in the double circle with its Cabalistic figures
stood out white and clear on the polished floor in the glare of the
electric lights. Evidently no ceremony had taken place after their
departure. To verify his impression the Duke threw up the lid of the
wicker hamper that stood beside the wall.
A scraping sound came from the basket, and he nodded. 'See Rex!
The Black Cock and the White Hen destined for sacrifice, but we
spoilt their game for tonight at all events. We'll take them down
and free them in the garden when we go.'
'What did they really mean to do-d'you think?' Rex asked gravely.
'Utilise the conjunction of certain stars which occurred at
Simon's birth, and again tonight, to work some invocation through
him. To raise some dark familiar perhaps, an elemental or an
earthbound spirit-or even some terrible intelligence from what we
know as Hell, in order to obtain certain information they require
from it.'
'Oh, nuts!' Rex exclaimed impatiently. 'I don't believe such
things. Simon's been got hold of by a gang of blackmailing
kidnappers and hypnotised if you like. They've probably used this
Black Magic stuff to impose on him just as it imposes on you-but in
every other way it's sheer, preposterous nonsense.'
'I only hope that you may continue to think so, Rex, but I fear
you may have reason to alter your views before we're through. Let's
continue our search-shall we?'
'Fine-though I've a hunch it's a pity we didn't call hi the cops
at the beginning.'
They examined the instruments, but all of them were beyond
suspicion of any secret purpose, and then a square revolving
bookcase, but it held only trigonometry tables and charts of the
heavens,
'Damn it, there must be something hi this place!' De Richleau
muttered, 'Swords or cups or devils' bibles. They couldn't perform
their rituals without them.'
'Maybe they took their impedimenta with them when they quit.'
'Perhaps, but I'd like even to see the place in which they kept
it. You never know what they may have left behind. Try tapping all
round the walls, Rex, and I'll do the floor. There's almost certain
to be a secret cache somewhere.'
For some minutes they pursued their search in silence, only their
repeated knockings breaking the stillness of the empty house. Then
Rex gave a sudden joyful shout. 'Here, quick-it's hollow under
here!'
Together they pulled aside an early seventeenth-century chart of
the Macrocosm by Robert Fludd, and after fumbling for a moment found
the secret spring. The panel slid back with a click.
In the recess some four feet deep reposed a strange collection of
articles: a wand of hazelwood, a crystal set in gold, a torch with a
pointed end so that it could be stuck upright in the ground, candle-
sticks, a short sword, two great books, a dagger with a blade curved
like a sickle moon, a ring, a chalice and an old bronze lamp, formed
out of twisted human figures, which had nine wicks. All had
pentacles, planetary signs, and other strange symbols engraved upon
them, and each had the polish which is a sign of great age coupled
with frequent usage.
'Got them!' snapped the Duke. 'By Jove, I'm glad we stayed, Rex!
These things are incredibly rare, and each a power in itself through
association with past mysteries. It is a thousand to one against
their having others, and without them their claws will be clipped
from working any serious evil against us.'
As he spoke De Richleau Lifted out the two ancient volumes. One
had a binding of worked copper on which were chased designs and
characters. Its leaves, which were made from the bark of young
trees, were covered with very clear writing done with an iron point.
The text of the other was painted on vellum yellowed by time, and
its binding supported by great scrolled silver clasps.
'Wonderful copies,' the Duke murmured, with all the enthusiasm of
a bibliophile. 'The Clavicule of Solomon and The Grimoire of Pope
Honorius. They are not the muddled recast versions of the
seventeenth century either, but far, far older. This Clavicule on
cork may be of almost any age, and is to the Black Art what the
Codex Sinaiticus and such early versions are to Christianity.'
'Well, maybe Mocata didn't figure we'd stay to search this place
when we found Simon wasn't here, but it doesn't say much for all his
clairvoyant powers you make such a song about for him to let us get
away with his whole magician's box of tricks. Say! where's that
draught coming from?' Rex suddenly clapped a hand on the back of his
neck.
The Duke thrust the two books back and swung round as if he had
been stung. He had felt it at the same instant-a sudden chill wind
which increased to a rushing icy blast, so cold that it stung his
hands and face like burning fire. The electric lights flickered and
went dim, so that only the faint red glow of the wires showed in the
globes. The great room was plunged in shadow and a violet mist began
to rise out of the middle of the pentacle, swirling with incredible
rapidity like some dust devil of the desert., It gathered height and
bulk, spread and took form.
The lights flickered again and then went out, but the violet mist
had a queer phosphorescent glow of its own. By it they could see the
cabalistic bookcase, like a dark shadow beyond it, through the
luminous mist. An awful stench of decay, which yet had something
sweet and cloying about it, filled their nostrils as they gazed,
sick and almost retching with repulsion, at a grey face that was
taking shape about seven feet from the floor. The eyes were fixed
upon them, malicious and intent? The eyeballs whitened but the face
went dark. Under it the mist was gathering into shoulders, torso,
hips.
Before they could choke for breath the materialisation had
completed. Clad in flowing robes of white, Mocata's black servant
towered above them. His astral body was just as the Duke had seen it
in the flesh, from tip to toe a full six foot eight, and the eyes,
slanting inward, burned upon them like live coals of fire.
6
The Secret Art
Rex was not frightened in the ordinary meaning of the word. He
was past the state in which he could have ducked, or screamed, or
run. He stood there rigid, numbered by the icy chill that radiated
from the figure in the pentagram, a tiny pulse throbbed in his
forehead, and his knees seemed to grow weak beneath him. A clear,
silvery voice beat in his ears: 'Do not look at his eyes!-do not
look at his eyes I-do not look at his eyes!'-an urgent repetition of
De Richleau's warning to him, but try as he would, he could not drag
his gaze from the malignant yellow pupils which burned in the black
face.
Unable to stir, hand or foot, he watched the ab-human figure grow
in breadth and height, its white draperies billowing with a strange
silent motion as they rose from the violet mist that obscured the
feet, until it overflowed the circles that ringed the pentagram and
seemed to fill the lofty chamber like a veritable Djin. The room
reeked with the sickly, cloying stench which he had heard of but
never thought to know-the abominable affluvium of embodied evil.
Suddenly red rays began to glint from the baleful slanting eyes,
and Rex found himself quivering from head to foot. He tried
desperately to pray: 'Our Father which art in Heaven-
hallowed-hallowed-hallowed . . .' but the words which he had not
used for so long would not come; the vibrations, surging through his
body, as though he were holding the terminals of a powerful electric
battery, seemed to cut them off. His left knee began to jerk. His
foot lifted. He strove to raise his arms to cover his face, but they
remained fixed to his sides as though held by invisible steel bands.
He tried to cry out, to throw himself backwards, but, despite every
atom of will which he could muster, a relentless force was drawing
him towards the silent, menacing figure. Almost before he realised
it he had taken a pace forward.
Through that timeless interval of seconds, days or weeks, after
the violet mist first appeared, De Richleau stood within a foot of
Rex, his eyes riveted upon the ground. He would not even allow
himself to ascertain in what form the apparition had taken shape.
The sudden deathly cold, the flicker of the lights as the room was
plunged in darkness, the noisome odour, were enough to tell him that
an entity of supreme evil was abroad.
With racing thoughts, he cursed his foolhardiness in ever
entering the accursed house without doing all things proper for
their protection. It was so many years since he had had any dealings
with the occult that his acute anxiety for Simon had caused him to
minimise the appalling risk they would run. What folly could have
possessed him, he wondered miserably, to allow Rex, whose ignorance
and scepticism would make him doubly vulnerable, to accompany him.
Despite his advancing age, the Duke would have given five precious
years of his life for an assurance that Rex was staring at the
parquet floor, momentarily riveted by fear perhaps, yet still free
from the malevolent influence which was streaming in pulsing waves
from the circle; but Rex was not-instinctively De Richleau knew that
his eyes were fixed on the Thing-and a ghastly dread caused little
beads of icy perspiration to break out on his forehead.
Then he felt, rather than saw, Rex move. Next second he heard his
footfall and knew that he was walking towards the pentagram. With
trembling lips he began to mutter strange sentences of Persian,
Greek and Hebrew, dimly remembered from his studies of the
past-calling-calling-urgently- imperatively, upon the Power of Light
for guidance and protection. Almost instantly the memory that he had
slipped the jewelled swastika into his waistcoat pocket when Max
returned it, flashed into his mind-and he knew that his prayer was
answered. His fingers closed on the jewel. His arms shot out. It
glittered for a second in the violet light, then came to rest in the
centre of the circle.
A piercing scream, desperate with anger, fear, and pain, like
that of a beast seared with a white-hot iron, blasted the silence.
The lights flickered again so that the wires showed red-came on-went
out-and flickered once more, as though two mighty forces were
struggling for possession of the current.
The chill wind died so suddenly that it seemed as if a blanket of
warm air had descended on their faces-but even while that hideous
screech was still ringing through the chamber De Richleau grabbed
Rex by the arm and dragged him towards the door. Next second the
control of both had snapped and they were plunging down the stairs
with an utter recklessness born of sheer terror.
Rex slipped on the lower landing and sprawled down the last
flight on his back. The Duke came bounding after, six stairs at a
time, and fell beside him. Together they scrambled to their
feet-dashed through the library-out of the french-windows-and across
the lawn.
With the agility of lemurs they swung up the branches of the
laburnum-on to the wall-and dropped to the far side. Then they
pelted down the lane as fast as their legs could carry them, and on
until a full street away they paused, breathless and panting, to
face each other under the friendly glow of a street lamp.
De Richleau's breath came in choking gasps. It was years since he
had subjected himself to such physical exertion, and his face was
grey from the strain which it had put upon him. Rex found his
evening collar limp from the sweat which had streamed from him in
his terror, but his lungs were easing rapidly, and he was the first
to recover.
'God! we're mighty lucky to be out of that!'
The Duke nodded, still unable to speak.
'I take back every word I said,' Rex went on hurriedly. 'I don't
think I've ever been real scared of anything in my life before-but
that was hellish!'
'I panicked too-towards the end-couldn't help it, but I should
never have taken you into that place-never,' De Rich-leau muttered
repentantly as they set off down the street.
'Since we've got out safe it's all to the good. I've a real idea
what we're up against now.'
The Duke drew Rex's arm through his own with a friendly gesture.
Far from desiring to say 'I told you so!' he was regretting that he
had been so impatient with Rex's previous unbelief, Most people he
knew regarded devil worship and the cultivation of mystic powers as
sheer superstitions due to the ignorance of the Middle Ages. It had
been too much to expect Rex to accept his contention that their sane
and sober friend Simon was mixed up in such practices, but now he
had actually witnessed a true instance of Saiitii De Richleau felt
that his co-operation would be ten times as valuable as before.
In the St. John's Wood Road they picked up a belated taxi, and on
the way back to Curzon Street he questioned Rex carefully as to the
form the Thing had taken. When he had heard the description he
nodded, 'It was Mocata's black servant, undoubtedly.'
'What did you say he was?'
'A Malagasy. They are a strange people. Half Negro and half
Polynesian. A great migration took place many centuries ago from the
South Seas to the East African Coast by way of the Malay Peninsula
and Ceylon. Incredible though it may seem, they covered fifteen
thousand miles of open ocean in their canoes, and most of them
settled in Madagascar, where they intermarried with the aborigines
and produced this half-breed type, which often has the worst
characteristics of both races.'
'And Madagascar is the home of Voodoo-isn't it?'
'Yes. Perhaps he is a Witch doctor himself . . , and yet I wonder
. . .'The Duke broke off as the taxi drew up before Errol House.
As they entered the big library Rex glanced at the clock and saw
that it was a Little after three. Not a particularly late hour for
him, since he often danced until the night clubs emptied, nor for De
Richleau, who believed that the one time when men opened their minds
and conversation became really interesting was in the quiet hours
before the dawn. Yet both were so exhausted by their ordeal that
they felt as though a month had passed since they sat down to
dinner.
Rex remade the remnants of the fire while the Duke mixed the
drinks and uncovered the sandwiches which Max always left for him.
Then they both sank into armchairs and renewed the discussion, for
despite their weariness, neither had any thought of bed. The peril
in which Simon stood was far too urgent.
'You were postulating that he might be a Madagascar Witch
doctor,' Rex began. 'But I've a hunch I've read some place that such
fellows have no power over whites, and surely that is so, else how
could settlers in Africa and places keep the blacks under?'
'Broadly speaking, you are right, and the explanation is simple.
What we call Magic-Black or White-is the Science and Art of Causing
Change to occur in conformity with Will, Any required Change may be
effected by the application of the proper kind and degree of Force
in the proper manner and through the proper medium. Naturally, for
causing any Change it is requisite to have the practical ability to
set the necessary Forces in right motion, but it is even more
important to have a thorough qualitative and quantitative
understanding of the conditions. Very few white men can really get
inside a Negro's mind and know exactly what he is thinking-and even
fewer blacks can appreciate a white's mentality. In consequence, it
is infinitely harder for the Wills of either to work on the other
than on men of their own kind.
'Another factor which adds to the difficulty of a Negroid or
Mongolian Sorcerer working his spells upon a European is the
question of vibrations. Their variation in human beings is governed
largely by the part of the earth's surface in which birth took
place. To use a simple analogy, some races have long wave lengths
and others short-and the greater the variation the more difficult it
is for a malignant will to influence that of an intended victim.
Were it otherwise, you may be certain that the white races, who have
neglected spiritual growth for material achievement, would never
have come to dominate the world as they do today.'
'Yet that devil of Mocata's got me down all right. Ugh!' Rex
shuddered slightly at the recollection.
True-but I was only speaking generally. There are exceptions, and
in the highest grades-the Ipsissimus, the Magus and the Magister
Templi-those who have passed the Abyss, colour and race no longer
remain a bar, so such Masters can work their will upon any lesser
human unless he is protected by a power of equal strength. This
associate of Mocata's may be one of the great Adepts of the Left
Hand Path. However, what I was really wondering was-is he a human
being at all?'
'But you said you saw him yourself-when you paid a call on Simon
weeks back.'
'I thought I saw him-so at first I assumed that the Thing you saw
tonight was his astral body, sent by Mocata to prevent our removing
his collection of Devil's baubles; but perhaps what we both saw was
a disembodied entity, an actual Satanic power which is not governed
by Mocata, but has gained entry to our world from the other side
through his evil practices,'
'Oh Lord!' Rex groaned. 'All this stuff is so new, so fantastic,
so utterly impossible to me-I just can't grasp it; though don't
think I'm doubting now. Whether it was an astral body or what you
say, I saw it all right, and it wasn't a case of any stupid parlour
tricks-I'll swear to that. It was so evil that my bones just turned
to water on me in sheer blue funk-and there's poor Simon all mixed
up in this. Say, now-what the hell are we to do?'
De Richleau sat forward suddenly. 'I wish to God I knew what was
at the bottom of this business. I am certain that it is something
pretty foul for them to have gone to the lengths of getting hold of
a normal man like Simon but, if it is the last thing we ever do,
we've got to find him and get him away from these people.'
'But how?' Rex flung wide his arms. 'Where can we even start in
on the hope of picking up the trail? Simon's a lone wolf-always has
been. He's got no father; his mother lives abroad; unlike so many
Jews, he hasn't even got a heap of relatives who we can dig out and
question?'
'Yes, that is the trouble. Of course he is almost certain to be
with Mocata, but I don't see how we are to set about finding
somebody who knows Mocata either. If only we had the address of any
of those people who were there this evening we might...'
'I've got it!' cried Rex, leaping to his feet. 'We'll trace him
through Tanith.'
7
De Richleau Plans a Campaign
'Tanith,' the Duke repeated; 'but you don't know where she is, do
you?'
'Sure.' Rex laughed, for the first time in several hours. 'Having
got acquainted with her after all this while, I wouldn't be such a
fool as to quit that party without nailing her address.'
'I must confess that I'm surprised she gave it to you.'
'She hadn't fallen to it that I wasn't one of their bunch-then!
She's staying at Claridges.'
'Do you think you can get hold of her?'
'Don't you worry-I meant to, anyhow.'
'You must be careful, Rex. This woman is very lovely, I know-but
she's probably damnably dangerous.'
'I've never been scared of a female yet, and surely these people
can't do me much harm in broad daylight?'
'No, except for ordinary human trickery they are almost powerless
between sunrise and sunset.'
Tine. Then I'll go right round to Claridges as soon as she is
likely to be awake tomorrow-today, rather.'
'You don't know her real name though, do you?'
'I should worry. There aren't two girls like her staying at
Claridges-there aren't two like her in all London.'
De Richleau stood up and began to pace the floor like some huge
cat. 'What do you intend to say to her?' he asked at length.
'Why, that we're just worried stiff about Simon-and that it's
absolutely imperative that she should help us out. I'll give her a
frank undertaking not to do anything against Mocata or any of her
pals if she'll come clean with me-though Heaven knows I can't think
she's got any real friends in a crowd like that.'
'Rex! Rex!' The Duke smiled affectionately down into the honest
attractive, ugly face of the young giant stretched in the armchair.
'And what, may I ask, do you intend to do should this lovely lady
refuse to tell you anything?'
'I can threaten to call in the cops, I suppose, though I'd just
hate to do anything like that on her.'
De Richleau gave his eloquent expressive shrug. 'My dear fellow,
unless we can get some actual evidence of ordinary criminal
activities against Mocata and his friends, the police are absolutely
ruled out of this affair-and she would know it.'
'I don't see why,' Rex protested stubbornly. 'These people have
kidnapped Simon, that's what it boils down to, and that's as much a
crime as running a dope joint or white slaving.'
'Perhaps, and if they had hit him on the head our problem would
be easy. The difficulty is that to all outward appearances he has
joined them willingly and in his right mind. Only we know that he is
acting under some powerful and evil influence which has been brought
to bear on him, and how in the world are you going to charge anyone
with raising the devil-or its equivalent-in a modern police court?'
'Well, what do you suggest?'
'Listen.' The Duke perched himself on the arm of Rex's chair.
'Even if this girl is an innocent party like Simon, she will not
tell you anything willingly-she will be too frightened. As a matter
of fact, now that she knows you are not a member of their infernal
circle it is doubtful if she will even see you, but if she
does-well, you've got to get hold of her somehow.'
'I'll certainly have a try-but it's not all that easy to kidnap
people in a city Like London.'
'I don't mean that exactly, but rather that you should induce
her, by fair means or foul, to accompany you to some place where I
can talk to her at my leisure. If she is only a neophyte I know
enough of this dangerous business to frighten her out of her wits.
If she is something more there will be a mental tussle, and I may
learn something from the cards which she is forced to throw on the
table.'
'O.K. I'll pull every gun I know to persuade her into coming here
with me for a cocktail.'
De Richleau shook his head. 'No, I'm afraid that won't do,
immediately she realised the reason she had been brought here she
would insist on leaving, and we couldn't stop her. If we tried she
would break a window and yell Murder! We have got to get her to a
place where she will see at once the futility of trying to call for
outside help. I have itl Do you think you could get her down to
Pangbourne?'
'What? To that river place of yours?'
'Yes; I haven't been down there yet this year, but I can send Max
down first thing in the morning to open it up and give it an
airing.'
'You talk as though I were falling off a log to get a girl to
come boating on the Thames at what's practically a first meet
ing-can't you weigh in and lend a hand yourself?'
'No. I shall be at the British Museum most of the day. It is so
many years since I studied the occult that there are a thousand
things I have forgotten. It is absolutely imperative that I should
immerse myself in some of the old key works for a few hours and rub
up my knowledge of protective measures. I must leave you to handle
the girl, Rex, and remember, Simon's safety will depend almost
wholly on your success. Get her there somehow, and I'll join you in
the late afternoon-say about six.'
Rex grinned. 'It's about as stiff a proposition as sending me in
your place to study the Cabbala, but I'll do rny best.'
'Of course you will.' The Duke began to pace hurriedly up and
down again. 'But go gently with her-I beg you. Avoid any questions
about this horrible business as you would the plague. Play the
lover. Be just the nice young man who has fallen in love with a
beautiful girl. If she asks you about our having abducted Simon from
the party, say you were completely in the dark about it. That you
have known me for years-and that I sprung some story on you about
his having fallen into the hands of a gang of blackmailers, so you
just blindly followed my lead without a second thought. Not a word
to her about the supernatural-you know nothing of that. You must be
as incredulous as you were with me when I first talked to you of it.
And, above all, if you can get her to Pang-bourne, don't let her
know that I am coming down.'
'Surely-I get the line you want me to play all right.'
'Good. You see, if I can only squeeze some information out of her
which will enable us to find out where Mocata is living, we will go
down and keep the place under observation for a day or two. He is
almost certain to have Simon with him. We will note the times that
Mocata leaves the house and plan our raid accordingly. If we can get
Simon into our hands again I swear Mocata shan't get him back a
second time.'
That's certainly the idea.'
'There is only one thing I am really frightened of.' 'What's
that?'
De Richleau paused opposite Rex's chair. 'What I heard this
evening of Simon's approaching change of name-to Abraham, you
remember. That, of course, would be after Abraham the Jew, a very
famous and learned mystic of the early centuries. He wrote a book
which is said to be the most informative ever compiled concerning
the Great Work. It was lost sight of for several hundred years, but
early in the fifteenth century came into the possession of a
Parisian bookseller named Nicolas Flamel who, by its aid, performed
many curious rites. Flamel was buried in some magnificence, and a
few years later certain persons who were anxious to obtain his
secrets opened his grave to find the book which was supposed to have
been buried with him. Neither Flamel nor the book was there, and
there is even some evidence to show that he was still living a
hundred years later in Turkey, which is by no means unbelievable to
those who have any real knowledge of the strange powers acquired by
the true initiate such as those in the higher orders of the Yoga
sects. That is the last we know of the Book of Abraham the Jew, but
it seems that Simon is about to take his name in the service of the
Invisible.'
'Well-what'll happen then?'
'That he will be given over entirely to the Power of Evil, be
cause he will renounce his early teaching and receive his re-baptism
at the hands of a high adept of the Left Hand Path. Until that is
done we can still save him, because all the invisible powers of Good
will be fighting on our side, but after-they will withdraw, and what
we call the Soul of Simon Aron will be dragged down into the Pit.'
'Are you sure of that? Baptism into the Christian Faith doesn't
ensure one going to Heaven, why should this other sprinkling be a
guarantee of anyone going to Hell?'
'It's such a big question, Rex, but briefly it is like this.
Heaven and Hell are only symbolical of growth to Light or
disintegration to Darkness. By Christian-or any other true religious
baptism, we renounce the Devil and all his Works, thereby erecting a
barrier which it is difficult for Evil forces to surmount, but
anyone who accepts Satanic baptism does exactly the reverse. They
wilfully destroy the barrier of astral Light which is our natural
protection and offer themselves as a medium through which the powers
of Darkness may operate on mankind.
'They are tempted to it, of course, by the belief that it will
give them supernatural powers over their fellow-men, but few of them
realise the appalling danger. There is no such person as the Devil,
but there are vast numbers of Earthbound spirits, Elementals, and
Evil Intelligences of the Outer Circle floating in our midst. Nobody
who has even the most elementary knowledge of the Occult can doubt
that. They are blind and ignorant, and except for the last, under
comparatively rare circumstances, not in the least dangerous to any
normal man or woman who leads a reasonably upright life, but they
never cease to search in a fumbling way for some gateway back into
existence as we know it. The surrender of one's own volition gives
it to them, and, if you need an example, you only have to think of
the many terrible crimes which are perpetrated when reason and will
are entirely absent owing to excess of alcohol. An Elemental seizes
upon the unresisting intelligence of the human and forces them to
some appalling deed which is utterly against their natural
instincts.
'That, then, is the danger. While apparently only passing through
an ancient barbarous and disgusting ritual, the Satanist, by
accepting baptism, surrenders his will to the domination of powers
which he believes he will be able to use for his own ends, but in
actual fact he becomes the spiritual slave of an Elemental, and for
ever after is nothing but the instrument of its evil purposes.'
'When do you figure they'll try to do this thing?'
'Not for a week or so, I trust. It is essential that it should
take place at a real Sabbat, when at least one Coven of thirteen is
present, and after our having broken up their gathering tonight I
hardly think they will risk meeting again for some little time,
unless there is some extraordinary reason why they should.'
'That gives us a breathing space then; but what's worrying me is
that it's so early in the year to ask a young woman to go picnicking
on the river.'
'Why? The sunshine for the last few days has been magnificent.'
'Still, it's only April 29th-the 30th, I mean.'
'What!' De Richleau stood there with a new and terrible anxiety
burning in his eyes. 'Good God! I never realised!'
'What's the trouble?'
'Why, that was only one Coven we saw tonight, and there are
probably a dozen scattered over England. The whole pack are probably
on their way by now to the great annual gathering. It's a certainty
they will take Simon with them. They'd never miss the chance of
giving him his Devil's Christening at the Grand Sabbat of the year.'
'What in the world are you talking about?' Rex hoisted himself
swiftly out of his chair.
'Don't you understand, man?' De Richleau gripped him by the
shoulder. 'On the last night of April every peasant in Europe still
double-locks his doors. Every latent force for Evil in the world is
abroad. We've got to get hold of Simon in the next twenty hours.
This coming night-April 30th-is Saint Walburga's Eve.'
8
Rex Van Ryn Opens the Attack
Six hours later, Rex, still drowsy with sleep, lowered himself
into the Duke's sunken bath. It was a very handsome bathroom some
fifteen feet by twelve; black glass, crystal mirrors, and chromium-
plated fittings made up the scheme of decoration.
Some people might have considered it a little too striking to be
in perfect taste, but De Richleau did not subscribe to the canon
which has branded ostentation as vulgarity in the last few
generations, and robbed nobility of any glamour which it may have
possessed in more spacious days.
His forbears had ridden with thirty-two footmen before them, and
it caused him considerable regret that modern conditions made it
impossible for him to drive in his Hispano with no more than one
seated beside his chauffeur on the box. Fortunately his resources
were considerable and his brain sufficiently astute to make good, in
most years, the inroads which the tax gatherers made upon them.
'After him,' of course 'the Deluge' as he very fully recognised, but
with reasonable good fortune he considered that private ownership
would last out his time, at least in England where he had made his
home; and so he continued to do all things on a scale suitable to a
De Richleau, with the additional lavishness of one who had had a
Russian mother, as far as the restrictions of twentieth-century
democracy would allow.
Rex, however, had used the Duke's ?1,000 bathroom a number of
times before, and his only concern at the moment was to wonder
vaguely what he was doing there on this occasion and why he had such
an appalling hangover. Never, since he had been given two glasses of
bad liquor in the old days when his country laboured under
prohibition, had he felt so desperately ill.
A giant sponge placed on the top of his curly head brought him
temporary relief and full consciousness of the events which had
taken place the night before. Of course it was that ghastly
experience he had been through in Simon's empty house that had
sapped him of his vitality and left him in this wretched state. He
remembered that he had kept up all right until they got back to
Curzon Street, and even after, during a long conversation with the
Duke; then, he supposed, he must have petered out from sheer nervous
exhaustion.
He lay back in the warm, faintly scented water, and gave himself
a mental shaking. The thought that he must have fainted shocked him
profoundly. He had driven racing cars at 200 miles an hour, had his
colours for the Cresta run, had flown a plane 1,500 miles, right out
of the Forbidden Territory down to Kiev in one hop. He had shot men
and been shot at in return both in Russia and in Cuba, where he had
found himself mixed up with the Revolution, but never before had he
been in a real funk about anything, much less collapsed like a spine
less fool.
He recalled with sickening vividness, that loathsome, striking
manifestation of embodied evil that had come upon them- and his
thoughts flew to Simon. How could their shy nervous, charming friend
have got himself mixed up in all this devilry? For Rex had no doubts
now that, incredible as it might seem, the Duke was right, and Satan
worship still a living force in modern cities, just as the infernal
Voodoo cult was still secretly practised by the Negroes in the
Southern States of his own country. He thought again of their first
visit to Simon's house as unwelcome guests at that strange party. Of
the Albino, the old Countess D'Urfe, the sinister Chinaman, and then
of Tanith, except for Simon the only normal person present, and felt
convinced that, but for the intervention of De Richleau some
abominable ceremony would certainly have taken place, although he
had laughed at the suggestion at the time.
Sitting up he began to soap himself vigorously while he restated
the situation briefly in his mind. One: Mocata was an adept of what
De Richleau called the Left Hand Path, and for some reason unknown
he had gained control over Simon. Two: owing to their intervention
the Satanists had abandoned Simon's house-taking him with them.
Three: Simon was shortly to be baptised into the Black Brotherhood,
after which, according to the Duke, he would be past all help. Four:
today was May Day Eve when, according to the Duke, the Grind Sabbat
of the year took place. Five: following from four, it was almost a
certainty that Mocata would seize this opportunity of the Walpurgis
Nacht celebrations to have Simon re-christened. Six: in the next
twelve hours therefore, Mocata had to be traced and Simon taken from
him. Seven: the only possibility of getting on Mocata's trail lay in
obtaining information by prayers, cajolery, or threats from Tanith.
Rex stopped soaping and groaned aloud at the thought that the one
woman he had been wanting to meet for years should be mixed up in
this revolting business. He loathed deception in any form and
resented intensely the necessity for practising it on her, but De
Richleau's last instructions to him were still clear in his mind,
and the one thing which stood out above all others, was the fact of
his old and clear friend being in some intangible but terrible
peril.
Feeling slightly better by the time he had shaved and dressed, he
noted from the windows of the flat that at least they had been
blessed with a glorious day. Summer was in the air and there seemed
a promise of that lovely fortnight which sometimes graces England in
early May.
To his surprise he found that De Richleau, who habitually was not
visible before twelve, had left the fiat at half-past eight.
Evidently he meant to put in a long day among the ancient
manuscripts at the British Museum, rubbing up his knowledge of
strange cults and protective measures against what he termed the Ab-
human monsters of the Outer Circle.
Max proffered breakfast, but Rex declined it until, with a hurt
expression, the servant produced his favourite omelet.
'The chef will be so disappointed, sir,' he said.
Reluctantly Rex sat down to eat while Max, busy with the coffee-
pot, permitted himself a hidden smile. He had had orders from the
Duke, and His Excellency was a wily man. None knew that better than
his personal servitor, the faithful Max.
Noting that Rex had finished, he produced a wine-glass full of
some frothy mixture on a salver. 'His Excellency said, sir.' he
stated blandly, 'that he finds this uncommon good for his neuralgia.
I was distressed to hear that you are sometimes a sufferer too, and
if you'd try it the taste is, if I may say so, not
unpleasant-somewhat resembling that of granadillas I believe.'
With a suspicious look Rex drank the quite palatable potion while
Max added suavely: 'Some gentleman prefer prairie-oysters I am told,
but I've a feeling, sir, that His Excellency knows best.'
'You old humbug.' Rex grinned as he replaced the glass. 'Anyhow
last night wasn't the sort of party you think-I wish to God it had
been.'
'No, sir! Well, that's most regrettable I'm sure, but I had a
feeling that Mr. Aron was not quite in his usual form, if I may so
express it-when he er-joined us after dinner.'
'Yes-of course you put Simon to bed-I'd forgotten that.'
Max quickly lowered his eyes. He was quite certain that his
innocent action the night before had been connected in some way with
Simon Aron's sudden disappearance from the bedroom later, and felt
that for once he had done the wrong thing, so he deftly turned the
conversation. 'His Excellency instructed me to tell you, sir, that
the touring Rolls is entirely at your disposal and the second
chauffeur if you wish to use him.'
'No-I'll drive myself; have it brought round right away- will
you?'
'Very good, sir, and now if you will excuse me I must leave at
once in order to get down to Pangbourne and prepare the house for
your reception.'
'O.K., Max-See-yer-later-I hope.' Rex picked up a cigarette. He
was feeling better already. 'A whole heap better,' he thought, as he
wondered what potent corpse-reviver lay hidden in the creamy depths
of De Richleau's so-called neuralgia tonic. Then he sat down to plan
out his line of attack on the lady at Claridges.
If he could only talk to her he felt that he would be able to
intrigue her into a friendly attitude. He could, of course, easily
find out her real name from the bureau of the hotel, but the snag
was that if he sent up his name and asked to see her the chances
were all against her granting him an interview. After all, by
kidnapping Simon, he and the Duke had wrecked the meeting of her
Circle the night before, and if she was at all intimately associated
with Mocata, she probably regarded him with considerable hostility.
Only personal contact could overcome that, so he must not risk any
rebuff through the medium of bell-hops, but accept it only if given
by her after he had managed to see her face to face.
His plan, therefore, eventually boiled down to marching on
Claridges, planting himself in a comfortable chair within view of
the lifts and sitting there until Tanith made her appearance. He
admitted to himself that his proposed campaign was conspicuously
lacking in brilliance but, he argued, few women staying in a London
hotel would remain in their rooms all day, so if he sat there long
enough it was almost certain that an opportunity would occur for him
to tackle her direct. If she did turn him down-well, De Richleau
wasn't the only person in the world who had ideas-and Rex flattered
himself that he would think of something.
Immediately the Rolls was reported at the door, he left the flat
and drove round to Claridges in it. A short conversation with a
friendly commissionaire ensured that there would be no trouble if
the car was left parked outside, even for a considerable time, for
Rex thought it necessary to have it close at hand since he might
need it at any moment.
As he entered the hotel from the Davies Street entrance he noted
with relief that it was only a little after ten. It was unlikely
that Tanith would have gone out for the day so early, and he settled
himself to wait for an indefinite period with cheerful optimism in
the almost empty lounge. After a moment it occurred to him that
somebody might come up to him and inquire his business if he was
forced to stay there for any length of time, but an underporter,
passing at the moment, gave him a swift smile and little bow of
recognition, so he trusted that having been identified as an
occasional client of the place he would not be unduly molested.
He began to consider what words he should use if, and when,
Tanith did step out of the lifts, and had just decided on a formula
which contained the requisite proportions of respect, subtle
admiration, and gaiety when a small boy in buttons came marching
with a carefree swing down the corridor.
'Mister Vine Rine-Mister Vine Rine,' he chanted in a monotonous
treble.
Rex looked at the boy suspiciously. The sound had a queer
resemblance to the parody of his own name as he had often heard it
shrilled out by bell-hops in clubs and hotel lounges. Yet no one
could possibly be aware of his presence at Claridges that
morning-except, of course, the Duke. At the thought that De Richleau
might be endeavouring to get in touch with him for some urgent
reason he turned, and at the same moment the page sidetracked
towards him.
'Mr. Van Ryn, sir?' he inquired, dropping into normal speech.
'Yes.' Rex nodded.
Then to his utter astonishment the boy announced: 'The lady
you've called to see sent down to say she's sorry to keep you
waiting, but she'll join you in about fifteen minutes.'
With his mouth slightly open Rex stared stupidly at the page
until that infant turned and strutted away. He did not doubt that
the message came from Tanith-who else could have sent it, yet how
the deuce did she know that he was there? Perhaps she had seen him
drive up from her window -that seemed the only reasonable
explanation. Anyhow that 'she was sorry to keep him waiting' sounded
almost too good to be true.
Recovering a little he stood up, marched out into Brook Street
and purchased a great sheaf of lilac from a florist's a few doors
down. Returning with it to the hotel he suddenly realised that he
still did not know Tanith's real name, but catching sight of the boy
who had paged him, he beckoned him over.
'Here boy-take these up to the lady's room with Mr. Van Ryn's
compliments.' Then he resumed his seat near the lift with happy
confidence.
Five minutes later the lift opened. An elderly woman leaning upon
a tall ebony cane stepped out. At the first glance Rex recognised
the parrot-peaked nose, the nut-cracker chin and the piercing black
eyes of the old Countess D'Urfe. Before he had time to collect his
wits she had advanced upon him and extended a plump, beringed hand.
'Monsieur Van Ryn,' she croaked. 'It is charming that you should
call upon me-sank you a thousand times for those lovely flowers.'
9
The Countess D'Urfe Talks of Many Curious Things
'Ha! ha!-not a bit of it-it's great to see you again.'
Rex gave a weak imitation of a laugh. He had only spoken to the
old crone for two minutes on the previous evening and that, when he
had first arrived at Simon's party, for the purpose of detaching
Tanith from her. Even if she had seen him drive up to Claridges what
in the world could have made her imagine that he had come to visit
herl If only he hadn't sent up that lilac he might have politely
excused himself-but he could hardly tell her now that he had meant
it for someone else.
'And how is Monseigneur le Due this morning?' the old lady
inquired, sinking into a chair he placed for her.
'He asked me to present his homage, Madame,' Rex lied quickly,
instinctively picking a phrase which De Richleau might have used
himself.
'Ca, c'est tres gentille.'E is a charming man-charming an' 'is
cigars they are superb,' The Countess D'Urfe' produced a square case
from her bag and drew out a fat, dark Havana. As Rex applied a match
she went on slowly: 'But it ees not right that one Circle should
make interference with the operations of another. What 'ave you to
say of your be'aviour lars' night my young frien'?'
'My hat,' thought Rex, 'the old beldame fancies we're an opposing
faction in the same line of business-I'll have to use this if I
can;' so he answered slowly: 'We were mighty sorry to have to do
what we did, but we needed Simon Aron for our own purposes.'
'So!-you also make search for the Talisman then?'
'Sure-that is, the Duke's taking a big interest in it.'
'Which of us are not-and 'oo but le petit Juif shall lead us to
it.'
'That's true.'
'Ave you yet attempted the Rite to Saturn?'
'Yes, but things didn't pan out quite as we thought they would,'
Rex replied cautiously, -not having the faintest idea what they were
talking about.
'You 'ave satisfy yourselves that the aloes and mastic were
fresh, eh?' The wicked old eyes bored into his.
'Yes, I'm certain of that,' he assured her.
'You choose a time when the planet was in the 'ouse of Capricorn,
of course?'
'Oh, surely!'
'An' you 'ave not neglect to make Libation to Our Lady Babalon
before'and?'
'Oh, no, we wouldn't do that!'
'Then per'aps your periods of silence were not long enough?'
'Maybe that's so,' he admitted hurriedly, hoping to close this
madhatter's conversation before he completely put his foot into it.
Countess D'Urfe nodded, then after drawing thoughtfully at her
cigar she looked at him intently. 'Silence,' she murmured. 'Silence,
that ees always essential in the Ritual of Saturn-but you 'ave much
courage to thwart Mocata-'e is powerful, that one.'
'Oh, we're not afraid of him,' Rex declared and, recalling the
highest grade of operator from his conversation with De Richleau, he
added: 'You see the Duke knows all about this thing-he's an
Ipsissimus.'
The old lady's eyes almost popped out of their sockets at this
announcement, and Rex feared that he had gone too far, but she
leaned forward and placed one of her jewelled claws upon his arm.
'An Ipsissimus!-an' I 'av studied the Great Work for forty years,
yet I 'ave reached only the degree of Practicus. But no, 'e cannot
be, or 'ow could 'e fail with the Rite to Saturn?'
'I only said that it didn't pan out quite as we expected,' Rex
hastened to remind her, 'and for the full dress business he'd need
Simon Aron anyway.'
'Of course,' she nodded again and continued in an awestruck
whisper, 'an' De Richleau is then a real Master. You must be far
advanced for one so young-that 'e allow you to work with 'im.'
He flicked the ash off his cigarette but maintained a cautious
silence.
'I am not-'ow you say-associated with Mocata long-since I 'ave
arrive only recently in England, but De Richleau will cast 'im down
into the Abyss-for 'ow shall 'e prevail against one who is of ten
circles and a single square?'
Rex nodded gravely.
'Could I not-' her dark eyes filled with a new eagerness, 'would
it not be possible for me to prostrate before your frien'? If you
spoke for me also, per'aps 'e would allow that I should occupy a
minor place when 'e proceeds again to the invocation?'
'Ho! Ho!' said Rex to himself, 'so the old rat wants to scuttle
from the sinking ship, does she. I ought to be able to turn this to
our advantage,' while aloud he said with a lordly air: 'All things
are possible-but there would be certain conditions.'
'Tell me,' she muttered swiftly.
'Well, there is this question of Simon Aron.'
'What question?-Now that you 'ave 'im with you-you can do with
'im as you will.'
Rex quickly averted his gaze from the piercing black eyes.
Evidently Mocata had turned the whole party out after they had got
away with Simon. The old witch obviously had no idea that Mocata had
regained possession of him later. In another second he would have
given away their whole position by demanding Simon's whereabouts.
Instead-searching his mind desperately for the right bits of
gibberish he said: 'When De Richleau again proceeds to the
invocation it is necessary that the vibrations of all present should
be attuned to those of Simon Aron.'
'No matter-willingly I will place myself in your 'ands for
preparation.'
'Then I'll put it up to him, but first I must obey his order and
say a word to the lady who was with you at Aron's house last
night-Tanith.' Having at last manoeuvred the conversation to this
critical point, Rex mentally crossed his thumbs and offered up a
prayer that he was right in assuming that they were staying at the
hotel together.
She smiled, showing two rows of white false teeth. 'I know it,
and you must pardon, I beg, that we 'ave our little joke with you.'
'Oh, don't worry about that,' he shrugged, wondering anxiously to
what new mystery she was alluding, but to his relief she hurried on.
'Each morning we look into the crystal an' when she see you walk
into the 'otel she exclaim, 'It is for me 'e comes-the tall
American," but we 'ave no knowledge that you are more than a
Neophyte or a Zelator at the most, so when you send up the flowers
she say to me, "You shall go down to 'im instead an' after we will
laugh at the discomfiture of this would-be lover."'
The smile broadened on Rex's full mouth as he listened to the
explanation of much that had been troubling him in the last hour,
but it faded suddenly as he realised that, natural as it seemed
compared to all this meaningless drivel which he had been exchanging
with the old woman, it was in reality one more demonstration of the
occult. These two women had actually seen him walk into the hotel
lounge when they were sitting upstairs in their room peering into a
piece of glass.
'In some ways I suffer the disappointment,' said the old Countess
suddenly, and Rex found her studying turn with a strange,
disconcerting look. 'I know well that promiscuity gives a greaty
power for all 'oo follow the Path an' that 'uman love 'inders our
development, but nevair 'ave I been able to free myself from a so
stupid sentimentality-an' you would, I think, 'ave made a good lover
for 'er.'
Rex stared in astonished silence, then looked quickly away, as
she added: 'No matter-the other ees of real importance. I will send
for 'er that you may give your message.'
With a little jerk she stood up and gripping her ebony cane
stumped across to the hall porter's desk while he relaxed, un
utterably glad that this extraordinary interview was over.
However, he felt a glow of satisfaction in the thought that he
kad duped her into the belief that De Richleau and himself were even
more powerful adepts than Mocata, and at having played his cards
sufficiently well to secure a meeting with Tanith under such
favourable circumstances. If only he could get into his car, he was
determined to inveigle her into giving him any information she
possessed which might lead to the discovery of Simon's whereabouts,
although, since Madame D'Urfe was ignorant of the fact that he was
no longer with the Duke, it was hardly likely that Tanith would
actually be able to take them to him.
With new anxiety Rex realised the gravity of the check. They had
practically counted on Tanith having the knowledge, if only they
could get it out of her, and even if he could persuade her to talk
about Mocata the man might have a dozen haunts. If so it would be no
easy task to visit all before sundown and the urgency of the Duke's
instructions still rang in his ears.
Today was May Day Eve. The Great Sabbat of the year would be held
tonight. It was absolutely imperative that they should trace and
secure Simon before dusk or else, under the evil influence which now
dominated his mentality, he would be taken to participate in those
unholy rites and jeopardise for ever the flame of goodness, wisdom
and right thinking which men term the soul.
After a moment Madame D'Urfe rejoined him. 'For tonight at
least,' she whispered, 'things in dispute between the followers of
the Path will be in abeyance-is it not?-for all must make their
'omage to the One.'
He nodded and she bent towards him, lowering her voice still
further: 'If I could but see De Richleau for one moment- as
Ipsissinus 'e must possess the unguent?'
That's so,' Rex agreed, but he was horribly uncertain of his
ground again as he added cryptically: 'But what of the Moon?'
'Ah, fatality,' she sighed. 'I 'ad forgotten that we are in the
dark quarter.'
He blessed the providence which had guided his tongue as she went
on sadly: 'I 'ave try so often but nevair yet 'ave I
succeeded. I know all things necessary to its preparation, an'
'ave gathered every 'erb at the right period. I 'ave even rendered
down the fat, but they must 'ave cheated me. It was from a mortuary
per'aps-but not from a graveyard as it should 'ave been.'
Rex felt the hair bristle on the back of his neck and his whole
body stiffened slightly as he heard this gruesome confession. Surely
it was inconceivable that people still practised these medieval
barbarities-yet he recalled the terrible manifestation that he had
witnessed with the Duke on the previous night. After that he could
no longer employ modern standards of belief or unbelief to the
possibilities which might result from the strange and horrible
doings of these people who had given themselves over to ancient
cults.
The old Countess was regarding him again with that queer
disconcerting look. 'It matters not,' she murmured. 'We shall get
there just the same, Tanith and I-an' it should be interesting-for
nevair before 'as she attended the Great Sabbat.'
The lift gates clicked at that moment and Tanith stepped out into
the corridor. For a fleeting instant Rex caught a glimpse of her
wise, beautiful face, over the old woman's shoulder, but the
Countess was speaking again in a husky whisper, so he was forced to
look back at her.
'Nevair before,' she repeated with unholy glee, 'and after the
One 'as done that which there is to do, 'oo knows but you may be the
next-if you are quick.'
Forcing himself out of his chair Rex shut his ears to the
infernal implication. His general reading had been enough for him to
be aware that in the old. days the most incredible orgies took place
as the climax to every Sabbat, and his whole body crept at the
thought of Tanith being subjected to such abominations. His impulse
was to seize this iniquitous old woman by the throat and choke the
bestial life out of her fat body, but with a supreme effort he
schooled himself to remain outwardly normal.
As Tanith approached, and taking his hand smiled into his eyes,
he knew that she, as well as Simon, must be saved before nightfall
from-yes, the old biblical quotation leapt to his mind-'The Power of
the Dog,' that was strong upon them.
10
Tanith Proves Stubborn
After the muttering of the old Countess and her veiled allusions
to unspeakable depravities Rex felt that even the air had grown
stale and heavy, as though charged with some subtle quality of evil,
but on the coming of Tanith the atmosphere seemed to lighten. The
morning sunshine was lending a pale golden glow to the street
outside and in her hand she held one of the sprays of lilac which he
had sent up to her. She lifted it to her face as he returned her
smile. 'So I' she said in a low clear voice, her eyes mocking him
above the fragrant bloom: 'You insisted then that Madame should let
you see me?'
'I'd have sat around this place all day if she hadn't,' Rex
confessed frankly, 'because now we've met at last I'm hoping you'll
let me see something of you.'
'Perhaps-but not today. I have many things to do and already I am
late for the dressmaker.'
Rex thanked his stars that the old woman had unwittingly given
him a lever in assuming the Duke to be an Adept of great power, and
himself his envoy. 'It's mighty important that I should see you
today,' he insisted. There are certain things we've got to talk
about.'
'Got to!' A quick frown clouded Tanith's face. 'I do not
understand!'
'Ma petite, it is you 'oo do not understan',' Madame D'Urfe broke
in hastily. Then she launched into a torrent of low speech in some
foreign language, but Rex caught De Richleau's name and the word
Ipsissimus, so he guessed that she was giving Tanith some version of
the events which had taken place the night before, based on his own
misleading statements, and wondered miserably how long he would be
able to keep up the impersonation which had been thrust upon him.
Tanith nodded several times and studied him with a new interest
as she nibbled a small piece of the lilac blossom between her teeth.
Then she said with charming frankness: 'You must forgive me-I had no
idea you were such an important member of the Order.'
'Forget it please,' he begged, 'but if you're free I'd be glad if
you could join me for lunch.'
'That puts me in a difficulty because I am supposed to be
lunching with the wife of the Roumanian Minister.'
'How about this afternoon then?'
Her eyes showed quick surprise. 'But we shall have to leave here
by four o'clock if we are to get down by dusk-and I have my packing
to do yet.'
He realised that she was referring to the meeting and covered his
blunder swiftly. 'Of course-I'm always forgetting that these
twisting English roads don't permit of the fast driving I'm used to
back home. How would it be if I run you along to your dress place
now and then we took'a turn round the Park after?'
'Yes-if you will have lots of patience with me, because I take an
almost idiotic interest in my clothes.'
'You're telling me! He murmured to himself as he admired the slim
graceful lines of her figure clad so unostentatiously and yet so
suitably for the sunshine of the bright spring day. He picked up his
hat and beamed at her. 'Let's go-shall we?'
To his amazement he found himself taking leave of the old
Countess just as though she were a nice, normal, elderly lady who
was chaperoning some young woman to whom he had been formally
introduced at a highly respectable dance. And indeed, as they
departed, her dark eyes had precisely the same look which had often
scared him in mothers who possessed marriageable daughters. Had he
not known that such thoughts were anathema to her creed he would
have sworn that she was praying that they would be quick about it,
so that she could book a day before the end of the season at St.
George's, Hanover Square, and was already listing in her mind the
guests who should be asked to the reception.
'Where does the great artist hang out?' he asked as he helped
Tanith into the car.
'I have two,' she told him. 'Schiaparelli just across the square,
where I shall be for some twenty minutes, and after I have also to
visit Artelle in Knightsbridge- Are you sure that you do not mind
waiting for me?'
'Why, no! we've a whole heap of time before us.'
'And tonight as well,' she added slowly. 'I am glad that you will
be there because I am just a little nervous.'
'You needn't be!' he said with a sudden tightening of his mouth,
but she seemed satisfied with his assurance and had no inkling of
his real meaning.
As she alighted in Upper Grosvenor Street he called gaily after
her: 'Twenty minutes mind, and not one fraction over,' then he drove
across the road and pulled up at the International Sportsman's Club
of which he was a member.
The telephone exchange put him through to the British Museum
quickly enough, but the operator there nearly drove him frantic. It
seemed that it was not part of the Museum staff's duties to search
for visitors in the Reading Room, but after urgent prayers about
imaginary dead and dying they at last consented to have the Duke
hunted out. The wait that followed seemed interminable but at
last'De Richleau came to the line.
'I've got the girl,' Rex told him hurriedly, 'but how long I'll
be able to keep her I don't know. I've had a long talk, too, with
the incredible old woman who smokes cigars-you know the one-Madame
D'Urfe. They're staying at Claridges together and both of them are
going to the party you spoke of tonight. Where it's to be held I
don't know, but they're leaving London by car at four o'clock and
hope to make the place by nightfall. I've spun 'em a yarn that
you're the high and mighty Hoodoo in the you-know-what-a fat bigger
bug than Mocata ever was-so the old lady's all for giving him the go-
by and sitting in round about your feet, but neither of them knows
where Simon is-I'm certain. In fact they've no idea that he made a
getaway last night after we got him to your flat-so what's the drill
now?'
'I see-well, in that case you must. . .' but Rex never learnt
what De Richleau intended him to do for at that moment they were cut
off. When he got through to the Museum again it was to break in on a
learned conversation about South American antiques which was being
conducted on another line and, realising that he had already
exceeded his twenty minutes, he had no option but to hang up the
receiver and dash out into the street.
Tanith was just coming down the steps of Schiaparelli's as he
turned the car to meet her. 'Where now?' he asked when she had
settled herself beside him.
'To Artelle. It is just opposite the barracks in Knightsbridge. I
will not be more than five minutes this time, but she has a new idea
for me. She is really a very clever woman, so I am anxious to hear
what she has thought of.'
It was the longest speech he had so far heard her make, as their
conversation the night before had been brief and frequently
interrupted by Mocata. Her idiom was perfect, but the way in which
she selected her words and the care with which she pronounced them
made him ask suddenly. 'You're not English-are you?'
'Yes,' she smiled as they turned into Hyde Park, 'but my mother
was Hungarian and I have lived abroad nearly all my life. Is my
accent very noticeable?'
'Well-in a way, but it sounds just marvellous to me. Your voice
has got that deep caressing note about it which reminds me of-well,
if you want the truth, it's like Marlene Dietrich on the talkies.'
She threw back her head and gave a low laugh. 'If I believed that
I should be tempted to keep it, and as it is I have been working so
hard to get rid of it ever since I have been in England. It is
absurd that I should not be able to speak my own language
perfectly-yet I have talked English so little, except to foreign
governesses when I was a young girl.'
'And how old are you now, or is that a piece of rudeness?'
'How old do you think?'
'From your eyes you might be any age, but I've a feeling that
you're not much over twenty-two.'
'If I were to live I should be twenty-four next January.'
'Come now,' he protested, laughing, 'what a way to put it, that's
only a matter of nine months and no one could say you don't look
healthy.'
'I am,' she assured him gravely, 'but let us not talk of death.
Look at the colour of those rhododendrons. They are so lovely.'
'Yes, they've jerked this Park up no end since I first saw it as
a boy.' As the traffic opened he turned the car into Knightsbridge
and two minutes later Tanith got out at the discreet door of her
French dressmaker.
While she was inside Rex considered the position afresh, and
endeavoured to concoct some cryptic message purporting to come from
the Duke, to the effect that she was not to attend the Sabbat but to
remain in his care until it was all over, Yet he felt that she would
never believe him. It was quite evident that she meant to be present
at this unholy Walpurgis-Nacht gathering, and from what the old
woman had said all Satanists regarded it with such importance that
even warring factions among them sank their differences-for this one
night of the year-in order to attend.
Obviously she could have no conception of what she was letting
herself in for, but the very idea of her being mishandled by that
ungodly crew made his big biceps tighten with the desire to lash out
at someone. He had got to keep her with him somehow, that was
clear-but how?
He racked his mind in vain for a plausible story but, to his
dismay, she rejoined him almost immediately and he had thought of
nothing by the time they had turned into the Park again.
'Well-tell me,' she said softly.
Tell you what?' he fenced. 'That I think you're very lovely?'
'No, no. It is nice that you should have troubled to make pretty
speeches about my accent and Marlene Dietrich, but it is time for
you to tell me now of the real reason that brought you to Claridges
this morning.'
'Can't you guess?'
'No.'
'I wanted to take you out to lunch.'
'Oh, please! Be serious-you have a message forme?'
'Maybe, but even if I hadn't, I'd have been right on the mat at
your hotel just the same.'
She frowned slightly. 'I don't understand. Neither of us is free
to give our time to that sort of thing.'
'I've reached a stage where I'm the best judge of that,' he
announced, with the idea of trying to recover some of the prestige
which seemed to be slipping from him.
'Have you then crowned yourself with the Dispersion of Choronzon
already?'
Rex suppressed a groan. Here they were off on the Mumbo Jumbo
stuff again. He felt that he would never be able to keep it up, so
instead of answering he turned the car with sudden determination out
into the Kensington Road and headed towards Hammersmith.
'Where are you taking me?' she asked quickly.
To lunch with De Richleau,' he lied. 'I've got no message for you
but the Duke sent me to fetch you because he wants to talk to you
himself.' It was the only story he could think of which just might
get over.
'I see-where is he?'
'At Pangbourne.'
'Where is that?'
'Little place down the Thames-just past Reading.'
'But that is miles away!'
'Only about fifty.'
'Surely he could have seen me before he left London.'
He caught her eyes, quick with suspicion, on his face, so he
answered boldly: 'I know nothing of that, but he sent me to fetch
you-and what the Duke says goes.'
'I don't believe you!' she exclaimed angrily. 'Stop this car at
once! -I am going to get out.'
11
The Truth Will Always Out
For a second Rex thought of ignoring her protest and jamming his
foot on the accelerator, but the traffic in Kensington High Street
was thick, and to try to abduct her in broad daylight would be sheer
madness. She could signal a policeman and have him stopped before
he'd gone two hundred yards.
Reluctantly he drew hi to the side of the road, but he stretched
his long arm in front of her and gripped the door of the car so that
she could not force it open.
Tanith stared at him with angry eyes: 'You are lying to me -I
will not go with you.'
'Wait a moment.' He thrust out his chin pugnaciously while he
mustered all his resources to reason with her. If he once let her
leave the car the chances were all against his having another
opportunity to prevent her reaching the secret rendezvous where
those horrible Walpurgis ceremonies would take place in the coming
night. His determination to prevent her participating in those
barbaric rites, of which he was certain she could not know the real
nature, quickened his brain to an unusual cunning: 'You know what
happened to Simon Aron?' he said.
'Yes, you kidnapped him from his own home last night.'
'That's so-but do you know why?'
'Madame D'Urfe said that it was because the Duke is also seeking
for the Talisman of Set. You needed him for your own invocations.'
'Exactly.' Rex paused for a moment to wonder what the Talisman
could be. This was the second time he had heard it mentioned. Then
he went on slowly: 'It's him being born under certain stars makes
his presence essential. We'd hunt for years before we found anyone
else who's suitable to do the business and born in the same hour of
the same day and year. Well, we need you too.'
'But my number is not eight!'
'That doesn't matter-you're under the Moon, aren't you?' He
risked the shot on what he remembered of De Richleau's words about
her name.
'Yes,' she admitted. 'But what has that to do with it?'
'A whole heap-believe you me. But naturally you'd know nothing of
that. Even Mocata doesn't realise the importance of the Moon in this
thing and that's why he's failed to make much headway up to date.'
'Mocata would be furious if I left his Circle-you see I am his
favourite medium-so attuned to his vibrations that he would have the
very greatest difficulty in replacing me. Perhaps -perhaps he would
punish me in some terrible manner.' Tanith's face had gone white and
her eyes were staring slightly at the thought of some nameless evil
which might befall her.
'Don't worry. De Richleau will protect you-and he's an Ipsissimus
remember. If you don't come right along, now he wants to see you,
maybe he'll do something to you that'll be far worse.' As Rex lied
and threatened he hated himself for it, but the girl had just got to
be saved from herself and this form of blackmail was the only line
that offered.
'How am I to know? How am I to know?' she repeated quickly. 'You
may be lying. Think what might happen to me if Mocata proved the
stronger.'
'You had the proof last night. We got Simon Aron away from under
his very nose-didn't we?'
'Yes, but will you be able to keep him?'
'Sure,' Rex declared firmly, but he felt sick with misery as he
remembered that by Mocata's power Simon had been taken from them
under the hour. And where was Simon now? The day was passing, their
hope of Tanith being able to put them on his track had proved a
failure. How would they find him in time to save him too from the
abominations of the coming night?
'Oh, what shall I do?' Tanith gave a little nervous sob. 'It is
the first tune I have heard of any feud in our Order. I thought that
if I only followed the Path I should acquire power and now this
hideously dangerous decision is thrust on me.'
Rex saw that she was weakening so he pressed the self-starter.
'You're coming with me and you're not going to be frightened of
anything. Get that now-I mean it.'
She nodded. 'All right. I win trust you then,' and the car slid
into motion.
For a few moments they sat in silence, then as the car entered
Hammersmith Broadway he turned and smiled at her. 'Now let's cut out
all talk about this business till we see the Duke and just be
normal-shall we?'
'If you wish-tell me about yourself?'
He smothered a sigh of relief at her acquiescence. At least he
would be free for an hour or so from the agonising necessity of
skating on thin ice of grim parables which had no meaning for him.
With all his natural gaiety restored he launched into an account of
his life at home in the States, his frequent journeys abroad, and
his love of speed in cars and boats and planes and bob-sleighs.
As they sped through Brentford and on to Slough he got her to
talk a little about herself. Her English father had died when she
was still a baby and the Hungarian mother had brought her up. All
her childhood had been spent in an old manor house, dignified by the
name of Castle, in a remote village on the southern slopes of the
Carpathians, shut in so completely from the world by steep mountains
on every side that even the War had passed it by almost unnoticed.
After the peace and the disintegration of the Austrian-Hungarian
Empire their lands had become part of the new state of Jugo-Slavia,
but her life had gone on much the same for, although the War had
cost them a portion of their fortune, the bulk of it had been left
safe by her father in English Trustee securities. Her mother had
died three years before and it was then, having no personal ties and
ample money, that she had decided to travel. 'Isn't it just
marvellous that I should have seen you such
different places about the world,' he laughed.
'The first time that you speak of in Budapest I do not remember,'
she replied, 'but I recall the day outside Buenos Aires well. You
were in a long red car and I was riding a roan mare. As you drew
into the side of the track to let us pass I wondered why I knew your
face, and then I remembered quite clearly that our cars had been
locked side by side in a traffic jam, months before, in New York.'
'Seems as if we were just fated to meet sometime-doesn't it?'
'We both know that there is no such thing as Chance,' she said
slowly. 'I believe you have a wax image of me somewhere and have
worked upon it to bring today about.'
The day before he would have instantly assumed her to be joking,
despite her apparent seriousness, but now, he realised with a little
shock, he no longer considered it beyond the bounds of possibility
that actual results might be procured by doing certain curious
things to a little waxen doll, so greatly had his recent experiences
altered his outlook. He hesitated, unable to confess his ignorance
of such practices, and unwilling to admit that he had not done his
best to bring about a meeting, but he was saved from the necessity
of a reply by Tanith suddenly exclaiming:
'I had forgotten!-luncheon-I shall never be back in time.'
'Easy, put through a call and say you've suddenly been called out
of Town,' he told her, and a few miles farther on he pulled up at
Skindles Hotel in Maidenhead.
While Tanith was telephoning he stood contemplating the river.
Although it was early in the year a period of drought had already
checked the spate of the current sufficiently to make boating
pleasureable, and he noted that in the gardens of the Hungaria River
Club, on the opposite bank, they were setting out their gay
paraphernalia preparatory to opening for the Season. Immediately
Tanith rejoined him they set off again.
The straggling suburbs of Greater London had already been left
behind them before Slough and now, after Maidenhead, the scattered
clusters of red-roofed dwellings on the new building estates, which
have spread so far afield, also disappeared, giving place to the
real country. On certain portions of the road, the fresh green of
the beech trees formed a spring canopy overhead and between their
trunks, dappled with sunlight, patches of bluebells gave glory to
the silent woods; at others they ran between meadows where lazy
cattle nibbled the new grass, or fields where the young corn, strong
with life, stretched its vivid green shoots upwards to the sun.
The sight and smell of the countryside, unmarred by man or
carefully tended in his interests, windswept and clean, gave Rex
fresh confidence. He banished his anxiety about Simon for the moment
and, thrusting from his mind all thoughts of this gruesome business
into which he had been drawn, began to talk all the gay nonsense to
Tanith which he would have aired to any other girl whom he had
induced to steal a day out of London in which to see the country
preparing its May Day garb.
Before they reached Reading he had her laughing, and by the time
they entered the little riverside village of Pangbourne, her pale
face was flushed with colour and her eyes dancing with new light.
They crossed to the Whitchurch side where the Duke's house stood,
some way back from the river, its lawns sloping gently to the
water's edge.
Max received them, and while a maid took Tanith upstairs to wash,
Rex had a chance to whisper quick instructions to him.
When she entered the low, old-fashioned lounge with its wide
windows looking out over the tulip beds to the trees on the further
bank she found Rex whistling gaily. He was shooting varying
proportions of liquor out of different bottles into a cocktail
shaker. Max stood beside him holding a bowl of ice.
'Where is the Duke?' she asked, with a new soberness in her
voice.
He had been waiting for the question, and keeping his face
averted answered cheerfully: 'He's not made it yet-what time are you
expecting him, Max?'
'I should have told you before, sir. His Excellency telephoned
that I was to present his excuses to the lady, and ask you, sir, to
act as host in his stead. He has been unavoidably detained, but
hopes to be able to join you for tea.'
'Well, now, if that isn't real bad luck!' Rex exclaimed
feelingly. 'Never mind, we'll go right in to lunch the moment it's
ready.' He tasted the concoction which he had been beating up with a
large spoon and added: 'My! that's good!'
'Yes, sir-in about five minutes, sir,' Max bowed gravely and
withdrew.
Rex knew that there was trouble corning but he presented a glass
of the frothing liquid with a steady hand. 'Never give a girl a
large cocktail,' he cried gaily, 'but plenty of 'em. Make 'em strong
and drink 'em quick-come on now! It takes a fourth to make an
appetite- Here's to crime!'
But Tanith set down the glass untasted. All the merriment had
died out of her eyes and her voice was full of a fresh anxiety as
she said urgently: 'I can't stay here till tea-time- don't you
realise that I must leave London by four o'clock.'
It was on the tip of his tongue to say, 'Where is this place
you're going to?' but he caught himself in time and substituted:
'Why not go from here direct?' Then he prayed silently that the
secret meeting place might not be on the other side of London.
Her face lightened for a moment. 'Of course, I forgot that you
were going yourself, and the journey must be so much shorter from
here. If you could take me it seems stupid to go all the way back to
London-but what of Madame D'Urfe- she expects me to motor down with
her-and I must have my clothes.'
'Why not call her on the phone. Ask her to have your stuff packed
up and say we'll meet her there. You've got to see the Duke, and
whatever happens he'll turn up here because he and I are going down
together.'
She nodded. 'If I am to place myself under his protection it is
vital that I should see him before the meeting, for Mocata has eyes
hi the ether and will know that I am here by now.'
'Come on then!' He took her hand and pulled her to her feet.
'Well get through to Claridges right away.'
Tanith allowed him to lead-her out into the hall and when he had
got the number he left her at the telephone. Then he returned to the
lounge, poured himself another cocktail and began to do a gay little
dance to celebrate his victory. He felt that he had got her now,
safe for the day, until the Duke turned up. Then trust De Richleau
to get something out of her which would enable them to get on
Simon's track after all.
At his sixth pirouette he stopped suddenly. Tanith was standing
in the doorway, her face ashen, her big eyes blazing with a mixture
of anger and fear.
'You have lied to me,' she stammered out, 'Mocata is with the
Countess at this moment-he got Simon Aron away from you last night.
You and your precious Duke are impostors- charlatans- You haven't
even the power to protect yourselves, and for this Mocata may tie me
to the Wheel of Ptah- oh, I must get back!' Before he could stop her
she had turned and fled out of the house.
12
The Grim Prophecy
In one spring Rex was across the room, another and he had reached
the garden. Against those long legs of his Tanith had no chance.
Before she had covered twenty yards he caught her arm and jerked her
round to face him.
'Let me go!' she panted. 'Haven't you endangered me enough with
your lies and interference.'
He smiled down into her frightened face but made no motion to
release her. 'I'm awfully sorry I had to tell you all those
tarradiddles to get you to this place-but now you're here you're
going to stay-understand?'
'It is you who don't understand,' she flashed. 'You and your
friend, the Duke, are like a couple of children playing with a
dynamite bomb. You haven't a chance against Mocata. He will loose a
power on you that will simply blot you out.'
'I wouldn't be too certain of that. Maybe I know nothing of this
occult business myself and if anyone had suggested to me that there
were practising Satanists wandering around London this time last
week, I'd have said they had bats in the belfry. But the Duke's
different-and, believe you me, he's a holy terror when he once gets
his teeth into a thing. Best save your pity for Mocata-he'll need it
before De Richleau's through with him.'
'Is he-is he really an Ipsissimus then?' she hesitated.
'Lord knows-I don't. That's just a word I picked out of some
jargon he was talking last night that I thought might impress you.'
Rex grinned broadly. All the lying and trickery which he had been
forced to practise during the morning had taxed him to the utmost,
but now that he was able to face the situation openly he felt at the
top of his form again.
'I daren't stay then-I daren't!' She tried to wrench herself
free. 'Don't you see that if he is only some sort of dabbler he will
never be able to protect me.'
'Don't fret your sweet self. No one shall lay a finger on you as
long as I'm around.'
'But, you great fool, you don't understand,' she waved miserably.
"The Power of Darkness cannot be turned aside by bruisers or iron
bars. If I don't appear at the meeting tonight, the moment I fall
asleep Mocata will set the Ab-humans on to me. In the morning I may
be dead or possessed-a raving lunatic.'
Rex did not laugh. He knew that she was genuinely terrified of an
appalling possibility. Instead he turned her towards the house and
said gently: 'Now please don't worry so. De Rich-leau does
understand just how dangerous monkeying with this business is. He
spent half the night trying to convince me of it, and like a fool I
wouldn't believe him until I saw a thing I don't care to talk about,
but I'm dead certain he'd never allow you to run any risk like
that.'
'Then let me go back to London!'
'No. He asked me to get you here so as he could have a word with
you-and I've done it. We'll have a quiet little lunch together now
and talk this thing over when the Duke turns up. Hell either
guarantee to protect you or let you go.'
'He can't protect me I tell you-and in any case I wish to attend
this meeting tonight.'
'You wish to!' he echoed with a shake of the head. 'Well, that
gets me beat, but you can't even guess what you'd be letting
yourself in for. Anyhow I don't mean to let you-so now you know.'
'You mean to keep me here against my will?'
'Yes!'
'What is to stop me screaming for help?'
'Nix, but since the Duke's not here the servants know I'm in
charge, so they won't bat an eyelid if you start to yell the house
down-and there's no one else about.'
Tanith glanced swiftly down the drive. Except at the white gates
tall banks of rhododendrons, heavy with bloom, obscured the lane. No
rumble of passing traffic broke the stillness that brooded upon the
well-kept garden. The house lay silent in the early summer sunshine.
The inhabitants of the village were busy over the midday meal.
She was caught and knew it. Only her wits could get her out of
this, and her fear of Mocata was so great that she was determined to
use any chance that offered to free herself from this nice, meddling
fool.
'You'll not try to prevent me leaving if De Richleau says I may
when he arrives?' she asked,
'No. I'll abide by his decision,' he agreed.
'Then for the time being I will do as you wish.'
'Fine-come on.' He led her back to the house and rang for Max,
who appeared immediately from the doorway of the dining-room.
'We've decided to lunch on the river,' Rex told him. 'Make up a
basket and have it put in the electric canoe.' He had made the
prompt decision directly he sensed that Tanith meant to escape if
she could. Once she was alone in a boat with him he felt that,
unless she was prepared to jump out and swim for it, he could hold
her without any risk of a scene just as long as he wanted to.
'Very good, sir-I'll see to it at once.' Max disappeared into the
domain of which he was lord and master, while Rex shepherded Tanith
back to the neglected cocktails.
He refreshed the shaker while she sat on the sofa eyeing him
curiously, but he persuaded her to have one, and when he pressed her
she had another. Then Max appeared to announce that his orders had
been carried out.
'Let's go-shall we?' Rex held open the french-windows and
together they crossed the sunlit lawn, gay with its beds of tulips,
polyanthus, wallflowers and forget-me-nots. At the river's edge,
upon a neat, white painted landing-stage, a boatman held the long
electric canoe ready for them.
Tanith settled herself on the cushions and Rex took the small
perpendicular wheel. In a few moments they were chugging out into
midstream and up the river towards Goring, but he preferred not to
give her the opportunity of appealing to the lock-keeper, so he
turned the boat and headed it towards a small backwater below the
weir.
Having tied up beneath some willows, he began passing packages
and parcels out of the stern. 'Come on,' he admonished her. 'It's
the girl's job to see to the commissariat. Just forget yourself a
moment and see what they've given us to eat.'
She smiled a little ruefully. 'If I really thought you realised
what you were doing I should look on you as the bravest man I've
ever known.'
He turned suddenly, still kneeling at the end of the boat. 'Go
on-say it again. I love the sound of your voice.'
'You fool!' She coloured, laughing as she unwrapped the napkins.
'There's some cheese here-and ham and tongue-and brown bread-and
salad-and a lobster. We shall never be able to eat all this and-oh,
look,' she held out a small wicker basket, 'fraises des bois.'
'Marvellous. I haven't tasted a wood strawberry since I last
lunched at Fontainbleau. Anyhow, it's said the British Army fights
on its stomach, so I'm electing myself an honorary member of it for
the day. Fling me that corkscrew-will you, and I'll deal with this
bottle of Moselle.'
Soon they were seated face to face propped against the cushions,
a little sticky about the mouth, but enjoying themselves just as any
nice normal couple would in such circumstances; but when the meal
was finished he felt that, much as he would have liked to laze away
the afternoon, he ought, now the cards were upon the table, to learn
what he could of this grim business without waiting for the coming
of the Duke. He unwrapped another packet which he had found in the
stern of the boat, and passing it over asked half humorously:
Tell me, does a witch ever finish up her lunch with chocolates?
I'd be interested to know on scientific grounds.'
'Oh, why did you bring me back-I have been enjoying myself so
much,' her face was drawn and miserable as she buried it in her
hands.
'I'm sorry!' He put down the chocolates and bent towards her.
'But we're both in this thing, so we've got to talk of it, haven't
we, and though you don't look the part, you're just as much a witch
as any old woman who ever soured the neighbour's cream-else you'd
never have seen me in that crystal this morning as I sat in the
lounge of your hotel.'
'Of course I am if you care to use such a stupid old-fashioned
term. She drew her hands away and tossed back her fair hair as she
stared at him defiantly. 'That was only child's play-just to keep my
hand in-a discipline to make me fit to wield a higher power.'
"For good?' he questioned laconically.
'It is necessary to pass through many stages before having to
choose whether one will take the Right or Left Hand Path.'
'So I gather. But how about this unholy business in which you've
a wish to take part tonight?'
'If I submit to the ordeal I shall pass the Abyss.' The low,
caressing voice lifted to a higher note, and the wise eyes suddenly
took on a fanatic gleam.
'You can't have a notion what they mean to do to you or you'd
never even dream of it,' he insisted.
'I have, but you know nothing of these things so naturally you
consider me utterly shameless or completely mad. You are used to
nice English and American girls who haven't a thought in their heads
except to get you to marry them-if you have any money-which
apparently you have, but that sort of thing does not interest me. I
have worked and studied to gain power -real power over other
people's lives and destinies-and I know now that the only way to
acquire it is by complete surrender of self. I don't expect you to
understand my motives but that is why I mean to go tonight.'
He studied her curiously for a moment, still convinced that she
could not be fully aware of the abominations that would take place
at the Sabbat. Then he broke out: 'How long is it since you became
involved in this sort of thing?'
'I was psychic even as a child,' she told him slowly. 'My mother
encouraged me to use my gifts. Then when she died I joined a society
in Budapest. I loved her. I wanted to keep in touch with her still.'
'What proof have you got it was her?' he demanded with a sudden
renewal of scepticism as he recalled the many newspaper exposures of
spiritualistic seances.
'I had very little then, but since, I have been convinced of it
beyond all doubt.'
'And is she-your own mother, still-yes, your guide-I suppose
you'd call it?'
Tanith shook her head. 'No, she has gone on, and it was not for
me to seek to detain her, but others have followed, and every day my
knowledge of the worlds which lie beyond this grows greater.'
'But it's extraordinary that a young girl like you should devote
yourself to this sort of thing. You ought to be dancing, dining,
playing golf, going places-you're so lovely you could take your pick
among the men.'
She shrugged a little disdainfully. 'Such a life is dull-
ordinary-after a year I tired of it, and few women can climb
mountains or shoot big game, but the conquest of the unknown offers
the greatest adventure of all.'
Again her voice altered suddenly, and the inscrutable eyes which
gave her a strange, serious beauty, so fitting for a lady of the
Italian Renaissance, gleamed as before.
'Religions and moralities are man-made, fleeting and local; a
scandalous lapse from virtue in London may be a matter for the
highest praise in Hong Kong, and the present Archbishop of Paris
would be shocked beyond measure if it was suggested that he had
anything in common, beyond his religious office, with a Medieval
Cardinal. One thing and one thing only remains constant and
unchanging, the secret doctrine of the way to power. That is a thing
to work for, and if need be cast aside all inherent scruples for-as
I shall tonight.'
'Aren't you-just a bit afraid?' He stared at her solemnly.
'No, provided I follow the path which is set, no harm can come to
me.'
'But it is an evil path,' he insisted, marvelling at the change
which had come over her. It almost seemed as if it were a different
woman speaking or one who repeated a recitation, learned in a
foreign language, with all the appropriate expression yet not
understanding its true meaning, as she replied with a cynical little
smile.
'Unfortunately the followers of the Right Hand Path obsess
themselves only with the well-being of the Universe as a whole,
whereas those of the Left exercise their power upon living humans.
To bend people to your will, to cause them to fall or rise, to place
unaccountable obstacles in their path at every turn or smooth their
way to a glorious success-that is more than riches, more than
fame-the supreme pinnacle to which any man or woman can rise, and I
wish to reach it before I die.'
'Maybe-maybe.' Rex shook his head with a worried frown, 'But
you're young and beautiful-just breaking in on all the fun of
life-why not think it over for a year or two? It's horrible to hear
you talk as though you were a disillusioned old woman.'
Her mouth tightened still further. 'In a way I am-and for me,
waiting is impossible because, although in your ignorance I do not
expect you to believe it, as surely as the sun will set tonight I
shall be dead before the year is out.'
13
The Defeat of Rex Van Ryn
For a moment they sat in silence. The river flowed gently on; the
sun still dappled the lower branches of the willows and flecked the
water with points of light.
Gradually the fire died out of Tanith's eyes and she sank back
against the cushions of the canoe as Rex stared at her
incredulously. It seemed utterly impossible that there could be any
real foundation for her grim prophecy, yet her voice had held such
fatal certainty.
'It isn't true!' Rex seized her hand and gripped it as though, by
his own vitality, he would imbue her with continued life. 'You're
good for fifty years to come. That's only some criminal nonsense
this devil Mocata's got you to swallow.'
'Oh, you dear fool!' She took his other hand and pressed it
while, for a moment, it seemed as if tears were starting to her
eyes. 'If things were different I think I might like you enormously,
but I knew the number of my days long before I ever met Mocata, and
there is nothing which can be done to lengthen them by a single
hour.'
'Show me your hand,' he said suddenly. It was the only thing even
remotely connected with the occult of which Rex had any knowledge.
The year before he had ricked an ankle, while after Grizzly in the
Rockies, and had had to lie up for a week at a tiny inn where the
library consisted of less than a dozen battered volumes. A book on
Palmistry, which he had discovered among them, had proved a real
windfall and the study of it had whiled away many hours of his
enforced idleness.
As Tanith held out her hand he saw at once that it was of the
unusual psychic type. Very long, narrow and fragile, the wrist
small, the fingers smooth and tapering, ending in long, almond-
shaped nails. The length of the first, second and third fingers
exceeded that of the palm by nearly an inch, giving the whole a
beautiful but useless appearance. The top phalange of the thumb, he
noted, was slim and pointed, another sign of lack of desire to
grapple with material things.
'You see?' she turned it over showing him the palm. 'The Arabs
say that "the fate of every man is bound about his brow," and mine
is written here, for all who can, to read.'
Rex's knowledge of the subject was too limited for him to do much
but read character and general tendencies by the various shapes of
hands, but even he was startled by the unusual markings on the
narrow palm.
On the cushion of the hand the Mount of the Moon stood out firm
and strong, seeming to spread over and dominate the rest, a clear
sign of an exceedingly strong imagination, refinement and love of
beauty; but it was tinged with that rare symbol, the Line of
Intuition, giving, in connection with such a hand, great psychic
powers and a leaning towards mysticism of a highly dangerous kind. A
small star below the second finger, upon the Mount of Saturn, caused
him additional uneasiness and he looked in vain for squares which
might indicate preservation at a critical period. Yet worst of all
the Line of Life, more clearly marked than he would have expected,
stopped short with a horrifying suddenness at only a little over a
third of the way from its commencement, where it was tied to the
Line of Head.
He stared at it in silence, not knowing what to say to such
sinister portents, but she smiled lightly as she withdrew her hand.
'Don't worry please, but there is no appeal from the verdict of the
Stars and you will understand now why marriage -children-a lovely
home-all things connected with the future just mean nothing to me.'
'So that's the reason you let yourself get mixed up in this
horrible business?'
'Yes. Since I am to die so soon no ordinary emotion can stir me
any more. I look as though I were already a great way from it, and
what happens to my physical body matters to me not at all. Ten
months ago I began seriously to cultivate my psychic sense under
real instruction, and the voyages which I can make now into the
immensity of the void are the only things left to me which still
have power to thrill.'
'But, why in heaven's name involve yourself with Black Magic when
you might practise White?'
'Have I not told you? The adepts of the Right Hand Path concern
themselves only with the Great Work; the blending of the Microcosm
with the Macrocosm; a vague philosophic entity in which one can
witness no tangible results. Whereas, those of the Left practise
their Art upon human beings and can actually watch the working of
their spells.'
'I can't get over your wanting to attend this Satanic festival
tonight all the same.'
'It should be an extraordinary experience.'
'Any normal person would be terrified at what might happen.'
'Well, if you like, I will admit that I am just a little
frightened but that is only because it is rny first participation.
By surrendering myself I shall only suffer or enjoy, as most other
women do, under slightly different circumstances at some period of
then- life.'
'Slightly different!' he exclaimed, noting again the sudden
change of eyes and voice, as though she were possessed by some
sinister dual personality which appeared every time she spoke of
these horrible mysteries, and blotted out the frank, charming
individuality which was natural to her. 'This thing seems worlds
apart to me from picking a man you like and taking a sporting chance
about the rest.'
'No, in ancient Egypt every woman surrendered herself at the
temple before she married, in order that she might acquire virtue,
and sacred prostitution is still practised in many parts of the
world-for that is what this amounts to. Regarded from the personal
point of view, of course, it is loathsome. If I thought of it that
way I should never be able to go through with it at all, but I have
trained myself not to, and only think of it now as a ritual which
has to be gone through in order to acquire fresh powers.'
'It's mightly difficult for any ordinary person to see it that
way-though I suppose the human brain can shut out certain aspects of
a thing.' Rex paused, frowning: 'Still I was really speaking of the
hideous danger you will incur from placing yourself in the hands
of-well, the Devil if you like.'
She smiled. 'The Devil is only a bogey invented by the Early
Church to scare fools.'
'Let's say the Power of Darkness then.'
'You mean by receiving re-Baptism?'
'By attending this Sabbat at all. I imagined from your strange
name you had received re-Baptism already.'
'No, Tanith is the name by which I was Christened. It was my
mother's choice.'
Rex sat forward suddenly. 'Then you haven't-er-given yourself
over completely yet?'
'No, but I shall tonight, for if De Richleau has a tenth of the
knowledge which you say he has he will realise the appalling danger
to which I should be exposed if he detained me here, so he will let
me go immediately he arrives-and remember, you have promised not to
interfere with my freedom once he has seen me.'
'But listen,' he caught her hands again. 'It was bad enough that
you should have been going to take a part in this abominable
business as a graduate-it's a thousand times worse that you should
do it while there's still time to back out.'
'Mocata would not allow me to now, even if I had the inclination,
but you are so nice it really distresses me that you should worry
so. The Satanic Baptism is only an old-fashioned and rather
barbarous ritual, but it will give me real status among adepts, and
no possible harm can come to me as long as I do not deviate from the
Path which must be followed by all members of the Order.'
'You're wrong-wrong-wrong,' Rex insisted boldly. 'De Richleau was
explaining the real horror of this thing to me last night. This
promise of strange powers is only a filthy trap. At your first
Christening your Godparents revoked the Devil and all his Works.
Once you willingly rescind that protection, as you'll have to do,
something awful will take possession of you and force you into doing
its will, an Earthbound Spirit or an Elemental I think he called
it.'
She shrugged. There are ways of dealing with Elementals.' 'Aw,
hell. Why can't I make you understand!' He wrung his hands together
desperately. 'It's easy to see they haven't called on you to do any
real devilry yet. They've just led you on by a few demonstrations
and encouraging your crystal gazing, but they will-once you're a
full member-and then you'll be more scared than ever to refuse, or
find "it's just impossible under the influence of this thing that
will get hold of you.'
'I'm sorry, but I don't believe you. It is I who will make use of
them-not they of me, and quite obviously you don't know what you are
talking about.'
'The Duke does,' he insisted, 'and he says that you can still get
free as long as you haven't been actually re-baptised, but after
that all holy protection is taken from you. Why else d'you think we
took a chance of breaking up that party last night -if not to try
and save Simon from the self-same thing.'
A queer light came into Tanith's eyes. 'Yet Mocata willed him to
return so he will receive his nom-du-Diable after all tonight.'
'Don't you be too certain. I've a hunch we'll save him yet.' Rex
spoke with a confidence he was very far from feeling.
'And how do you propose to set about it?' she asked with a quick
intuition that by some means she might utilise this factor to
facilitate her own escape.
'Ah! that's just the rub,' he admitted. 'You see we thought maybe
you'd know his whereabouts and I'll be frank about it. That's the
reason I went round to Claridges this morning, to see if I couldn't
get you down here some way so as De Richleau could question you
although I should have called on you anyway for a very different
reason. Still you didn't even know Mocata had taken Simon off us
till you spoke to the old woman on the wire, so it's pretty obvious
you don't know where he is. I believe you could give us a line on
Mocata though-if you choose to.'
'I was under the impression that it was at his house that the
party where we met was given.'
'No, that was Simon's place, though I gather Mocata's been living
there with him for some little time. He must have a hideout of his
own somewhere though and that's what we want to get at.'
'I know nothing of his ordinary life, and if I did, I do not
think I should be inclined to tell you of it, but why are you so
interested in this Mr. Aron? That was a lie you told me about your
needing him because you are also searching for the Talisman of Set.'
'He's my very greatest friend, and more than that he risked his
life to come out to Soviet Russia and look for me, when I was gaoled
for poking my nose into the "Forbidden Territory," a few years back.
The Duke came too, and he looks on Simon almost as a son.'
'That does not give you any right to interfere if, like myself,
he elects to devote himseif to the occult.'
'Maybe, as long as he confines himself to the harmless side, but
De Richleau says the game that you and he are playing is the most
hideously dangerous that's ever been known to mankind, and after
what I saw last night I certainly believe him.'
'Simon Aron did not strike me as a fool. He must be aware of the
risks which he is running and prepared to face them for the
attainment of his desires.'
'I doubt it-I doubt if you do either. Anyhow, for the moment,
we're regarding him as a person who's not quite all there, and
nothing you can name is going to stop the Duke and me from saving
him from himself if we get half a chance.'
Tanith felt that now was the time to show the bait in the trap
which she had been preparing. So she leant forward and said, slowly:
'If you really are so mad as to wish for a chance to pit yourselves
against Mocata, I think I could give it to you.'
'Could you?' Rex jerked himself upright and the water gurgled a
little at the sides of the canoe.
'Yes, I don't know if he has a house of his own anywhere, but I
do know where he will be this evening-and your friend Simon will be
with him.'
'You mean the Sabbat eh? And you'll give me the name of the place
where it's being held?'
'Oh, no.' The sunlight gleamed golden on her hair as she shook
her head. 'But I'll let you take me to it, if you agree to let me go
free once we are there.'
'Nothing doing,' he said bluntly.
'I see,' she smiled, 'you are afraid of Mocata after all. Well,
that doesn't surprise me because he has ample means of protecting
himself against anything you could attempt against him. That is why,
of course, I feel that, providing the place is not given away
beforehand, he would prefer me to let you know it than detain me
here-I'm quite honest you see, but evidently you are not so
confident of yourself or interested in your friend as I thought.'
Rex was thinking quickly. Nothing but an actual order from the
Duke, based on his assurance that Mocata might punish Tanith in some
terrible manner if she failed to appear, would have induced him to
let her go to the Sabbat, but on the other hand this was a real
chance to reach Simon, in fact, the only one that offered. 'Do you
require that I should actually hand you over to Mocata when we get
there?' he asked at length.
'No. If you take me to the place that will be sufficient, but
there must be no question of gagging me or tying me up.'
In an agony of indecision he pondered the problem again. Dare he
risk taking Tanith within the actual sphere of Mocata's influence?
Yet he would have the Duke with him, so surely between them they
would be able to restrain her from taking any part in the ceremony,
and it was impossible to throw away such a chance of saving Simon.
'I'm not giving any promise to let you join the party,' Rex said
firmly.
'Well, I intend to do so.'
'That remains to be seen-but I'll accept your offer on those
conditions.'
She nodded, confident now that once they reached their
destination Mocata would exercise his powers to relieve her of
restraint.
'The place must be about seventy miles from here,' she told him,
'and I should like to be there by sundown, so we ought to leave here
by six.'
'Wouldn't it be possible to start later?' A worried frown clouded
Rex's face. 'The truth is, that message Max gave us before lunch was
phony-just a part of my plan for keeping you here. I never did count
on De Richleau arriving much before the tune you say we ought to
start-and I'd just hate to leave without him.'
Tanith smiled to herself. This was an unexpected piece of luck.
She had only met the Duke for a moment the night before, but his
lean, cultured face and shrewd, grey eyes had impressed her. She
felt that he would prove a far more difficult opponent that this
nice, bronzed young giant, and if she could get away without having
to face him after all, it would be a real relief, so she made a wry
face and proceeded to elaborate her story.
'I'm sorry, but there are certain preparations which have to be
made before the gathering. They begin at sunset, so J must be
at-well, the place to which we are going by a quarter past eight. If
I arrive later I shall not be eligible to participate-so I will not
go at all.'
'In that case I guess I'm in your hands. Anyhow, now we've
settled things, let's get back to the house.' Rex untied the canoe
and, setting the motor in motion, steered back to the landing stage.
His first thought was to inform De Richleau of the bargain that
he had made, but after pleading once more with the officials at the
British Museum to have the Duke sought for, he learned that he was
no longer there, and when he got through to the Curzon Street flat
the servants could tell him nothing of De Richleau's whereabouts, so
it was impossible to expedite his arrival.
For a time Rex strolled up and down the lawn with Tanith, then
round the lovely garden, while he talked again of the places that
they had both visited abroad and tried to recapture something of the
gaiety which had marked their drive down from London in the morning.
Max brought them tea out onto the terrace, and afterwards they
played the electric gramophone, but even that failed to relieve Rex
of a steadily deepening anxiety that the Duke might not arrive in
time.
The shadows of the lilacs and laburnums began to lengthen on the
grass. Tanith went upstairs to tidy herself, and when she came down
asked if he could find her a road map. He produced a set and for a
time she studied two of them in silence, then she refolded them and
said quietly: 'I know so little of the- English country but I am
certain now that I can find it. We must be leaving soon.'
It was already six o'clock, and he had put off shaking a cocktail
until the last moment in order to delay their departure as long as
possible. Now, he rang for ice as he said casually; 'Don't fuss,
I'll get you there by a quarter after eight.'
'I'll give you five miniutes-no more.
'Well, listen now. Say De Richleau fails to make it. Won't you
give me a break? Let me know the name of the place so as I can leave
word for him to follow?'
She considered for a moment. 'I will give you the name of a
village five miles from it where he can meet you on one condition.'
'Let's hear it.'
'That neither of you seek to restrain me in any way once we reach
our destination.'
'No. I'll not agree to that.'
'Then I certainly will not give you any information which will
enable your friend to appear on the scene and help you.'
'I'll get him there some way-don't you worry.'
'That leaves me a free hand to prevent you if I can-doesn't it?'
As he swallowed his cocktail she glanced at the clock. 'It's ten
past now, so unless you prefer not to go we must start at once.'
Consoling himself with the thought that De Richleau could have
got no more out of her even if he had questioned her himself, Rex
led her out and settled her in the Rolls then, before starting up
the engine, he listened intently for a moment, hoping that even yet
he might catch the low, steady purr of the big Hispano which would
herald the Duke's eleventh hour arrival, but the evening silence
brooded unbroken over the trees and lane. Reluctantly he set the car
in motion and as they ran down the gravel sweep, Tanith said
quietly, 'Please drive to New-bury.'
'But that's no more than twenty miles from here!'
'Oh, I will give you further directions when we reach it,' she
smiled, and for a little time they drove in silence through the
quiet byways until they entered the main Bath Road at Theale.
At Newbury, she gave fresh instructions. 'To Hungerford now,' and
the fast, low touring Rolls sped out of the town eating up another
ten miles of the highway to the west.
'Where next?' he asked, scanning the houses of the market town
for its most prosperous-looking inn and mentally registering The
Bear. It was just seven o'clock-another few miles and they would be
about half-way to the secret rendezvous. He did not dare to stop in
the town in case she gave him the slip and hired another car or went
on by train, but when they were well out in the country again he
meant to telephone the Duke, who must have arrived at Pangbourne by
this time, and urge him to follow as far as Hungerford at once-then
sit tight at The Bear until he received further information.
Tanith was studying the map. 'There are two ways from here,' she
said, 'but I think it would be best to keep to the main road as far
as Maryborough.'
A few miles out of Hungerford the country became less populous
with only a solitary farmhouse here and there, peaceful and placid
in the evening light. Then these, too, were left behind and they
entered a long stretch of darkening woodlands, the northern fringe
of Savernake Forest.
Both were silent, thinking of the night to come which was now so
close upon them and the struggle of wills that must soon take place.
Rex brought the car down to a gentle cruising speed and watched the
road-sides intently. At a deserted hairpin bend, where a byway
doubled back to the south-east, he found just what he wanted, a
telephone call-box.
Turning the car off the main road he pulled up, and noted with
quick appreciation that they had entered one of the most beautiful
avenues he had even seen. As far as the eye could see it cut clean
through the forest, the great branches meeting overhead in the
sombre gloom of the falling night, it looked like the nave of some
titanic cathedral deserted by mankind; but he had no leisure to
admire it to the full, and stepping out, called to Tanith over his
shoulder: 'Won't be a minute-just want to put through'a call.'
She smiled, but the queer look that he had seen earlier in the
day came into her eyes again. 'So you mean to trick me and let De
Richleau know the direction we have taken?'
'I wouldn't call it that,' he protested. 'In order to get in
touch with Simon I bargained to take you to this place you're so
keen to get to, but I reserved the right to stop you taking any part
yourself, and I need the Duke to help me.'
'And I agreed, because it was the only way in which I could get
away from Pangbourne, but I reserved the right to do all in my power
to attend the meeting. However,' she shrugged lightly, 'do as you
will.'
'Thanks.' Rex entered the box, spoke to the operator, and having
inserted the necessary coins, secured his number. Next minute he was
speaking to De Richleau. 'Hello! Rex here. I've got the girl and
she's agreed- Oh, Hell!'
He dropped the receiver and leapt out of the box. While his back
was turned Tanith had moved into the driver's seat. The engine
purred, the Rolls slid forward. He clutched frantically at the rear
mudguard but his fingers slipped and he fell sprawling in the road.
When he scrambled to his feet the long blue car was almost hidden by
a trail of dust as it roared down the avenue, and while he was still
cursing his stupidity, it disappeared into the shadows of the
forest.
14
The Duke de Richleau Takes the Field
At 7.20. Rex was through again to the Duke, gabbling out the
idiotic way in which he had allowed Tanith to fool him and leave him
stranded in Savernake Forest.
At 7.22. De Richleau had heard all he had to tell and was
ordering him to return to Hungerford as best he could, there to
await instructions at The Bear.
At 7.25. Tanith was out of the Forest and on a good road again,
some five miles south-east of Marlborough, slowing down to consult
her map.
At 7.26. The Duke was through to Scotland Yard.
At 7.28. Rex was loping along at a steady trot through the
gathering darkness, praying that a car would appear from which he
could ask a lift.
At 7.30. De Richleau was speaking to the Assistant Commissioner
at the Metropolitan Police, a personal friend of his. 'It's not the
car that matters,' he said, 'but the documents which are in it.
Their immediate recovery is of vital importance to me and I should
consider it a great personal favour if any reports which come in may
be sent at once to the Police Station at Newbury.'
At 7.32. Tanith was speeding south towards Tidworth, having
decided that to go round Salisbury Plain via Amesbury would save her
time on account of the better roads.
At 7.38. Scotland Yard was issuing the following communique by
wireless: 'All stations. Stolen. A blue touring Rolls, 1934 model.
Number OA 1217. Owner, Duke de Richleau. Last seen in Savernake
Forest going south-east at 19 hours 15, but reported making for
Marlborough. Driven by woman. Age twenty-three-attractive
appearance-tall, slim, fair hair, pale face, large hazel eyes,
wearing light green summer costume and small hat. Particulars
required by Special Department. Urgent. Reports to Newbury,'
At 7.42. De Richleau received a telephone call at Pang-bourne.
'Speakin' fer Mister Clutterbuck,' said the voice, 'bin tryin' ter
get yer this lars' arf hour, sir. The green Daimler passed through
Camberley goin' south just arter seven o'clock.'
At 7.44. Tanith was running past the military camp at Tid-worth
still going south.
At 7.45. Rex was buying a second-hand bicycle for cash at three
times its value from a belated farm-labourer.
At 7.48. The Duke received another call. 'I have a special from
Mr. Clutterbuck,' said a new voice. 'The Yellow Sports Sunbeam
passed Devizes going south at 7.42.'
At 7.49. Tanith reached the Andover-Amesbury road and turned west
along it.
At 7.54. De Richleau climbed Into his Hispano. 'My night
glasses-thank you,' he said as he took a heavy pair of binoculars
from Max. 'Any messages which come in for me up to 8.25 are to.be
relayed to the police at Newbury, after that to Mr. Van Ryn at the
Bear Inn, Hungerford, up till 8.40, and from then on to the police
at Newbury again.'
At 7.55. Tanith was approaching a small cross-roads on the
outskirts of Amesbury. A Police-Sergeant who had left the station
ten minutes earlier spotted the number of her car, and stepping out
into the road called on her to halt. She swerved violently, missing
him by inches, but managed to swing the car into the by-road leading
north.
At 7.56. Rex was pedalling furiously along the road to Hungerford
with all the strength of his muscular legs.
At 7.58. Tanith, livid with rage that Rex should have put the
police on to her as though she were a common car thief, had spotted
another policeman near the bridge in Bulford village. Not daring to
risk his holding her up in the narrow street, she switched up
another side-road leading north-east
At 7.59. The Amesbury Police-Sergeant dropped off a lorry beside
the constable on duty at the main cross-roads of the town and warned
him to watch out for a Blue Rolls, number
OA 1217, recklessly driven by a young woman who was wanted by the
Yard.
At 8.1. Tanith had slowed down and was wondering desperately if
she dared risk another attempt to pass through Amesbury. Deciding
against it she ran on, winding in and out through the narrow lanes,
to the north-eastward.
At 8.2. Rex had abandoned his bicycle outside the old Alms-houses
at Froxfield and was begging a lift from the owner of a rickety Ford
who was starting into Hungerford.
At 8.3. The Amesbury Police-Sergeant was reporting to Newbury the
appearance of the 'wanted' Rolls.
At 8.4. Tanith pulled up, hopelessly lost in a tangle of twisting
lanes.
At 8.6, De Richleau swung the Hispano on to the main Bath Road.
His cigar tip glowed red in the twilight as he sank his chin into
the collar of his coat and settled down to draw every ounce out of
the great powerful car.
At 8.8. Tanith had discovered her whereabouts on the map and
found that she had been heading back towards the And-over Road.
At 8.5. The Amesbury Police-Sergeant was warning the authorities
at Andover to keep a look-out for the stolen car in case it headed
back in that direction.
At 8.10. Tanith had turned up a rough track leading north through
some woods in the hope that it would enable her to get past the
Military Camp at Tidworth without going through it.
At 8.12. Rex was hurrying into The Bear Inn at Hungerford.
At 8.14. Tanith was stuck again, the track having come to an
abrupt end at a group of farm buildings.
At 8.17. The Duke was hurtling along the straight, about five
miles east of Newbury.
At 8.19. Tanith was back at the entrance of the track and turning
into a lane that led due east.
At 8.20. The Amesbury Police-Sergeant left the station again. He
had completed his work of warning Salisbury, Devizes, Warminster and
Winchester to watch for the stolen Rolls.
At 8.21, Tanith came out on the main Salisbury-Marl -borough road
and, realising that there was nothing for it but to chance being
held up at Tidworth, turned north.
At 8.22. Rex had sunk his second tankard of good Berkshire ale
and took up his position in the doorway of The Bear to watch for the
Duke.
At 8.23. Tanith, possessed now, it seemed, by some inhuman glee,
chortled with laughter as a Military Policeman leapt from the road
to let her flash past the entrance of Tidworth Camp.
At 8.24. De Richleau entered Newbury Police Station and learned
that the Blue Rolls had been sighted in Amesbury half an hour
earlier.
At 8.25. Tanith had pulled up, a mile north of Tidworth, and was
studying her map again. She decided that her only hope bf reaching
the secret rendezvous now lay in taking the by-roads across the
northern end of Salisbury Plain.
At 8.26. The Duke was reading two messages which had been handed
to him by the Newbury Police. One said: 'Green Daimler passed
through Basingstoke going west at 7.25. Max per Clutterbuck,' and
the other, 'Green Daimler passed through Andover going west at 8.0.
Max per Clutterbuck.' He nodded, quickly summing up the position to
himself. 'Green is heading west through Amesbury by now, and Blue
was seen making in the same direction, while Yellow took the other
route and is coming south from Devizes-most satisfactory so far.' He
then turned to the Station Sergeant: 'I should be most grateful if
you would have any further messages which may come for me relayed to
Amesbury. Thank you-Good night.'
At 8.27. Tanith had reached a cross-road two miles north of
Tidworth and turning west took a dreary wind-swept road which
crosses one of the most desolate parts of the Plain. Dusk had come
and with it an overwhelming feeling that whatever happened she must
be present at the meeting. The fact that she was about seventeen
miles farther from her destination than she had been at Amesbury did
not depress her, for she had misled Rex as to the vital necessity of
her being there by sunset, and the actual Sabbat did not begin until
midnight.
At 8.32. Rex was taking a message over the telephone of The Bear
at Hungerford.
At 8.35. Tanith was passing the Aerodrome at Upavon, and forced
to slow down owing to the curving nature of the road
At 8.37. De Richleau's Hispano roared into Hungerford, and Rex,
who had resumed his position in the doorway of The Bear, ran out to
meet it. 'Any messages?' the Duke asked as he scrambled in.
'Yep-Max called me. A bird named Clutterbuck says a Yellow
Sunbeam passed through Westbury heading south at five minutes past
eight.'
'Good,' nodded the Duke, who already had the car in motion again.
At 8.38. Tanith was free of the twisting patch of road by Upavon
and out on the straight across the naked Plain once more. If only
she could keep clear of the police, she felt that she would be able
to reach the meeting-place in another forty-five minutes. A wild,
unnatural exaltation drove her on as the Blue Rolls ate up the miles
towards the west.
At 8.39. Rex was asking; 'What is all this about a Yellow Sunbeam
anyway? It was a Blue Rolls I got stung for,' And the Duke replied,
with his grey eyes twinkling: 'Don't worry about the Rolls. The
police saw your young friend with it in Amesbury a little after
eight. They will catch her for us you may be certain.'
At 8.40. The police at Newbury were relaying a message from Max
for the Duke to their colleagues at Amesbury.
At 8.41, De Richleau was saying: 'Don't be a fool, Rex. I only
said that I could not call in the police unless these people
committed some definite breach of the law. Car stealing is a crime,
so I have been able to utilise them in this one instance -that's
all.'
At 8.44. Two traffic policemen on a motor-cycle combination,
which had set out from Devizes a quarter of an hour before, spotted
the back number-plate of Blue Roils number OA 1217 as it switched to
the left at a fork road where they were stationed, but Tanith had
caught sight of them, and her headlights streaked away, cutting a
lane through the darkness to the south-westward.
At 8.45. The Hispano was rocking from side to side as it flew
round the bends of the twisting road south-west of Hungerford. The
Duke had heard Rex's account of the way Tanith had tricked him but
refused to enlighten him about the Yellow Sunbeam. 'No, no,' he said
impatiently. 'I want to hear every single thing you learned from the
girl-I'll tell you my end later.'
At 8.46. The traffic policemen had their machine going all out
and were in full cry after the recklessly driven Rolls,
At 8.47, The Police at Newbury were relaying a second message
from Max for the Duke to their colleagues at Ames-bury.
At 8.48, Tanith saw the lights of Easterton village looming up in
the distance across the'treeless grassland as she hurtled south-
westward in the Rolls.
At 8.49. The traffic policeman in the side-car said: 'Steady,
Bill-we'll get her in a minute.'
At 8.50. The Hispano had passed the cross-roads nine miles south-
west of Hungerford and come out on to the straight. De Richleau had
now heard everything of importance which Rex had to tell and replied
abruptly to his renewed questioning: 'For God's sake don't pester me
now. It's no easy matter to keep this thing on the road when we're
doing eighty most of the time.'
At 8.51. Tanith clutched desperately at the wheel of the Rolls as
with screaming tyres it shot round the comer of the village street.
The police siren in her ears shrilled insistently for her to halt.
She took another bend practically on two wheels, glimpsed the
darkness of the open country again for a second then, with a
rending, splintering crash, the off-side mudguards tore down a
length of wooden palings. The car swerved violently, dashed up a
steep bank then down again, rocking and plunging, until it came to
rest, with a sickening thud, against the back of a big barn.
At 9.8. The Duke, with Rex beside him, entered Amesbury Police
Station and the two messages which had been 'phoned through from
Newbury were handed to him. The first read: 'Green Daimler passed
through Amesbury going west at 8.15,' and the second, 'Yellow
Sunbeam halted Chilbury 8.22.' Both were signed 'Max per
Clutterbuck.'
As De Richleau slipped them into his pocket an Inspector came out
of an inner room. 'We've got your car, sir,' he said cheerfully.
'Heard the news only this minute. Two officers spotted the young
woman at the roads south of Devizes and gave chase. She made a
mucker of that bad bend in Easterton village. Ran it through a
garden and up a steep bank.'
'Is she hurt?' asked Rex anxiously.
'No, sir-can't be. Not enough to prevent her hopping out and
running for it. I reckon it was that bank that saved her and the car
too-for I gather it's not damaged anything to speak of.'
'Has she been caught?' inquired the Duke.
'Not yet, sir, but I expect she will be before morning.'
As De Richleau nodded his thanks, and spread out a map to find
the village of Chilbury, the desk telephone shrilled. The constable
who answered it scribbled rapidly on a pad and then passed the paper
over to him. 'Here's another message for you, sir.'
Rex glanced over the Duke's shoulder and read, 'Green Daimler
halted Chilbury 8.30. Other cars parked in vicinity and more
arriving. Will await you cross-roads half a mile south of village.
Clutterbuck.'
De Richleau looked up and gave a low chuckle. 'Got them!' he
exclaimed. 'Now we can talk.'
At 9.14. They were back in the car.
15
The Road to the Sabbat
The big Hispano left the last houses of Amesbury behind and took
the long, curving road across the Plain to the west. De Richleau,
driving now at a moderate pace, was at last able to satisfy Rex's
curiosity.
'It is quite simple, my dear fellow. Immediately I learned from
you that Madame D'Urfe was leaving Claridges for the Sabbat at four
o'clock, I realised that in her we had a second line of inquiry.
Having promised to meet you at Pangbourne, I couldn't very well
follow her myself, so I got in touch with an ex-superintendent of
Scotland Yard named Clutterbuck, who runs a Private Inquiry Agency.'
'But I thought you said we must handle this business on our own,'
Rex protested.
That is so, and Clutterbuck has no idea of the devilry that we
are up against. I only called him in for the purpose of tracing cars
and watching people, which is his normal business. After I had
explained what I wanted to him he arranged for are highly potent
against evil my friend, and if we can only secure Simon they will
prove a fine protection for him. Here, take this crucifix.'
'What'll I do with it?' Rex asked, admiring for a moment the
beautiful carving on the sacred symbol.
'Hold it in your hand from the moment we go over this wall, and
before your face if we come upon any of these devilish people.'
While De Richleau was speaking, he had taken a little plush box
from the suitcase, and out of it a rosary from which dangled a
small, gold cross. Reaching up, he hung it about Rex's neck,
explaining as he did so: 'Should you drop the big one, or if it is
knocked from your hand by some accident, this will serve as a
reserve defence. In addition, I want you to set another above a
horse-shoe in your aura.'
'How d'you mean?' Rex frowned, obviously puzzled.
'Just imagine if you can that you are actually wearing a horse-
shoe surmounted by a crucifix on your forehead. Think of it as
glowing there in the darkness an inch or so above your eyes. That is
an even better protection than any ordinary material symbol, but it
is difficult to concentrate sufficiently to keep it there without
long practice, so we must wear the sign as well.' The Duke placed a
similar rosary round his own neck and took two small phials from the
open case. 'Mercury and Salt,' he added. 'Place one in each of your
breast pockets!'
Rex did as he was bid. 'But why are we wearing crucifixes when
you put a swastika on Simon before?' he asked.
'I was wrong. That is the symbol of Light in the East, where I
learned what little I know of the Esoteric Doctrine. There, it would
have proved an adequate barrier, but here, where Christian thoughts
have been centred on the Cross for many centuries, the crucifix has
far more potent vibrations.'
He took up the bottJe and went on: 'This is holy water from
Lourdes, and with it I shall seal the nine openings of your body
that no evil may enter it at any one of them. Then you must do the
same for me.'
With swift gestures, the Duke made the sign of the cross in holy
water upon Rex's eyes, nostrils, lips, etc., and then Rex performed
a similar service for him.
De Richleau picked up the other crucifix and shut the case. 'Now
we can start,' he said. 'I only wish that we had a fragment of the
Host apiece. That is the most powerful defence of all, and with it
we might walk unafraid into hell itself. But it can only be obtained
by a layman after a special dispensation, and I had no time to plead
my case for that today.'
The night was fine and clear, but only a faint starlight lit the
surrounding country, and they felt rather than saw the rolling
slopes of the Plain which hemmed in the village and the house, where
they were set in a sheltered dip. The whole length of the high stone
wall was fringed, as far as they could see, by the belt of trees,
and through their thick, early-summer foliage no glimpse of light
penetrated to show the exact position of the house.
Since no sound broke the stillness-although a hundred people were
reported to be gathered there-they judged the place to be somewhere
in the depths of the wood at a good distance from the wall; yet
despite that, as they walked quickly side by side down the chalky
lane, they spoke only in whispers, lest they disturb the strange
stillness that brooded over that night-darkened valley.
At length they found the thing that they were seeking, a place
where the old wall had crumbled and broken at the top. A pile of
masonry had fallen into the lane, making a natural step a couple of
feet in height, and from it they found no difficulty in hoisting
themselves up into the small breach from which it had tumbled.
As they slipped down the other side, they paused for a moment,
peering through the great tree-trunks, but here on the inside of the
wall beneath the wide-spreading branches of century-old oaks and
chestnuts they were in pitch darkness, and could see nothing ahead
other than the vague outline of the
trees.
'In manus tuas, domine,' murmured the Duke, crossing himself;
then holding their crucifixes before them they moved forward
stealthily, their feet crackling the dry twigs with a faint snapping
as they advanced.
After a few moments the darkness lightened and they came out on
the edge of a wide lawn. To their left, two hundred yards away, they
saw the dim, shadowy bulk of a rambling old house, and through a
shrubbery which separated them from it, faint chinks of light coming
from the ground floor windows. Now, too, they could hear an
indistinct murmur, which betrayed the presence of many people.
Keeping well within the shadow of the trees, they moved
cautiously along until they had passed the shrubbery and could get a
clear view of the low, old-fashioned mansion. Only the ground-floor
windows showed lights and these were practically obscured by heavy
curtains. The upper stories were dark and lifeless.
Still in silence, and instinctively agreeing upon their
movements, the two friends advanced again and began to make a circle
of the house. On the far side they found the cars parked just as
Clutterbuck had described, upon a gravel sweep, and counted up to
fifty-seven of them.
'By Jove,' Rex breathed. 'This lot would rejoice an automobile
salesman's heart.'
The Duke nodded. Not more than half a dozen out of the whole
collection were ordinary, moderately-priced machines. The rest bore
out De Richleau's statement that the practitioners of the Black Art
in modern times were almost exclusively people of great wealth. A
big silver Rolls stood nearest to them; beyond it a golden Bugatti.
Then a supercharged Mercedes, another Rolls, an Isotta Fraschini
whose bonnet alone looked as big as an Austin Seven, and so the line
continued with Alfa Romeos, Daimlers, Hispanos and Bentleys, nearly
every one distinctive of its kind. At a low estimate there must have
been ?100,000 worth of motor-cars parked in that small area.
As they paused there for a moment a mutter of voices and a sudden
burst of laughter came from a ground-floor window. Rex tip-toed
softly forward across the gravel. De Richleau followed and,
crouching down with their heads on a level with the low sill, they
were able to see through a chink in the curtains into the room.
It was a long, low billiards-room with two tables, and the usual
settees ranged along the walls. Both tables were covered with white
cloths upon which were piles of plates, glasses, and an abundant
supply of cold food. About the room, laughing, smoking and talking,
were some thirty chauffeurs who, having delivered their employers at
the rendezvous, were being provided with an excellent spread to keep
them busy and out of the way.
The Duke touched Rex on the shoulder, and they tiptoed
quietly back to the shelter of the bushes. Then, making a circle
of the drive, they passed round the other side of the house, which
was dark and deserted, until they came again to the lighted windows
at the back which they had first seen.
The curtains of these had been more carefully drawn than those of
the billiards-room where the chauffeurs were supping, and it was
only after some difficulty that they found a place at one where they
were able to observe a small portion of the room. From what little
they could see, the place seemed to be a large reception-room, with
parquet floor, painted walls and Italian furniture.
The head of a man, who was seated with his back to the window,
added to their difficulty in seeing into the room but the glimpse
they could get was sufficient to show that all the occupants of it
were masked and their clothes hidden under black dominoes, giving
them all a strangely funereal appearance.
As the man by the window turned his head De Richleau, who was
occupying their vantage point at the time, observed that his hah-
was grey and curly and that he had lost the top portion of his left
ear, which ended in a jagged piece of flesh. The Duke felt that
there was something strangely familiar in that mutilated ear, but he
could not for the life of him recall exactly where he had seen it.
Not at Simon's party, he was certain but, although he watched the
man intently, no memory came to aid his recognition.
The others appeared to be about equal numbers of both sexes as
far as the Duke could judge from the glimpses he got of them as they
passed and repassed the narrow orbit of his line of vision. The
masks and dominoes made it particularly difficult for him to pick
out any of the Satanists whom he had seen at the previous party but,
after a little, he noticed a man with a dark-skinned, fleshy neck
and thin, black hair whom he felt certain was the Babu, and a little
later a tall, lank, fair-haired figure who was undoubtedly the
Albino.
After a time Rex took his place at their observation post. A
short, fat man was standing now in the narrow line of sight. A black
mask separated his pink, bald head from the powerful fleshy chin-it
could only be Mocata. As he watched, another domino came up, the
beaky nose, the bird-like head, the narrow, stooping shoulders of
which must surely belong to Simon Aron.
'He's here,' whispered Rex.
'Who-Simon?'
'Yes. But how we're going to get at him in this crush is more
than I can figure out.'
That has been worrying me a lot,' De Richleau whispered back.
'You see, I have had no time to plan any attempt at rescue. My whole
day has been taken up with working at the Museum and then organising
the discovery of this rendezvous, I had to leave the rest to chance,
trusting that an opportunity might arise where we could find Simon
on his own if they had locked him up, or at least with only a few
people, when there would be some hope of our getting him away. All
we can do for the moment is to bide our time. Are there any signs of
them starting their infernal ritual?'
'None that I can see. It's only a "conversation piece" in
progress at the moment.'
De Richleau glanced at his watch. 'Just on eleven,' he murmured,
'and they won't get going until midnight, so we have ample time
before we need try anything desperate. Something may happen to give
us a better chance before that.'
For another ten minutes they watched the strange assembly. There
was no laughter but, even from outside the window, the watchers
could sense a tenseness in theatmosphereanda strange suppressed
excitement. De Richleau managed to identify the Eurasian, the
Chinaman and old Madame D'Urfe with her parrot beak. Then it seemed
to him that the room was gradually emptying. The man with the
mutilated ear, whose head had obscured their view, stood up and
moved away and the low purr of a motor-car engine came to them from
the far side of the house.
'It looks as if they're leaving,' muttered the Duke; 'perhaps the
Sabbat is not to be held here after all. In any case, this may be
the chance we're looking for. Come on.'
Stepping as lightly as possible to avoid the crunching of the
gravel, they stole back to the shrubbery and round the house to the
place where the cars were parked. As they arrived a big car full of
people was already running down the drive. Another was in the
process of being loaded up with a number of hampers and folding
tables. Then that also set off with two men on the front seat.
Rex and De Richleau, crouching in the bushes, spent the best part
of half an hour watching the departure of the assembly.
Every moment they hoped to see Simon. If they could only identify
him among those dark shapes that moved between the cars they meant
to dash in and attempt to carry him off. If would be a desperate
business but there was no time left in which to make elaborate
plans; under cover of darkness and the ensuing confusion there was
just a chance that they might get away with it.
No chauffeurs were taken and a little less than ha!f the number
of cars utilised. Where me guests had presumably arrived in ones,
twos, and threes, they now departed crowded five and six apiece in
the largest of the cars.
When only a dozen or so of the Satanists were left the Duke
jogged Rex's arm. 'We've missed him I'm afraid. We had better make
for our own car now or we may lose track of them,' and, filled with
growing concern at the difficulties which stood between them and
Simon's rescue, they turned and set off at a quick pace through the
trees to the broken place in the wall.
Scrambling over, they ran at a trot down the lane. Once in the
car, De Richleau drove it back on to the main road and then pulled
up as far as possible in the shadow of the overhanging trees. A big
Delage came out of the park gates a hundred yards farther along the
road and turning east sped away through the village.
'Wonder if that's the last,' Rex said softly.
'I hope not,' De Richleau replied. They have been going off at
about two-minute intervals, so as not to crowd the road and make too
much of a procession of it. If it is the last, they would be certain
to see our lights and become suspicious. With any luck the people in
the Delage will take us for the following car if we can slip in now,
and the next to follow will believe our rear light to be that of the
Delage.' He released his brake, and the Hispano slid forward.
On the far side of the village they picked up the rear light of
the Delage moving at an easy pace and followed to the cross-roads
where they had met Clutterbuck an hour and a half earlier. Here the
car turned north along a by-road, and they followed for a few miles
upward on to the higher level of the desolate rolling grassland,
unbroken by house or farmstead, and treeless except for, here and
there, a coppice set upon a gently sloping hillside.
Rex was watching out of the back window and had assured himself
that another car was following in their rear, for upon that open
road motor headlights were easily visible for miles.
They passed through the village of Chitterne St. Mary, then round
the steep curve to the entrance of its twin parish, Chitterne All
Saints. At the latter the car which they were following switched
into a track runinng steeply uphill to the northeast, then swiftly
down again into a long valley bottom and up the other side on to a
higher crest. They came to a crossroads where four tracks met in
another valley and turned east to run on for another mile, bumping
and skidding on the little-used, pathlike way. After winding a
little, the car ahead suddenly left the track altogether and ran on
to the smooth short turf.
After following the Delage for a mile or more across the grass,
De Richleau saw it pull up on the slope of the downs where the score
or so of cars which had brought the Satanists to this rendezvous
were parked in a ragged line. He swiftly dimmed his lights, and ran
slowly forward, giving the occupants of the Delage time to leave
their car before he pulled up the Hispano as far from it as he dared
without arousing suspicion in the others. The car following, which
seemed to be the last in the procession, passed quite close to them
and halted ten yards ahead, also disgorging its passengers, Rex and
the Duke waited for a moment, still seated in the darkness of the
Hispano, then after a muttered conference, Rex got out to go forward
and investigate.
He returned after about ten minutes to say that the Satanists had
gone over the crest of the hill into the dip beyond, carrying their
hampers and their gear with them.
'We had better drive on then,' said the Duke, 'and park our car
with theirs. It's likely to be noticed if the moon gets up.'
'There isn't a rnoonfl Rex told him. 'We're in the dark quarter.
But it would be best to have it handy all the same.'
They drove on until they reached the other cars, all of whose
lights had been put out, then, getting out, set off at a stealthy
trot in the direction the Satanists had taken.
Within a few moments, they arrived at the brow of the hill and
saw that spread below them lay a natural amphitheatre. At the
bottom, glistening faintly, lay a small tarn or lake, and De
Richleau nodded understandingly.
This is the place where the devilry will actually be done without
a doubt. No Sabbat can be held except in a place which is near open
water.' Then the two friends lay down in the grass to watch for
Simon among the dark group of figures who were moving about the
water's edge.
Some were busy unpacking the hampers, and erecting the small
folding-tables which they had brought. The light was just sufficient
for Rex to see that they were spreading upon them a lavish supper.
As he watched, he saw a group of about a dozen move over to the left
towards a pile of ancient stones which, in the uncertain light,
seemed to form a rugged, natural throne.
De Richleau's eyes were also riveted upon the spot and, to his
straining gaze, it seemed that there was a sudden stirring of
movement in the shadows there. The whole body of masked, black-clad
figures left the lake and joined those near the stones, who seemed
to be their leaders. After a moment the watchers could discern a
tall, dark form materialising on the throne and, as they gazed with
tense expectancy, a faint shimmer of pale violet light began to
radiate from it.
Even at that distance, this solitary illumination of the dark
hollow was sufficient for the two friends to realise that the thing
which had appeared out of the darkness, seated upon those age-old
rocks, was the same evil entity that De Richleau had once taken for
Mocata's black servant, and which had manifested itself to Rex with
such ghastly clarity in Simon's silent house. The Sabbat was about
to commence.
16
The Sabbat
Straining their eyes and ears for every sound and movement from
the assembly in the dark shadows below, Rex and the Duke lay side by
side on the rim of the saucer-shaped depression in the downland.
As far as they could judge, they were somewhere about half-way
between the two hamlets of Imber and Tilshead, with Chitterne All
Saints in their rear and the village of Easterton, where Tanith had
crashed, about five miles to the north. The country round about was
desolate and remote. Once in a while some belated Wiltshire yokel
might cross the plain by night upon a special errand created by
emergency; but even if such a one had chanced to pass that way on
this Walpurgis-Nacht, the hidden meeting-place-guarded by its
surrounding hills-was far from the nearest track, and at that
midnight hour no living soul seemed to be stirring within miles of
the spot which the Satanists had chosen for the worship of their
Infernal Master.
In the faint starlight they could see that the tables were now
heaped with an abundance of food and wine, and that the whole crowd
had moved over towards the throne round which they formed a wide
circle, so that the nearest came some little way up the slope and
were no more than fifty yards from where the Duke and Rex lay
crouched in the grass.
'How long does it last?' Rex asked, beneath his breath, a little
nervously.
'Until cock-crow, which I suppose would be at about four o'clock
at this time of the year. It is a very ancient belief that the
crowing of a cock has power to break spells, so these ceremonies, in
which the power to cast spells is given, never last longer. Keep a
sharp look out for Simon.'
'I am, but what will they be doing all that time?'
First, they will make their homage to the Devil. Then they will
gorge themselves on the food that they have brought and get drunk on
the wine; the idea being that everything must be done contrary to
the Christian ritual. They will feast to excess as opposed to the
fasting which religious people undergo before their services. Look!
There are the leaders before the altar now.'
Rex followed the Duke's glance, and saw that half a dozen black
figures were placing tall candles-eleven of them in a circle and the
twelfth inside it-at the foot of the throne.
As they were lighted the twelve candles burned steadily in the
windless night with a strong blue flame, illuminating a circle of
fifty feet radius including the tables where the feast was spread.
Outside this ring the valley seemed darker than before, filled with
pitch-black shadows so that the figures in the area of light stood
out clearly as though upon a bright
circular stage.
'Those things they have lighted are the special black candles
made of pitch and sulphur,' muttered the Duke. 'You will be able to
smell them in a minute. But look at the priests: didn't I tell you
that there is little difference between this modern Satanism and
Voodoo? We might almost be witnessing some heathen ceremony in an
African jungle!'
While the crowd had been busy at the tables, their leaders had
donned fantastic costumes. One had a huge cat mask over his head and
a furry cloak, the tail of which dangled behind him on the ground;
another wore the headdress of a repellent toad; the face of a third,
still masked, gleamed bluish for a moment in the candle-light from
between the distended jaws of a wolf, and Mocata, whom they could
still recognise by his squat obesity, now had webbed wings sprouting
from his shoulders which gave him the appearance of a giant bat.
Rex shivered. 'It's that infernal cold again rising up the hill,'
he said half-apologetically. 'Say-look at the thing on the throne.
It's changing shape.'
Until the candles had been lit, the pale violet halo which
emanated from the figure had been enough to show that it was human
and the face undoubtedly black. But, as they watched, it changed to
a greyish colour, and something was happening to the formation of
the head.
'It is the Goat of Mendes, Rex!' whispered the Duke. 'My God!
this is horrible!' And even as he spoke, the manifestation took on a
clearer shape; the hands, held forward almost in an attitude of
prayer but turned downward, became transformed into two great cloven
hoofs. Above rose the monstrous bearded head of a gigantic goat,
appearing to be at least three times the size of any other which
they had ever seen. The two slit-eyes, slanting inwards and down,
gave out a red baleful light. Long pointed ears cocked upwards from
the sides of the shaggy head, and from the bald, horrible unnatural
bony skull, which was caught by the light of the candles, four
enormous curved horns spread out-sideways and up.
Before the apparition the priests, grotesque and terrifying
beneath their beast-head masks and furry mantles, were now swinging
lighted censers, and after a little a breath of the noisome incense
was wafted up the slope.
Rex choked into his hand as the fumes caught his throat, then
whispered: 'What is that filth they're burning?'
'Thorn, apple leaves, rue, henbane, dried nightshade, myrtle and
other herbs,' De Richleau answered. 'Some are harmless apart from
their stench, but others drug the brain and excite the senses to an
animal fury of lust and eroticism as you will see soon enough. If
only we could catch sight of Simon,' he added desperately.
'Look, there he is!' Rex exclaimed. 'Just to the left of the toad-
headed brute.'
The goat rose, towering above the puny figures of its unhallowed
priests, and turned its back on them; upon which one stooped
slightly to give the osculam-infame as his mark of homage. The
others followed suit, then the whole circle of Satanists drew in
towards the throne and, in solemn silence, followed their example,
each bending to salute his master in an obscene parody of the holy
kiss which is given to the Bishop's ring.
Simon was among the last, and as he approached the throne, Rex
grabbed De Richleau's arm. 'It's now or never,' he grunted. 'We've
got to make some effort. We can't let this thing go through.'
'Hush,' De Richleau whispered back. This is not the baptism. That
will not be until after they have feasted-just before the orgy. Our
chance must come.'
As the two lay there in the rough grass, each knew that the time
was close at hand when they must act if they meant to attempt
Simon's rescue. Yet, despite the fact that neither of them lacked
courage, both realised with crushing despondency how slender their
chances of success would be if they ran down the slope and charged
that multitude immersed in their ghoulish rites. There were at least
a hundred people in that black-robed crowd and it seemed an utter
impossibility to overcome such odds.
Rex leaned over towards the Duke and voiced his thoughts aloud,
'We're right up against it this time unless you can produce a
brainwave. We'd be captured in ten seconds if we tried getting Simon
away from this bunch of maniacs.'
'I know,' De Richleau agreed miserably. 'I did not bargain for
them all being shut up together in one room in that house or coming
on to this place in a solid crowd. If only they would split up a
little we might isolate Simon with just two or three of them, down
the rest, and get him away before the main party knew what was
happening; but as things are I am worried out of my wits. If we
charge in, and they catch us, I have not a single doubt but that we
should never be allowed to come up out of this hollow alive. We know
too much, and they would kill us for a certainty. In fact, they
would probably welcome the chance on a night like this to perform a
little human sacrifice in front of that ghastly thing on the stones
there.'
'Surely they wouldn't go in for murder even if they do practise
this filthy parody of religion?' whispered Rex incredulously.
De Richleau shook his head. 'The Bloody Sacrifice is the oldest
magical rite in the world. The slaying of Osiris and Adonis, the
mutilation of Attis and the cults of Mexico and Peru, were all
connected with it. Even in the Old Testament you read that the
sacrifice which was most acceptable to God the Father was one of
blood, and St. Paul tells us that "Without the shedding of blood
there is no remission".'
'That was just ancient heathen cruelty.'
'Not altogether. The blood is the Life. When it is shed,
energy-animal or human as the case may be-is released into the
atmosphere. If it is shed within a specially prepared circle, that
energy can be caught and stored or redirected in precisely the same
way as electric energy is caught and utilised by our modern
scientists.'
'But they wouldn't dare to sacrifice a human being?'
'It all depends upon the form of evil they wish to bring upon the
world. If it is war they will seek to propitiate Mars with a virgin
ram; if they desire the spread of unbridled lust-a goat, and so on.
But the human sacrifice is more potent for all purposes than any
other, and these wretched people are hardly human at the moment.
Their brains are diseased and their mentality is that of the hags
and warlocks of the Dark Ages.'
'Oh, Hell!' Rex groaned, 'we've simply got to get Simon out of
this some way.'
The Goat turned round again after receiving the last kiss,
holding between its hoofs a wooden cross about four feet in length.
With a sudden violent motion it dashed the crucifix against the
stone, breaking it into two pieces. Then the cat-headed man, who
seemed to be acting the part of Chief Priest, picked them up. He
threw the broken end of the shaft towards a waiting group, who
pounced upon it and smashed it into matchwood with silent ferocity,
while he planted the crucifix end upside down in the ground before
the Goat. This apparently concluded the first portion of the
ceremony.
The Satanists now hurried over to the tables where the banquet
was spread out. No knives, forks, spoons or glasses were in
evidence. But this strange party, governed apparently by a desire to
throw themselves back into a state of bestiality, grabbed handfuls
of food out of the silver dishes and, seizing the bottles, tilted
them to drink from the necks, gurgling and spitting as they did so
and spilling the wine down their dominoes. Not one of them spoke a
word, and the whole macabre scene was carried out in a terrible
unnatural silence, as though it were a picture by Goya come to life.
'Let's, creep down nearer,' whispered the Duke. 'While they are
gorging themselves an opportunity may come for us to get hold of
Simon. If he moves a few paces away from them for a moment, don't
try to argue with him, but knock him out.'
At a stealthy crawl, the two friends moved down the hillside to
within twenty yards of the little lake, at the side of which the
tables were set. The throne still occupied by the monstrous goat was
only a further fifteen yards away from them, and by the light of the
twelve black candles burning with an unnaturally steady flame even
in that protected hollow among the hills, they could see the
clustered figures sufficiently well to recognise those whom they
knew among them despite their masks and dominoes.
Simon, like the rest, was gnawing at a chunk of food as though he
had suddenly turned into an animal, and, as they watched, he
snatched a bottle of wine from a masked woman standing nearby,
spilling a good portion of its contents over her and himself; then
he gulped down the rest.
For a few moments Rex felt again that he must be suffering from a
nightmare. It seemed utterly beyond understanding that any cultured
man like Simon, or other civilised people such as these must
normally be, could behave with such appalling bestiality. But it was
no nightmare. In that strange, horrid silence, the Satanists
continued for more than half an hour to fight and tumble like a pack
of wolfish dogs until the tables had been overthrown and the ground
about the lakeside was filthy with the remaining scraps of food,
gnawed bones and empty bottles.
At last Simon, apparently three parts drunk, lurched away from
the crash and flung himself down on the grass a little apart from
the rest, burying his head between his hands.
'Now!' whispered the Duke. 'We've got to get him.'
With Rex beside him, he half rose to his feet, but a tall figure
had broken from the mass and reached Simon before they could move.
It was the man with the mutilated ear, and in another second a group
of two women and. three more men had followed him. De Richleau
gritted his teeth to suppress an oath and placed a restraining hand
on Rex's shoulder.
'It's no good,' he muttered savagely. 'We must wait a bit.
Another chance may come.' And they sank down again into the shadows.
The group about the tables was now reeling drunk, and the whole
party in a body surged back towards the Goat upon its throne. Rex
and De Richleau had been watching Simon so intently they had failed
to notice until then that Mocata and the half dozen other masters of
the Left Hand Path had erected a special table before the Goat, and
were feeding from it. Yet they appeared strangely sober compared
with the majority of the crowd who had fed beside the lake.
'So the Devil feeds, too,' Rex murmured.
'Yes,' agreed the Duke, 'or at least the heads of his priesthood,
and a gruesome meal it is if I know anything about it. A little
cannibalism, my friend. It may be a stillborn baby or perhaps some
unfortunate child that they have stolen and murdered, but I would
stake anything that it is human flesh they are eating.'
As he spoke, a big cauldron was brought forward and placed before
the throne. Then Mocata and the others with him each took a portion
of the food which they had been eating from the table and cast it
into the great iron pot. One of them threw in a round ball which met
the iron with a dull thud.
Rex shuddered as he realised that the Duke was right. The round
object was a human skull.
'They're going to boil up the remains with various other things,'
murmured the Duke, 'and then each of them will be given a little
flask of that awful brew at the conclusion of the ceremony, together
with a pile of ashes from the wood fire they are lighting under the
cauldron now. They will be able to use them for their infamous
purposes throughout the year until the next Great Sabbat takes
place.'
'Oh, Hell!' Rex protested. 'I can't believe that they can work
any harm with that human mess, however horrid it may be. It's just
not reasonable.'
'Yet you believe that the Blessed Sacrament has power for good,'
De Richleau whispered. 'This is the antithesis of the Body of Our
Lord, and I assure you, Rex, that, while countless wonderful
miracles have been performed by the aid of the Host, terrible things
can be accomplished by this blasphemous decoction.'
Rex had no deep religious feeling, but he was shocked and
horrified to the depths of his being by this frightful parody of the
things he had been taught to hold sacred in his childhood.
'Dear God,' muttered the Duke, 'they are about to commit the most
appalling sacrilege. Don't look, Rex-don't look.' He buried his face
in his hands and began to pray, but Rex continued to watch despite
himself, his gaze held by some terrible fascination.
A great silver chalice was being passed from hand to hand, and
very soon he realised the purpose to which it was being put, but
could not guess the intention until it was handed back to the cat-
headed man. One of the other officiating priests at the infamy
produced some round white discs which Rex recognised at once as
Communion Wafers-evidently stolen from some church.
In numbed horror he watched the Devil's acolytes break these into
pieces and throw them into the brimming chalice, then stir the
mixture with the broken crucifix and hand the resulting compound to
the Goat, who, clasping it between its great cloven hoofs, suddenly
tipped it up so that the whole contents was spilled upon the ground.
Suddenly, at last, the horrid silence was rent, for the whole mob
surged forward shouting and screaming as though they had gone
insane, to dance and stamp the fragments of the Holy Wafers into the
sodden earth.
'Phew!' Rex choked out, wiping the perspiration from his
forehead. 'This is a ghastly business. I can't stand much more of
it. They're mad, stark crazy, every mother's son of them.'
'Yes, temporarily.'The Duke looked up again.'Some of them are
probably epileptics, and nearly all must be abnormal. This revolting
spectacle represents a release of all their pent-up emotions and
suppressed complexes, engendered by brooding over imagined
injustice, lust for power, bitter hatred of rivals in love or some
other type of success and good fortune. That is the only explanation
for this terrible exhibition of human depravity which we are
witnessing.'
'Thank God, Tanith's not here. She couldn't have stood it. She'd
have gone mad, I know, or tried to run away. And then they'd
probably have murdered her. But what are we going to do about
Simon?'
De Richleau groaned. 'God only knows. If I thought there were the
least hope, we'd charge into this rabble and try to drag him out of
it, but the second they saw us they would tear us limb from limb.'
The fire under the cauldron was burning brightly, and as the
crowd moved apart Rex saw that a dozen women had now stripped
themselves of their dominoes and stood stark naked in the candle-
light. They formed a circle round the cauldron, and holding hands,
with their backs turned to the inside of the ring, began a wild
dance around it anti-clockwise towards the Devil's left.
In a few moments the whole company had stripped off their
dominoes and joined in the dance, tumbling and clawing at one
another before the throne, with the exception of half a dozen who
sat a little on one side, each with a musical instrument, forming a
small band. But the music which they made was like no other that Rex
had ever heard before, and he prayed that he might never hear the
like again. Instead of melody, it was a harsh, discordant jumble of
notes and broken chords which beat into the head with a horrible
nerve-racking intensity and set the teeth continually on edge.
To this agonising cacophony of sound the dancers, still masked,
quite naked and utterly silent but for the swift movement of their
feet, continued their wild, untimed gyrations, so that rather than
the changing pattern of an ordered ballet the scene was one of a
trampling mass of bestial animal figures.
Drunk with an inverted spiritual exaltation and excess of
alcohol-wild-eyed and apparently hardly conscious of each other-the
hair of the women streaming disordered as they pranced, and the
panting breath of the men coming in laboured gasps-they rolled and
lurched, spun and gyrated, toppled, fell, picked themselves up
again, and leaped with renewed frenzy in one revolting carnival of
mad disorder. Then, with a final wailing screech from the violin,
the band ceased and the whole party flung themselves panting and
exhausted upon the ground, while the huge Goat rattled and clacked
its monstrous cloven hoofs together and gave a weird laughing neigh
in a mockery of applause.
De Richleau sat up quickly. 'God help us, Rex, but we've got to
do something now. When these swine have recovered their wind the
next act of this horror will be the baptism of the Neophytes and
after that the foulest orgy, with every perversion which the human
mind is capable of conceiving. We daren't wait any longer. Once
Simon is baptised, we shall have lost our last chance ot saving him
from permanent and literal Hell in this life and the next.'
'I suppose it's just possible we'll pull it off now they've
worked themselves into this state?' Rex hazarded doubtfully.
'Yes, they're looking pretty done at the moment,' the Duke
agreed, striving to bolster up his waning courage for the desperate
attempt.
'Shall we-shall we chance it?' Rex hesitated. He too was filled
with a horrible fear as to the fate which might overtake them once
they left the friendly shadows to dash into that ring of evil blue
light. In an effort to steady his frayed nerves, he gave a travesty
of a laugh, and added: 'The odds aren't quite so heavy against us
now they've lost their trousers. No one fights his best like that.'
'It's not the pack that I'm so frightened of, but that ghastly
thing sitting on the rocks.' De Richleau's voice was hoarse and
desperate. 'The protections I have utilised may not prove strong
enough to save us from the evil which is radiating from it.'
'If we have faith,' gasped Rex, 'won't that be enough?'
De Richleau shivered. The numbing cold which lapped up out of the
hollow in icy waves seemed to sap all his strength and courage.
'It would,' he muttered. 'It would if we were both in a state of
grace.'
At that pronouncement Rex's heart sank. He had no terrible secret
crime with which to charge himself, but although circumstances had
appeared to justify it at the time, both he and the Duke had taken
human life, and who, faced with the actual doorway of the other
world, can say that they are utterly without sin?
Desperately now he fought to regain his normal courage. In the
dell the Satanists had recovered their wind and were forming in the
great semi-circle again about the throne. The chance to rescue Simon
was passing with the fleeting seconds, while his friends stood
crouched and tongue-tied, their minds bemused by the reek of the
noxious incense which floated up from the hollow, their bodies
chained by an awful, overwhelming fear.
Three figures now moved out into the open space before the Goat.
Upon the left the beast-like, cat-headed high priest of Evil; upon
the right Mocata, his gruesome bat's wings fluttering a little from
his hunched-up shoulders; between them, naked, trembling, almost
apparently in a state of collapse, they supported Simon.
'It's now or never!' Rex choked out.
'No-I can't do it,' moaned the Duke, burying his face in his
hands and sinking to the ground. 'I'm afraid, Rex. God forgive me,
I'm afraid.'
17
Evil Triumphant
As the blue Rolls, number OA 1217, came to rest with a sickening
thud against the back of the big barn outside Easter-ton Village,
Tanith was flung forward against the windscreen. Fortunately the
Duke's cars were equipped with splinter-proof glass and so the
windows remained intact, but for the moment she was half-stunned by
the blow on her head and painfully 'winded' by the wheel, which
caught her in the stomach.
For a few sickening seconds she remained dazed and gasping for
breath. Then she realised that she had escaped serious injury, and
that the police would be on her at any moment. Her head whirling,
her breath stabbing painfully, she threw open the door of the Rolls
and staggered out on to the grass.
In a last desperate effort to evade capture, she lurched at an
unsteady run across the coarse tussocks and just as the torches of
the police appeared over the same hillock, which had slowed down the
wild career of the car, she flung herself down in a ditch, sheltered
by a low hedge, some thirty yards from the scene of the accident.
She paused there only long enough to regain her breath, and then
began to crawl away along the runnel until it ended on the open
plain. Taking a stealthy look over the hedge, she saw her pursuers
were still busy examining the car, so she took a chance and ran for
it, trusting in the darkness of the night to hide her from them.
After she had covered a mile she flopped exhausted to the ground,
drawing short gulping breaths into her straining lungs -her heart
thudding like a hammer. When she had recovered a little, she looked
back to find that the village and the searching officers were now
hidden from her by a sloping crest of down-land. It seemed that she
had escaped-at least for the time being-and she began to wonder what
she had better do.
From what she remembered of the map, the house at Chil-bury where
the Satanists were gathering preparatory to holding the Great Sabbat
was at least a dozen miles away. It would be impossible for her to
cover that distance on foot even if she were certain of the
direction in which it lay, and the fact that she was wanted by the
police debarred her from trying to seek a lift in a passing car if
she were able to find the main road again. In spite of her desperate
attempt to reach the rendezvous in the stolen Rolls, and the frantic
excitement of her escape from the police, she found to her surprise
that a sudden reaction had set in, and she no longer felt that
terrible driving urge to be present at the Sabbat.
Her anger against Rex had subsided. She had tricked him over the
car, and he had retaliated by putting the police on her track. She
realised now that he could only have done it on account of his
overwhelming anxiety to prevent her from joining Mocata, and smiled
to herself in the darkness as she thought again of his anxious,
worried face as he had tried so hard that afternoon on the river to
dissuade her from what she had only considered, till then, to be a
logical step in her progress towards gaining supernatural powers.
She began to wonder seriously for the first time if he was not
right, and that during these last months which she had spent with
Madame D'Urfe her brain had become clouded almost to the point of
mania by this obsession to the exclusion of all natural and
reasonable thoughts. She recalled those queer companions who were
travelling the same path as herself, most of them far further
advanced upon it, of whom she had seen so much hi recent times. The
man with the hare-lip, the one-armed Eurasian, the Albino and the
Babu. They were not normal any one of them and, while living
outwardly the ordinary life of monied people, dwelt secretly in a
strange sinister world of their own, flattering themselves and each
other upon their superiority to normal men and women on account of
the strange powers that they possessed, yet egotistical and hard-
hearted to the last degree.
This day spent with the buoyant, virile Rex among the fresh green
of the countryside and the shimmering sunlight of the river's bank,
had altered Tanith's view of them entirely; and now, in a great
revulsion of feeling, she could only wonder that her longing for
power and forgetfulness of her foreordained death had blinded her to
their cruel way of life for so long.
She stood up and, smoothing down her crumpled green linen frock,
did her best to tidy herself. But she had lost her bag in the car
smash, so not only was she moneyless but had no comb with which to
do her hair. However, feeling that now Rex had succeeded in
preventing her reaching the meeting-place he would be certain to
call off the police, she set out at a brisk pace away from Easterton
towards where she believed the main Salisbury-Devizes road to lie;
hoping to find a temporary shelter for the night and then make her
way back to London in the morning.
Before she had gone two hundred yards, her way was blocked by a
tail, barbed-wire fence shutting in some military enclosure, so she
turned left along it. Two hundred yards farther on the fence ended,
but she was again brought up by another fence and above it the steep
embankment of a railway line. She hesitated then, not wishing to
turn back in the direction of Easter-ton, and was wondering what it
would be best to do, when a dark, hunched figure seemed to form out
of the shadows beside her. She started back, but recovered herself
at once on realising that it was only a bent old woman.
'You've lost your way, dearie?' croaked the old crone.
'Yes,' Tanith admitted. 'Can you show me how I get on to the
Devizes road?'
'Come with me, my pretty.. I am going that way myself,' said the
old woman in a husky voice, which seemed to Tanith in some strange
way vaguely familiar.
'Thank you.' She turned and walked along the bridle-path that
followed the embankment to the west, searching her mind as to where
she could have heard that husky voice before.
'Give me your hand, dearie. The way is rough for my old feet,'
croaked the ancient crone; and Tanith willingly offered her arm.
Then, as the old woman rested a claw upon it, a sudden memory of
long ago flooded her mind.
It was of the days when, as a little girl living in the foothills
of the Carpathians, she had made a friend of an old gypsy-woman who
used to come to the village for the fair and local Saints' Days,
with her band of Ziganes. It was from her that Tanith had first
learned her strange powers of clairvoyance and second sight. Many a
time she had scrambled down from the rocky mount upon which her home
was set to the gypsy encampment outside the village to gaze with
marvelling eyes at old Mizka who knew so many wonderful things, and
could tell of the past and of the future by gazing into a glass of
water or consulting her grimy pack of Tarot cards.
Tanith could still see those pasteboards which had such
fascinating pictures upon them. The twenty-two cards of the Major
Arcana, said by some to be copies of the original Book of Thoth,
which contained all wisdom and was given to mankind by the ancient
ibis-headed Egyptian god. For thousands of years such packs had been
treasured and reproduced from one end of the world to the other and
were treasured still, from the boudoirs of modern Paris to the tea-
houses of Shanghai, wherever people came secretly in the quiet hours
to learn, from those who could read them, the secrets of the future.
As she walked on half unconscious of her strange companion,
Tanith recalled them in their right and fateful order. The Juggler
with his table-meaning mental rectitude; the High Priestess like a
female Pope-wisdom; the Empress-night and darkness; the
Emperor-support and protection; the Pope-reunion and society; the
Lovers-marriage; iheChariot-triumph and despotism; Justice, a winged
figure with sword and scales-the law, the Hermit with his lantern-a
pointer towards good; the Wheel of Fortune carrying a cat and a
demon round with it-success and wealth; Strength, a woman wrenching
open the jaws of a lion-power and sovereignty; the Hanged Man lashed
by his right ankle tp a beam and dangling upside down while holding
two money bags-warning to be prudent; Death with his scythe-ruin and
destruction; Temperance, a woman pouring liquid from one vase to
another-moderation; the Devil, batwinged, goatfaced, with a human
head protruding from his belly-force and blindness; the Lightning-
struck Tower with people falling from it-want, poverty and
imprisonment; the Star-disinterestedness; the Moon~speech and
lunacy; the Sun-light and science; the Judgement-typifying will; the
World, a naked woman with goat and ram below-travel and possessions;
then last but not least the card that has no number, the Fool,
foretelling dementia, rapture and extravagance.
Old Mizka had been a willing teacher, and Tanith, the child, an
eager pupil, for she had spent a lonely girlhood in that castle on
the hill separated by miles of jagged valleys difficult to traverse
from other children of her own postion, and debarred by custom from
adopting the children of the villagers as her playmates. Long before
her time she had learned all the secrets of life from the old gipsy,
who talked for hours in her husky voice of lovers and marriage and
lovers again, and potions to bring sleep to suspicious husbands and
philtres which could warm the heart of the coldest man towards a
woman who desired his caresses.
'Mizka," Tanith whispered suddenly. 'It is you-isn't it?'
'Yes, dearie. Yes-old Mizka has come a long way tonight to set
her pretty one upon the road.'
'But how did you ever come to England?'
'No matter, dearie. Don't trouble your golden head about that,
Old Mizka started you upon the road, and she has been sent to guide
your feet tonight.'
Tanith hung back for a second in sudden alarm, but the claw upon
her arm urged her forward again with gentle strength as she
protested.
'But I don't want to go! Not... not to the .,.'
The old crone chuckled. 'What foolishness is this? It is the road
that you have taken all your life, ever since Mizka told you of it
as a little girl. Tonight is the night that old Mizka has seen for
so many years in her dreams-the night when you shall know all
things, and be granted powers which come to few. How fortunate you
are to have this opportunity when you are yet so young.'
At the old woman's silken words, a new feeling crept into
Tanith's heart. She had been dwelling upon Rex's face as she crossed
the plain, and all the health-giving freshness of his gay clean
modernity, but now she was drawn back into another world; the one of
which she had thought so long, in which a very few chosen people
could perform the seemingly impossible -bend others to their
will-cause them to fall or rise-place unaccountable obstacles in
their path at every turn, or smooth their way to a glorious success.
That was more than riches, more than fame; the supreme pinnacle to
which any man or woman could rise, and all her longing to reach
those heights before she died came back to her. Rex was a pleasant,
stupid child; De Richleau a meddlesome fool, who did not understand
the danger of the things with which he was trying to interfere.
Mocata was a Prince in power and knowledge. She should be
unutterably grateful that he had considered her worthy of the honour
which she was about to receive.
'It is not far, dearie. Not so far as you have thought. The great
Festival does not take place in the house at Chilbury. That was only
a meeting place, and the Sabbat is to be held upon these downs only
a few miles from here. Come with me, and you shall receive the
knowledge and the power that you seek.'
A curtain of forgetfuiness seemed to be falling over Tanith's
mind-a feeling of intoxication-mental and physical, flooded through
her. She felt her eyes closing . . . closing ... as she muttered:
'Yes. Knowledge and Power. Hurry, Mizka! Hurry, or we shall be too
late,'
All her previous hesitations had now been blotted out, and
although they were walking over coarse grass, it seemed to her that
they trod a smooth and even way. Her mind was obsessed again with
the sole thought of reaching the Sabbat in time.
'That is my own beautiful one talking now,' crooned the old
beldame in a honeyed voice. 'But have no fear, the night is young,
and we shall reach the meeting-place of the Covens before the hour
when our Master will appear.'
Tanith was holding herself stiffly as she walked. Her golden head
thrown back, her eyes dilated to an enormous size-the muscles at the
sides of her mouth twitched incessantly as the old woman's smooth
babble flowed on.
They crossed the road, although Tanith was hardly conscious of it
as, with Mizka beside her, she stepped out, a new strength surging
through her despite her long and tiring day. Then as she mounted an
earthy bank a dark and furry presence brushed against her legs, and
looking down she saw the golden eyes of a great black cat.
For a moment she was startled, but the old woman chuckled in the
darkness. 'It is only Nebiros,' she muttered. 'You have played with
him often as a child, dearie, and he is so pleased to see you now.'
The cat mewed with pleasure as Tanith stooped for a moment to
stroke its furry back. Then they hastened on again.
For hours it seemed they tramped over the grassy tussocks, up
gently-sloping hills and down again into lonesome valleys unbroken
by trees or cottages or farmsteads, ever on to the secret place
where the Satanists would be gathering now, until old Mizka, walking
at Tanith's left, suddenly pulled up-clutching at her arm with her
bony hand.
'Shut your eyes, dearie,' she hissed in a sharp whisper. 'Shut
your eyes. There is something here that it is not good for you to
see. I will guide you.'
Tanith did as she was bid mechanically, and although she could no
longer see the rough ground over which they were passing, she did
not stumble but continued to step forward evenly at a good pace. Yet
she had a feeling that she was no longer alone with the old woman,
but that a third person was now walking with them at her right hand.
Then, a low voice, bell-like and clear, sounded in her ears.
'Tanith, my darling. Look at me, I implore you.'
At the shock of hearing that well-loved voice, the curtain lifted
for a moment and Tanith opened her eyes again. To her right, she saw
the figure of her mother dressed in white as she had last seen her
before she had set out to some great party where she had died of a
sudden heart attack. Round her neck hung a rope of pearls, and her
head was adorned with a half-hoop of diamond stars. The figure shone
by some strange unnatural light in the surrounding darkness, seeming
as pure and translucent as carved crystal.
'My dear one,' the voice went on, 'my folly of encouraging your
gift of second sight has led you into terrible peril. I beg you by
all that is good and holy to draw back while there is yet time.'
Despite the urging hand which clawed upon her arm, Tanith
stumbled for the first time in the long grass and, wrenching her arm
away, stood still. In a flash of insight which seared through her
drugged brain, she knew then that old Mizka was not a living being,
but a Dark Angel sent to lead her to the Sabbat, and that her mother
had come at this moment from the world beyond as an Angel of Light
to draw her back again into the safety and protection of holy
things.
Mizka was babbling and crowing upon her left, urging her onward
with a terrible force and intensity. The words 'power' -'crowning
your life'-'mastery of all' came again and again in her rapid
speech, and Tanith moved a few steps forward. But her mother's
voice, imploring again, came clearly in her ears.
Tanith, my darling, I am only allowed to appear to you because of
your great danger, and for the briefest space. I am called back
already, but I beg you in the name of the love that we had for each
other, not to go. There is a better influence in your life. Trust in
it while there is still time, otherwise you will be dragged down
into the pit and we shall never meet again.' Suddenly the voice
changed, becoming cold and commanding, 'Back, Mizka-back whence you
came. I order you by the names of Isis, mother of Horus, Kwan-Yin,
mother of Hau-Ki, and Mary, mother of Our Lord.'
The voice ceased on a thin wall as though, all unwillingly, the
spirit had been drawn back while its abjuration to the demon was
only half completed. With a wild cry and arms outstretched, Tanith
dashed forward to the place where that nebulous moon-white being had
floated, but where the apparition of her mother had been a second
before, only a little breeze ruffled the long grasses. A feeling of
immense fatigue bowed her shoulders as she turned towards old Mizka
and the cat. But they too had vanished.
She sank upon her knees and began to pray, feverishly at first
and then less strongly, until her tongue tripped upon the words and
at last she fell silent. Almost unconsciously she rose to her feet
and found herself, the night wind playing gently in her hair,
standing upon a hilltop gazing down into a shallow
valley.
A new and terrible fear gripped at her heart, for she saw below
her, by the strange unearthly light of a ring of blue candles, the
Satanists gathering for their unholy ceremony, and knew that evil
powers had led her feet by devious paths to the place of the Great
Sabbat that she might participate after all.
She stood for a moment, the blood draining from her face, quick
tremors of horror and apprehension running down her body. She wanted
to turn and flee into the dark, protective shadows of the night, but
she could not tear her eyes away from that terrible figure seated
upon the rocky throne, before which the Satanists were making their
obscene obeisance. Some terrible uncanny power kept her feet rooted
to the spot, and although her mother's warning still rang in her
ears, she could not drag her gaze away from that blasphemous mockery
of God proceeding in a horrid silence a hundred yards down the slope
from where she stood.
Time ceased to exist for Tanith then. An unearthly chill seemed
to creep up out of the valley, swirling and eddying about her legs
as a cold current suddenly strikes a bather in a warm patch of sea.
The chill crept upward to the level of her breasts, numbing her
limbs and dulling her faculties until she could have cried out with
the pain. She watched the gruesome banquet with loathing and
repulsion, but as she saw those ghoul-like figures tilting the
bottles to their mouths she was suddenly beset by an appalling
desire to drink.
Although her limbs were cold, her mouth seemed parched; her
throat swollen and burning. She was seized with an unutterable
longing to rush forward, down the slope, and grab one of those
bottles with which to slake her all-consuming thirst. Yet she
remained rooted, held back by her higher consciousness; the vision
of her mother no longer before her physical eyes, but clear in her
mentality just as she had seen it, tall, slender and white-clad,
with a sparkling hoop of star-like diamonds glistening above the
hair drawn back from the high, broad forehead.
At the defamation of the Host, she was seized by a shuddering
rigor in all her limbs. She tried to shut her eyes but they remained
fixed and staring while silent tears welled from them and gushed
down her cheeks. She endeavoured to cross herself, but her hand,
numb with that awful cold, refused to do the bidding of her brain
and remained hanging limp and frozen at her side. She endeavoured to
pray, but her swollen tongue refused its office, and her mind seemed
to have gone utterly blank so that she could not recall even the
opening words of the Paternoster or Ave Maria. She knew with a
sudden appalling clarity that having even been the witness of this
blasphemous sacrilege was enough to damn her for all eternity, and
that her own wish to attend this devilish saturnalia had been
engendered only by a stark madness caught like some terrible
contagious disease from her association with these other unnatural
beings who were the victims of a ghastly lunacy;
In vain she attempted to cast herself upon her knees, to struggle
back from this horror, but she seemed to be caught in an invisible
vice and could not lift her glance for one single second from that
small lighted circle which stood out so clearly in the surrounding
darkness of the mysterious valley.
She saw the Satanists strip off their dominoes and shuddered
afresh-almost retching-as she watched them tumbling upon each other
in the disgusting nudity of their ritual dance. Old Madame D'Urfe,
huge-buttocked and swollen, prancing by some satanic power with all
the vigour of a young girl who had only just reached maturity; the
Babu, dark-skinned, fleshy, hideous; the American woman, scraggy,
lean-flanked and hag-like with empty, hanging breasts; the Eurasian,
waving the severed stump of his arm in the air as he gavotted beside
the unwieldy figure of the Irish bard, whose paunch stood out like
the grotesque belly of a Chinese god.
'They are mad, mad, mad,' she found herself saying over and over
again, as she rocked to and fro where she stood, weeping bitterly,
beating her hands together and her teeth chattering in the icy wind.
The dance ceased on a high wail of those discordant instruments
and then the whole of that ghastly ghoul-like crew sank down
together in a tangled heap before the Satanic throne. Tanith
wondered for a second what was about to happen next, even as she
made a fresh effort to drag herself away. Then Simon was led out
from among the rest and she knew all too soon that the time of
baptism was at hand. As she realised it, a new menace came upon her.
Without her own volition, her feet began to move.
In a panic of fear she found herself setting one before the other
and advancing slowly down the hill. She tried to scream, but her
voice would not come. She tried to throw herself backward, but her
body was held rigid, and an irresistible suction dragged at each of
her feet in turn, lifting it a few inches from the ground and
pulling it forward, so that, despite her uttermost effort of will to
resist the evil force, she was being drawn slowly but surely to
receive her own baptism.
The weird unearthly music had ceased. An utter silence filled the
valley. She was no more than ten yards from the nearest of those
debased creatures who hovered gibbering about the throne. Suddenly
she whimpered with fright for although she was still hidden by the
darkness, the great horned head of the Goat turned and its fiery
eyes became fixed upon her.
She knew then that there was no escape. The warnings from Rex and
her mother had come too late. Those powers which she had sought to
suborne now held her in their grip and she must submit to this
loathsome ritual despite the shrinking of her body and her soul,
with all the added horror of full knowledge that it meant final and
utter condemnation to the bottomless pit.
18
The Power of Light
At the sight of De Richleau's breakdown Rex almost gave in too.
The cold sweat of terror had broken out on his own forehead, yet he
was still fighting down his fear and, after a moment, the collapse
of that indomitable leader to whom he had looked so often and with
such certain faith in the worst emergencies brought him a new
feeling of responsibility. His generous nature was great enough to
realise that the Duke's courage had only proved less than his own on
this occasion because of his greater understanding of the peril they
were called upon to face. Now, it was as though the elder man had
been wounded and put out of action, so Rex felt that it was up to
him to take command.
'We can't Jet this thing be,' he said with sudden firmness,
stooping to place an arm round De Richleau's shaking shoulders. 'You
stay here. I'm going down to face the music.'
'No-no, Rex.' The Duke grabbed at his coat. 'They'll murder you
without a second thought.'
'Will they? We'll see!' Rex gave a grating laugh. 'Well, if they
do you'll have something you can fix on them that the police will
understand. It'll be some consolation to think you'll see to it that
these devils swing for my murder if they do me in.'
'Wait I I won't let you go alone,' the Duke stumbled to his feet.
'Don't you realise that death is the least thing I fear. One look
from die eyes of the Goat could send you mad-then where is the case
to put before the police? Half the people in our asylums may be
suffering from a physical lesion of the brain but the others are
unaccountably insane. The real reason is demoniac possession brought
about by looking upon terrible things that they were never meant to
see.'
'I'll risk it.' Rex was desperate now. He held up the crucifix.
This is going to protect me, because I've got faith that it will.'
'All right then-but even madness isn't the worst that can happen
to us. This life is nothing-I'm thinking of the next. Oh, God, if
only dawn would come or we had some form of Light that we could
bring to bear on these worshippers of Darkness.'
Rex took a pace forward. 'If we'd known what we were going to be
up against we'd have brought a searchlight on a truck. That would
have given this bunch something to think about if light has the
power you say. But it's no good worrying about that now. We've got
to hurry.'
'No-wait!' the Duke exclaimed with sudden excitement. 'I've got
it. This way-quick!' He turned and set off up the hill at a swift
crouching run.
Rex followed, and when they reached the brow easily overtook him.
'What's the idea,' he cried, using his normal voice for the first
time for hours.
'The car!' De Richleau panted, as he pelted over the rough grass
to the place where they had left the Hispano. To attack them is a
ghastly risk in any case, but this will give us a sporting chance.'
Rex reached it first and flung open the door. The Duke tumbled in
and got the engine going. It purred on a low note as they bumped
forward in the darkness to the brow of the hill.
'Out on the running-board, Rex,' snapped De Richleau as he thrust
out the clutch. He seemed in those few moments to have recovered all
his old steel-like indomitable purpose. 'It's a madman's chance
because it's ten to one we'll get stuck going up the hill on the
other side, but we must risk that. When I use the engine again, snap
on the lights. As we go past, throw your crucifix straight at the
thing on the throne. Then try and grab Simon by the neck.'
'Fine!' Rex laughed suddenly, all his tension gone now that he
was at last going into action. 'Go to it!'
The car slid forward, silently gathering momentum as it rushed
down the steep slope. Next second they were almost upon the nearest
of the Satanists. The Duke let in the clutch and Rex switched on the
powerful headlights of the Hispano.
With the suddenness of a thunderclap a shattering roar burst upon
the silence of the valley-as though some monster plane was diving
full upon that loathsome company from the cloudy sky. At the same
instant, the whole scene was lit in all its ghast-liness by a
blinding glare which swept towards them at terrifying speed. The
great car bounded forward, the dazzling beams threw into sharp
relief the naked forms gathered in the hollow. De Richleau jammed
his foot down on the accelerator and, calling with all his will upon
the higher powers for their protection, charged straight for the
Goat of Mendes upon his Satanic throne.
At the first flash of those blinding lights which struck full
upon them, the Satanists rushed screaming for cover. It was as
though two giant eyes of some nightmare monster leapt at them from
the surrounding darkness and the effect was as that of a fire-hose
turned suddenly upon an angry threatening mob.
Then- maniacal exaltation died away. The false exhilaration of
the alcohol, the pungent herbal incense and the drug-laden ointments
which they had smeared upon their bodies, drained from them. They
woke as from an intoxicated nightmare to the realisation of their
nakedness and helplessness.
For a moment some of them thought that the end had come and that
the Power of Darkness had cashed in their bond, claiming them for
its own upon this last Walpurgis-Nacht. Others, less deeply imbued
with the mysteries of the Evil cult, forgot the terrible entity
whose powers they had come to beg in return for their homage and,
reverting to their normal thoughts, saw themselves caught and ruined
in some ghastly scandal, believing those blinding shafts of light
from the great Hispano to herald the coming of the police.
As the grotesque nude figures scattered with shrieks of terror
the car bounded from ridge to ridge heading straight for the
monstrous Goat. When the lights fell upon it Rex feared for an
instant that the malefic rays which streamed from its baleful eyes
would overcome the headlights of the car. The lamps flickered and
dimmed, but as the Duke clung to the wheel he was concentrating with
all the power of his mind upon visualising the horseshoe surmounted
by a cross in silver light just above the centre of his forehead,
setting the symbol in his aura and, at the same time, repeating the
lines of the Ninety-first Psalm which is immensely powerful against
all evil manifestations.
' "Whoso dwelleth under the defence of the most High: shall abide
under the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say unto the Lord, Thou are my hope, and my stronghold:
my God, in Him will I trust.
For He shall deliver thee from the snare of the hunter: and from
the noisome pestilence." '
From the time Rex switched on the headlights, it was only a
matter of seconds before the big car hurtled forward like a living
thing right on to the ground where the Sabbat was being held.
Rex, clinging to the coachwork, and also visualising that symbol
which De Richleau had impressed so strongly upon him, leaned from
the step of the car and, with all his force, threw the ivory
crucifix straight in the terrible face of the monstrous beast.
The Duke swerved the car to avoid the throne and Simon who, alone
of all the Satanists, remained standing but apparently utterly
unconscious of what was happening.
The blue flames of the black candles set upon the hellish altar
went out as though quenched by some invisible hand. The lights of
the car regained their full brilliance, and once again they heard
the terrible screaming neigh which seemed to echo over the desolate
Plain for miles around as the crucifix, shining white in the glow of
the headlights, passed through the face of the Goat.
A horrible stench of burning flesh mingled with the choking odour
from the sulphur candles, filled the air like some poisonous gas,
but there was no time to think or analyse sensations. After that
piercing screech, the brute upon the rocks disappeared. At the same
instant Rex grabbed Simon by the neck and hauled him bodily on to
the step of the car as it charged the farther slope of the hollow. '
Jolting and bouncing it breasted the rise, hesitating for the
fraction of a second upon the brink as though some awful power was
striving to draw it backwards. But the Duke threw the gear lever
into low, and they lurched forward again on to level ground,
Rex, meanwhile, had flung open the door at the back and dragged
Simon inside where he collapsed on the floor in a senseless heap.
Instinctively, although De Richleau had warned him not to do so, he
glanced out of the back window down into the valley where they had
witnessed such terrible things, but it lay dark, silent, and
seemingly deserted.
The car was travelling now at a better pace, although De Richleau
did not dare to use the full power of his engine for fear that they
should strike a sudden dip or turn over in some hidden gully.
For a mile they raced north-eastward while, without ceasing, the
Duke muttered to himself those protective lines:
' "He shall defend thee under his wings, and thou shall be safe
under his feathers: his faithfulness and truth shall be thy shield
and buckler.
Thou shalt not be afraid for any terror by night: nor for the
arrow that flieth by day;
For the pestilence that walketh in darkness: nor for the sickness
that destroyeth in the noon-day."'
Then to his joy, they struck a track at right-angles, and he
turned along it to the north-westward, slipping into top gear. The
car bounded forward and seemed to fly as though in truth all the
devils of Hell were unleashed behind it in pursuit. Swerving,
jolting, and bounding across the grassy ruts, they covered five
miles in twice as many minutes until they came upon the Lavington-
Westbury road.
Even then De Richleau would not slow down but, turning in the
direction of London, roared on, swerving from bend to bend with
utter disregard for danger in his fear of the greater danger that
lay behind.
They flashed through Earlstoke, Market Lavington and then
Easterton, where, unseen by them, the Blue Rolls lay just off the
road in a ditch where Tanith had crashed it a few hours before; then
Bushall, Upavon, Ludgershall and so to Andover, having practically
completed a circuit of the Plain. Here at last, at the entrance of
the town, the Duke brought the car to a halt and turned in his seat
to look at Rex,
'How is he?' he asked.
'About all-in I reckon. He is as cold as blazes, and he hasn't
fluttered an eyelid since I hauled him into the car. My God I what a
ghastly business.'
'Grim, wasn't it!' De Richleau for once was looking more than his
age. His grey face was lined and heavy pouches seemed to have
developed beneath his piercing eyes. His shoulders were hunched as
he leaned for a moment apparently exhausted over the wheel. Then he
pulled himself together with a jerk and thrusting his hand in his
pocket, took out a flask which he passed to Rex.
'Give him some of this-as much as you can get him to swallow. It
may help to pull him round.'
Rex turned to where Simon lay hunched up beneath the car rugs on
the back seat beside him and forcing open his mouth poured a good
portion of the old brandy into it.
Simon choked suddenly, gasped, and jerked up his head. His eyes
flickered open and he stared at Rex, but there was no recognition in
them. Then his lids closed again and his head fell backwards on the
seat.
'Well, he's alive, thank God,' murmured Rex. 'While you've been
driving like a maniac I've been scared that we had lost poor Simon
for good and all. But now we'd best get him back to London or to the
nearest doctor just as soon as we can.'
'I daren't.' De Richleau's eyes were full of a desperate anxiety.
That devilish mob will have recovered themselves and are probably
back at the house near Chilbury by now. They will be plotting
something against us you may be certain.'
'You mean that as Mocata knows your flat he will concentrate on
it to get Simon back-just as he did before?' 'Worse, I doubt if
they'd ever let us reach it.' 'Oh, shucks!' Rex frowned impatiently,
'How're they going to stop us?'
'They can control all the meaner things-bats, snakes, rats,
foxes, owls-as well as cats and certain breeds of dog like the
Wolfhound and Alsatian. If one of those dashed beneath the wheels of
the car when we were going at any speed it might turn over. Besides,
within certain limits, they can control the elements, so they could
ensure a dense local fog surrounding us the whole way, and every
mile of it we'd be facing the risk of another car that hadn't seen
our lights smashing into us head on at full speed. If they combine
the whole of their strength for ill it's a certainty they'll be able
to bring about some terrible accident before we can cover the
seventy miles to London. Remember too, this is still Walpurgis-Nacht
and every force of evil that is abroad will be leagued against us.
For every moment until dawn we three remain in the direst peril.'
19
The Ancient Sanctuary
'Well, we can't stay here,' Rex protested.
'I know, and we've got to find some sanctuary where we can keep
Simon safe until morning.'
'How about a church?'
'Yes, if we could find one that is open. But they will all be
locked up at this hour.'
'Couldn't we get some local parson out of bed?'
'If I knew one anywhere near here I'd chance it, but how can we
possibly expect a stranger to believe the story that we should have
to tell? He would think us madmen, or probably that it was a plot to
rob his church. But wait a moment! By Jove, I've got it! We'll take
him to the oldest cathedral in Britain and one that is open to the
skies.' With a sudden chuckle of relief, De Richleau set the car in
motion again and began to reverse it.
'Surely you're not going back?' Rex asked anxiously.
'Only three miles to the fork-roads at Weyhill, then down to
Amesbury.'
'Well, don't you call that going back?'
'Perhaps, but I mean to take him to Stonehenge. If we can reach
it, we shall be in safety, even though it is no more than a dozen
miles from Chilbury.'
Once more the car rocketed along the road across those grassy,
barren slopes, cleaving the silent darkness of the night with its
great arced headlights.
Twenty minutes later they passed again through the twisting
streets of Amesbury, now silent and shuttered while its inhabitants
slept, not even dreaming of the terrible battle which was being
fought out that night between the Power of Light and the Power of
Darkness, so near to them in actuality and yet so remote to the
teeming life of everyday modern England.
A mile outside the town, they ran up the slope to the wire fence
which rings in the Neolithic monument, Stonehenge. The Duke drove
the car into the deserted car park beside the road and there they
left it. Rex carried Simon, wrapped in De Richleau's great-coat and
the car rug, while the Duke followed him through the wire with the
suitcase containing his protective impedimenta.
As they staggered over the grass, the vast monoliths of the
ancient place of worship stood out against the skyline-the timeless
symbols of a forgotten cult that ruled Britain, before the Romans
came to bring more decorative and more human gods.
They passed the outer circle of great stone uprights upon some of
which the lintels forming them into a ring of arches still remain.
Then De Richleau led the way between the mighty chunks of fallen
masonry to where, beside the two great trili-thons, the sandstone
altar slab lies half buried beneath the remnants of the central
arch.
At a gesture from the Duke, Rex laid Simon, still unconscious,
upon it. Then he looked up doubtfully. 'I suppose you know what
you're doing, but I've always heard that the Druids, who built this
place, were a pretty grim lot. Didn't they sacrifice virgins on this
stone and practise all sorts of pagan rites? I should have thought
this place would be more sacred to the Power of Evil than the Power
of Good.'
'Don't worry, Rex,' De Richleau smiled in the darkness. 'It is
true that the Druids performed sacrifices, but they were sun-
worshippers. At the summer solstice, the sun rises over the hilltop
there, shedding its first beam of light directly through the arch on
to this altar stone. This place is one of the most hallowed spots in
all Europe because countless thousands of long-dead men and women
have worshipped here-calling upon the Power of Light to protect them
from the evil things that go in darkness-and the vibrations of their
souls are about us now making a sure buttress and protection until
the coming of the dawn.'
With gentle hands, they set about a more careful examination of
Simon. His body was still terribly cold but they found that, except
for where Rex had clawed at his neck, he had suffered no physical
injury.
'What do you figure to do now?' Rex asked as the Duke opened his
suitcasej
'Exorcise him in due form, in order to try and drive out any evil
spirit by which he may be possessed.'
'Like the Roman Catholic priests used to do in the Middle Ages.'
'As they still do,' De Richleau answered soberly,
'What-in these days?'
'Yes. Don't you remember the case of Helene Poirier who died only
in 1914. She suffered from such terrible demoniacal possession that
many of the most learned priests in France, including Monsiegneur
Dupanloup, Bishop of Orleans, and Monsieur Mallet, Superior of the
Grand Seminary, had to be called in before, with God's grace, she
could be freed from the evil spirit which controlled her.'
'I didn't think the Church admitted the existence of such things
as witchcraft and black magic.'
'Then you are very ignorant, my friend. I do not know the
official views of others, but the Roman Church, whose authority
comes unbroken over nineteen centuries from the time when Our Lord
made St. Peter his viceregent on earth, has ever admitted the
existence of the evil power. Why else should they have issued so
many ordinances against it, or at the present time so unhesitatingly
condemn all spiritualistic practices which they regard as the modern
counterparts of necromancy, by which Hell's emissaries seek to lure
weak, foolish and trusting people into their net?'
'I can't agree to that,' Rex demurred. 'I know a number of
Spiritualists, men and women of the utmost rectitude.'
'Perhaps.' De Richleau was arranging Simon's limp body. They are
entitled to their opinion and he who thinks rightly lives rightly.
No doubt their high principles act as a protective barrier between
them and the more dangerous entities of the spirit world. However,
for the weak-minded and mentally frail such practices hold the
gravest peril. Look at that Bavarian family of eleven people, all of
whom went out of their minds after a Spiritualistic seance in 1921.
The case was fully reported by the Press at the time and I could
give you a dozen similar examples, all attributable to Diabolic
possession, of course. In fact, according to the Roman Church, there
is no phenomenon of modem Spiritism which cannot be paralleled in
the records of old witch trials.'
'According to them, maybe, but Simon's not a Catholic.'
'No matter, there is nothing to prevent a member of the Roman
Church asking Divine aid for any man whatever his race or creed.
Fortunately I was baptised a Catholic and, although I may not be a
good one, I believe that with the grace of God, power will be
granted to me this night to help our poor friend.
'Kneel down now and pray silently, for all prayers are good if
the heart is earnest and perhaps those of the Church of England more
efficacious than others since we are now in the English countryside.
It is for that reason I recite certain psalms from the book of
Common Prayer. But be ready to hold him if he leaps up for, if he is
possessed, the Demon within him will fight like a maniac.'
De Richleau took up the holy water and sprinkled a few drops on
Simon's forehead. They remained there a moment and then trickled
slowly down his drawn, furrowed face. But he remained corpse-like
and still.
'May the Lord be praised,' murmured the Duke.
'What is it?' breathed Rex.
'He is not actually possessed. If he were the holy water would
have scalded him like boiling oil, and at its touch the Demon would
have screamed like a hell cat.'
'What now then?'
'He still reeks of evil so I must employ the banishing ritual to
purge the atmosphere about him and do all things possible to protect
him from Mocata's influence. Then we will see if this coma shows any
signs of lifting.'
The Duke produced a crutch of Rowan wood then proceeded to
certain curious and complicated rites; consisting largely in
stroking Simon's limbs with a brushing motion towards the feet; the
repetition of many Latin formulas with long intervals in which, led
by the Duke, the two men knelt to pray beside their friend.
Simon was anointed with holy water and with holy oil. The gesture
of Horus was made to the north, to the south, to the east and to the
west. The palms of his hands were sprinkled and the soles of his
feet. Asafoetida grass was tied round his wrists and his ankles. An
orb with the cross upon it was placed in his right hand, and a phial
of quicksilver between his lips. A chain of garlic flowers was hung
about his neck, and the sacred oil placed in a cross upon his
forehead. Each action upon him was preceded by prayer, concentration
of thought, and invocation to the archangels, the high beings of
Light, and to his own higher consciousness.
At last, after an hour, all had been accomplished in accordance
with the ancient lore and De Richleau examined Simon again. He was
warmer now and the ugly lines of distress and terror had faded from
his face. He seemed to have passed out of his dead faint into a
natural sleep and was breathing regularly.
'I think that with God's help we have saved him,' declared the
Duke. 'He looks almost normal now, but we had best wait until he
wakes of his own accord; I can do no more, so we will rest for a
little.'
Rex passed his hand across his eyes as De Richleau sank down
beside him. 'I'll say I need it. Would it be . . . er . .
sacrilegious or anything if I had a smoke?'
'Of course not.' De Richleau drew out his cigars. 'Have a Hoyo.
It is thoughts, not formalities, which make an atmosphere of good or
evil.'
For a little while the two friends sat silent, the points of
their cigars glowing faintly in the darkness until a pale greyness
in the eastern sky made clearer the ghostly outlines of the great
oblong stones towering at varying angles to twenty feet about their
heads.
'What a strange place this is,' Rex murmured. 'How old do you
suppose it to be?'
'About four thousand years.'
'As old as that, eh?'
'Yes, but that is young compared with the Pyramids and, beside
them, for architecture and scientific alignment, this thing is a
primitive toy.'
'Those ancient Britons must have been a whole heap cleverer than
we give them credit for all the same, to get these great blocks of
stone set up. It would tax all the resources of our modern
engineers, I reckon. Some of them must weigh a hundred tons apiece.'
De Richleau nodded. 'Only the piety of many thousand willing
hands, hauling on skin ropes, and manipulating vast levers, could
have accomplished it, but what is even more remarkable is that the
foreign stones were transported from a quarry nearly two hundred
miles from here.'
'What do you mean by "foreign stones"?'
The stones which form the inner ring and the inner horseshoe are
called so because they were brought from a great distance-a place in
Pembrokeshire, I think.'
'Horseshoe,' Rex repeated with a puzzled look. 'I thought all the
stones were placed in rings.'
'It is hardly discernible in the ruins now, but originally this
great temple consisted of an outer ring formed of big arches, then a
concentric circle of smaller uprights. Inside that, five great
separate trilithons of arches, two of which you can see still
standing, set in the form of a horseshoe and then another horseshoe
of the smaller stones,'
The Druids used the horseshoe, too, then?'
'Certainly. As I have told you, it is a most potent symbol
indissolubly connected with the Power of Light. Hence my use of it
in connection with the swastika and the cross.'
They fell silent again for some time, then Simon stirred beside
them and they both stood up. He slowly turned over and looked about
him with duil eyes until he recognised his friends, and asked in a
stifled voice where he was.
Without answering, De Richleau drew him down between Rex and
himself on to his knees, and proceeded to give thanks for his
restoration. 'Repeat after me,' he said, 'the words of the fifty-
first Psalm.
' "Have mercy upon me, O God, after thy great goodness: according
to the multitude of thy mercies do away mine offences.
Wash me thoroughly from my wickedness: and cleanse me from my
sin,
For I acknowledge my faults and my sin is ever before me." '
To the end of the beautiful penitent appeal the Duke read in a
solemn voice from the Prayer Book by the aid of a little torch while
the others repeated verse by verse after him. Then all three stood
up and began at last to talk in their normal voices.
De Richleau explained what had taken place, and Simon sat upon
the altar-stone weeping like a child as now, with a clear brain, he
began at last to understand the terrible peril from which his
friends had rescued him.
He remembered the party which had been given at his house and
that the Duke had hypnotised him in Curzon Street. After
that-nothing, until he found himself present in the Sabbat which had
been held that night, and even then he could only see vague pictures
of it, as though he had not participated in it himself, but watched
the whole of the ghastly proceedings from a distance; horrified to
the last degree to see a figure that seemed to be himself taking
part in those abominable ceremonies, yet mentally chained and
powerless to intervene or stop that body, so curiously like his own,
participating in that godless scene of debauchery.
Dawn was now breaking in the eastern sky. as De Richleau placed
his arm affectionately round Simon's shoulders. 'Don't take it to
heart so, my friend,' he said kindly. 'For the moment at least you
have been spared, and praise be to God you are still sane, which is
more than I dared to hope for when we got you here.'
Simon nodded. 'I know-I've been lucky,' he said soberly. 'But am
I really free-for good? I'm afraid Mocata will try and get me back
somehow.'
'Now we're together again you needn't worry,' Rex grinned. 'If
the three of us can't fight this horror and win out we're not the
men I always thought we were.'
'Yes,' Simon agreed, a little doubtfully. 'But the trouble is
that I was born at a time when certain stars were in conjunction, so
in a way I'm the key to a ritual which Mocata's set his heart on
performing.'
The invocation to Saturn coupled with Mars,' the Duke put in.
'I'm scared he'll exercise every incantation in the book to drag
me back to him despite myself,'
'Isn't that danger over? Surely it should have been done two
nights ago, but we managed to prevent it then.'
'Ner,' Simon used his favourite negative with a little wriggle of
his bird-like head. 'That would have been the most suitable time of
all, but the ritual can be performed with a reasonable prospect of
success any night while the two planets remain in the same house of
the Zodiac.'
'Then the longer we can keep you out of Mocata's clutches, the
less chance he stands of pulling it off as the two planets get
farther apart,' Rex commented.
De Richleau sighed. His face looked grey and haggard in the early
morning light. 'In that case,' he said slowly, 'Mocata will exert
his whole strength when twilight comes again, and we shall have to
fight with our backs to the wall throughout this coming night.'
20
The Four Horsemen
Now that the sun was up Rex's resilient spirit reasserted itself.
'Time enough to worry about tonight when we are through today,' he
declared cheerfully. 'What we need most just now is a good hot
breakfast.'
The Duke smiled. 'I thoroughly agree, and in any case we can't
stay here much longer. While we feed we'll discuss the safest place
to which we can take Simon.'
'We can't take him anywhere at the moment,' Rex grinned. 'Not as
he is-with only the car rug and your great-coat to cover his
birthday suit.'
Simon tittered into his hand. It was the gesture which both his
friends knew so well, and which it delighted them to see again. 'I
must look pretty comic as I am,' he chuckled. 'And it's chilly too.
One of you had better try and raise me a suit of clothes.'
'You take the car, Rex,' said the Duke, 'and drive into Ames-
bury. Knock up the first clothes dealer you can find and buy him an
outfit. Have you enough money?'
'Plenty. I was going down to Derby yesterday for the first Spring
Race Meeting if this business hadn't cropped up overnight. So I'd
drawn fifty the day before.'
'Good,' the Duke nodded. 'We shan't move from here until you
return.' Then, as Rex strode away across the grass to the Hispano,
which was now visible where they had left it in the car-park, he
turned to Simon:
'Tell me,' he said, 'while Rex is gone. How did you ever get
drawn into this terrible business?'
Simon smiled. 'Well,' he said hesitantly, 'it may seem a queer
thing to say, but you are partly responsible yourself.'
'I!' exclaimed the Duke. 'What the deuce do you mean?'
'I'm not blaming you, of course, in the least, but do you
remember that long chat we had when we were both down at Cardinals
Folly for Christmas? It started by your telling us about the old
Alchemists and how they used to make gold out of base metals.'
De Richleau nodded. 'Yes, and you threw doubt upon my statement
that the feat had actually been performed. I cited the case of the
scientist Helvetius, I remember, who was bitterly opposed to the
pretentions of the Alchemists, but who, when he was visited by one
at the Hague in December, 1666, managed to secrete a little of the
reddish powder which the man showed him under his finger-nail, and
afterwards succeeded in transmuting a small amount of lead into gold
with it. But you would not believe me, although I assured you, that
no less a person than Sponoza verified the experiment at the time.'
'That's right,' said Simon. 'Well, I was sceptical but
interested, so I took the trouble to check up as far as possible on
all you'd said. It was Spinoza's testimony that impressed
me because he was so very sane and unbiased.'
'So was Helvetius himself for that matter.'
'I know. Anyhow, I dug up the fact that Povelius, the chief
tester of the Dutch Mint, assayed the metal seven times with all the
leading goldsmiths at the Hague and they unanimously pronounced it
to be pure gold. Of course there was a possibility that Helvetius
deceived them by submitting a piece of gold obtained through the
ordinary channels, but it hardly seemed likely that he practised
deliberate fraud, because he had no motive. He had always declared
his disbelief in alchemy and he couldn't make any more because he
hadn't got the powder -so there was no question of his trying to
float a bogus company on the experiment. He couldn't even claim any
scientific kudos from it either because he frankly admitted that he
had stolen the powder from the stranger who showed it to him. After
that I went into the experiment of Berigord de Pisa and Van
Helmont.'
'And what did you think of those?' asked the Duke, his lined face
showing quick interest in the early morning light.
'They shook my unbelief a lot. Van Helmont was the greatest
chemist of his time, and like Helvetius, he'd always said the idea
of transmitting base metals into gold was sheer nonsense until a
stranger gave him a little of that mysterious powder with which he,
too, performed the experiment successfully; and he again had no
personal axe to grind,'
'There are plenty of other cases as well,' remarked the Duke;
'Raymond Lully made gold for King Edward III of England, and George
Ripley gave ?100,000 of alchemical gold to the Knights of Rhodes.
The Emperor Augustus of Saxony left 17,000,000 Rix dollars and Pope
John XXII of Avignon 25,000,000 florins, sums which were positively
gigantic for those days. Both were poor men with slender revenues
which could not have accounted in a hundred years for such fortunes.
But both were alchemists, and transmutation is the only possible
explanation of the almost fabulous treasure which was actually found
in their coffers after their deaths.'
Simon nodded. 'I know. And if one rejects the sworn evidence of
men like Spinoza and Van Helmont, why should one believe the people
who say they can measure the distance to the stars, or the
scientists of the last century who produced electrical phenomena?'
The difference is that the mass mind will not accept scientific
truths unless they can be demonstrated freely and harnessed to the
public good. Everyone accepts the miracle that sulphur can be
converted into fire because they see it happen twenty times a day
and we all carry a box of matches in our pockets, but if it had been
kept as a jealously guarded secret by a small number of initiates,
the public would still regard it as impossible. And that, you see,
is precisely the position of the alchemist.
'He stands apart from the world and is indifferent to it. To
succeed in the Great Work he must be absolutely pure, and to such
men gold is dross. In most cases he makes only sufficient to supply
his modest needs and refuses to pass on his secret to the profane;
but that does not necessarily mean that he is a fraud and a liar.
The theory that all matter is composed of atoms, molecules and
electrons in varying states is generally accepted now. Milk can be
made as hard as concrete by the new scientific process, glass into
women's dresses, wood and human flesh decay into a very similar
dust, iron turns to rust, and crystals are known to grow although
they are a type of stone. Even diamonds can be made synthetically.'
'Of course,' Simon agreed, with his old eagerness, so absorbed
now in the discussion as to be apparently oblivious of his
surroundings. 'And as far as metals are concerned, they are all
composed of sulphur and mercury and can be condensed or materialised
by means of a salt. Only the varying proportions of those three
Principals account for the difference between them. Metals are the
fruits of mineral nature, and the baser ones are still unripe
because the sulphur and mercury had no time to combine in the right
proportions before they solidified. This powder, or the
Philosophers' Stone as they call it, is a ferment that forces on the
original process of Nature and ripens the base metals into gold.'
'That is so. But do you mean to tell me that you have been
experimenting yourself?'
'Ner,' Simon shook his narrow head. 'I soon found out that to do
so would mean a lifetime of restheticism and then perhaps failure
after all. It is hardly in my line to become a "Puffer." Besides
it's obvious that transmutation in its higher sense is the supreme
mystery of turning Matter into Light. Metals are like men, the baser
corresponding to the once born, and both gradually become
purified-metals by geological upheavals- men by successive
reincarnations, and the part piayed by the secret agent which
hurries lead to gold is the counterpart of esoteric initiation which
lifts the spirit towards light.'
'Was that your aim then?'
To some extent. You know how one thing leads to another. I
discovered that the whole business is bound up with the Quabalah so,
being a Jew, I began to study the esoteric doctrine of my own
people.'
De Richleau nodded. 'And very interesting you found it. I don't
doubt.'
'Yes, it took a bit of getting into, but after I'd tackled a
certain amount of the profane literature to get a grounding, I read
the Sepher Ha Zoher, the Sepher Jetyirah and some of the Midraschim.
Then I began to see a Little daylight.'
'In fact you began to believe, lake most people who have really
read considerably and had a wide experience of life, that our
western scientists have only been advancing in one direction and
that we have even lost the knowledge of many things with which the
wise men of ancient times were well acquainted.'
'That's so,' Simon smiled again. 'I've always been a complete
sceptic. But once I began to burrow beneath the surface I found such
a mass of evidence that I could no longer doubt the existence of
strange hidden forces which can be chained and untilised if one only
knows the way.'
'Yes. And plenty of people still interest themselves in these
questions and use the Quabalah to promote their own well-being and
the general good. But where does Mocata come into all this?'
Simon shuddered slightly at the name and drew the car rug more
closely about his shoulders. 'I met him in Paris,' he said, 'at the
house of a French banker with whom I've sometimes done business.'
'Castelnau!' exclaimed the Duke. 'The man with the jagged ear. I
knew last night that I had seen that ear somewhere before, but for
the life of me I couldn't recall where.'
Simon nodded quickly. That's right-Castelnau. Well, I met Mocata
at his place, and I don't quite know how it started, but the
conversation drifted round to the Quabalah and, as I had been
soaking myself in it at the time, I was naturally in- terested. He
said he had a lot of books upon it and suggested that I might like
to visit the house where he was staying and have a look through
them. Of course I did. Then he told me that he was conducting an
experiment in Magic the following night, and asked if I would care
to be present.'
'I see. That's how the trouble started.'
'Yes. The experiment was quite a harmless affair. He made certain
ritual conjurations with the four elements, Fire, Air, Water and
Earth, then told me to look into a mirror with him. It was an old
Venetian piece, a bit spotted at the back but otherwise quite
ordinary you know. As I watched, it clouded over with a sort of
mist, then when it cleared again I could no longer see my reflection
in it, but a sheet of newspaper instead. It was the financial page
of Le Temps giving all the quotations of the Paris Bourse, which
sounds pretty prosaic I suppose, but the queer part is that this
issue was dated three days ahead.'
De Richleau stroked his lean face with his slender fingers. 'I
saw a similar demonstration in Cairo once,' he commented gravely.
'But on that occasion it was the name of the new Commander-in-Chief,
who had only been appointed by the War Office in London that
afternoon, which appeared in the mirror. You took a note of some of
the Bourse quotations I suppose?'
'Urn. The list wasn't visible for more than ten seconds then the
mirror clouded over again and went back to its normal state, but
that was quite long enough for me to memorise the stocks I was
interested in, and when I checked up afterwards they were right to a
fraction.'
'What happened then?'
'Mocata offered to instruct me in the attainment of the knowledge
and conversation of my Holy Guardian Angel as the first step on the
road to obtaining similar powers myself.'
'My poor Simon!' The Duke made an unhappy grimace. 'You are not
the first to be trapped by a Brother of the Left Hand Path who is
recruiting for the Devil by such a promise. If you had known more of
Magic you would have realised that it is proper to pass through the
six stages of Probationer, Neophyte, Zelator, Practicus, Philosophus
and Dominus Liminis before, as an Adeptus Inferior after many years
of study and experience, you would be qualified to take the risk of
attempting to pass the Abyss. Besides, there are no precise rules
for attaining the knowledge and conversation of one's Holy Guardian
Angel. It is a thing which each man must work out for himself and no
other can help one to it. Mocata invoked your Evil Angel, of course,
to act a blasphemous impersonation while your Holy Guardian wept
impotent tears to see the terrible danger into which you were being
drawn.'
'I suppose so, although, of course, I couldn't know that at the
time. Anyhow, I had to go back to London a few days later, and I was
so impressed by that time that I asked Mocata to let me know
directly he arrived, because he spoke of coming over. He turned up a
fortnight later and rang me up at once to urge me to unload a lot of
stock that he knew I was carrying. I had faith in it myself but in
view of what I'd seen in his mirror I took his tip and saved myself
quite a packet, because the market broke almost immediately after.'
'Was that when you asked him to go and live with you?' inquired
the Duke.
'Yes. I suggested that he should stay with me while he was in
London because he had no suitable place in which to practise his
evocations at his hotel. He moved over to St. John's Wood then and
after that we used to sit up together in the observatory pretty well
every night. That's why I saw so little of you during that time. But
the results were extraordinary-utterly amazing.'
'He gave you more information which governed your financial
transactions, I suppose.'
'Yes, but more than that. He foretold the whole of the Stravinsky
scandal. I'm not a poor man as you know, but if I hadn't been
forewarned about that, it would have darn nearly broken me. As it
was, I cleared every single share in the dud companies before the
storm broke and got out with an immense profit.'
'By that time you had begun to dabble in Black Magic I imagine?'
Simon's dark eyes flickered away from the Duke's for a moment,
then he nodded. 'Just a bit. He asked me to recite the Lord's Prayer
backwards one night, and I was a bit unhappy about it but . . .
well, I did. He said that since I wasn't a Christian anyhow no harm
could come to me from it.'
'It is horribly potent all the same,' the Duke commented.
'Perhaps,' agreed Simon miserably. 'But Mocata is so
devilish glib and according to him there is no such thing as Black
Magic anyhow. The harnessing of supernatural powers to one's will is
just Magic-neither black nor white, and that's all there is to it.'
'Tell me about this man.'
'Oh, he's about fifty, I suppose, bald-headed, with curious light
blue eyes and a paunch that would rival Dorn Goren-fiot's.'
'I know,' agreed the Duke impatiently. 'I've seen him. But I
meant his personality, not his appearance.'
'Of course, I forgot,' Simon apologised. 'You know for weeks now
I hardly know what I've been doing. It's almost as though I had been
dreaming the whole time. But about Mocata: he possesses
extraordinary force of character, and he can be the most charming
person when he likes. He's clever of course-amazingly so, and seems
to have read pretty well every book that one can think of. It's
extraordinary, too, what a fascination he can exercise over women. I
know half a dozen who are simply "bats" about him.'
'What can you tell me of his history?'
'Not much, I'm afraid. His Christian name is Damien and he is a
Frenchman by nationality, but his mother was Irish. He was educated
for the Church. In fact, he actually took Orders, but finding the
life of a priest did not suit him, he chucked it up.'
De Richleau nodded. 'I thought as much. Only an ordained priest
can practise the Black Mass, and since he is so powerful an adept of
the Left Hand Path, it was pretty certain that he was a renegade
priest of the Roman Church. But what more can you tell me? Every
scrap of information which you have may help us in our fight,
because you must remember, Simon, that you have only achieved a very
temporary security. The battle will begin again when he exercises
his dominance over you to call you back.'
Simon shifted his position on the stones and then replied
thoughtfully. 'He does the most lovely needlework, petit point and
that sort of thing you know, and he's terribly fastidious about
keeping his plump little hands scrupulously clean. As a companion he
is delightful to be with except that he will smother himself in
expensive perfumes and is as greedy as a schoolboy about sweets. He
had huge boxes of fondants, crystallised fruits, and marzipan sent
over from Paris twice a week when he was at St. John's Wood.
'Ordinarily he was perfectly normal and his manners were
charming, but now and again he used to get irritable fits. They came
on about once a month and after he had been boiling up for twenty-
four hours, he use to clear out for a couple of days and nights. I
don't know where he used to go to at those times, but I ran into him
one morning early, when he had just returned from one of these
bouts, and he was in a shocking state: filthy dirty, a two days'
growth of beard on his chin, his clothes all torn and absolutely
stinking of drink. It looked to me as if he hadn't been to bed at
all the whole time but had been wallowing in every sort of
debauchery down in the slums of the East End.
'He is quite an exceptional hypnotist, of course, and keeps
himself in touch with what is going on in Paris, Berlin, New York
and a dozen other places by throwing various women, who used to come
and visit him regularly, into a trance. One of them was a girl
called Tanith, a perfectly lovely creature. You may have seen her at
the party, and he says she is by far the best medium he's ever had.
He can use her almost like a telephone and plug in right away to
whatever he wants to know about. Whereas with the others there are
very often hitches and delays.'
'You let him hypnotise you, too, of course?'
'Yes, hi order to get these financial results.'
'I thought as much,' De Richleau nodded. 'And after you had
allowed him to do it willingly for some little time he was able to
block out your own mentality entirely and govern your every thought.
That's why you've failed to realise what's been going on. It is just
as though he'd been keeping you drugged the whole time.'
'Um,' Simon agreed miserably. 'It makes me positively sick to
think of it, but I suppose he has been gradually preparing me for
this Ritual to Saturn which he meant to perform two nights ago and
...' He broke off suddenly as Rex appeared between two of the great
monoliths.
Grinning from ear to ear, Rex displayed his purchases for their
inspection. A pair of grey flannel shorts, a khaki shirt, black and
white check worsted stockings, a gaudy tie of revolting magenta hue,
a pair of waders, a cricket cap quartered in alternate triangular
sections of orange and mauve, and a short, dark blue bicyclist's
cape.
'Only things I could get,' he volunteered cheerfully. 'The
people who run the local Co-op don't live on the premises, so I
had to knock up a sports outfitter.'
De Richleau sat back and roared with laughter while Simon
fingered the queer assortment of garments doubtfully. 'You're joking
Rex,' he protested with a sheepish grin. 'I can't return to London
in this get-up.'
'We're not going to London,' the Duke announced. 'But to
Cardinals Folly.'
'What-to Marie Lou's?' Rex looked at him sharply. 'How did you
come to get that idea ...'
'Something that Simon said just after you left us.'
Simon shook his head jerkily. 'I don't like it-not a little bit.
I'd never forgive myself if I brought danger into their home.'
'You will do as you're told my friend,' De Richleau's voice
brooked no further argument. 'Richard and Marie Lou are the most
mentally healthy couple that I know. The atmosphere of their sane
and happy household will be the very best protection we could find
for you and all of us are certain of a warm welcome. No harm will
come to them if we exercise reasonable precautions, and the help of
their right-thinking minds will give us the extra strength we need.
Besides, they are about the only people to whom we can explain the
whole situation without being taken for madmen. Now hurry up and
array yourself like the champion of next year's Olympic games.'
With a shrug of his narrow shoulders Simon disappeared behind the
stones while Rex added: 'That's right. I ordered ham and eggs to be
got ready at the local inn and I'm mighty anxious to start in on
them.'
'Eggs and fruit,' cut in the Duke, 'but no ham for any of us. It
is essential that we should avoid meat for the moment. If we are to
retain our astral strength our physical bodies must undergo a semi-
fast at least.'
Rex groaned. 'Why, oh, why dear Simon, did you ever go hunting
Talisman and let your friends in for this? When I went to Russia
after the Shulimoff jewels and you came to get me out of trouble, at
least it didn't prevent your feeding decently when you had the
chance.'
'That reminds me,' De Richleau threw over his shoulder in the
direction where Simon was struggling into his queer garments. 'What
is this Talisman? Rex mentioned it last night.'
'It's the reason why Mocata is certain to make every effort to
get possession of me again,' Simon's voice came back. 'It is buried
somewhere, and adepts of the Left Hand Path have been seeking it for
centuries. It conveys almost limitless powers upon its possessor and
Mocata has discovered that its whereabouts will be revealed if he
can practise the ritual to Saturn in conjunction with Mars with
someone who was born in a certain year at the hour of the
conjunction. There can't be many such, but for my sins I happen to
be one, and even if he can find others they might not be suitable
for various reasons.'
'Yes, I realise that. But what is the Talisman?'
'I don't really know. Except for conducting my business on the
lines suggested by Mocata, I don't think my brain has been
functioning at all in the last two months. But it's called the
Talisman of Set.'
'What!' The Duke sprang to his feet as Simon appeared grotesquely
attired in his incongruous new clothes, his long knees protruding
beneath the shorts, the absurd cricket cap set at a rakish angle on
his head, and the cycling cloak flapping about his shoulders.
Rex dissolved into tears of laughter, but the Duke's grim face
quickly sobered his mirth.
'The Talisman of Set,' De Richleau repeated almost in a whisper.
'Yes, it has something to do with four horsemen I think- but what
on earth's the matter?' Simon's big mouth fell open in dismay at the
sight of the Duke's horror-stricken eyes.
'It has indeed! The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,' De Richleau
grated out. 'War, Plague, Famine and Death. We all know what
happened the last time those four terrible entities were unleashed
to cloud the brains of statesmen and rulers.'
'You're referring to the Great War I take it.' Rex said soberly.
'Of course, and every adept knows that it started because one of
the most terrible Satanists who ever lived found one of the secret
gateways through which to release the four horsemen.'
'I thought the Germans got a bit above themselves,' Rex hazarded,
'although it seems that lots of other folks were pretty well as much
to blame.'
'You fool!' De Richleau suddenly swung upon him. 'Germany did not
make the War. It came out of Russia. It was Russia who instigated
the murder at Sarajevo, Russia who backed Serbia to resist Austria's
demands, Russia who mobilised first and Russia who invaded Germany.
The monk Rasputin was the Evil genius behind it all. He was the
greatest Black Magician that the world has known for centuries. It
was he who found one of the gateways through which to let forth the
four horsemen that they might wallow in blood and destruction-and I
know the Talisman of Set to be another. Europe is ripe now for any
trouble and if they are loosened again, it will be final Armageddon.
This is no longer a personal matter of protecting Simon. We've got
to kill Mocata before he can secure the Talisman and prevent his
plunging the world into another war.'
21
Cardinals Folly
Richard Eaton read the telegram a second time:
'Eat no lunch this vitally important Simon ill Rex and I bringing
him down to you this afternoon Marie Lou must stop eating too kiss
Fleur love all.-De Richleau,'
He passed one hand over the smooth brown hair which grew from his
broad forehead in an attractive widow's peak, and handed the wire to
his wife with a puzzled smile.
'This is from the Duke. Do you think he has gone crazy- or what?'
'What, darling,' said Marie Lou promptly. 'Definitely what. If he
stood on his handsome head in Piccadilly and the whole world told me
he was crazy I should still maintain that dear old Greyeyes was
quite sane.'
'But really,' Richard protested. 'No lunch-and you told me that
the shrimps from Morecambe Bay came in this morning. I was looking
forward ...'
'My sweet!' Marie Lou gave a delicious gurgle of laughter as she
flung one arm round his neck and drew him down on to the sofa beside
her. 'What a glutton you are. You simply live for your tummy.'
He nuzzled his head against her thick chestnut curls. 'I don't. I
eat only in order to maintain sufficient strength to deal with you.'
'Liar,' she pushed him away suddenly. 'There must be some reason
for this extraordinary wire, and poor Simon ill tool What can it
mean?'
'God knows! Anyhow it seems that virtuous and upright wife orders
preparations of rooms for guests while miserable worm husband goes
down into dark, dirty cellar to select liquid sustenance for same.'
Richard paused for a moment. A wicked little smile hovered round his
lips as he looked at Marie Lou curled up on the sofa with her slim
legs tucked under her like a very lovely Persian kitten, then he
added thoughtfully: 'I think tonight perhaps we might give them a
Little of the Chateau Lafite '99.'
'Don't you dare,' she cried, springing to her feet. 'You know
that it's my favourit.,'
'Got you-got you,' chanted Richard merrily. 'Who's a glutton
now?'
'You beast,' she pouted deliciously, and for the thousandth time
since he had brought her out of Russia her husband felt himself go a
little giddy as his eyes rested on the perfection of her heart-
shaped face, the delicately flushed cheeks and the heavy-lidded blue
eyes, With a sudden movement, he jerked her to him and swinging her
off her feet, picked her up in his arms.
'Richard-put me down-stop.' Her slightly husky voice rose to a
higher note in a breathless gasp of protest.
'Not until you kiss me.'
'All right.'
He let her slide down to her feet, and although he was not a tall
man, she was so diminutive that she had to stand on tiptoe to reach
her arms round his neck.
'There,' she declared, a trifle breathlessly, after he had
crushed her soft lips under his. 'Now go and play with your bottles,
but spare the Lafite, beloved. That's our own special wine, and you
mustn't even give it to our dearest friends- unless it's for Simon
and he's really ill.
'I won't,' he promised. 'But whatever I give them, we shall all
be tight if we're not to be allowed to eat anything. I wish to
goodness I knew what De Richleau is driving at.'
'Something it is worth our while to take notice of, you may be
certain. Greyeyes never does anything without a purpose. He's a wily
old fox if ever there was one in this world.'
'Yes-wily's the word,' Richard agreed. 'But it's nearly lunch-
time now, and I'm hungry. Surely we're not going to take serious
notice of this absurd telegram?'
'Richard!' Marie Lou had curled herself up on the sofa again. But
now she sat forward suddenly, almost closing her big eyes with their
long curved lashes. 'I do think we ought to do as he says, but I was
looking round the strawberry house this morning.'
'Oh were you!' He suppressed a smile. 'And picking a few just'to
see how they were getting on, I don't mind betting.'
'Three,' she answered gravely. 'And they are ripening
beautifully. Now if we took a little cream and a little sugar, it
wouldn't be cheating really to go and have another look at them
instead of having lunch-would it?'
'No,' said Richard with equal gravity. 'But we have an ancient
custom in England when a girl takes a man to pick the first
strawberries,'
'But, darling, you have so many ancient customs and they nearly
always end in kissing.'
'Do you dislike them on that account?'
'No.' She smiled, extending a small, strong hand by which he
pulled her to her feet. 'I think that is one of the reasons why I
enjoy so much having become an Englishwoman.'
They left Marie Lou's comfortable little sitting-room and,
pausing for a moment for her to pull on a pair of gum-boots which
came almost up to her knees while Richard gave orders cancelling
their luncheon, went out into the garden through the great octagonal
Library.
The house was a rambling old mansion, parts of which dated back
to the thirteenth century, and the Library, being one of the oldest
portions of it, was sunk into the ground so that they had to go up
half a dozen steps from its french windows on to the long terrace
which ran the whole length of the
southern side of the house.
A grey stone balustrade patched with moss and lichens separated
the terrace from the garden, and from the former two sets of steps
led down to a broad, velvety lawn. An ancient cedar graced the
greensward towards the east end of the mansion where the kitchen
quarters lay, hiding the roofs of the glass-houses and the walled
garden with its espaliered peach and nectarine trees.
At the bottom of the lawn tall yew hedges shut in the outer
circle of the maze, beyond which lay the rose garden and the
swimming-pool. To the right, just visible from the library windows,
a gravel walk separated the lawn from a gently sloping bank, called
the Botticelli Garden. It was so named because in spring it had all
the beauty of the Italian master's paintings. Dwarf trees of apple,
plum, and cherry, standing no more than six feet high and separated
by ten yards or more from each other, stood covered with white and
pink blossom while, rising from the grass up the shelving bank,
clumps of polyanthus, pheasant's-eye narcissus, forget-me-nots and
daffodils were planted one to the square yard.
This spring garden was in full bloom now and the effect of the
bright colours against the delicate green of the young grass was
almost incredibly lovely. To walk up and down that two hundred yard
stretch of green starred by its rnany-hued clumps of flowers with
Richard beside her was, Marie Lou thought -sometimes with a little
feeling of anxiety that her present happiness was too great to
last-as near to Heaven as she would ever get. Yet she spent even
more time in the long walk that lay beyond it, for that was her own,
in which the head gardener was never allowed to interfere. It
consisted of two glorious herbaceous borders rising to steep hedges
on either side, and ending at an old sun-dial beyond which lay the
pond garden, modelled from that at Hampton Court, sinking in
rectangular stages to a pool where, later in the year, blue lotus
flowers and white water-lilies floated serenely in the sunshine.
As they came out on to the terrace, there were shrieks of
'Mummy-Mummy,' and a diminutive copy of Marie Lou, dressed in a
Russian peasant costume with wide puffed sleeves of lawn and a
slashed vest of colourful embroidery threaded with gold, came
hurtling across the grass. Her mother and father went down the steps
of the terrace to meet her, and as she arrived like a small
whirlwind Richard swung her up shoulder high in his arms.
'What is it Fleur d'amour?' he asked, with simulated concern,
calling her by the nick-name that he had invented for her. 'Have you
crashed the scooter again or is it that Nanny's been a wicked girl
today?'
'No-no,' the child cried, her blue eyes, seeming enormous in that
tiny face, opened wide with concern. 'Jim's hurted his-self.'
'Has he?' Richard put her down. 'Poor Jim. We must see about
this.
'He's hurted bad,' Fleur went on, tugging impulsively at her
mother's skirt. 'He's cutted hisself on his magic sword.'
'Dear me,' Marie Lou ran her ringers through Fleur's dark curls.
She knew that by 'magic sword' Fleur meant the gardener's scythe,
for Richard always insisted that the lawn at Cardinals Folly was too
old and too fine to be ruined by a mowing machine, and maintained
the ancient practice of having it scythe-cut. 'Where is he now, my
sweet?'
'Nanny binded him up and I helped a lot. Then he went wound to
the kitchen.'
'And you weren't frightened of the blood?' Richard asked with
interest.
Fleur shook her curly head. 'No. Fleur's not to be frightened of
anyfink, Mummy says. Why would I be frightened of theblug?'
'Silly people are sometimes,' her father replied. 'But not people
who know things like Mummy and you and I.'
At that moment Fleur's nurse joined them. She had heard the last
part of the conversation. 'It's nothing serious, madam,' she assured
Marie Lou. 'Jim was sharpening his scythe and the hone slipped, but
he only cut his finger.'
'But fink if he can't work,' Fleur interjected in a high treble.
'Why?' asked her father gravely.
'He's poor,' announced the child after a solemn interval for deep
thought. 'He-has-to-work-to-keep-his-children. So if he can't work,
he'll be in a muddle-won't he?'
Richard and Marie Lou exchanged a smiling glance as Simon's
expression for any sort of trouble came so glibly to the child's
lips.
'Yes, that's a serious matter,' her father agreed gravely. 'What
are we going to do about it?'
'We mus' all give him somefink,' Fleur announced breathlessly.
'Well, say I give him half-a-crown,' Richard suggested. 'How much
do you think you can afford?'
Til give half-a-cwown too.' Fleur was nothing if not generous.
'But have you got it, Batuskha?' inquired her mother?
Fleur thought for a bit, and then said doubtfully: 'P'r'aps I
haven't. So I'll give him a ha'-penny instead.'
'That's splendid, darling, and I'll contribute a shilling,' Marie
Lou declared. That makes three shillings and sixpence halfpenny
altogether, doesn't it?'
'But Nanny must give somefink,' declared Fleur suddenly turning
on her nurse, who smiling said that she thought she could manage
fourpence.
'There,' laughed Richard. 'Three and tenpence halfpenny! He'll be
a rich man for life, won't he? Now you had better toddle in to
lunch.'
This domestic crisis having been satisfactorily settled, Richard
and Marie Lou strolled along beneath the balustraded terrace, past
the low branches of the old cedar, and so to the hot-houses. Their
butler, Malin, had just arrived with sugar and fresh cream, and for
half an hour they made a merry meal of the early strawberries.
They had hardly finished when, to their surprise, since it was
barely two o'clock, Malin returned to announce the arrival of their
guests. So they hurried back to the house.
'There they are,' cried Marie Lou as the three friends came out
from the tall windows of the drawing-room on to the terrace. 'But,
darling, look at Simon-they have gone mad.'
Well might the Batons think so from Simon's grotesque appearance
in shorts, cycling cape and the absurd mauve and orange cricketing
cap. Hurried greetings were soon exchanged and the whole party went
back into the drawing-room.
'Greyeyes, darling,' Marie Lou exclaimed as she stood on tiptoe
again to kiss De Richleau's lean cheek. 'We had your telegram and we
are dying to know what it's all about. Have our servants conspired
to poison us or what?'
'What,' smiled De Richleau. 'Definitely what, Princess. We have a
very strange story to tell you, and I was most anxious you should
avoid eating any meat for today at all events.'
Richard moved towards the bell. 'Well, we're not debarred from a
glass of your favourite sherry, I trust.'
The Duke held up a restraining hand. 'I'm afraid we are. None of
us must touch alcohol under any circumstances at present.'
'Good God!' Richard exclaimed. 'You don't mean that- you can't.
You have gone crazy!'
'I do,' the Duke assured him with a smile. 'Quite seriously.'
'We're in a muddle-a nasty muddle,' Simon added with a twisted
grin.
'So it appears,' Richard laughed, a trifle uneasily. He was quite
staggered by the strange appearance of his friends, the tense
electric atmosphere which they had brought into the house with them,
and the unnatural way in which they stood about-speaking only in
short jerky, sentences.
He glanced at Rex, usually so full of gaiety, standing huge,
gloomy and silent near the door, then he turned suddenly back to the
Duke and demanded: 'What is Simon doing in that absurd get-up? If it
was the right season for it I should imagine that he was competing
for the fool's prize at the Three Arts' Ball.'
'I can quite understand your amazement,' the Duke replied
quietly, 'but the truth is that Simon has been very seriously
bewitched.'
'It is obvious that something's happened to him,' agreed Richard
curtly. 'But don't you think it would be better to stop fooling and
tell us just what all this nonsense is about?'
'I mean it,' the Duke insisted. 'He was sufficiently ill advised
to start dabbling in Black Magic a few months ago, and it's only by
the mercy of Providence that Rex and I were enabled to step in at a
critical juncture with some hope of arresting the evil effects.'
Richard's brown eyes held the Duke's grey ones steadily. 'Look
here,' he said, 'I am far too fond of you ever to be rude
intentionally, but hasn't this joke gone far enough? To talk about
magic in the twentieth century is absurd.'
'All right. Call it natural science then.' De Richleau leaned a
little wearily against the mantelpiece. 'Magic is only a name for
the sciences of causing change to occur in conformity with will.'
'Or by setting natural laws in action quite inadvertently,' added
Marie Lou, to everyone's surprise.
'Certainly,' the Duke agreed after a moment, 'and Richard has
practised that type of magic himself.'
'What on earth are you talking about?' Richard exclaimed.
De Richleau shrugged. 'Didn't you tell me that you got a Diviner
down from London when you were so terribly short of water here last
summer, and that when you took his hazel twig from him you found out
quite by accident that you could locate an underground spring in the
garden without his help?'
'Yes,' Richard hesitated. That's true, and as a matter of fact,
I've been successful in finding places where people could sink wells
on several estates in the neighbourhood since. But surely that has
something to do with electricity? It's not magic.'
'If you were to say vibrations, you would be nearer the mark,' De
Richleau replied seriously. 'It is an attunement of certain little-
understood vibrations between the water under the ground and
something in yourself which makes the forked hazel twig suddenly
begin to jump and revolve in your hands when you walk over a hidden
spring. That is undoubtedly a demonstration of the lesser kind of
magic.'
'The miracle of Moses striking the rock in the desert from which
the waters gushed forth is only another example of the same thing,'
Simon cut in.
Marie Lou was watching the Duke's face with grave interest.
'Everyone knows there is such a thing as magic,' she declared, 'and
witchcraft. During those years that I lived in a little village on
the borders of the Siberian Forest I saw many strange things, and
the peasants went in fear and trembling of one old woman who lived
in a cottage ail alone outside the village. But what do you mean by
lesser magic?'
'There are two kinds,' De Richleau informed her. 'The lesser is
performing certain operations which you believe will bring about a
certain result without knowing why it should be so. If you chalk a
line on the floor and take an ordinary hen, hold its beak down for a
little time on to the line and then release it, the hen will remain
there motionless with its head bent down to the floor. The
assumption is that, being such a stupid creature, it believes that
it has been tied down to the line and it is therefore useless to
endeavour to escape. But nobody knows for certain. All we do know is
that it happens. That is a fair example of an operation in minor
magic. The great majority of the lesser witches and wizards in the
part had no conception as to why their spells worked, but had
learned from their predecessors that if they performed a given
operation a certain result was almost sure to follow it.'
Rex looked up suddenly and spoke for the first time. 'I'd say
they were pretty expert at playing on the belief of the credulous by
peddling a sort of inverted Christian Science, faith healing,
Coueism and all that as well.'
'Of course,' De Richleau smiled faintly. 'But they were far too
clever to tell a customer straight out that if he concentrated
sufficiently on his objective he would probably achieve it- even if
they realised that themselves. Instead, they followed the old
formulas which compelled him to develop his will power. If a man is
in love with a girl and is told that he will get her if he rises
from his bed at seven minutes past two every night for a month,
gathers half a dozen flowers from a new-made grave in the local
churchyard and places them in a spot where the girl will walk over
them the following day, he does not get much chance to slacken in
his desire and we all know that persistence can often work wonders.'
'Perhaps,' Richard agreed with mild cynicism. 'But would you have
us believe that Simon is seeking the favour of a lady by wandering
about in this lunatic get-up?'
'No, there is also the greater magic which is only practised by
learned students of the Art who go through long courses of
preparation and initiation, after which they understand not only
that certain apparently inexplicable results are brought about by a
given series of actions, but the actual reason why this should be
so. Such people are powerful and dangerous in the extreme, and it is
into the hands of one of these that our poor friend has fallen.'
Richard nodded, realising at last that the Duke was perfectly
serious in his statement. 'This seems a most extraordinary affair,'
he commented. 'I think you'd better start from the beginning and
give us the whole story.'
'All right. Let's sit down. If you doubt any of the statements
that I am about to make, Rex will guarantee the facts and vouch for
my sanity.'
'I certainly will,' Rex agreed with a sombre smile.
De Richleau then told the Batons all that had taken place in the
last forty-eight hours, and asked quite solemnly if they were
prepared to receive Simon, Rex and himself under their roof in spite
of the fact that it might involve some risk to themselves.
'Of course,' Marie Lou said at once. 'We would not dream of your
going away. You must stay just as long as you like and until you are
quite certain that Simon is absolutely out of danger.'
Richard, sceptical still, but devoted to his friends whatever
their apparent folly, nodded his agreement as he slipped an arm
through his wife's. 'Certainly you must stay. And,' he added
generously without the shadow of a smile, 'tell us exactly how we
can help you best.'
'It's awfully decent of you,' Simon hazarded with a ghostly
flicker of his old wide-mouthed grin. 'But I'll never forgive myself
if any harm comes to you from it.'
'Don't let's have that all over again,' Rex begged. 'We argued it
long enough in the car on the way here, and De Rich-leau's assured
you time and again that no harm will come to Richard and Marie Lou
providing we take reasonable precautions.'
'That is so,' the Duke nodded. 'And your help will be invaluable.
You see, Simon's resistance is practically nill owing to his having
been under Mocata's influence for so long, and Rex and I are at a
pretty low ebb after last night. We need every atom of vitality
which we can get to protect him, and your coming fresh into the
battle should turn the scale in our favour. What we should have done
if you had thrown us out I can't think, because I know of no one
else who wouldn't have considered us all to be raving lunatics.'
Richard laughed. 'My dear fellow, how can you even suggest such a
thing? You would still be welcome here if you'd committed murder.'
!I may have to before long,' De Richleau commented soberly. 'The
risk to myself is a bagatelle compared to the horrors which may
overwhelm the world if Mocata succeeds in getting possession of the
Talisman-but I won't involve you in that of course.'
This Sabbat you saw ...' Richard hazarded after a moment. 'Don't
think I'm doubting your account of it, but isn't it just possible
that your eyes deceived you in the darkness? I mean about the
Satanic part. Everyone knows that Sabbats took place all over
England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But it is
generally accepted now that they were only an excuse for a bit of a
blind and a sexual orgy. Country people had no motor bikes and buses
to take them in to local cinemas then, and the Church frowned on all
but the mildest forms of amusement, so the bad hats of the community
used to sneak off to some quiet spot every now and again to give
their repressed complexes an airing. Are you sure that it was not a
revival of that sort of thing staged by a group of wealthy
decadents?'
'Not on your life,' Rex declared with a sudden shiver. 'I've
never been scared all that bad before and, believe you me, it was
the real business.'
'What do you wish us to do, Greyeyes dear?' Marie Lou asked the
Duke.
He hoisted himself slowly out of the chair into which he had
sunk. 'I must drive to Oxford. An old Catholic priest whom I know
lives there and I am going to try and persuade him to entrust me
with a portion of the Blessed Host. If he will, that is the most
perfect of all protections which we could have to keep with us
through the night. In the meantime, I want the rest of you to look
after Simon.' He smiled affectionately in Simon's direction. 'You
must forgive me treating you like a child for the moment, my dear
boy, but I don't want the others to let you out of their sight until
I return.'
'That's all right,' Simon agreed cheerfully. 'But are you certain
that I'm not-er-carrying harmful things about with me still?'
'Absolutely. The purification ceremonies which I practised on you
last night have banished all traces of the evil. Our business now is
to keep you free of it and get on Mocata's trail as quickly as we
can.'
'Then I think I'll rest for a bit.' Simon glanced at Richard as
he followed the Duke towards the door. The nap we had at the hotel
in Amesbury after breakfast wasn't long enough to put me right-and
afterwards perhaps you could lend me a decent suit of clothes?'
'Of course,' Richard smiled, 'Let's see Greyeyes off, then I'll
make you comfortable upstairs.'
The whole party filed into the hall and, crowding about the low
nail-studded oaken door, watched De Richleau, who promised to be
back before dark, drive off. Then Richard, taking Simon by the arm,
led him up the broad Jacobean stairway, while Marie Lou turned to
Rex.
'What do you really think of all this?' she asked gravely, the
usual merriment of her deep blue eyes clouded by a foreboding of
coming trouble.
He stared down at her upturned heart-shaped face from his great
height and answered soberly. 'We've struck a gateway of Hell all
right, my dear, and I'm just worried out of my wits. De Richleau
didn't give you the whole story. There's a girl in this that
I'm-well-that I'm crazy about.'
'Rex!' Marie Lou laid her small strong hand on his arm. 'How
awful for you. Come into my room and tell me everything.'
He followed her to her sitting-room and for half an hour poured
into her sympathetic ears the strange tale of his three glimpses of
Tanith at different times abroad, and then his unexpected meeting
with her at Simon's party. Afterwards he related with more detail
than the Duke had done their terrible experiences on Salisbury Plain
and was just beginning his anxious speculation as to what could have
happened to Tanith when Malin, the butler, softly opened the door.
'Someone is asking for you on the telephone, Mr. Van Ryn, sir.'
'For me!' Rex stood up and, excusing himself to Marie Lou,
hurried out, wondering who in the world it could be since no one
knew his whereabouts. He was soon enlightened. A lilting voice,
which had a strong resemblance to that of Marlene Dietrich, came
over the wire as he placed the receiver to his ear.
'Is that you, Rex? Oh, I am so glad I have found you. I must see
you at once-quickly-without a moment's delay.'
'Tanith!' he exclaimed. 'How did you tumble to it that I was
here?'
'Oh, never mind that! I will tell you when I see you. But hurry,
please.'
'Where are you then?'
'At the village inn, no more than a mile from you. Do come at
once. It is very urgent.'
For a second Rex hesitated, but only for a second. Simon would be
safe enough in the care of Richard and Marie Lou, and Tanith's voice
had all the urgency and agitation of extreme fear. Anxiety for her
had been gnawing at his heart ever since he had heard of her crash
the previous evening. He knew that he loved her now-loved her
desperately.
'All right,' he answered, his voice shaking a little. Til be
right over.'
Running back across the hall, he explained breathlessly to Marie
Lou what had happened.
'You must go of course,' she said evenly. 'But you'll be back
before nightfall won't you, Rex?'
'Sure.' All his animation seemed suddenly to have returned to him
as, with a quick grin, he hurried out, snatched up his hat and,
leaving the house, set off at a long easy loping trot by the short
cut across the meadows to the village.
Unnoticed by him, a short figure entered the drive just as he
disappeared beyond the boundary of the garden. A few moments later
the newcomer was in conversation with Malin. The butler knew that
his master was upstairs sitting with his friend Mr. Aron while the
latter rested, and had given orders that he was not to be disturbed,
so leaving the visitor in the hall he crossed to Marie Lou's sitting-
room.
'There is a gentleman to see you, madam,' he announced quietly.'A
Mr. Mocata.'
22
The Satanist
For a moment Marie Lou hesitated, her eyes round with surprise,
staring at the butler. In the last hour she had heard so much about
this strange and terrifying visitor, but it had not occurred to her
for one instant that she might be called upon to face him in the
flesh so soon.
Her first impulse was to send upstairs for Richard, but like many
people who possess extremely small bodies, her brain was
exceptionally quick. Rex and the Duke were both absent, and, if she
sent for Richard, Simon would be left alone-the one thing that De
Richleau had been so insistent should not be allowed to happen.
True, she and Richard would have the principal enemy under
observation themselves, but he had allies. It flashed upon her that
this girl Tanith was one perhaps and had purposely decoyed Rex away
to the inn. Mocata might have others already waiting to lure Simon
out of the house while they were busy talking to him. Almost
instantly her mind was made up. Richard must not leave Simon, so she
would have to interview Mocata on her own.
'Show him in,' she told the butler evenly. 'But if I ring you are
to come at once-immediately, you understand?'
'Certainly, madam.' Malin softly withdrew, while Marie Lou seated
herself in an armchair with her back to the light and within easy
reach of the bell-push.
Mocata was shown in, and she studied him curiously. He was
dressed in a suit of grey tweeds and wore a black stock tie. His
head, large, bald and shiny, reminded her of an enormous egg, and
the several folds of his heavy chin protruded above his stiff
collar.
'I do hope you'll forgive me, Mrs. Eaton,' he began in a voice
that was musical and charming, 'for calling on you without any
invitation. But you may perhaps have heard my name.'
She nodded slightly, carefully ignoring the hand which he half
extended as she motioned him to the armchair on the opposite side of
the fireplace. Marie Lou knew nothing of Esoteric Doctrines, but
quite enough from the peasants' superstitions which had been rife in
the little village where she had lived, an outcast of the Russian
Revolution, to be aware that she must not touch this man, not offer
him any form of refreshment while he was in her house.
The afternoon sunshine played full upon Mocata's pink, fleshy
countenance as he went on, 'I thought perhaps that would be the
case. Whether the facts have been rightly represented to you, I
don't know, but Simon Aron is a very dear friend of mine, and during
his recent illness I have been taking care of him.'
'I see,' she answered guardedly. 'Well, it was hardly put to me
in that way, but what is the purpose of your visit?'
'I understand that Simon is with you now?'
'Yes,' she replied briefly, feeling that it was senseless to deny
it, 'and his visit to us will continue for some little time.'
He smiled then, and with a little shock Marie Lou suddenly
caught herself thinking that he was really quite an attractive
person. His strange light-coloured eyes showed a strong intelligence
and, to her surprise, a glint of the most friendly humour, which
almost suggested that he was about to conspire with her in some
amusing undertaking. His lisping voice, too, was strangely pleasant
and restful to listen to as he spoke again in perfect English
periods, only a curious intonation of the vowel sounds indicating
his French extraction.
'The country air would no doubt be excellent for him, and I am
certain that nothing could be more charming for him than your
hospitality. Unfortunately there are certain matters, of which you
naturally know nothing, but which make it quite imperative that I
should take him back to London tonight.'
'I am afraid that is quite impossible.'
'I see,' Mocata looked thoughtfully for a moment at his large
elastic-sided boots. 'I feared that you might take this attitude to
begin with, because I imagine our friend De Rich-leau has been
filling the heads of your husband and yourself with the most
preposterous nonsense. I don't propose to go into that now or his
reason for it, but I do ask you to believe me, Mrs. Eaton, when I
say that Simon will be in very considerable danger if you do not
allow me to take him back into my care.'
'No danger will come to him as long as he is in my house,' said
Marie Lou firmly.
'Ah, my dear young lady,' he sighed a little wistfully. 'I can
hardly expect anyone like yourself to understand precisely what will
happen to our poor Simon if he remains here, but his mental state
has been unsatisfactory for some little time, and I alone can cure
him of his lamentable condition. Chocolates!' he added suddenly and
irrelevantly as his eyes rested upon a large box on a nearby table.
'You'll think me terribly rude, but may I? I simply adore
chocolates.'
'I'm so sorry,' Marie Lou replied without the flicker of an
eyelash, 'but that box is empty. Do go on with what you were saying
about Simon.'
Mocata withdrew his hand, feeling himself unable to challenge her
statement by opening the box to see, and Marie Lou found it
difficult to repress a smile as he made a comically rueful face like
some greedy schoolboy who has been disappointed of a slice of cake.
'Really!' he exclaimed. 'What a pity. May I put it in the waste-
paper basket for you then? To leave it about is such a terrible
temptation for people like myself.' Before she could stop him he had
reached out again and picked up the box, realising immediately by
its weight that she had lied to him.
'No, please,' she put out her hand and almost snatched the box
from his pudgy fingers. 'I gave it to my little girl to put her
marbles in-we mustn't throw it away.' The box gave a faint rustle as
she laid it down beside her, so she added swiftly: 'She puts each
one in the little paper cups that the chocolates are packed in and
arranges them in rows. She would be terribly distressed if they were
upset.'
Mocata was not deceived by that ingenious fiction. He guessed at
once her true reason for denying him the chocolates and was quick to
realise that in this lovely young woman, who stood no taller than a
well-grown child, he was up against a far cleverer antagonist than
he had at first supposed. However, he was amply satisfied with the
progress he had made so far, sensing that her first antagonism had
already given way to a guarded interest. He must talk to her a
little, his eyes and voice would do the rest. For a moment they
stared at each other in silence. Then he opened his attack in a new
direction.
'Mrs. Eaton, it is quite obvious to me that you distrust me and,
after what your friends have told you, I am not surprised. But your
intelligence emboldens me to think that I am likely to serve my
purpose better by putting my cards on the table than by beating
about the bush.'
'It will make no difference what you do,' said Marie Lou quietly.
He ignored the remark and went on in his low, slightly lisping
voice. 'I do not propose to discuss with you the rights or wrongs of
practising the Magic Art. I will confine myself to saying that I am
a practitioner of some experience and Simon, who has interested
himself in these things for the past few months, shows great promise
of one day achieving considerable powers. Monsieur De Richleau has
probably led you to suppose that I am a most evil person. But in
fairness to myself I must protest that such a view of me is quite
untrue. In magic, there is neither good nor evil. It is only the
science of causing change to occur by means of will. The rather
sinister reputation attaching to it is easily accounted for by the
fact that it had to be practised in secret for many centuries owing
to the ban placed upon it by the Church. Anything which is done in
secret naturally begets a reputation for mystery and, since it dare
not face the light of day, the reverse of good. Few people
understand anything of these mysteries, and I can hardly assume that
you have more than vague impressions gathered from casual reading;
but at least I imagine you will have heard that genuine adepts in
the secret Art have the power to call certain entities, which are
not understood or admitted by the profane, into actual being.
'Now these are perfectly harmless as long as they are under the
control of the practitioner, just as a qualified electrician stands
no risk in adjusting a powerful electric battery from which a child,
who played foolishly with it, might receive a serious shock or even
death. This analogy applies to the work Simon and I are engaged
upon. We have called a certain entity into being just as workers in
another sphere might have constructed an electrical machine. It
needs both of us to operate this thing with skill and safety, but if
I am to be left to handle it alone, the forces which we have
engendered will undoubtedly escape and do the very gravest harm both
to Simon and myself. Have I made the position clear?'
'Yes,' murmured Marie Lou. During that long explanatory speech he
had been regarding her with a steady stare, and as she Listened to
his quiet, cultured voice expressing what seemed such obvious
truths, she felt her whole reaction to his personality changing. It
suddenly seemed to her absurd that this nice, charming gentleman in
the neat grey suit could be dangerous to anyone. His face seemed to
have lost its puffy appearance even while he was speaking, and now
her eyes beheld it as only hairless, pink and clean like that of
some elderly divine.
'I am so glad,' he went on in his even, silky tone. 'I felt quite
sure that if you allowed me a few moments I could clear up this
misunderstanding which has only arisen through the over-eagerness of
your old friend the Duke, and that charming young American, to
protect Simon from some purely imaginary danger. If I had only had
the opportunity to explain to them personally I am quite convinced
that I should have been able to save them a great deal of worry, but
I only met them for a few moments one evening at Simon's house. It
is a charming little place that, and he very kindly permits me to
share it with him while I am in England. If you are in London during
the next few weeks, I do hope that you will come and see us there.
We both know without asking that Simon would be delighted, and it
would give me the very greatest pleasure to show you my collection
of perfumes, which I always take with me when I travel.
'As a matter of fact, I am rather an expert in the art of
blending perfumes, and quite a number of my women friends have
allowed me to make a special scent for them. It is a delicate art,
and interesting, because each woman should have her own perfume made
to conform to her aura and personality. You have an outstanding
individuality, Mrs. Eaton, and it would be a very great pleasure if
you would allow me some time to see if I could not compound
something really distinctive in that way for you.'
'It sounds most interesting,' Marie Lou's voice was low and
Mocata's eyes still held hers. Really, she felt, despite his bulk,
he was a most attractive person, and she had been quite stupid to be
a little frightened of him when he first entered the room. The May
sunshine came in gently-moving shafts through the foliage of a tree
outside the window, so that the dappled light played upon his face,
and it was that, she thought, which gave her the illusion that his
unblinking eyes were larger than when she had first looked into
them.
'When will the Duke be back?' he asked softly. 'Unfortunately, my
visit today must be a brief one, but I should so much have liked to
talk this matter over quietly with him before I go.'
'I don't know,' Marie Lou found herself answering. 'But I'm
afraid he won't be back before six.'
'And our American friend-the young giant,' he prompted her.
"I've no idea. He has gone down to the village.'
'I see. What a pity, but of course your husband is here
entertaining Simon, is he not?'
'Yes, they are upstairs together.'
'Well, presently I should like to explain to your husband, just
as I have to you, how very important it is that I should take Simon
back with me tonight, but I wonder first if I might beg a glass of
water. Walking from the village has given me quite a thirst.'
'Of course,' Marie Lou rose to her feet automatically and pressed
the bell. 'Wouldn't you prefer a cup of tea or a glass of wine and
some biscuits?' she added, completely now under the strange
influence that radiated from hirn.
'You are most kind, but just a glass of water and a biscuit if I
may.'
Malin already stood in the doorway and Marie Lou gave orders for
these slender refreshments. Then she sat down again, and Mocata's
talk flowed on easily and glibly, while her ears became more and
more attuned to that faint musical lisping intonation.
The butler appeared with water and biscuits on a tray and set
them down beside Mocata, but for the moment he took no notice of it.
Instead he looked again at Marie Lou, and said: 'I do hope you'll
forgive me asking, but have you recently been ill? You are looking
as though you were terribly run down and very, very tired.'
'No,' said Marie Lou slowly. 'I haven't been ill.' But at that
moment her limbs seemed to relax where she was sitting and her heavy
eyelids weighed upon her eyes. For some unaccountable reason, she
felt an intense longing to shut them altogether and fall asleep.
Mocata watched her with a faint smile curving his full mouth. He
had her under his dominance now and knew it. Another moment and she
would be asleep. It would be easy to carry her into the next room
and leave her there, ring for the servant, ask him to find his
master and when Richard arrived, say that she had gone out into the
garden to find him. Then another of those quiet little talks which
he knew so well how to handle, even when people were openly
antagonistic to him to begin with, and the master of the house would
also pass Into a quiet, untroubled sleep. Then he would simply call
Simon by his will and they would leave the house together.
Marie Lou's eyes flickered and shut. With a shake of her head she
jerked them open again. 'I'm so sorry,' she said sleepily. 'But I am
tired, most awfully tired. What was it that you were talking about?'
Mocata's eyes seemed enormous to her now, as they held her own
with a solemn, dreamy look. 'We shall not talk any more,' he said.
'You will sleep, and at four o'clock on the afternoon of 7th May,
you will call on me at Simon's house in St. John's Wood.'
Marie Lou's heavy lashes fell on her rounded cheeks again, but
next second her eyes were wide open, for the door was flung back and
Fleur came scampering into the room.
'Darling, what is it?' Marie Lou struggled wide awake and Mocata
snapped his plump fingers with a little angry, disappointed gesture.
The sudden entrance of the child had broken the current of delicate
vibrations.
'Mummy-mummy,' Fleur panted. 'Daddy-sent-me-to-find-you. We'se
playing hosses in the garden, an' Uncle Simon says he's a dwagon,
an' not a boss at all. Daddy says you're to come and tell him
diffwent.'
'So tbis is your little daughter? What a lovely child,' Mocata
said amiably, stretching out a hand to Fleur. 'Come here, my ...'
But Marie Lou cut short his sentence as full realisation of the
danger to which she had exposed herself flooded her mind. 'Don't you
touch her!' she cried, snatching up the child with blazing eyes.
'Don't you dare! '
'Really, Mrs. Eaton,' he raised his eyebrows in mild protest.
'Surely you cannot think that I meant to hurt the child? I thought
too, that we were beginning to understand each other so well.'
'You beast,' Marie Lou cried angrily as she jabbed her finger on
the bell. 'You tried to hypnotise me.'
'What nonsense,' he smiled good-humouredly. 'You were a little
tired, but I fear I bored you rather with a long dissertation- upon
things which can hardly interest a woman so young and charming as
yourself. It was most stupid of me, and I hardly wonder that you
nearly fell asleep.'
As Malin arrived on the scene she thrust Fleur into the
astonished butler's arms and gasped: 'Fetch Mr. Eaton-he's in the
garden- quickly-at once.'
The butler hurried off with Fleur and Mocata turned on her. His
eyes had gone cold and steely. 'It is vital that I should at least
see Simon before I leave this house.'
'You shan't,' she stormed. 'You had better go before my husband
comes. D'you hear?' Then she found herself looking at him again, and
quickly jerked her head away so that she should not see his eyes,
yet she caught his gesture as he stooped to pick up the glass of
water from the table.
Furious now at the way she had been tricked into ordering
it for him, and determining that he should not drink, she sprang
forward and, before he could stop her, dashed the little table to
the ground. The plate caught the carafe as it fell and smashed it
into a dozen pieces, the biscuits scattered and the water spread in
a shallow, widening lake upon the carpet. Mocata swung round with an
angry snarl. This small, sensuous, catlike creature had cheated him
at the last, and the placid, kindly expression of his face changed
to one of hideous demoniacal fury. His eyes, muddled now with all
the foulness of his true nature, stripped and flayed her,
threatening a thousand unspeakable abominations in their unwinking
stare as she-faced him across the fallen table.
Suddenly, with a fresh access of terror, Marie Lou cowered back,
bringing up her hands to shield her face from those revolting
eyeballs. Then a quick voice in the doorway exclaimed: 'Hello! What
is all this?'
'Richard,' she gasped. 'Richard, it's Mocata! I saw him because I
thought you'd better stay with Simon, but he tried to hypnotise me.
Have him thrown out. Oh, have him thrown out.'
The muscles in Richard's lean face tightened as he caught the
look of terror in his wife's eyes and thrusting her aside he took a
quick step towards Mocata. 'If you weren't twice my age and in my
house, I'd smash your face in,' he said savagely. 'And that won't
stop me either unless you get out thundering quick.'
With almost incredible swiftness Mocata had his anger under
control. His face was benign and smiling once more, as he shrugged,
showing no trace of panic. 'I'm afraid your wife is a little upset,'
he said mildly. 'It is this spring weather, and while we were
talking together, she nearly fell asleep. Having heard all sorts of
extraordinary things about me from your friends, she scared herself
into thinking that I tried to hypnotise her. I apologise profoundly
for having caused her one moment's distress.'
'I don't believe one word of that,' replied Richard. 'Now kindly
leave the house.'
Mocata shrugged again. 'You are being very unreasonable, Mr.
Eaton. I called this afternoon in order to take Simon Aron back to
London.'
'Well, you're not going to.'
'Please,' Mocata held up his protesting hand. 'Hear me for
one moment. The whole situation has been most gravely
misrepresented to you, as I explained to your wife, and if she
hadn't suddenly started to imagine things we should be discussing it
quite amicably now. In fact, I even asked her to send for you, as
she will tell you herself.'
'It was a trick,' cried Marie Lou angrily. 'Don't look at his
eyes, Richard, and for God's sake turn him out!'
'You hear,' Richard's voice held a threatening note and his face
was white. 'You had better go-before I lose my temper.'
'It's a pity that you are so pig-headed, my young friend,' Mocata
snapped icily. 'By retaining Simon here, you are bringing extreme
peril both on him and on yourself. But since you refuse to be
reasonable and let me take him with me, let me at least have five
minutes' conversation with him alone.'
'Not five seconds,' Richard stood aside from the door and
motioned through it for Mocata to pass into the hall.
'All right! If that is your final word!' Mocata drew himself up.
He seemed to grow in size and strength even as he stood there. A
terrible force and energy suddenly began to shake his obese body.
They felt it radiating from him as his words came low and clear like
the whispering splash of death-cold drops falling from icicles upon
a frozen lake.
'Then I will send the Messenger to your house tonight and he
shall take Simon from you ah've-or dead!'
'Get out,' gritted Richard between his teeth, 'Damn you- get
out!'
Without another word Mocata left them. Marie Lou crossed herself,
and with Richard's arm about her shoulder they followed him to the
door.
He did not turn or once look back, but plodded heavily, a very
ordinary figure now, down the long, sunlit drive.
Richard suddenly felt Marie Lou's small body tremble against him,
and with a little cry of fright she buried her head on his shoulder.
'Oh, darling,' she wailed. 'I'm frightened of that man-frightened.
Did you see?'
'See what, my sweet?' he asked, a little puzzled.
'Why!' sobbed Marie Lou. 'He is walking in the sunshine -but he
has no shadow!'
23
The Pride of Peacocks
The inn which served the village near Cardinals Folly was almost
as old as the house. At one period it had been a hostelry of some
importance, but the changing system of highways in the eighteenth
century had left it denuded of the coaching traffic and doomed from
then on to cater only for the modest wants of the small local
population. It had been added to and altered many times; for one
long period falling almost wholly into disrepair, since its revenue
was insufficient for its upkeep, and so it had remained until a few
years earlier upon the retirement of Mr. Jeremiah Wilkes, the ex-
valet of a wealthy peer who lived not far distant.
Only the fact that Mr. Wilkes suffered from chronic sciatica,
which rendered it impossible for him to travel any more with his old
master, had made his retirement necessary, and through those long
years of packing just the right garments that his lordship might
need for Cowes, Scotland or the French Riviera and exercising his
incomparable facility for obtaining the most comfortable seats upon
trains which were already full, he had always had it in the back of
his mind that he would like to be the proprietor of a gentlemanly
'house.'
When the question of his retirement had been discussed, and
Jeremiah had named the ambition of his old age, his master had most
generously suggested the purchase and restoration of the old inn,
but voiced his doubts of Jeremiah's ability to run it at a profit;
stating that capital was very necessary to the success of any
business, and adding in his innocence that he did not feel Jeremiah
could have saved a sufficient sum despite the long period in his
employment.
In this, of course, his lordship was entirely wrong. Jeremiah's
wage might have been a modest one but, while protecting his master
from many generations of minor thieves, he had gathered in the time-
honoured perquisites which were his due and, since he had stoutly
resisted the efforts of his fellow servants to interest him in 'the
horses,' he owned investments in property which would have
considerably amazed his master.
Mr. Wilkes, therefore, had modestly stated that he thought he
might manage providing that his lordship would be good enough to
send him such friends or their retainers as could not be
accommodated at the Court when shooting parties and such like were
in progress. This having been arranged satisfactorily, Mr. Wilkes
underwent the metamorphosis from a gentleman's gentleman to host of
'The Pride of Peacocks.'
Very soon the old inn began to thrive again; quietly, of course,
since it was no road-house for noisy motorists. But it became well
known among a certain select few who enjoyed a peaceful weekend in
lovely scenery, and Mr. Wilkes' admirable attention to these,
together with his wife's considerable knowledge of the culinary art,
never caused them to question their Monday morning bill.
Jeremiah had further added to the attraction of the place by
stocking a cellar with variety and taste from his lordship's London
wine merchant on terms extremely advantageous to himself, and
moreover to the added well-being of the neighbourhood. The hideous
and childish tyranny of licensing hours never affected him in the
least for the simple reason that all his customers were personal
friends, including, of course, the magistrates upon the local bench,
and had some officious policeman from the town ever questioned the
fact that gentlemen were to be found there quite frequently in the
middle of the afternoon taking a little modest refreshment, they
would have quailed under the astonished and supercilious glance of
the good Mr. Wilkes, together with the freezing statement that this
was no monetary transaction, but the gentlemen concerned were doing
him the honour to give him their opinion upon his latest purchase in
the way ot port.
In short, it will be gathered that this ancient hostelry could
provide all the comfort which any reasonable person might demand,
and was something a little out of the ordinary for a village inn.
Rex, of course, knew the place well from his previous visits to
Cardinals Folly and, a little out of breath from the pace at which
he had come, hurried into the low, comfortably furnished lounge, the
old oak beams of which almost came down to his head,
Tanith was there alone. Immediately she saw him she jumped up
from her chair and ran to meet him, gripping both his hands in hers
with a strength surprising for her slender fingers.
She was pale and weary. Her green linen dress was stained and
mired from her terrible journey on the previous night, although
obviously she had done her best to tidy herself. Her eyes were
shadowed from strain and lack of sleep, seeming unnaturally large,
and she trembled slightly as she clutched at him.
'Oh, thank God you've come!' she cried.
'But how did you know I was at Cardinals Folly?' he asked her
quickly.
'My dear,' she sank down in the chair again, drawing her hand
wearily across her eyes. 'I am terribly sorry about last night. I
think I was mad when I stole your car and tried to get to the
Sabbat. I crashed of course, but I expect you will have heard about
that-and then I did the last five miles on foot.'
'Good God! Do you mean to say you got there after all?'
She nodded and told him of that nightmare walk from Easterton to
the Satanic Festival. As she came to the part in her story where,
against her will, she had been drawn down into the valley, her eyes
once more expressed the hideous terror which she had felt.
'I could not help myself,' she said. 'I tried to resist with all
my mind but my feet simply moved against my will. Then, for a
moment, I thought that the heavens had opened and an angry God had
suddenly decided to strike those blasphemous people dead. There was
a noise like thunder and two giant eyes like those of some nightmare
monster seemed to leap out of the darkness right at me. I screamed,
I think, and jumped aside. I remember falling and springing up
again. The power that had held my feet seemed to have been suddenly
released and I fled up the hill in absolute panic. When I got to the
top I tripped over something and then I must have fainted.'
Rex smiled. That was us in the car,' he said. 'But how did you
know where to find me?'
'It was not very difficult,' she told him. 'When I came to, I was
lying on the grass and there wasn't a sound to show that there was a
living soul within miles of me. I started off at a run without the
faintest idea where I was going-my only thought being to get away
from that terrible valley. Then when I was absolutely exhausted I
fell again, and I must have been so done in that I slept for a
little in a ditch.
'When I woke up, it was morning and I found that I was quite near
a main road. I limped along it not knowing what I should come to and
then I saw houses and a straggling street and, after a little, I
discovered that I had walked into Devizes.
'I went into the centre of the town and was about to go into an
hotel when I realised that I had no money; but I had a brooch, so I
found a jeweller's and sold it to them-or rather, they agreed to
advance me twenty pounds, because I didn't want to part with it and
it must be worth at least a hundred. An awfully nice old man there
agreed to keep it as security until I could send him the money on
from London. Then I did go to the hotel, took a room and tried to
think things over.
'Such an extraordinary lot seemed to have happened since you took
me off in your car from Claridges yesterday that at first I could
not get things straight at ail, but one thing stood out absolutely
clearly. Whether it was you or the vision of my mother, I don't
know, but my whole outlook had changed completely. How I could ever
have allowed myself to listen to Madame D'Urfe and do the things
I've done I just can't think. But I know now that I've been in the
most awful danger, and that I must try and get free of Mocata
somehow. Anyone would think me mad, and possibly I am, to come to
you like this when I hardly know you, but the whole thing has been
absolutely outside all ordinary experiences. I am terribly alone,
Rex, and you are the only person in the world that I can turn to.'
She sank back in her chair almost exhausted with the effort of
endeavouring to impress him with her feelings, but he leant forward
and, taking one of her hands in his great leg-of-mutton fist,
squeezed it gently.
'There, there, my sweet.' Speaking from his heart he used the
endearment quite naturally and unconsciously. 'You did the right
thing every time. Don't you worry any more. Nobody is going to hurt
a hair of your head now you've got here safely. But how in the world
did you do it?'
Her eyes opened again and she smiled faintly. 'My only hope was
to throw myself on your protection, so I had to find you somehow and
that part wasn't difficult. All systems of divination are merely so
many methods of obscuring the outer vision, in order that the inner
may become clear. Tea-leaves, crystals, melting wax, lees of wine,
cards, water, entrails, birds, sieve-turning, sand and all the rest.
'I wanted sleep terribly when I got to that hotel bedroom, but I
knew that I mustn't allow myself to, so I took some paper from the
lounge, and borrowed a pencil. Then I threw myself into a trance
with the paper before me and the pencil in my hand. When I looked at
it again I had quite enough information scribbled down to enable me
to follow you here.'
Rex accepted this amazing explanation quite calmly. Had he been
told such a thing a few days before he would have considered it
fantastic, but now it never even occurred to him that it was in any
way extraordinary that a woman desiring to know his whereabouts
should throw herself into a trance and employ automatic writing.
She glanced at the old grandfather clock which stood ticking away
in a corner of the low-raftered room. Half an hour had sped by
already and he was feeling guilty now at having left Simon. He would
never be able to forgive himself if, in his absence, any harm befell
his friend. Now that he knew Tanith was safe he must get back to
Cardinals Folly, so he announced abruptly: 'I'm mighty sorry, but
I've got Simon to look after so I can't stay here much longer.'
'Oh, Rex,' her eyes held his imploringly. 'You must not unless
you take me with you. If you leave me alone, Mocata will be certain
to get me.'
For a moment Rex hesitated miserably, wrestling with the quandary
that faced him. If Tanith was telling the truth, he couldn't
possibly leave her to be drawn back by that terrible power of evil.
But was she? So far she had been Mocata's puppet. How much truth was
there in this pretended change of heart? Had Mocata planted her
there in order to lure him deliberately away from Simon's side?
It occurred to him that he might take her back with him to
Cardinals Folly, for if she was speaking the truth she was in the
same case as Simon. They could keep the two of them together and
concentrate their forces against the black magician. But he
dismissed the idea almost as soon as it entered his mind. To do so
would be playing Mocata's game with a vengeance. If Tanith were
acting consciously or unconsciously under his influence, God alone
knew what powers she might possess to aid her master once they
accepted her as a friend in their midst. If he took her there it
would be like introducing one of the enemy into a beleaguered
fortress.
'What are you afraid might happen if I leave you?' he asked
suddenly.
'You can't-you mustn't,' her eyes pleaded with him, 'Not only for
my own sake, but your friends' as well. Mocata has a hundred means
of knowing where Simon is and where I am too. He may arrive here at
any moment. It's no good pretending Rex. I know beyond any question
that I cannot resist him and he'll work through me, however much my
will is set against it. He's told me a dozen times that he has never
met a woman who is such a successful medium for him as myself. So
you can be certain that he is on his way here now.'
'What d'you think he'll do when he turns up?'
'He will throw me into a trance and call Simon to him. Then if
Simon fails to come Mocata may curse him through me.'
Rex shrugged. 'Don't worry. De Richleau's a wily old bird. He'll
turn the curse aside some way.'
'But you don't seem to understand,' she sobbed. 'If a curse is
sent out it must lodge somewhere, and if it fails to reach its
objective because there is an equally strong influence working
against it, the vibrations recoil and impinge upon the sender.'
'Steady now.' He took her hands and tried to soothe her. 'If that
is so I guess we couldn't find a better way to tickle up Mocata.'
'No-no!! He never does things himself-at least I have never known
him to-just in case he fails, because then he would have to pay the
penalty. Instead, he uses other people -hypnotises them and makes
them throw out the thought or the wish. That is what he will do to
me. If he succeeds, you will no longer be able to protect Simon, and
if he fails, it is I who will pay the price. That is why you've just
got to stay with me and prevent him using me as his instrument.'
'Holy smoke! Then we're in a proper jam!' Rex's brain was working
swiftly. If she were telling the truth, she was in real danger. If
not, at least Simon still had Richard and Marie Lou to take care of
him until the Duke's return.
All his chivalry and his love for her which seemed to have
blossomed overnight welled up and told him that he must chance her
honesty and remain there to protect her. 'All right, I'll stay,' he
said after a moment.
'Oh, thank God!' she sighed. 'Thank God!'
'But tell me,' he went on, 'just why is it you're such a kingpin
medium to this man? What about old Madame D'Urfe and the rest? Can't
he do his stuff through them?'
Tanith looked at him through tear-dimmed eyes and shook her head.
'Not in the same way. You see there is rather an unusual link
between us. My number is twenty and so is his.'
Rex frowned. 'What exactly do you mean by that?' he asked in a
puzzled voice.
'I mean our astrological number,' she replied quietly. 'Give me a
piece of paper, and I will show you.'
Rex handed her a few sheets from a nearby table and a pencil from
his waistcoat pocket, then she quickly drew out a list of the
numerical values to the letters of the alphabet: -
A=1 K=2 S=3
B=2 L=3 T=4
C=3 M=4 U=6
D=4 N=5 V=6
E=5 O=7 W=6
F=5 P=8 X=5
G=3 Q=1 Y=1
H=5 R=2 Z=7
I or J=1
'There!' she went on. 'By substituting numbers for letters in
anyone's name and adding them up you get their occult number which
indicates the planet that influences them most in all spiritual
affairs. It must be the name by which they are most generally
known-even if it is a pet name. Now look!'
M=4 T=4
O=7 A=1
C=3 N=5
A=1 I=1
T=4 T=4
A=1 H=5
____ ____
20 2+0=2 20
2+0=2
'You see how closely our vibrations are attuned. Two is the value
of the Moon, to which both he and I are subject, and any names
having a total numerical value which reduce by progresssive
additions to two, such as eleven or twenty-nine or thirty-eight or
forty-seven, would give us some affinity, but that they actually add
up to the same compound number shows that we are attuned to a very
remarkable degree. That is why I have proved such an exceptionally
good medium for him to work through.'
'But you are utterly different from him,' Rex protested,
'Of course,' she nodded gravely. 'One's birth date gives the
material number, which is generally that of another planet and
modifies the influence of the spiritual number considerably. As it
happens mine is May 2nd-again a two you see, so I am an almost pure
type. Moon people are intensely imaginative, artistic, romantic,
gentle by nature and not very strong physically. They are rather
over-sensitive and lacking in self-confidence, unsettled too, and
liable to be continually changing their plans, but most of them, of
course, have some balancing factor. Mocata gets all his imaginative
and psychic qualities from the Moon, but his birthday is April 24th
which adds up to six, and six being the number of Venus, he is very
strongly influenced by that planet. Venus people are extremely mag
netic. They attract others easily and are usually loved and
worshipped by those under them, but very often they are obstinate
and unyielding. It is that in his nature which balances the weakness
of the Moon and makes him so determined in carrying out his plans.'
'What do I come under?" Rex asked with sudden curiosity. 'My
names are so short that I'm generally known by all three.'
Again Tanith took the paper and quickly worked out the equivalent
of his name.
R=2
E=5
X=5
--- = 12
V=6
A=1
N=5
--- = 12
R=2
Y=1
N=5
--- = 8
---
32 and 3+2=5
She looked at him sharply. 'Yes, I am not surprised. Five is a
fortunate and magic number which comes under Mercury. Such people
are versatile and mercurial, quick in thought and decisions,
impulsive in action and detest plodding work. They make friends
easily with every type and have a wonderful elasticity of character
which can recover at once from any setback. Even though I do not
know you well, I am certain that all this is true of you. I expect
you are a born speculator as well and every type of risk attracts
you.'
'That certainly is so,' Rex grinned as she went on thoughtfully:
'But I should have thought that there was a good bit of the Sun
about you because you have such strong individuality and you are so
definite in your views.'
'I was born on the 19th of August if that gives you a line.'
She smiled. 'Yes, 19 is 1+9 which equals ten and 1+0 equals 1,
the number of the Sun. So I was right, and it is that part of you
which I think attracts me so much. Sun and Moon people always get on
well together.'
'I don't know anything about that,' Rex said softly. 'But I'm
dead sure I could never see too much of you.'
She lifted her eyes from his quickly as though almost in fright
and to break the pause that followed he asked: 'What number is Simon
associated with?'
'He was born under Saturn as we know only too well, and his
occult number is certain to be the Saturrdan eight,' Tanith replied
promptly, scribbling the name and numbers on the paper.
S=3
I=1
M=4
O=7
N=5
--- = 20
A=1
R=2
O=7
N=5
--- = 15
--
35 and 3+5=8
'By Jove! That's queer,' Rex murmured as he saw the name
worked out quite simple to the number she had predicted.
'He is a typical number eight person too,' she went on.
'They have deep, intense natures and are often lonely at heart
because they are frequently misunderstood. Sometimes they play a
most important part on life's stage and nearly always a
fatalistic one. They are almost fanatically loyal to persons
they are fond of or causes they take up, and carry things
through regardless of making enemies. It is not a fortunate
number to be born under as a rule, and such people usually
become great successes or great failures.'
Rex drew the paper towards him, and taking the pencil from
her began to work out for himself the numerical symbols of De
Richleau, Richard Eaton and Marie Lou.
R=2
I=1
D=4 C=3
E=5 H=5
--- = 9 A=1 M=4
R=2 R=2 A=1
I=1 D=4 R=2
C=3 --- = 18 I=1
H=5 E=5 E=5
L=3 A=1 --- = 13
E=5 T=4 L=3
A=1 O=7 O=7
U=6 N=5 U=6
--- = 26 --- = 22 --- = 16
-- -- --
35 = 8 40 = 4 29 = 11 = 2
'This is amazing,' Tanith exclaimed when he had finished. The
Duke not only comes under the eight like Simon, but their
compound number-thirty-five-is the same as well. He should have
immence influence with Simon through that affinity, just as
Mocata has over me, and the nine in his name gives him the
additional qualities of the born leader, independence, success,
courage and determination. If anyone in the world can save your
friend, that extraordinary combination of trength and sympathy
will enable De Richleau to do so.'
'But d'you see that the names Richleau and Ryn boil down to
eight as well, linking us both with Simon. That's strange, isn't
it?'
'Not altogether. Any numerologist who knew of your devotion to
each other would expect to find some such affinity in your
numbers. You will see, too, that your other friend, Richard
Eaton, is a four person, which accounts for his sympathy towards
you. The eight is formed by two halves or circles and, four
being the half of eight, persons with those numbers will always
incline towards each other. Then his wife, like myself, is a two
which is again linked to all four of you because it is divisible
into eight.'
Rex nodded. 'It's the strangest mystery I've met up with in
the whale of a while. There isn't a single odd number in the
whole series, but tell me, would this combination of eights be a
good thing d'you reckon-or no?'
'It is very, very potent,' she said slowly. '888 is the number
given to Our Lord by students of Occultism in his aspect as the
Redeemer. Add them together and you get twenty-four. 2+4=6 which
is the number of Venus, the representative of Love. That is the
complete opposite of 666 which Revelations give as the number of
the Beast. The three sixes add to eighteen, and 1+8-9, the
symbol of Mars-De Richleau's secondary quality which makes him a
great leader and fighter, but in its pure state represents
Destruction, Force and War.'
At the mention of War, Rex's whole mind was jerked from the
quiet, comfortable, old-fashioned inn parlour to a mental
picture of De Richleau as he had stood only a few hours before
with the light of dawn breaking over Stonehenge. He saw again
the Duke's grey face and unnaturally bright eyes as he spoke of
the Talisman of Set; that terrible gateway out of Hell through
which, if Mocata found it, those dread four horsemen would come
riding, invisible but all-powerful, to poison the thoughts of
peace-loving people and manipulate unscrupulous statesmen,
influencing them to plunge Europe into fresh calamity.
Not only had they to fight Mocata for Simon's safety and
Tanith's as well but, murder though it might be to people lack
ing in understanding, they had to kill him even if they were
forced to sacrifice themselves.
With sudden clarity Rex saw that Tanith's appeal for protec
tion offered a golden, opportunity to carry the war into the
enemy's camp. She was so certain that Mocata would appear to
claim her, and De Richleau had stated positively that while
daylight lasted the Satanist was no more powerful than any other
thug.
'Why,' Rex thought, with a quick tightening of his great
muscles, 'should he not seize Mocata by force when he arrived;
then send for the Duke to decide what they should do with him.'
Only one difficulty seemed to stand in the way. He could
hardly attack a visitor and hold him prisoner in The Pride of
Peacocks.' Mr. Wilkes might object to that. But apparently
Mocata could find Tanith with equal ease wherever she was, so
she must be got out of the inn to some place where the business
could be done without interference.
For a moment the thought of Cardinals Folly entered his mind
again, but if he once took Tanith there, they could hardly turn
her out later on, and she might become a highly dangerous focus
in the coming night; besides, Mocata might not care to risk a
visit to the house in daylight with the odds so heavily against
him, and that would ruin the whole plan. Then he remembered the
woods at the bottom of the garden behind the inn. If he took
Tanith there and Mocata did turn up he would have a perfectly
free hand in dealing with him. He glanced across at Tanith and
suggested casually: 'What about a little stroll?'
She shook her fair head, and lay back with half-closed eyes in
the arm-chair. 'I would love to, but I am so terribly tired. I
had no proper sleep you know last night.'
He nodded. 'We didn't get much either. We were sitting around
Stonehenge the best part of the time till dawn. After that we
went into Amesbury where the Duke took a room. The people there
must have thought us a queer party-one room for three people and
beds being specially shifted into it at half-past seven in the
morning, but he was insistent that we shouldn't leave Simon for
a second. So we had about four hours' shut-eye on those three
beds, all tied together by our wrists and ankles; but it's a
glorious afternoon and the woods round here are just lovely now
it's May.' 'If you like,' She rose sleepily. 'I dare not.go to
sleep in anycase. You mustn't let me until to-morrow morning.
After midnight it will be May 2nd, the mystic two again you see,
and my birthday. So during the dark hours tonight I shall be
passing into my fatal day. It may be good or evil, but in such
circumstances it is almost certain to bring some crisis in rny
life, and I'm afraid, Rex, terribly afraid.'
He drew her arm protectively through his and led her out
through the back door into the pleasant garden which boasted two
large, gay archery targets, a pastime that Jeremiah Wilkes had
seen fit to institute for the amusement of the local gentry,
deriving considerable profit therefrom when they bet each other
numerous rounds of drinks upon their prowess with the six-foot
bow.
A deep border of dark wallflowers sent out their heady scent
at the farther end of the lawn and beyond them the garden opened
on to a natural wooded glade. A small stream marked the boundary
of Mr. Wilkes' domain and when they reached it, Rex passed his
arm round Tanith's body, lifted her before she could protest,
and with one spring of his long legs cleared the brook. She did
not struggle from his grasp, but looked up at him curiously as
she lay placid in his arms.
'You must be very strong,' she said. 'Most men can lift a
woman, but it can't be easy to jump a five-foot brook with one.'
'I'm strong enough,' he smiled into her face, not attempting
to put her down. 'Strong enough for both of us. You needn't
worry,' Then, still carrying her in his arms, he walked on into
the depths of the wood until the fresh, green beech trees hid
them from the windows of the inn.
'You will get awfully tired,' she said lazily.
'Not me,' he declared, shaking his head. 'You may be tall, but
you're only a featherweight. I could carry you a mile if I
wanted, and it wouldn't hurt me any.'
'You needn't,' she smiled up at him. 'You can put me down now
and we'll sit under the trees. It's lovely here. You were quite
right-much nicer than the inn.'
He laid her down very gently on a sloping bank, but instead of
rising, knelt above her with one arm still about her shoulders
and looked down into her eyes. 'You love me,' he said suddenly.
'Don't you?'
'Yes,' she confessed with troubled shadows brooding in her
golden eyes. 'I do. But you mustn't love me, Rex. You know what
I told you yesterday. I'm going to die. I'm going to die
soon-before the year is out.'
'You're not,' he said, almost fiercely. 'We'll break this
devil Mocata-De Richleau will. I'm certain.'
'But, my dear, it's nothing to do with him,' she protested
sadly. 'It's just Fate, and you haven't known me long, so it's
not too late yet for you to keep a hold on yourself, You mustn't
love me, because if you do, it will make you terribly unhappy
when I die.'
'You're not going to die,' he repeated, and then he laughed
suddenly, boyishly, ail his mercurial nature rising to dispel
such gloomy thoughts. 'If we both die tomorrow,' he said
suddenly, 'we've still got today, and I love you, Tanith. That's
all there is to it.'
Her arms crept up about his neck and with sudden strength she
kissed him on his mouth.
He grabbed her then, his lips seeking hers again and again,
while he muttered little phrases of endearment, pouring out all
the agony of anxiety that he had felt for her during the past
night and the long run from Amesbury in the morning. She clung
to him, laughing a little hysterically although she was not far
from tears. This strange new happiness was overwhelming to her,
flooding her whole being now with a desperate desire to live; to
put behind her those nightmare dreams from which she had woken
shuddering in the past months at visions of herself torn and
bleeding, the victim of some horrible railway accident, or
trapped upon the top storey of a blazing building with no
alternative but to leap into the street below. For a moment it
almost seemed to her that no real foundation existed for the
dread which had haunted her since childhood. She was young,
healthy and full of life. Why should she not enjoy to the full
all the normal pleasures of life with this strong, merry-eyed
man-who had come so suddenly into her existence.
Again and again he assured her that all those thoughts of
fatality being certain to overtake her were absurd. He told her
that once she was out of Europe she would see things
differently; the menace of the old superstition-ridden countries
would drop away and that, in his lovely old home in the southern
states, they would be able to laugh at Fate together.
Tanith did not really believe him. Her habit of mind had grown
so strongly upon her; but she could not bring herself to argue
against his happy auguries, or spoil those moments of glorious
delight as they both confessed their passion for each other.
As he held her in his arms a marvellous languor began to steal
through all her limbs. 'Rex,' she said softly. 'I'm utterly done
in with this on top of all the rest. I haven't slept for nearly
thirty-six hours. I ought not to now, but I'll never be able to
stay awake tonight unless I do. No harm can come to me while
you're with me, can it?'
'No,' he said huskily. 'Neither man nor devil shall harm you
while I'm around. You poor sweet, you must be just about at the
end. of your tether. Go to sleep now-just as you are.'
With a little sigh she turned over, nestling her fair head
into the crook of his arm, where he sat with his back propped up
against a tree-trunk. In another moment she was sound asleep.
The afternoon drew into evening. Rex's arms and legs were cold
and stiff, but he would not move for fear of waking her. A new
anxiety began to trouble him. Mocata had not appeared, and what
would they think had become of him at Cardinals Folly? Marie Lou
knew he had gone to the inn, and they would probably have rung
up by now. But, like a fool, he had neglected to leave any
message for them.
The shadows fell, but still there was no sign of Mocata, and
the imps of doubt once more began to fill Rex's mind with
horrible speculations as to the truth of Tanith's story. Had she
consciously or unconsciously lured him from Simon's side on
purpose? Simon would be safe enough with Richard and Marie Lou,
and De Richleau had promised to rejoin them before dusk-but
perhaps Mocata was plotting some evil to prevent the Duke's
return. If that were so-Rex shivered slightly at the
thought-Richard knew nothing of those mysterious protective
barriers with which it would be so necessary to surround Simon
in the coming night-and he, who at least knew what had been done
the night before-would be absent. By his desertion of his post
poor Simon might fall an easy prey to the malefic influence of
the Satanist.
He thought more than once of rousing Tanith, but she looked so
peaceful, so happy, so lovely there, breathing gently and
resting in his strong arms with all her limbs relaxed that he
could not bring himself to do it. The shadows lengthened, night
drew on, and at last darkness fell with Tanith still sleeping.
The night of the ordeal had come and they were alone in the
forest.
24
The Scepticism of Richard Eaton
At a quarter to six, De Richleau arrived back at Cardinals
Folly and Richard, meeting him in the hall, told him of Mocata's
visit.
'I am not altogether surprised,' the Duke admitted sombrely.
'He must be pretty desperate to come here in daylight on the
chance of seeing Simon, but of course, he is working against
time-now. Did he threaten to return?'
'Yes.' Richard launched into full particulars of the
Satanist's attempt on Marie Lou and the conversation that had
followed. As he talked he studied De Richleau's face, struck by
his anxious harassed expression. Never before had he thought of
the Duke as old, but now for the first time it was brought home
to him that De Richleau must be nearly double his own age. And
this evening he showed it. He seemed somehow to have shrunk in
stature, but perhaps that was because he was standing with bent
shoulders as though some invisible load was borne upon them.
Richard was so impressed by that tired, lined face that he found
himself ending quite seriously: 'Do you really think he can work
some devilry tonight?'
De Richleau nodded. 'I am certain of it, and I'm worried
Richard. My luck was out today. Father Brandon, whom I went to
see, was unfortunately away. He has a great knowledge of this
terrible "other world" that we are up against, and knowing me
well, would have helped us, but the young priest I saw in his
place would not entrust me with the Host, nor could I persuade
him to come with it himself, and that is the only certain
protection against the sort of thing Mocata may send against
us.'
'We'll manage somehow,' Richard smiled, trying to cheer him.
'Yes, we've got to.' A note of the old determination came into
De Richleau's voice. 'Since the Church cannot help us we must
rely upon my knowledge of Esoteric formulas. Fortunately, I have
the most important aids with me already, but I should be glad if
you would se-rad down to the village blacksmith for five
horseshoes. Tell whoever you send, that they must be brand
new-that is essential.'
At this apparently childish request for horseshoes all
Richard's scepticism welled up with renewed force, but he con
cealed it with his usual tact and agreed readily enough. Then,
the mention of the village having reminded him of Rex, he told
the Duke how their friend had been called away to the inn.
De Richleau's face fell suddenly. 'I thought Rex had more
sense!' he exclaimed bitterly. 'We must telephone at once.'
Richard got on to Mr. Wilkes, but the landlord could give them
little information. A lady had arrived at about three, and the
American gentleman had joined her shortly after. Then they had
gone out into the garden and he had seen nothing of them since.
De Richleau shrugged angrily. 'The young fool! I should have
thought that he would have'seen enough of this horror by now to
realise the danger of going off with that young woman. It's a
hundred to one that she is Mocata's puppet if nothing else. I
only pray to God that he turns up again before nightfall. Where
is Simon now?'
'With Marie Lou. They are upstairs in the nursery I think-
watching Fleur bathed and put to bed.'
'Good. Let us go up then. Fleur can help us very greatly in
protecting him tonight.'
'Fleur!' exclaimed Richard in amazement.
The Duke nodded. 'The prayers of a virgin woman are amazingly
powerful in such instances, and the younger she is the stronger
her vibrations. You see, a little child like Fleur who is old
enough to pray, but absolutely unsoiled in any way, is the
nearest that any human being can get to absolute purity. You
will remember the words of Our Lord: "Except ye become as little
children ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven." You
have no objection I take it?'
'None,' agreed Richard quickly. 'Saying a prayer for Simon
cannot possibly harm the child in any way. We'll go up through
the library.'
Seven sides of the great octagonal room were covered ceiling
high with books and the eighth consisted of wide trench windows
through which half-a-dozen stone steps, leading up to the
terrace, could be seen and beyond, a portion of the garden.
Richard led the way to one of the book-lined walls and pressed
the gilded cardinal's hat upon a morocco binding. A low doorway,
masked by dummy bookbacks, swung open disclosing a narrow spiral
stairway hewn out of the solid wall. They ascended the stone
steps and a moment later entered Fleur's nursery on the floor
above, through a sliding panel in the wall.
When they arrived the nursery was empty, but in the bathroom
beyond they found Simon, with Nanny's apron tied about his
waist, quite solemnly bathing Fleur while Marie Lou sat on the
edge of the bath and chortled with laughter.
It was an operation which Simon performed on every visit that
he had made to Cardinals Folly so Fleur was used to the business
and regarded it as a definite treat; but this tubbing of his
friend's child was a privilege which De Richleau had never
claimed, and as he entered Fleur suddenly exhibited signs of
maidenly modesty surprising in one so young.
'Oh, Mummy,' she exclaimed. 'He mussent see me, muss he,
'cause he's a man.' On which the whole party gave way to a fit
of laughter.
'Sen' him away!' yelled the excited Fleur, standing up and
clutching an enormous bath sponge to her chest.
De Richleau's firm mouth twitched with his old humour, as he
apologised most gravely and backed into the nursery beside
Richard. A few minutes later the others joined them, and the
Duke held a hurried conversation in whispers with Marie Lou.
'Of course,' she said. 'If it will help, do just what you
think. I will get rid of Nanny for a few minutes.'
Walking over, he smiled down at Fleur. 'Does Mummy watch you
say your prayers every night?' he asked gently.
'Oh, yes,' she lisped. 'And you shall all hear me now.'
He smiled again. 'Have you ever heard her say hers?'
Fleur thought hard for a moment. 'No,' she shook her dark head
and the big blue eyes looked up at him seriously. 'Mummy says
her prayers to Daddy when I'se asleep.'
He noddedy quietly. 'Well, we're all going to say them to
gether tonight.'
'Ooo,' cooed Fleur. 'Lovely. It'll be just as though we'se
playing a new game, won't it?'
'Not a game, dearest,' interjected Marie Lou quietly, 'Because
prayers are serious, and we mean them.'
'Yes, we mean them very much tonight, but we could all kneel
down in a circle couldn't we and put Uncle Simon in the middle?'
'Jus' like kiss-in-the-ring,' added Fleur.
'That's right,' the Duke agreed, 'or Postman's Knock. And you
shall be the postman. But this is very serious, and instead of
touching him on the shoulder, you must hold his hand very
tight.'
They all knelt down then and Fleur extended her pudgy palm to
Simon, but the Duke gently laid his hand on her shoulder. 'No,'
he whispered. 'Your left hand, my angel, in Uncle Simon's right.
You shall say your prayers first, just as you always do, and
then I shall say one for all of us afterwards.'
The first few lines of the Our Father came tumbling out from
the child's lips in a little breathless spate as they knelt with
bowed heads and closed eyes. Then there was a short hesitation,
a prompting whisper from Marie Lou, and an equally breathless
ending. After that, the little personal supplication for Mummy
and Daddy and Uncle Simon and Uncle Rex and Uncle Greyeyes and
dear Nanny were hurried through with considerably more gusto.
'Now,' whispered De Richleau. 'I want you to repeat everything
I say word for word after me,' and in a low, clear voice he
offered up an entreaty that the Father of All would forgive His
servants their sins and strengthen them to resist temptation,
keeping at bay by His limitless power all evil things that
walked in darkness, and bringing them safely by His especial
mercy to see again the glory of the morning light.
When all was done and Fleur, tucked up and kissed, left be
tween Mr. Edward Bear and Golliwog, the others filed downstairs
to Marie Lou's cosy sitting-room.
De Richleau was worried about Rex, but a further 'phone call
to the inn failed to elicit any later information. He had not
returned, and they sat round silently, a little subdued.
Richard, vaguely miserable because it was sherry time and the
Duke had once again firmly prohibited the drinking of any
alcohol, asked at length: 'Well, what do you wish us to do now?'
'We should have a light supper fairly early,' De Richleau
announced. 'And after, I should like you to make it quite clear
to Malin that none of the servants are to come into this wing of
the house until tomorrow morning. Say, if you like, that I am
going to conduct some all-night experiments with a new wireless
or television apparatus, but in no circumstances must we be
disturbed or any doors opened and shut.'
'Hadn't we . . . er . . . better disconnect the telephone as
well?' Simon hazarded. 'In case it rings after we've settled
down.'
'Yes, with Richard's permission I will attend to that myself.'
'Do, if you like, and I'll see to the servants,' Richard
agreed placidly. 'But what do you call a light supper?'
'Just enough to keep up our strength. A little fish if you
have it. If not eggs will do, with vegetables or a salad and
some fruit, but no meat or game and, of course, no wine.'
Richard grunted. 'That sounds a jolly dinner I must say. I
suppose you wouldn't like to shave my head as well, or get us
all to don hair shirts if we could find them. I'm hungry as a
hunter, and owing to your telegram, we had no lunch.'
The Duke smiled tolerantly. 'I am sorry, Richard, but this
thing is deadly serious. I am afraid you haven't realised quite
how serious yet. If you had seen what Rex and I did last night,
I'm certain that you wouldn't breathe a word of protest about
these small discomforts, and realise at once that I am acting
for the best.'
'No,' Richard confessed. 'Quite frankly, I find it very diffi
cult to believe that we haven't all gone bug-house with this
talk of witches and wizards and magic and what-not at the
present day.'
'Yet you saw Mocata yourself this afternoon.'
'I saw an unpleasant pasty-faced intruder I agree, but to
credit him with all the powers that you suggest is rather more
than I can stomach at the moment.'
'Oh, Richard!' Marie Lou broke in. 'Greyeyes is right. That
man is horrible. And to say that people do not believe in
witches at the present day is absurd. Everybody knows that there
are witches just as there have always been.'
'Eh!' Richard looked at his lovely wife in quick surprise.
'Have you caught this nonsense from the others already? I've
never heard you air this belief before.'
'Of course not,' she said a little sharply. 'It is unlucky to
talk of such things, but one knows about them all the same. Of
witches in Siberia I could tell you much-things that I have seen
with my own eyes.'
'Tell us, Marie Lou,' urged the Duke. He felt that in their
present situation scepticism might prove highly dangerous. If
Richard did not believe in the powers that threatened them, he
might relax in following out the instructions for their pro
tection and commit some casual carelessness, bringing, possibly,
a terrible danger upon them all. He knew how very highly Richard
esteemed his wife's sound common sense. It was far better to let
her convince him than to press arguments on Richard himself.
'There was a witch in Romanovsk,' Marie Lou proceeded. 'An old
woman who lived alone in a house just outside the village. No
one, not even the Red Guards, with all their bluster about
having liquidated God and the Devil, would pass her cottage
alone at night. In Russia there are many such and one in nearly
every village. You would call her a wise woman as well perhaps,
for she could cure people of many sicknesses and I have seen her
stop the flow of blood from a bad wound almost instantly. The
village girls used to go to her to have their fortunes told and,
when they could afford it, to buy charms of philtres to make the
young men they liked fall in love with them. Often, too, they
would go back again afterwards when they became pregnant and buy
the drugs which would secure their release from that unhappy
situation. But she was greatly feared, for everyone knew that
she could also put a blight on crops and send a murrain on the
cattle of those who displeased her. It was even whispered that
she could cause men and women to sicken and die if any enemy
paid her a high enough price to make it worth her while.'
'If that is so I wonder they didn't lynch her,' said Richard
quietly.
'They did in the end. They would not have dared to do. that
themselves. But a farmer whom she had inflicted with a plague of
lice appealed to the local commissar and he went with twenty men
to her house one day. All the villagers and I among them-for I
was only a little giri then and naturally curious-went with them
in a frightened crowd hanging well behind. They brought the old
woman out and examined her, and having proved she was a witch,
the commissar had her shot against the cottage wall.'
'How did they prove it?' Richard asked sceptically
'Why-because she had the marks of course.'
'What marks?'
'When they stripped her they found that she had a teat under
her left arm, and that is a certain sign.'
De Richleau nodded. To feed her familiar with, of course. Was
it a cat?'
Marie Lou shook her head. 'No. In this case, it was a great
big fat toad that she used to keep in a little cage.'
'Oh, come!' Richard protested. 'This is fantastic. They
slaughtered the poor old woman because she had some malformation
and kept an unusual pet.'
'No, no,' Marie Lou assured him. 'They found the Devil's mark
on her thigh and they swam her in the village pond. It was very
horrible, but it was all quite conclusive.'
The Devil's mark!' interjected Simon suddenly, 'I've never
heard of that,' and the Duke answered promptly:
'It is believed that the Devil or his representative touches
these people at their baptism during some Satanic orgy and that
spot is for ever afterwards free from pain. In the old witch
trials, they used to hunt for it by sticking pins into the
suspected person because the place does not differ in appearance
from any other portion of the body.'
Marie Lou nodded her curly head. That's right. They bandaged
this old woman's eyes so that she could not see what part of her
they were sticking the pin into and then they began to prick her
gently in first one place and then another. Of course she cried
out each time the pin went in, but after about twenty cries, the
head man of the village pushed the pin into her left thigh and
she didn't make a sound. He took it out then and stuck it in
again, but still she did not cry out at all so he pushed it in
right up to the head, and she didn't know he'd even touched her.
So you see, everyone was quite satisfied then that she was a
witch.'
'Well, you may have been,' Richard said slowly. 'It seems a
horribly barbarous affair in any case. I dare say the old woman
deserved all she got, but it's pretty queer evidence to shoot
anyone on.'
'Er . . . Richard . . .' Simon leaned forward suddenly. 'Do
you believe in curses?'
'What-the old bell and book business! Not much. Why? '
'Because the actual working of a curse is evidence of the
supernatural.'
They're mostly old wives' tales of coincidences I think.'
'How about the Mackintosh of Moy?'
'Oh, Scotland is riddled with that sort of thing. But what is
supposed to have happened to the Mackintosh?'
'Well, this was in seventeen something,' Simon replied slowly.
They story goes that he was present at a witch burning or jilted
one-I forget exactly. Anyhow she put a curse on him and it went
like this:
"Mackintosh, Mackintosh, Mackintosh of Moy If you ever have a
son he shall never have a boy." '
Richard smiled. 'And what happened then?'
'Well, whether the story's true or not I can't say, but it's a
fact that the Chieftainship of the Clan has gone all over the
shop ever since. Look it up in the records of the Clans if. you
doubt me.'
'My dear chap, you'll have to produce something far more
concrete than that to convince me.'
'All right,' Marie Lou gazed at him steadily out of her large
blue eyes. 'You know very little about such things, Richard, but
in Russia people are much closer to nature and everyone there
still accepts the supernatural and diabolic possession as part
of ordinary life. Only about a year before you brought me to
England they caught a were-wolf in a village less than fifty
miles from where I lived.
He moved over to the sofa and, taking her hand, patted it
gently. 'Surely, darling, you don't really ask me to believe
that a man can actually turn into a beast-leave his bed in the
middle of the night to go out hunting-then return and go to his
work in the morning as a normal man again?'
'Certainly,' Marie Lou nodded solemnly. 'Wolves, as you know,
nearly always hunt in packs, but that part of the country had
been troubled for months by a lone wolf which seemed possessed
of far more than normal cunning. It killed sheep and dogs and
two young children. Then it killed an old woman.
She was found with her throat bitten out, but she had been
ravished too, so that's how they knew that it must be a were
wolf. At last it attacked a woodman and he wounded it in the
shoulder with his axe. Next day a wretched half-imbecile crea
ture, a sort of village idiot, died suddenly, and when the women
went to prepare his body for burial they found that he had died
from loss of blood and that there was a great wound in his right
shoulder just where the woodman had struck the wolf. After that
there were no other cases of slaughtered sheep or people being
done to death. So it was quite clear that he was the were-wolf.'
Richard looked thoughtful for a moment. 'Of course,' he
remarked, 'the man may have done all that without actually
changing his shape at all. If anyone is bitten by a mad dog and
gets hydrophobia, they bark, howl, gnash their teeth and behave
just as though they were dogs and certainly believe at the time
that they are. Lycanthropy, of which this poor devil seems to
have been the victim, may be some rare disease of the same
kind.'
Marie Lou shrugged lightly and stood up. 'Well, if you won't
believe me-there it is. I don't know enough to argue with you,
only what I believe myself, so I shall go and order supper.'
As the door closed behind her the Duke said quietly: 'That may
be a possible explanation, Richard, but there is an enormous
mass of evidence in the jurisprudence of every country to
suggest that actual shape shifting does occur at times. The form
varies of course. In Greece it is often of the were-boar that
one hears. In Africa of the were-hyena and were-leopard. China
has the were-fox; India the were-tiger; and Egypt the were-
jackal. But even as near home as Surrey I could introduce you to
a friend of mine, a doctor who practices among the country
people, who will vouch for it that the older cottagers are still
unshakable in their beliefs that certain people are were-hares,
and have power to change their shape at particular phases of the
moon.'
'If you really believe these fantastic stories,' Richard
smiled a little grimly, 'perhaps you can give me some reasonable
explanation as to what makes such things possible.'
'By all means.' De Richleau hoisted himself out of his chair
and began to pace softly up and down the fine, silk Persian
prayer rug before the fireplace while he expounded again the
Esoteric doctrine just as he had to Rex two nights before.
Simon and Richard listened in silence until the Duke spoke of
the eternal fight which, hidden from human eyes, has been waged
from time immemorial between the Powers of Light and the Powers
of Darkness. Then the latter, his serious interest really
aroused for the first time, exclaimed:
'Surely you are proclaiming the Manichaean heresy? The
Manichees believed in the Two Principals, Light and Darkness,
and the Three Moments, Past, Present and Future. They taught
that in the Past Light and Darkness had been separate; then that
Darkness invaded Light and became mingled with it, creating the
Present and this world in which evil is mixed with good. They
preached the practice of astheticism as the means of freeing the
light imprisoned in human clay so that in some distant Future
Light and Darkness might be completely separated again.'
The Duke's lean face lit with a quick smile. 'Exactly, my
friend I The Manichees had a credo to that effect.
"Day by day diminishes The number of Soul below As they are
distilled and mount above"
The basis of the belief is far, far older of course, pre-
Egyptian at the least, but where before it was a jealously
guarded mystery the Persian Mani proclaimed it to the world.'
'It became a serious rival to Christianity at one time, didn't
it?'
'Um,' Simon took up the argument. 'And it survived despite the
most terrible persecution by the Christians. Mani was crucified
in the third century after Christ and, by their own creed, his
followers were not allowed to enlist converts. Yet somehow it
spread in secret. The Albigenses followed it in Southern France
in the twelfth century until they were stamped out. Then in the
thirteenth, a thousand years after Mani's death, it swept
Bohemia. A form of it was still practised there by certain sects
as late as the 1840's and even today many thinking people
scattered all over the world believe that it holds the core of
the only true religion.'
'Yes, I can understand that,' Richard agreed, 'Brahminism,
Budism, Taoism, all the great philosophers which have passed
beyond the ordinary limited religions with a personal God are
connected up with the Prana, Light, and the Universal Life
Stream, but that is a very different matter to asking me to
believe in were-wolves and witches.'
They only came into the discussion because they illustrate
certain manifestations of supernatural Evil,' De Richleau pro
tested; 'just as the appearance of wounds similar to those of
Christ upon the Cross in the flesh of exceptionally pious people
may be taken as evidence for the existence of supernatural Good.
Ernminent surgeons have testified again and again that stigmata
are not due to trickery. It is a changing of the material body
by the holy saints in their endeavour to approximate to its
highest form, that of Our Lord, so, I contend, base natures,
with the assistance of the Power of Darkness, may at times
succeed in altering their form to that of were-beasts. Whether
they change their shape entirely it is impossible to say because
at death they always revert to human form, but the belief is
world-wide and the evidence so abundant that it cannot lightly
be put aside. In any case what you call madness is actually a
very definite form of diabolic possession which seizes upon
these people and causes them to act with the same savagery as
the animal they believe themselves for the time to be. Of its
existence, no one who has read the immense literature upon it,
can possibly doubt.'
'Perhaps,' Richard admitted grudgingly. 'But apart from Marie
Lou's story, all the evidence is centuries old and mixed up with
every sort of superstition and fairy story. In the depths of the
Siberian forests or the Indian jungle the belief in such things
may perhaps stimulate some poor benighted wretch to act the part
now and again and so perpetuate the legend. But you cannot cite
me a case in which a number of people have sworn to such
happenings in a really civilised country in modern times!'
'Can't I?' De Richleau laughed grimly. 'What about the affair
at Uttenheim near Strasbourg. The farms in the neighbourhood had
been troubled by a lone wolf for weeks. The Garde-Chainpetre was
sent out to get it. He tracked it down. It attacked him and he
fired-killing it dead. Then he found himself bending over the
body of a local youth. That unfortunate rural policeman was
tried for murder, but he swore by all that was holy that it was
a wolf at which he had shot, and the entire population of the
village came forward to give evidence on his behalf-that the
dead man had boasted time and again of his power to change his
shape.'
'Is that a fifteenth or sixteenth century story?' murmured
Richard,
'Neither. It occurred in November, 1925.'
25
The Talisman of Set
For a while longer De Richleau strode up and down, patiently
answering Richard's questions and ramming home his arguments for
a belief in the power of the supernatural to affect mankind
until, when Marie Lou rejoined them, Richard's brown eyes no
longer held the half-mocking humour which had twinkled in them
an hour before.
The Duke's explanation had been so clear and lucid, his
earnestness so compelling that the younger man was at least
forced to suspend judgment, and even found himself toying with
the idea that Simon might really be threatened by some very
dangerous and potent force which it would need all their courage
to resist during the dark hours that lay ahead.
It was eight o'clock now. Twilight had fallen and the trees at
the bottom of the garden were already merged in shadow. Yet with
the coming of darkness they were not filled with any fresh
access of fear. It seemed that their long talk had elucidated
the position and even strengthened the bond between them. Like
men who are about to go into physical battle, they were alert
and expectant but a little subdued, and realised that their
strongest hope lay in putting their absolute trust in each
other.
At Marie Lou's suggestion they went into the dining-room and
sat down to a cold supper which had already been laid out.
Having eaten so lightly during the day, their natural inclina
tion was to make a heavy meal but, without any further caution
from De Richleau, they all appreciated now that the situation
was sufficiently serious to make restraint imperative.
Even Richard denied himself a second helping of his favourite
Morecambe Bay shrimps which had arrived that morning.
When they had finished the Duke leant over him. 'I think the
library would be the best place to conduct my experiments, and I
shall require the largest jug you have full of fresh water, some
glasses and it would be best to leave the fruit.'
'By all means,' Richard agreed, glancing towards his butler.
'See to that please, Maim-will you.' He then went on to give
clear and definite instructions that they were not to be dis
turbed on any pretext until the morning, and concluded with an
order that the table should be cleared right away.
With a bland, unruffled countenance the man signified his
understanding and motioned to his footman to begin clearing the
table. So bland in fact was the expression that it would have
been difficult for them to visualise him half an hour later in
the privacy of the housekeeper's room declaring with a knowing
wink:
'In my opinion it's spooks they're after-the old chap's got no
television set. And behaving like a lot of heathens with not a
drop of drink to their dinner. Think of that with young Simon
there who's so mighty particular about his hock. But
spiritualists always is that way. I only hope it doesn't get 'em
bad or what's going to happen to the wine bill I'd like to
know?'
When Richard had very pointedly wished his henchman 'good
night,' they moved into the library and De Richleau, who knew
the room well, surveyed it with fresh interest.
Comfortable sofas and large arm-chairs stood about the uneven
polished oak of the floor. A pair of globes occupied two angles
of the book-lined walls, and a great oval mahogany writing-table
of Chippendale design stood before the wide french window. Owing
to its sunken position in the old wing of the house the lighting
of the room was dim even on a summer's day. Yet its atmosphere
was by no means gloomy. A log fire upon a twelve-inch pile of
ashes was kept burning in the wide fireplace all through the
year, and at night, when the curtains were drawn and the room
lit with the soft radiance of the concealed ceiling lights,
which Richard had installed, it was a friendly, restful place
well suited for quiet work or idle conversation.
'We must strip the room-furniture, curtains, everything!' said
the Duke. 'And I shall need brooms and a mop to polish the
floor.'
The three men then began moving the furniture out into the
hall while Marie Lou fetched a selection of implements from the
house-maid's closet.
For a quarter of an hour they worked in silence until nothing
remained in the big library except the serried rows of gilt-
tooled books.
'My apologies for even doubting the efficiency of your staff!'
the Duke smiled at Marie Lou. 'But I would like the room gone
over thoroughly, particularly the floor, since evil emanations
can fasten on the least trace of dust to assist their
materialisation. Would you see to it, Princess, while I
telephone the inn again to find out if Rex has returned.'
'Of course, Greyeyes, dear,' said Marie Lou and, with
Richard's and Simon's help, she set about dusting, sweeping and
polishing until when De Richleau rejoined them, the boards were
so scrupulously clean that they could have eaten from them.
'No news of Rex, worse luck,' he announced with a frown. 'And
I've had to disconnect the telephone now in case a call makes
Malm think it necessary to disregard his instructions.. We had
better go upstairs and change next.'
'What into?' Richard inquired.
'Pyjamas. I hope you have a good supply. You see none of us
tonight must wear any garment which has been even slightly
soiled. Human impurities are bound to linger in one's clothes
even if they have only been worn for a few hours, and it is just
upon such things that elementals fasten most readily.'
'Shan't we be awfully cold?' hazarded Simon with an unhappy
look;
'I'll fit you out with shooting stockings and an overcoat,'
Richard volunteered.
'Stockings if you like, providing that they are fresh from the
wash-but no overcoats, dressing-gowns or shoes,' said the Duke.
'However, there is no reason why we should not wear a couple of
suits apiece of Richard's underclothes, beneath the pyjamas, to
keep us warm. The essential paint is that everything must be
absolutely clean.'
The whole party then migrated upstairs, the men congregating
in Richard's dressing-room where they ransacked his ward-robe
for suitable attire. Marie Lou joined them a little later
looking divinely pretty in peach silk pyjamas and silk stockings
into the tops of which, above the knees, the bottoms of her
pyjamas were neatly tucked.
'Now for a raid on the linen cupboard,' said De Richleau.
'Cushions, being soiled already, are useless to us, but I am
dreading that hard floor so we will take down as many sheets as
we can carry, clean bath towls and blankets too. Then we shall
have some sort of couch to sit on.'
In the library once more, they set down their bundles and De
Richleau produced his suitcase, taking from it a piece of chalk,
a length of string, and a footrule. Marking a spot in the centre
of the room, he asked Marie Lou to hold the end of the string to
it, measuring off exactly seven feet and then, using her as a
pivot, he drew a large circle in chalk upon the floor.
Next, the string was lengthened and an outer circle drawn.
Then the most difficult part of the operation began. A five-
rayed star had to be made with its points touching the outer
circle and its valleys resting upon the inner. But, as the Duke
explained, while such a defence can be highly potent if it is
constructed with geometrical accuracy, should the angles vary to
any marked degree or the distance of the apexes from the central
point differ more than a fraction, the pentacle would prove not
only useless but even dangerous.
For half an hour they measured and checked with string and
rule and marking chalk; but Richard proved useful here, for all
his life he had been an expert with maps and plans and was even
something of amateur architect. At last the broad chalk lines
were drawn to the Duke's satisfaction, forming the magical five
pointed star, in which it was his intention that they should
remain while darkness lasted.
He then chalked in, with careful spacing round the rim of the
inner circle, the powerful exorcism: -
In nomina Pa + tris et Fi + lii et Spiritus + Sancti! + El +
Elohym + Sother + Emmanuel + Sabaoth + Agia + Tetragammaton +
Agyos + Otheos + Ischiros + - and, after reference to an old
book which he had brought with him, drew certain curious and
ancient symbols in the valleys and the mounts of the microcosmic
star.
Simon, whose recent experience had taught him something of
pentacles, recognised ten of them as Cabbalistic signs taken
from the Sephirotic Tree; Kether, Binah, Ceburah, Hod, Malchut
and the rest. But others, like the Eye of Horus, were of
Egyptian origin, and others again in some ancient Aryan script
which he did not understand.
When the skeleton of this astra! fortress was completed, the
clean bedding was laid out inside it for them to rest upon and
De Richleau produced further impedimenta from his case.
With lengths of asafretida grass and blue wax he sealed the
windows, the door leading to the hall, and that concealed in the
bookshelves which led to the nursery above, each at both sides
and at the tops and at the bottoms, making the sign of the Cross
in holy water over every seal as he completed it.
Then he ordered the others inside the pentacle, examined the
switches by the door to assure himself that every light in the
room was on, made up the fire with a great pile of logs so that
it would last well through the night and there be no question of
their having to leave the circle to replenish it and, joining
them where they had squatted down on the thick mat of blankets,
produced five little silver cups, which he proceeded to fill two-
thirds full with Holy water. These he placed, one in each valley
of the pentacle.
Then, taking five long white tapering candles, such as are
offered by devotees to the Saints in Catholic Churches, he lit
them from an old-fashioned tinder-box and set them upright, one
at each apex of the five-pointed star. In their rear he placed
the five brand new horseshoes which Richard had secured from the
village with their horns pointing outward, and beyond each vase
of holy water he set a dried mandrake, four females and one
male, the male being in the valley to the north.
These complicated formulas for the erection of outward
barriers being at last finished, the Duke turned his attention
to the individual protection of his friends and himself. Four
long wreaths of garlic flowers were strung together and each of
the party placed one about his neck. Rosaries, with little
golden crucifixes attached, were distributed, medals of Saint
Benedict holding the Cross in his right hand and the Holy Rule
in his left, and phials of salt and mercury; lengths of the
asafcetida grass were again tied round Simon's wrists and
ankles, and he was placed in their midst facing towards the
north. The Duke then performed the final rites of sealing the
nine openings of each of their bodies.
All this performance had entirely failed to impress Richard.
In fact, it tended to revive his earlier scepticism. It was his
private belief that a blackmailing gang were playing tricks upon
Simon and the Duke so, before coming downstairs, he had tucked a
loaded automatic comfortably away beneath his pyjama jacket. In
deference to De Richleau's obvious concern that nothing soiled
should be brought within the circle he had first, half-
ashamedly, cleansed the weapon in a bath of spirit but, if Mr.
Mocata was so ill-advised as to break into his house that night
with the intention of staging any funny business, he meant to
use it. After a little pause he looked cheerfully round at the
others. 'Well-here we are! What happens now?'
'We have ample room here,' replied De Richleau. 'So there is
no reason why we should not lie down with our feet towards the
rim of the circle and try to get some sleep, but there are
certain instructions I would like to give you before we settle
down.'
'I never felt less like sleep in my life,' remarked Simon.
'Nor I,' agreed Richard. 'It's early yet and if only Marie Lou
weren't here I'd tell you some bawdy stories to keep you gay.'
'Don't mind me, darling,' cooed Marie Lou. 'I'm human- even if
you are right about my having an angelic face.'
'No!' He shook his head quickly. 'Somehow they fail to amuse
me when you're about. That's why I never tell you any. It needs
men on their own sitting round a bottle of something to get the
best out of a bawdy jest. My God! I wish we'd got a bottle of
brandy with us now!'
'Mean pig,' she murmured amiably, snuggling up against him.
'If Greyeyes and Simon didn't know you so well they would think
you nothing but an awful little drunk from the way you talk,
whereas you're a nice person really.'
'Am I? Well, anyway it's fine that you should think so.' He
fondled her short curly hair with his long fingers. 'My present
lust-for liquor is only because I've been done out of my fair
ration today. But what shall we talk about? Greyeyes-this
Talisman that all the bother centres on-tell us about it before
you give us your final orders for the night.'
'You know the legend of Isis and Osiris?' the Duke asked.
'Yes-vaguely,' Richard replied. 'They were the King and Queen
of Heaven who came to earth in human form and taught the
Egyptians all they knew weren't they? The old business of a
fairhaired god arriving among a dusky people and importing all
sorts of new ideas about agriculture and architecture and
justice-in fact-what we call civilisation.'
De Richleau nodded. 'That is so. But I mean the story of how
Osiris came to die?'
'He was murdered wasn't he?' volunteered Simon. 'But I've
forgotten how.'
'Well, this is the account which has been handed down to us
through many thousands of years. Osiris was, apparently, as
Richard says, a fair-haired, light-skinned man, alien to the
Egyptian race, who became their King and, ruling them with great
intelligence, brought them many blessings. But he had a brother
named Set-and here again you get the two principals of Good and
Evil, Light and Darkness-for Set was a dark man. The legend is,
of course, apocryphal up to a point but, eliminating the overlay
of myth with which the priests later embroidered it, the whole
story had such a genuine ring of human tragedy that it is very
difficult to doubt that these two men and the woman Isis
actually lived, as the progenitors of a Royal dynasty, in the
Nile valley long before the Pyramids were built.
'It always amazes me, whenever I re-read the story in the
Greek Classics, how Set, particularly, stands out as a definite
and living figure after all these countless generations. The
characters in our seventeenth century plays even are quite un
real to' us now-with a very few exceptions; but Set remains,
timeless and unchanging, the charming but unscrupulous rogue who
might have entertained you with lavish hospitality and brilliant
conversation yesterday-yet would do you down without the least
compunction if he met you in the street tomorrow.
"He was tall and slim and dark and handsome; a fine athlete
and a great hunter, but a cultured, amusing person too, and a
boon companion who knew how to carry his wine at table. The type
whose lapses men are always ready to condone on account of their
delightful personality, and whose wickedness women persuade
themselves is only waywardness-while they succumb almost at a
glance to that dark, male virility.
'Set was younger than Osiris and jealous of his authority.
Then he fell in love with Isis, his brother's wife. The old
story of the human triangle you see, or rather the original, for
all others in the whole literature of the world which deal with
the same subject are plagiarisms. Set conspired, therefore, to
slay the King and seize his wife and power for himself.
'To assassinate Osiris openly would have been a difficult
matter because he was always surrounded by the older nobles, who
loved him and knew that he kept the peace while the land
flourished and grew prosperous. Set knew that they would defend
the King's person with their lives, and he was faced with
another problem too. Osiris was a god, and even if he could lure
him to a place where the deed could be done in secret, he dared
not spill one drop of the divine blood.
'He planned then a superlatively clever murder. You all know
that the Egyptians considered this present life to be only an
interlude and that almost from the age at which they could think
at all their thoughts were largely focused on the life to come.
Many of them spent their entire fortune upon preparing some
magnificent place of burial for themselves, and at every
banquet, when the slaves served the dessert, thehead wine butler
carried round a miniature coffin with a skeleton inside to re
mind the guests that death was waiting round the corner for them
all.
'With diabolical cunning, Set utilised the national preoccupa
tion with death and ceremonial burial to ensnare his brother.
First, by a clever piece of trickery he secured Osiris' exact
measurements. Then he had made the most beautiful sarcophagus
that had ever been seen. It was a great heavy chest of fine
cedar wood with the figures of the forty-two assessors of the
dead, who form the jury of the gods, painted in lapis blue, and
the minutest hieroglyphics in black and red; line upon line of
them reciting the most effective protections against black
magic, and every requisite line of ritual from the great Book of
the Dead.
'As soon as this wonderful coffin was completed, Set prepared
a great banquet to which he invited Osiris and seventy-two of
the younger nobles, all of whom he had corrupted and drawn one
by one into his conspiracy.
'Then on the night of the feast he had the beautiful sarcopha
gus placed in a small anteroom through which every guest had to
pass on his arrival.
'You can imagine how envious they were when they saw it, and
how each commented on the workmanship and the artistry of the
designs-Osiris no less than the others.
'They dined, drank heavily of wine, watched the Egyptian
dancing girls, saw Ethiopian contortionists, and listened to the
best stringed music of the day. Then as a final hospitality to
his guests, the Prince Set rose from his couch and proclaimed:
' "You have all seen the sarcophagus which stands in the
little anteroom, and it is my wish that one of you should
receive it as a gift. He whom it fits may take it with my bless
ing."
'Picture to yourselves the nobles as they scrambled up from
their couches, thrusting the dancing girls aside, and elbowing
their way out into the anteroom, each hoping that the princely
gift might fall to him.
'One after another they got inside and lay down, but not one
of them fitted it exactly. Then Set led Osiris into the anteroom
and, waving his hand towards the handsome chest said with a
little laugh: "Why don't you try it brother. It is worthy of a
King. Even of the Lord of the Two Lands, the Upper and the Lower
Nile."
'With a smile Osiris lowered himself into the masterpiece. And
behold, it fitted his tall, broad-shouldered body to a hair's
breadth. No sooner was he inside than the principal conspira
tors, who were in the secret, rushed forward with the weighty
lid. In frantic haste they nailed it down and poured molten lead
upon it, so that Osiris may have survived an hour in agony but
died at last of suffocation.
'Set thus succeeded in his treacherous design of killing his
brother without spilling one drop of his blood. He and his
turbulent followers then hastened to their chariots, rode forth,
and seized the Kingdom. But Isis was warned in time and managed
to escape.
'The coffer had been left with Osiris in it and, the Egyptian
religion being so strongly bound up with the worship of the
dead, it was vital to Set's newly established authority that the
body should be disposed of at the earliest possible moment.
Otherwise, if the priests got hold of it, they would bury it in
state and erect a mighty shrine to the dead King's memory which
would form a rallying point for all the best elements in the
Kingdom where they would league themselves against the murderer.
'Next morning, therefore, immediately he got home, Set had the
chest cast into the Nile. But Isis recovered it, and after
certain magical ceremonies, succeeded in impregnating herself by
means of her husband's dead body. Then she fled to the papyrus
marshes of the Delta, taking Osiris' body with her in the chest
since there was no time to give it proper burial.
'When Set learned what had happened, he swore that he would
hunt Isis down and kill her, and that he would find Osiris' body
and destroy it for ever.
'Again now, in the story, we get one of those strange glimpses
of happenings many thousands of years ago which we can see more
clearly than the things of yesterday.
'In a few phrases it is recounted how Set searched for months
in vain, and then one night, the pregnant ex-Queen Isis, now a
destitute refugee alone and unattended, is seated beneath a
cluster of palm trees in the desert. Her husband's body, roughly
embalmed, is in the wooden chest beside her and she is conscious
of the movements of the child she bears. Suddenly her sorrowful
meditations are disturbed by a distant rumble breaking the
stillness of the night. The noise increases to a drumming
thunder as a party of horsemen come galloping across the sand.
Isis runs for cover to a nearby papyrus swamp and crouches waist
high in the water watching from amidst the reeds. The dusky
riders come thundering past. She sees that it is Set and his
dissolute nobles hunting by the brilliant light of the Egyptian
moon. One of them recognises the chest. With cries of triumph
they fling themselves from their saddles, break it to pieces and
drag out the body of Osiris. Hidden there, fearful and
trembling, Isis watches Set's dark, proud profile as he orders
the body to be torn into fourteen pieces and the parts
distributed throughout the length and breadth of the Kingdom so
that they might never be brought together again.
'Years later, Horus, the son of Isis, the Great God, the Hawk
of Light, who restored its blessings to mankind and lifted again
the veil of darkness that Set's treachery had brought to dim the
world, became master of the Kingdom. Then Isis roamed the
country seeking for the dismembered portions of her husband. She
did not attempt to assemble them again, but wherever she found
one she erected a great temple to his memory. In all, she
succeeded in finding thirteen pieces of the body, but the
fourteenth she never found. That Set had carefully embalmed and
kept himself. It was for this reason that, although Horus
defeated Set three times in battle he was never able to slay
him. The portion that Set retained was the most potent of all
charms-the phallus of the dead god, his brother.
'In the secret histories of esoterism it is stated that it has
since been heard of many times. For long periods through the
ages it has been completely lost. But whenever it is fouad it
brings calamity upon the world, and that is the thing which we
have to prevent Mocata securing at all costs today-the Talisman
of Set.'
When De Richleau had ceased speaking, they sat silent for a
while until Marie Lou said softly: 'I am feeling rather tired
now, Greyeyes, dear, and I think I'd like to rest, even if it is
impossible to sleep with all these lights.'
'All right. Then I'll say what I have to Princess. But please,
all of you'-the Duke paused to look at each of them in turn
-'listen carefully, because this is vitally serious.
'What may happen I have no idea. Perhaps nothing at all and
the worst we'll have to face is an uncomfortable night. But
Mocata threatened to get Simon away from us by hook or by crook,
and I feel certain that he meant it. I cannot tell you what form
his attack is likely to take, but I am sure he will literally do
his damnedest to break us up and get Simon out of our care
tonight.
'He may send the most terrible powers against us, but there is
one thing above all others that I want you to remember. As long
as we stay inside this pentacle we shall be safe, but if any of
us sets one foot outside it we risk eternal damnation.
'We may be called upon to witness the sort of horrors which it
is difficult for you to conceive. I mean visions such as you
have read of in Gustave Flaubert's Temptation of Saint Anthony,
or seen in pictures by the old Flemish masters such as Brueghel.
But they cannot do us the least harm as long as we remain where
we are.
'Again, we may see nothing, but the attack may develop in a
far more subtle form. That is to say, inside ourselves. Any, or
all of us, may find our reason being undermined by insidious
argument so that we may start telling each other that there is
nothing in the world to be frightened of and that we are utter
fools to spend a miserable night sitting here when we might all
be comfortably in bed upstairs. If that happens, it is a lie.
Even if I appear to change my mind and tell you that I have
thought of new arrangements which would be safer, you must not
believe me because it will not be my true self speaking. It may
be that an awful thirst will come upon us. That is why I have
had this big jug of'water brought in. We may be assailed by
hunger, but to meet that we have the fruit. It is possible that
we may be afflicted with earache or some other bodily pain
which, ordinarily, would make us want to go upstairs to seek
relief. If that happens we've just got to stick it till the
morning.
'Poor old Simon is likely to be afflicted worst because the
campaign will centre on an attempt to make him break out of the
circle. But we've got to stop him-by force, if need be. There
are two main defences which we can bring into play if any
manifestations do take place, as I fear they may.
'One is the Blue vibration. Shut your eyes and try to think of
yourselves as standing in an oval of blue light. The oval is
your aura, and the colour blue exceedingly potent in all things
pertaining to the spirit; the other is prayer. Do not endeavour
to make up complicated prayers or your words may become muddled
and you will find yourself saying something that you do not
mean. Confine yourselves to saying over and over again: "Oh,
Lord, protect me! Oh, Lord, protect me!" and not only say it but
think it with all the power of your will, visualising, if you
can, Our Lord upon the Cross with blue light streaming from His
body towards yourselves; but if you think you see Him outside
this pentacle beckoning you to safety while some terrible thing
threatens you from the other side, still you must remain
within.'
As De Richleau finished there was a murmur of assent. Then
Richard, with an arm about Marie Lou's shoulders said quietly:
'I understand, and we'll do everything you say.'
'Thank you. Now, Sirnon,' the Duke went on. 'I want you to say
clearly and distinctly seven times, "Om meni gadme aum." That is
the invocation to manathaer-your higher self.'
Simon did as he was bid, then they knelt together and each
offered a silent prayer that the Power of Light might guard and
protect them from all uncleanness, and that each might be
granted strength to aid the others should they be faced with any
peril.
They lay down then and tried to rest despite the burning
candles and the soft glow of the electric Light. Sleep was
utterly impossible to them in such circumstances. Yet no one
there had more to say upon any point that mattered and, after a
little time, no one felt that they could break the stillness by
endeavouring to make ordinary conversation.
The steady ticking of a clock came faintly from somewhere in
the depths of the house. Occasionally a log fell with a loud
plop and hissed for a moment in the fire grate. Then the little
noises of the night were hushed, and an immense silence, brood
ing and mysterious, seemed to have fallen upon them. In some
strange way it did not seem as though the quite octagonal room
was any longer a portion of the house or that outside the window
lay the friendly, well-cared-for garden that they knew so well.
Watchful, listening, intent, they lay silent, waiting to see
what the night would bring,
26
Rex Learns of the Undead
Tanith slept peacefully, curled up in Rex's arms, her golden
head pillowed upon his chest. For a little time anxious thoughts
occupied his mind. He reproached himself for having left Sirnon,
and the gnawing worm of doubt raised its head again to whisper
that Tanith had planned to lure him away from protecting his
friend, but he dismissed such thoughts almost immediately. Simon
would be safe enough in the care of Richard and Marie Lou.
Tanith was alone and needed him, and he soon convinced himself
that in remaining there he was breaking a lance against the
enemy as well, by preventing Mocata securing her again to assist
him, all unwillingly, in his hostilities.
The shadows lengthened and the patches of sunligbt dimmed, yet
still Tanith slept on-the sleep of utter exhaustion- brought
about by the terrible nervous crisis through which she had
passed from hour to hour during the previous day, the past
night, and that morning, in her attempt to seek safety with him.
With infinite precaution not to disturb her he looked at his
watch and found that the time was nearly eight o'clock. De
Richleau should be back by now and after all it was unlikely
that Mocata could prevent his return before sundown. De Richleau
might have lost his nerve for a few moments the night before,
but he had retrieved it brilliantly in that headlong dash at the
wheel of the Hispano down into the hellish valley where the
Satanists practised their grim rites. Now that they had secured
Simon safe and sound once more, Rex had an utter faith that De
Richleau would fight to the last ditch, with all the skill and
cunning of his subtle brain, and that stubborn, tenacious
courage that Rex knew so well, before he would surrender their
friend to the evi! powers again,
It was dark now; even the afterglow had faded, leaving the
trees as vague, dark sentinels in that silent wood. The under
growth was massed in bulky shadows and the colour had faded from
the grasses and wild-flowers on the green, mossy bank where he
lay with Tanith breathing so evenly in his embrace.
His back and arms were aching from his strained position but
he sat on while the moments fled, sleepy himself now, yet
determined not to give way to the temptation, even to doze, lest
silent evil should steal upon them where they lay.
Another hour crept by and then Tanith stirred slightly.
Another moment, and she had raised her head, shaking the tumbled
golden hair back from her face and blinking up at him a little
out of sleepy eyes.
'Rex, where are we?' she murmured indistinctly. 'What has
happened? I've had an awful dream.'
He smiled down at her and kissed her full on the lips.
'Together,' he said. 'That's all that matters, isn't it? But
if you must know, we're in the wood behind the road-house.'
'Of course,' she gave a little gasp, and hurriedly began to
tidy herself. 'But we can't stay here all night.'
The thought of taking her back to Cardinals Folly occurred to
him again, but in these timeless hours he had witnessed so many
things he would have thought impossible a few days before that
he dismissed the idea at once. Tanith, he felt convinced, was
not lying to him. She was genuinely repentant and terrified of
Mocata. But who could say what strange powers that sinister man
might not be able to exercise over her at a distance. He dared
not risk it. However, she was certainly right in saying that
they could not stay where they were all night,
We'd best go back to the road-house,' he suggested. They will
be able to knock us up a meal, and after, it'll be time enough
to figure out what we mean to do.'
'Yes,' she sighed a little. 'I am hungry now-terribly hungry.
Do let us go back and see if they can find us something to eat.'
Her arm through his, their fingers laced together, they walked
back the quarter of a mile to the little stream which separated
the wood from the inn garden. He lifted her over it again and
when they reached'the lounge of the 'Pride of Peacocks' they
found that it was already half-past nine.
Knowing that his friends would be anxious about him, Rex tried
to telephone immediately he got in, but the village exchange
told him that the line to Cardinals Folly was out of order, Then
he sent the trim maid for Mr. Wilkes, and when that worthy
arrived on the scene, inquired if it was too late for them to
have a hot meal.
'Not at all, sir,' Mr. Wilkes bent, quiet-voiced, deferential,
priestlike, benign. 'My wife will be very happy to cook you a
little dinner. What would you care for now? Fish is a little
difficult in these parts, except when I know that I have guests
staying and can order in advance, and game, of course, is un
fortunately out of season. But a nice young duckling perhaps, or
a chicken? My wife, if I may say so, does a very good Chicken
Maryland, sir, of which our American visitors have been kind
enough to express their approval from time to time.'
'Chicken Maryland,' exclaimed Rex. 'That sounds grand to me.
How about you, honey?'
Tanith nodded. 'Lovely, if only it is not going to take too
long.'
'Some twenty minutes, madam. Not more. Mrs. Wilkes will see to
it right away, and in the meantime, I've just had in a very nice
piece of smoked salmon, which comes to me from a London house. I
could recommend that if you would like to start your dinner
fairly soon.'
Rex nodded, and the aged Wilkes went on amiably: 'And now
sir-to drink? Red wine, if I might make so bold would be best
with the grill, perhaps. I have a little of the Clos de Vougoet
1920 left, which Mr. Richard Eaton was good enough to compliment
me on when he dined here last, and his Lordship, my late master,
always used to say that he found a glass of Justerini's
Amontillado before a meal lent an edge to the appetite.'
For a second Rex wavered. He recalled De Richleau's pro
hibition against alcohol, but he had been far from satisfied by
the brief rest which he had snatched that morning and was
feeling all the strain now of the events which had taken place
in the last forty-eight hours. Tanith, too, was looking pate and
drawn, despite her sleep. A bottle of good burgundy was the very
thing they needed to give them fresh strength and courage. He
could have sunk half a dozen cocktails with the greatest ease
and pleasure, but by denying himself spirits, he felt that he
was at least carrying out the kernel of the Duke's instructions.
Good wine could surely harm no one-so he acquiesced.
A quarter of an hour later, he was seated opposite to Tanith
at a little corner table in the dining-room, munching fresh,
warm toast and the smoked salmon with hungry relish, while the
neat little maid ministered to their wants, and the pontifical
Mr. Wilkes hovered eagle-eyed in the background. The chicken was
admirably cooked, and the wine lent an additional flavour by the
fact that his palate was unusually clean and fresh from having
denied himself those cocktails before the meal.
When the chicken was served, Mr. Wilkes murmured something
about a sweet and Rex, gazing entranced into Tanith's big eyes,
nodded vaguely. Which sign of assent resulted, a little later,
in the production of a flaming omelette au kirsch. Then Wilkes
came forward once more, with a suggestion that the dinner should
be rounded off by allowing him to decant a bottle of his
Cockburn's '08. But here, Rex was firm. The burgundy had served
its purpose, stimulated his brain and put fresh life into his
body. To drink a vintage port after it would have been pleasant
he knew, but certain to destroy the good effect and cause him to
feel sleepy. So he resisted Mr. Wilkes' blandishments.
After the meal Rex tried to get on to Cardinals Folly again
but the line was still reported out of order, so he scribbled a
note to Richard, saying that he was safe and well and would ring
them in the morning, then asked Wilkes to have it sent up to the
house by hand.
When the landlord had left them, they moved back into the
lounge and discussed how they should pass the night. Tanith was
as insistent as ever that under no circumstances should Rex
leave her to herself, even if she asked him later on to do so.
She felt that her only hope of safety lay in remaining with him
beside her until the morning, so it was decided that they spend
the night together in the empty lounge.
Tanith had already booked a room and so, to make all things
orderly in the mind of the good Mr. Wilkes, Rex booked another,
but told the landlord that, as Tanith suffered from insomnia,
they would probably remain in the lounge until very late, and so
he was not to bother about them when he locked up. As a gesture
he also borrowed from Wilkes a pack of cards, saying that they
meant to pass an hour or two playing nap.
The fire was made up and they settled down comfortably under
the shelter of the big mantel in the inglenook with a little
table before them upon which they spread out the cards for
appearance sake. But no sooner had the maid withdrawn than they
had their arms about each other once more and blissfully
oblivious of their surroundings, began that delightful first
exchange of confidences about their previous lives, which is
such a blissful hour for all lovers.
Rex would have been in the seventh heaven but for the thought
of this terrible business in which Tanith had got herself
involved and the threat of Mocata's power hanging like a sword
of Damocles above her head.
Again and again, from a variety of subjects and experiences
ranging the world over, and from their childhood to the present
day, they found themselves continually and inexplicably caught
back to that macabre subject which both were seeking to avoid.
In the end, both surrendered to it and allowed the thoughts
which were uppermost in their minds to enter their conversation
freely.
'I'm still hopelessly at sea about this business,' Rex
confessed. 'It's all so alien, so bizarre, so utterly fantastic.
I know I wasn't dreaming last night or the night before. I know
that if Simon hadn't got himself into trouble I wouldn't be
holding your loveliness in my arms right now. Yet, every time I
think of it, I feel that I must have been imagining things, and
that it just simply can't be true.'
'It is, my dear,' she pressed his hand gently; That is just
the horror of it. If it were any ordinary tangible peril, it
wouldn't be quite so terrifying. It wouldn't be quite so bad
even if we were living in the middle ages. Then at least, I
could seek sanctuary in some convent where the nuns would
understand
and the priests who were learned in such matters, exert them
selves to protect me. But in these days of modern scepticism
there is no one I can turn to; police and clergymen and doctors
would all think me insane. I only have you and after last night
I'm frightened, Rex, frightened.' A sudden flush mounted to her
cheeks again.
'I know, I know,' Rex soothed her gently. 'But you must try
all you know not to be. I've a feeling that you're scaring your
self more than is really necessary. I'll agree that Mocata might
hypnotise you if he got you on your own again, and maybe use you
in some way to get poor Simon back into his net, but what could
he actually do to you beyond that? He's not going to take a
chance on murdering anybody, so that the police could take a
hand, even if he had sufficient motive to want to try."
'I am afraid you don't understand, dearest,' she murmured
gently. 'A Satanist who is as far along the Path as Mocata does
not need a motive to do murder, unless you can call malicious
pleasure in the deed a motive in itself, and my having left him
in the lurch at such a critical time is quite sufficient to
anger him into bringing about my death.'
'I tell you, sweet, he'll never risk doing murder. In this
country it is far too dangerous a game.'
'But his murders are not like ordinary murders. He can kill
from a distance if he likes.'
'What-by sticking pins in a little wax figure with your name
scratched on it, or letting it melt away before the fire until
you pine and die?'
That is one way, but he is more likely to use the blood of
white mice.'
'How in the world do you mean?'
'I don't know very much about it except what I have picked up
from Madame D'Urfe and a few other people. They say that when a
very advanced adept wishes to kill someone, he feeds a white
mouse on some of the holy wafers that they compel people to
steal from churches for them. The sacrilegious aspect of the
thing is very important, you see. Then they perform the Catholic
ceremony of baptism over the mouse, christening it with the same
name as that of their intended victim. That creates an affinity
between the mouse and the person far stronger than carving their
name on any image.'
Then they kill the mouse, eh?'
'No, I don't think so. They draw off some of its blood,
impregnate that with their malefic will, vaporise it, and call
up an elemental to feed upon its essence. Then they perform a
mystic transfusion in their victim's veins causing the elemental
to poison them. But, Rex--'
'Yes, my sweet.'
'It is not that I am afraid to die. In any case, as I have
told you, there is no hope of my living out the year, but that
has not troubled me for a long time now. It is what may come
after that terrifies me so.'
'Surely he can't harm anybody once they're dead,' Rex pro
tested.
'But he can,' Tanith burst out with a little cry of distress
and fear,; 'If he kills me that way, he can make me dead to the
world, but I shall live on as an undead, and that would be
horrible.'
Rex passed his hand wearily across his eyes. 'Don't speak in
riddles, treasure. What is this thing you're frightened of? Just
tell me now in ordinary, plain English.'
'All right. I suppose you have heard of a vampire.'
'Why, yes. I've read of them in fiction. They're supposed to
come out of their graves every night and drink the blood of
human beings, aren't they? Until they're found out, then their
graves are opened up for a priest to cut off their head and
drive stakes through their hearts. Is that what you call an
undead?'
Tanith nodded slowly. 'Yes, that is an undead-a foul, re
volting thing, a living corpse that creeps through the night
like a great white slug, and a body bloated from drinking
people's blood. But have you never read of them in other books
beside nightmare fiction?'
'No, I wouldn't exactly say I have as far as I can remember.
The Duke would know all about them for a certainty -and Richard
Eaton too, I expect-because they're both great readers. But I'm
just an ordinary chap who's content to take his reading from the
popular novelists who can turn out a good, interesting story. Do
you mean to tell me seriously that such creatures have ever
existed outside the thriller writer's imagination?'
'I do. In the Carpathians, where I come from, the whole
countryside is riddled with vampire stories from real life. You
hear of them in Poland and Hungary and Roumania, too. All
through Middle Europe and right down into the Balkan countries
there have been endless cases of such revolting Satanic
manifestations. Anyone there will tell you that time and again,
when graves have been opened on suspicion, the corpses of
vampires have been found, months after burial, without the
slightest sign of decay, their flesh pink and flushed, their
eyes wide-open, bright and staring. The only difference to their
previous appearance is the way in which their canine teeth have
grown long and pointed. Often, even, they have been found with
fresh blood trickling out of the sides of then-mouths.'
'Say, that sounds pretty grim,' Rex exclaimed with a little
shudder.' I reckon De Richleau would explain that by saying that
the person was possessed before he died and that after, although
the actual soul passed on, the evil spirit continued to make a
doss-house of its borrowed body. But I can't think that anything
so awful would ever happen to you,'
'It might, my dear. That is what scares me so. And if Mocata
did get hold of me again he would not need to perform those
ghastly rites with impregnated blood. He could just throw me
into the hypnotic state and, after he had made me do all he
wished, allow some terrible thing to take possession of me at
once. The elemental would still remain in my body when he killed
me, and I should become one of those loathsome creatures-the
undead, if that happened, this very night.'
'Stop! I can't bear to think of it,' Rex drew her quickly-to
him again. 'But he shan't get hold of you. We'll fight him till
all's blue, and I'm going to marry you to-morrow so that I can
be with you constantly. We'll apply for a special licence first
thing in the morning.
She nodded, and a new light of hope came into her eyes. 'If
you wish it, Rex,' she whispered, 'and I do believe that by your
love and strength, you can save me. But you mustn't leave me for
a single second tonight, and we mustn't sleep a wink. Listen!'
She paused a moment as the bell in the village steeple chimed
the twelve strokes of midnight, which came to them clearly in
the stillness of the quiet room. 'It is the second of May now
-my fatal day.'
He smiled indulgently. 'Sure, I won't leave you, and we won't
sleep either. One of us might drop off if we were all alone, but
together we'll prod each other into keeping awake. Though I just
can't think that'll be necessary, with all the million things
I've got to tell you about your sweet self.'
She stood up then, raising her arms to smooth back her hair,
and making a graceful, slender silhouette against the flickering
flames of the heaped-up fire.
'No. The night will slip away before we know it,' she agreed
more cheerfully. 'Because I've got a thousand things to tell you
too. I must just slip upstairs to powder my nose now, and when I
come back, we'll settle down in earnest to make a night of it
together.'
A quick frown crossed his face. 'I thought you said I wasn't
to let you leave me even for a second. I don't like your going
upstairs alone at all.'
'But, my dear!' Tanith gave a little laugh. 'I can hardly take
you with me, and I shan't be more than a few moments.'
Rex nodded, reassured as he saw her standing there, smiling
down at him in the firelight so happy and normal in every way.
He felt certain that he would know at once if Mocata was trying
to exert his power on her from a distance, by that strange far-
away look which had come into her eyes and the fanatical note
that had raised the pitch of her voice each time she had spoken
of the imperative necessity of her reaching the meeting-place
for the Sabbat on the previous day. There was not the faintest
suggestion of that other will, imposed upon her own, in her face
or voice now, and obviously it would have been childish to
attempt to prevent her carrying out so sensible a suggestion
before settling down. The best part of six hours must elapse
before daylight began to filter greyly through the old-fashioned
bow window at the far end of the room.
'All right,' he laughed. Til give you five minutes by that
clock-but no more, remember, and if you're not down then, I'll
come up and get you.'
'Dear lover!' she stooped suddenly and kissed him, then
slipped out of the room closing the door softly behind her.
Rex lay back, spreading his great limbs now in the comfortable
corner of the inglenook, and stretching out his long legs to the
glow of the log fire. He wasn't sleepy, which amazed him when he
thought how little sleep he had had since he woke in his state-
room on the giant Cunarder the morning of the day that he dined
with De Richleau. That seemed ages ago now, weeks, months,
years. So many things had happened, so many new and staggering
thoughts come to seethe and ferment in his brain, yet Simon's
party had been held only a bare two nights before.
His hand moved lazily to his hip pocket to get a cigarette,
but half way to it he abandoned the attempt as too much trouble,
wriggling down instead more comfortably about the cushions.
He wasn't sleepy-not a bit. His brain had never been more
active and his thoughts turned for a moment to his friends at
Cardinals Folly. They, too, would be wide awake, braced, no
doubt, under De Richleau's determined leadership, to face an
attack from the powers of evil. De Richleau must be feeling
pretty sleepy he thought. Neither of them had had more than
three hours that morning after their exhausting night. They
hadn't got to bed much before dawn the night before either, and
the Duke had been up, according to Max, at seven in order to be
at the British Museum directly it opened. Say six hours in
sixty. That wasn't much, but De Richleau was an old campaigner
and he would stick it all right, Rex had no doubt.
He glanced at the clock, thinking it almost time that Tanith
should rejoin him, but saw that the slow-moving hand had only
advanced two minutes. 'Amazing how time drags when one is
watching it,' he thought, and his mind wandered on to the
reflection that he had been mighty wise not to drink anything
but that one glass of sherry and the burgundy for dinner. He
would probably have been horribly drowsy by now if he had been
fool enough to fall for the cocktails or the port. But he wasn't
sleepy-not a bit.
His mind began to form little mental pictures of some of those
strange episodes which he had lived through in the last two
days-old Madame D'Urfe smoking her cigar and then Tanith; Max
arranging the cushions in De Richleau's electric canoe at
Pangbourne, and then Tanith again. That plausible old humbug
Wilkes serving the Clos de Vougoet with meticulous care-a mighty
fine thing he made out of this pub no doubt -and then Tanith
once more, sitting opposite him at table, with the soft glow of
the shaded electric lamp lighting her oval face and throwing
strange shadows in the silken web of her golden hair.
He glanced at the clock again-another minute had crawled by,
and then he pictured Tanith as he had seen her only a few
moments before, bending to kiss him, her face warm and flushed
by the firelight, and those strange, deep, age-old eyes of hers
smiling tenderly into his beneath their heavy half-lowered lids.
It must be this strange wonderful love for her, he thought,
which kept him so alive and alert, for ordinarily his healthy
body demanded its fair share of sleep and he would have been
nodding his head off by this time. He could still see those
glorious golden eyes of hers smiling into his. The face above
them was indistinct and vague, but they remained clear and
shining in the shadows on the far side of the fireplace. The
eyes were changing now a little-losing their colour and fading
from gold to grey and then to a palish blue. Yet their bright
ness seemed to increase and they grew bigger as he held them
with his mental gaze.
He thought for a second of glancing at the clock again. It
seemed that Tanith had left him ages ago now, but judging by the
time it had taken for that long hand to crawl through three
minutes' space he felt that it could hardly yet have covered the
other two. Besides, he did not want to lose the focus of those
strange, bright eyes which he could see so plainly when he half
closed his own.
Rex wasn't sleepy-not a bit. But time is an illusion, and Rex
never afterwards knew how long he sat awake there in the semi-
darkness. Perhaps during the first portion of his watch some
strange power deluded his vision and the clock had in reality
moved on while he only thought that the minutes dragged so
heavily. In any case, those eyes that watched him from the
shadows were his last conscious thought, and next moment Rex was
sound asleep.
27
Within the Pentacle
While Rex slumbered evenly and peacefully before the dying
fire in the lounge of the 'Pride of Peacocks,' Richard, Marie
Lou, the Duke and Simon waited in the pentacle, on the floor of
the library at Cardinals Folly, for the dreary hours of night to
drag their way to morning.
They lay with their heads towards the centre of the circle and
their feet towards the rim, forming a human cross, but although
they did not speak for a long time after they had settled down,
none of them managed to drop off to sleep.
The layer of clean sheets and blankets beneath them was
pleasant enough to rest on for a while, but the hard, unyielding
floorboards under it soon began to cause them discomfort. The
bright flames of the burning candles and the steady glow of the
electric light showed pink through their closed eyelids, making
repose difficult, and they were all keyed up to varying degrees
of anxious expectancy.
Marie Lou was restless and miserable. Nothing but her fondness
for Simon, and the Duke's plea that the presence of Richard and
herself would help enormously in his protection, would have
induced her to play any part in such proceedings. Her firm
belief in the supernatural filled her with grim forebodings, and
she tried in vain to shut out her fears by sleep. Every little
noise that broke the brooding stillness, the creaking of a beam
as the old house eased itself upon its foundations, or the
whisper of the breeze as it rustled the leaves of the trees hi
the garden, caused her to start-wide awake again, her muscles
taut with alarm and apprehension.
Richard did not attempt to sleep. He lay revolving a number of
problems in his mind. Fleur d'amour's birthday was in a couple
of weeks' tune. The child was easy, but a present for Marie Lou
was a different question. It must be something that she wanted
and yet a surprise. A difficult matter when she already had
everything with which his fine fortune could endow her, and
jewellery was not only banal but absurd. The sale of the lesser
stones among the Shulimoff treasure, which they had brought out
of Russia, had realised enough to provide her with a handsome
independent income and her retention of the finer gems alone
equipped her magnificently in that direction. He toyed with the
idea of buying her a two-year-old. He was not a racing man but
she was fond of horses and it would be fun for her to see her
own run at the lesser meetings.
After a while he turned restlessly on to his tummy, and began
to ponder this wretched muddle into which Simon had got himself.
The more he thought about it the less he could subscribe to the
Duke's obvious beliefs. That so-called Black Magic was still
practised in most of the Continental capitals and many of the
great cities in America, he knew. He had even met a man, a few
years before, who had told him that he had attended a
celebration of the Black Mass at a house in the Earls Court
district of London, yet he could not credit that it had been
anything more than a flimsy excuse for a crowd of intellectual
decadents to get disgustingly drunk and participate in a
wholesale sexual orgy. Simon was not that sort, or a fool
either, so it was certainly queer that he should have got
himself mixed up with such beastliness.
Richard turned over again, yawned, glanced at his friend whom,
he decided, he had never seen look more normal, and wondered if,
out of courtesy to the Duke, he could possibly continue to play
his part in this tedious farce until morning.
The banishing rituals which De Richleau had performed upon
Simon the previous night at Stonehenge had certainly proved
successful, and he had had a good sleep that afternoon. His
brain was now quick and clear as it had been in the old days
and, although Mocata's threats were principally directed against
himself, he was by far the most cheerful of the party. Despite
his recent experiences, his natural humour bubbling up very
nearly caused him to laugh at the thought of them all lying on
that hard floor because he had made an idiot of himself, and
Richard's obvious disgust at the discomforts imposed by the Duke
caused him much amusement. Nevertheless, he recognised that his
desire to laugh was mainly due to nervous tension, and accepted
with full understanding the necessity for these extreme
precautions. To think, for only a second, of how narrow his
escape had been was enough to sober instantly any tendency to
mirth and send a quick shudder through his limbs. He was only
anxious now, having dragged his friends into this horrible
affair, to cause them as little further trouble as possible by
following the Duke's leadership without question. With resolute
determination he kept his thoughts away from any of his dealings
with Mocata and set himself to endure his comfortless couch with
philosophic patience.
To outward appearances De Richleau slept. He lay perfectly
still on his back breathing evenly and almost imperceptibly, but
he had always been able to do with very little sleep. Actually
he was recruiting his forces in a manner that was not possible
to the others. That gentle rhythmic breathing, perfectly but
unconsciously timed from long practice, was the way of the Raja
Yoga which he had learnt when young, and all the time he
visualised himself, the others, the whole room as
blue-blue-blue, the colour vibration which gives love and
sympathy and spiritual attainment. Yet he was conscious of every
tiny movement made by the others; the gentle sighing of the
breeze outside, and the occasional plop of burning logs as they
fell into the embers. For over two hours he barely moved a
muscle but all his senses remained watchful and alert.
The night seemed never-ending. Outside the wind dropped and a
steady rain began to fall, dripping with monotonous regularity
from the eaves on to the terrace. Richard became more and more
sore from the hard floor. He was tired now and bored by this
apparently senseless vigil. He thought that it must be about
half past one, and daylight would not come to release them from
their voluntary prison before half past five or six. That meant
another four hours of this acute and momentarily increasing
discomfort. As he tossed and turned it grew upon him with ever-
increasing force how stupid and futile this whole affair seemed
to be. De Richleau was so obviously the victim of a gang of
clever tricksters, and his wide reading on obscure subjects had
caused his imagination to run away with him. To pander to such
folly any longer simply was not good enough. With these thoughts
now dominating his mind Richard suddenly sat up.
'Look here,' he said. 'I'm sick of this. A joke's a joke, but
we've had no lunch and precious little dinner, and I haven't had
a drink all day. Some of you have got far too lively an
imagination, and we are making utter fools of ourselves. We had
better go upstairs. If you're really frightened of anything
happening to Simon we could easily shift four beds into one room
and all sleep within a hand's reach of each other. Nobody will
be able to get at him then. But frankly, at the moment, I think
we're behaving like a lot of lunatics.'
De Richleau rose with a jerk and gave him a sharp look from
beneath his grey slanting devil's eyebrows. 'Something's
beginning to happen,' he told himself swiftly. 'They're working
upon Richard, because he's the most sceptical amongst us, to try
and make him break up the pentacle.' Aloud he said quietly: 'So
you're still unconvinced that Simon is in real danger, Richard?'
'Yes, I am.' Richard's voice held an angry aggressive note
quite foreign to his normal manner. 'I regard this Black Magic
business as stupid nonsense. If you could cite me a single case
where so-called magicians have actually done their stuff before
sane people it would be different. But they're charlatans- every
one of them. Take Cagliostro-he was supposed to make gold but
nobody ever saw any of it, and when the Inquisition got hold of
him they bunged him in a dungeon in Rome and he died there in
abject misery. His Black Magic couldn't even procure him a hunk
of bread. Look at Catherine de Medici. She was a witch on the
grand scale if ever there was one- built a special tower at
Vincennes for Cosimo Ruggeri, an Italian sorcerer. They used to
slit up babies and practise all sorts of abominations there
together night after night to ensure the death of Henry of
Navarre and the birth of children to her own sons. But it didn't
do her a ha'porth of good. All four died childless so that at
last, despite all her bloody sacrifices, the House of Valois was
extinct, and Henry, the hated Bear-nais, became King of France
after all. Come nearer home if you like. Take that absurd fool
Elipas Levi who was supposed to be the Grand High Whatnot in
Victorian times. Did you ever read his book, The Doctrine and
Ritual of Magic! In his introduction he professes that he is
going to tell you all about the game and that he's written a
really practical book, by the aid of which anybody who likes can
raise the devil, and perform all sorts of monkey tricks. He
drools on for hundreds of pages about fiery swords and
tetragrams and the terrible aqua poffana, but does he tell you
anything? Not a blessed thing. Once it comes to a showdown he
hedges like the crook he was and tells you that such mysteries
are far too terrible and dangerous to be entrusted to the
profane. Mysterious balderdash my friend. I'm going to have a
good strong nightcap and go to bed.'
Marie Lou looked at him in amazement. Never before had she
heard Richard denounce any subject with such passion and venom.
Ordinarily, he possessed an extremely open mind and, if he
doubted any statement, confined himself to a kindly but slightly
cynical expression of disbelief. It was extraordinary that he
should suddenly forget even his admirable manners and be
downright rude to one of his greatest friends.
De Richleau studied his face with quiet understanding and as
Richard stood up he stood up too, laying his hand upon the
younger man's shoulder. 'Richard,' he said. 'You think I'm a
superstitious fool, don't you?'
'No.' Richard shrugged uncomfortably. 'OnIy that you've been
through a pretty difficult time and, quite frankly, that your
imagination is a bit overstrained at the moment.'
The Duke smiled. 'All right, perhaps you are correct, but we
have been friends for a long time now and this business tonight
has not interfered with our friendship in any way, has it?'
'Why, of course not. You know that.'
'Then, if I begged of you to do something for my sake, just
because of that friendship, you would do it, wouldn't you?'
'Certainly I would,' Richard's hesitation was hardly percep
tible and the Duke cut in quickly, taking him at his word.
'Good! Then we will agree that Black Magic may be nothing but
a childish superstition. Yet I happen to be frightened of it, so
I ask you, my friend, who is not bothered with such stupid
fears, to stay with me tonight-and not move outside this
pentacle.'
Richard shrugged again, and then smiled ruefully. . . .
'You've caught me properly now so I must make the best of it;
quite obviously if you say that, it is impossible for me to
refuse.'
Thank you,' De Richleau murmured as they both sat down again,
and to himself he thought: 'That's the first move in the game to
me.' Then as a fresh silence fell upon the party, he began to
ruminate upon the strangeness of the fact that elemen-tals and
malicious spirits may be very powerful, but their nature is so
low and their intelligence so limited that they can nearly
always be trapped by the divine spark of reason which is the
salvation of mankind. The snare was such an obvious one and yet
Richard's true nature had reasserted itself so rapidly that the
force, which had moved him to try and break up their circle for
its benefit, had been scotched almost before it had had a chance
to operate.
They settled down again but in some subtle way the atmosphere
had changed. The fire glowed red on its great pile of ashes, the
candles burned unflickeringly in the five points of the star,
and the electric globes above the cornices still lit every comer
of the room with a soft diffused radiance, yet the four friends
made no further pretence of trying to sleep. Instead they sat
back to back, while the moments passed, creeping with leaden
feet towards the dawn.
Marie Lou was perplexed and worried by Richard's outburst, De
Richleau tense with a new expectancy, now he felt that psychic
forces were actually moving within the room. Stealthy
-invisible-but powerful; he knew them to be feeling their way
from bay to bay of the pentacle, seeking for any imperfection in
the barrier he had erected, just as a strong current swirls and
eddies about the jagged fissures of a reef searching for an
entrance into a lagoon.
Simon sat crouched, his hands clasped round has knees,
staring, apparently with unseeing eyes, at the long lines of
books. It seemed that he was listening intently and the Duke
watched him with special care, knowing that he was the weak spot
of their defence. Presently, his voice a little hoarse, Simon
spoke:
'I'm awfully thirsty. I wish we'd got a drink.'
De Richleau smiled, a little grimly. Another of the minor
manifestations-the evil was working upon Simon now but only to
give another instance of its brutish stupidity. It overlooked
the fact that he had provided for such an emergency with that
big carafe of water in the centre of the pentacle. The fact that
it had caused Simon to forget its presence was of little moment.
'Here you are, my friend,' he said, pouring out a glass. This
will quench your thirst.'
Simon sipped it and put it aside with a shake of his narrow
head. 'Do you use well-water, Richard?' he asked jerkily. This
stuff tastes beastly to me-brackish and stale.'
'Ah!' thought De Richleau. 'That's the line they are trying,
is it? Well, I can defeat them there,' and taking Simon's glass
he poured the contents back into the carafe. Then he picked up
his bottle of Lourdes water. There was very little in it now for
the bulk of it had been used to fill the five cups which stood
in the vales of the pentagram-but enough-and he sprinkled a few
drops into the water in the carafe.
Richard was speaking-instinctively now in a lowered voice
-assuring Simon that they always used Burrows Malvern for
drinking purposes, when the Duke filled the glass again and
handed it back to Simon. 'Now try that.'
Simon sipped again and nodded quickly. 'Urn, that seems quite
different. I think it must have been my imagination before,' and
he drank off the contents of the glass.
Again for a long period no one spoke. Only the scraping of a
mouse behind the wainscot, sounding abnormally loud, jarred upon
the stillness. That frantic insistent gnawing frayed Marie Lou's
nerves to such a pitch that she wanted to scream, but after a
while that, too, ceased and the heavy silence, pregnant with
suspense, enveloped them once more. Even the gentle patter on
the window-panes was no longer there to remind them of healthy,
normal things, for the rain had stopped, and in that soundless
room the only movement was the soft flicker of the logs, piled
high in the wide fireplace.
It seemed that they had been crouching in that pentacle for
nights on end and that their frugal dinner lay days away. Their
discomfort had been dulled into a miserable apathy and they were
drowsy now after these hours of strained uneventful watching.
Richard lay down again to try and snatch a little sleep. The
Duke alone remained alert. He knew that this long interval of
inactivity on the part of the malefic powers was only a snare
designed to give a false sense of security before the renewal of
the attack. At length he shifted his position slightly and as he
did so he chanced to glance upwards at the ceiling. Suddenly it
seemed to him that the Lights were not quite so bright as they
had been. It might be his imagination, due to the fact that he
was anticipating trouble, but somehow he felt certain that the
ceiling had been brighter when he had looked at it before. In
quick alarm he roused the others.
Simon nodded, realising why De Richleau had touched him on the
shoulder and confirming his suspicion. Then with straining eyes,
they all watched the cornice, where the concealed lights ran
round the wall above the top of the bookshelves.
The action was so slow, that each of them felt their eyes must
be deceiving them, and yet an inner conviction told them that it
was true. Shadows had appeared where no shadows were before.
Slowly but surely the current was failing and the lights dimming
as they watched.
There was something strangely terrifying now about that quiet
room. It was orderly and peaceful, just as Richard knew it day
by day, except for the abseace of the furniture. No nebulous
ghost-like figure had risen up to confront them, but there, as
the minutes passed, they were faced with an unaccountable
phenomenon-those bright electric globes hidden from their sight
were gradually but unquestionably being dimmed.
The shadows from the bookcases lengthened. The centre of me
ceiling became a dusky patch. Gradually, gradually, as with
caught breath they watched, the room was being plunged in
darkness. Soundless and stealthy, that black shadow upon the
ceiling grew in size and the binding of the books became obscure
where they had before been bright until, after what seemed an
eternity of time, no light remained save only the faintest line
just above the rim of the top bookshelf, the five candles
burning steadily in the points of the five-starred pentagram,
and the dying fire.
Richard shuddered suddenly. 'My God! It's cold,' he exclaimed,
drawing Marie Lou towards him. The Duke nodded, silent and
watchful. He felt that sinister chill draught beginning to flow
upon the back of his neck, and his scalp prickled as he swung
round with a sudden jerk to face it.
There was nothing to be seen-only the vague outline of the
bookcases rising high and stark towards the ceiling where the
dull ribbon of light still glowed. The flames of the candles
were bent now at an angle under the increasing strength of the
cold invisible air current that pressed steadily upon them.
De Richleau began to intone a prayer. The wind ceased as
suddenly as it had begun, but a moment later it began to play
upon them again-this time from a different quarter.
The Duke resumed his prayer-the wind checked-and then came
with renewed force from another angle. He swung to meet it but
it was at his back again.
A faint, low moaning became perceptible as the unholy blast
began to circle round the pentacle. Round and round it
swirled with ever-increasing strength and violence, beating up
out of the shadows in sudden wild gusts of arctic iciness, and
tearing at them with chill, invisible, clutching fingers, so
that it seemed as if they were standing in the very vortex of a
cyclone. The candles flickered wildly-and went out.
Richard, his scepticism badly shaken, quickly pushed Marie Lou
to one side and whipped out his matches. He struck one, and got
the nearest candle alight again but, as he turned to the next,
that cold damp evil wind came once more, chilling the
perspiration that had broken out upon his forehead, snuffing the
candle that he had re-lit and the half-burnt match which he
still held between his fingers,
He lit another and it spluttered out almost before the wood
had caught-another-and another, but they would not burn.
He glimpsed Simon's face for an instant, white, set, ghastly,
the eyeballs protruding unnaturally as he knelt staring out into
the shadows-then the whole centre of the room was plunged in
blackness.
'We must hold hands,' whispered the Duke. 'Quick, it will
strengthen our resistance,' and in the murk they fumbled for
each other's fingers, all standing up now, until they formed a
little ring in the very centre of the pentagram, hand clasped in
hand and bodies back to back.
The whirling hurricane ceased as suddenly as it had begun. A
unnatural stillness descended on the room again. Then without
warning, an uncontrollable fit of trembling took possession of
Marie Lou.
'Steady, my sweet,' breathed Richard, gripping her 'hand more
tightly, 'you'll be all right in a minute.' He thought that she
was suffering from the effect of that awful cold which had
penetrated the thin garments of them all, but she was standing
facing the grate and her knees shook under her as she stammered
out:
'But look-the fire.'
Simon was behind her but the Duke and Richard, who were on
either side, turned their heads and saw the thing that had
caused her such excess of terror. The piled-up logs had flared
into fresh life as that strange rushing wind had circled round
the room, but now the flames had died down and, as their eyes
rested upon it, they saw that the red hot embers were turning
black. It was as though some monstrous invisible hand was
dabbing at it, then almost in a second, every spark of light in
that great, glowing fire was quenched.
'Pray,' urged the Duke, 'for God's sake, pray.'
After a little their eyes grew accustomed to this new dark
ness. The electric globes hidden behind the cornice were not
quite dead. They flickered and seemed about to fail entirely
every few moments, yet always the power exerted against them
seemed just not quite enough, for their area of light would
increase again, so that the shadows across the ceiling and below
the books were driven back. The four friends waited with
pounding hearts as they watched that silent struggle between
light and darkness and the swaying of the shadows backwards and
forwards, that ringed them in.
For what seemed an immeasurable time they stood in silent
apprehension, praying that the last gleam of light would hold
out, then, shattering that eerie silence like the sound of guns
there came three swift, loud knocks upon the window-pane.
'What's that?' snapped Richard.
'Stay still,' hissed the Duke.
A voice came suddenly from outside in the garden. It was clear
and unmistakable. Each one of them recognised it instantly as
that of Rex.
'Say, I saw your light burning. Come on and let me in.'
With a little sigh of relief at the breaking of the tension,
Richard let go Marie Lou's hand and took a step forward. But the
Duke grabbed his shoulder and jerked him back:
'Don't be a fool,' he rasped. 'It's a trap.'
'Come on now. What in heck is keeping you?' the voice
demanded. 'It's mighty cold out here, let me in quick.'
Richard alone remained momentarily unconvinced that it was a
superhuman agency at work. The others felt a shiver of horror
run through their limbs at the perfect imitation of Rex's voice,
which they were convinced was a manifestation of some terrible
entity endeavouring to trick them into leaving their carefully
constructed defence.
'Richard,' the voice came again, angrily now. 'It's Rex I tell
you-Rex. Stop all this fooling and get this door undone.' But
the four figures in the pentacle now remained tense, silent and
unresponsive.
The voice spoke no more and once again there was a long
interval of silence.
De Richleau feared that the Adversary was gathering his forces
for a direct attack and it was that, above all other things,
which filled him with dread. He was reasonably confident that
his own intelligence would serve to sense out and avoid any
fresh pitfalls which might be set, providing the others would
obey his bidding and remain steadfast in their determination not
to leave the pentacle, but he had failed in his attempt to
secure the holy wafers of the Blessed Sacrament that afternoon,
the lights were all but overcome, the sacred candles had been
snuffed out. The holy water, horseshoes, garlic and the pentacle
itself might only prove a partial defence if the dark entities
which were about them made an open and determined assault,
'What's that!' exclaimed Simon, and they swung round to face
the new danger. The shadows were massing into deeper blackness
in one corner of the room. Something was moving there.
A dim phosphorescent blob began to glow in the darkness;
shimmering and spreading into a great hummock, its outline
gradually became clearer. It was not a man form nor yet an
animal, but heaved there on the floor like some monstrous living
sack. It had no eyes or face but from it there radiated a
terrible malefic intelligence.
Suddenly there ceased to be anything ghostlike about it. The
Thing had a whitish pimply skin, leprous and unclean, like some
huge silver slug. Waves of satanic power rippled through its
spineless body, causing it to throb and work continually like a
great mass of new-made dough. A horrible stench of decay and
corruption filled the room; for as it writhed it exuded a slimy
poisonous moisture which trickled in little rivulets across the
polished floor. It was solid, terribly real, a living thing.
They could even see long, single, golden hairs, separated from
each other by ulcerous patches of skin, quivering and waving as
they rose on end from its flabby body-and suddenly it began to
laugh at them, a low, horrid, chuckling laugh.
Marie Lou reeled against Richard, pressing the back of her
hand against her mouth and biting into it to prevent a scream.
His eyes were staring, a cold perspiration broke out upon his
face.
De Richleau knew that it was a Saiitii manifestation of the
most powerful and dangerous kind. His nails bit into the palms
of his hands as he watched that shapeless mass, silver white and
putrescent, heave and ferment.
Suddenly it moved, with the rapidity of a cat, yet they heard
the squelching sound as it leapt along the floor, leaving a wet
slimy trail in its wake, that poisoned the air like foul gases
given off by animal remains.
They spun round to face it, then it laughed again, mocking
them with that quiet, diabolical chuckle that had the power to
fill them with such utter dread.
It lay for a moment near the window pulsating with demoniac
energy like some enormous livid heart. Then it leapt again back
to the place where it had been before.
Shuddering at the thought of that ghastliness springing upon
then- backs they turned with lightning speed to meet it, but it
only lay there wobbling and crepitating with unholy glee.
'Oh, God!' gasped Richard.
The masked door which led up to the nursery was slowly
opening. A line of white appeared in the gap from near the floor
to about three feet in height. It broadened as the door swung
back poiselessly upon its hinges, and Marie Lou gave a terrified
cry.
'It's Fleur!'
The men, too, instantly recognised the little body, in the
white nightgown, vaguely outlined against the blackness of the
shadows, as the face with its dark aureole of curling hair be
came clear.
The Thing was only two yards from the child. With hideous
merriment it chuckled evilly and flopping forward, decreased the
distance by a half.
With one swift movement, De Richleau Sung his arm about Marie
Lou's neck and jerked her backwards, her chin gripped fast in
the crook of his elbow. 'It's not Fleur,' he cried desperately.
'Only some awful thing which has taken her shape to deceive
you.'
'Of course it's Fleur-she walking in her sleep!' Richard
started forward to spring towards the child, but De Richleau
grapped his arm with his free hand and wrenched him back.
'It's not,' he insisted in an agonised whisper. 'Richard, I
beg you! Have a little faith in me! Look at her face-it's blue!
Oh, Lord protect us!'
At that positive suggestion, thrown out with such vital force
at a moment of supreme emotional tension, it did appear to them
for an instant that the child's face had a corpse-like bluish
tinge then, upon the swift plea for Divine aid, the lines of the
figure seemed to blur and tremble. The Thing laughed, but this
time with thwarted malice, a high-pitched, angry, furious note.
Then both the child and that nameless Thing became transparent
and faded. The silent heavy darkness, undisturbed by sound or
movement, settled all about them once again.
With a gasp of relief the straining Duke released his pri
soners. 'Now do you believe me?' he muttered hoarsely, but there
was not time for them to reply. The next attack developed almost
instantly.
Simon was crouching in the middle of the circle. Marie Lou
felt his body trembling against her thigh. She put her hand on
his shoulder to steady him and found that he was shaking like an
epileptic in a fit.
He began to gibber. Great shudders shook his frame from head
to toe and suddenly he burst into heart-rending sobs.
'What is it, Simon,' she bent towards him quickly, but he took
no notice of her and crouched there on all fours like a dog
until, with a sudden jerk, he pulled himself upright and began
to mutter:
'I won't-I won't I say-I won't. D'you hear-- You mustn't make
me-no-no-- No!' Then with a reeling, drunken motion he staggered
forward in the direction of the window. But Marie Lou was too
quick for him and Sung both arms about his neck.
'Simon darling-Simon,' she panted. 'You mustn't leave us.'
For a moment he remained still, then, his body twisted
violently as though his limbs were animated by some terrible
inhuman force, and he flung her from him. The mild good-natured
smile had left his face and it seemed, in the faint light which
still glowed from the cornice, that he had become an utterly
changed personality-his mouth hung open showing the bared teeth
in a snarl of ferocious rage-his eyes glinted hot and dangerous
with the glare of insanity-a little dribble of saliva ran down
his chin.
'Quick, Richard,' cried the Duke. 'They've got him-for God's
sake pull him down!'
Richard had seen enough now to destroy his scepticism for
life. He followed De Richleau's lead, grappling frantically with
Simon, and all three of them crashed struggling to the floor,
'Oh, God,' sobbed Marie Lou. 'Oh, God, dear God!'
Simon's breath came in great gasps as though his chest would
burst. He fought and struggled like a maniac, but Richard,
desperate now, kneed him in the stomach and between them they
managed to hold him down. Then De Rich-leau, who, fearing such
an attack, had had the forethought to provide himself with
cords, succeeded in tying his wrists and ankles.
Richard rose panting from the struggle, smoothed back his dark
hair, and said huskily to the Duke. 'I take it all back. I'm
sorry if I've been an extra nuisance to you.'
De Richleau patted him on the elbow. He could not smile for
his eyes were flickering, even as Richard spoke, from corner to
corner of that grim, darkened room, seeking, yet dreading, some
new form in which the Adversary might attempt their undoing.
All three linked their arms together and stood, with Simon's
body squirming at their feet, jerking their heads from side to
side in nervous expectancy. They had not long to wait. Indis
tinct at first, but certain after a moment, there was a stirring
in the blackness near the door. Some new horror was forming out
there in the shadows beyond the pointers of the pentacle-just on
a level with their heads.
Their grip upon each other tightened as they fought des
perately to recruit their courage. Marie Lou stood between the
others, her eyes wide and distended, as she watched this fresh
manifestation gradually take shape and gain solidity.
Her scalp began to prickle beneath her chestnut curls. The
Thing was forming into a long, dark, beast-like face. Two tiny
points of light appeared in it just above the level of her eyes.
She felt the short hairs at the back of her skull lift of their
own volition like the hackles of a dog.
The points of light grew in size and intensity. They were
eyes. Round, protuberant and burning with a fiery glow, they
bored into hers, watching her with a horrible unwinking stare.
She wanted desperately to break away and run, but her knees
sagged beneath her. The head of the Beast merged into powerful
shoulders and the blackness below solidified into strong thick
legs.
'It's a horse!' gasped Richard. 'A riderless horse.'
De Richleau groaned. It was a horse indeed. A great black
stallion and it had no rider that was visible to them, but he
knew its terrible significance. Mocata, grown desperate by his
failures to wrest Simon from their keeping, had abandoned the
attempt and, in savage revenge, now sent the Angel of Death
himself to claim them.
A saddle of crimson leather was strapped upon the stallion's
back, the pressure of invisible feet held the long stirrup
leathers rigid to its flanks, and unseen hands held the reins
taut a few inches above its withers. The Duke knew well enough
that no human who has beheld that dread rider in all his sombre
glory has ever lived to tell of it. If that dark Presence broke
into the pentacle they would see him all too certainly, but at
the price of death.
The sweat streaming down his face, Richard held his ground,
staring with fascinated horror at the muzzle of the beast, The
fleshy nose wrinkled, the lips drew back, barring two rows of
yellowish teeth. It champed its silver bit. Flecks of foam,
white and real, dripped from its loose mouth.
It snorted violently and its heated breath came like two
clouds of steam from its quivering nostrils warm and damp on his
face. He heard De Richleau praying, frantically, unceasingly,
and tried to follow suit.
The stallion whinnied, tossed its head and backed into the
bookcases drawn by the power of those unseen hands, its mighty
hoofs ringing loud on the boards. Then, as though rowelled by
knife-edged spurs, it was launched upon them.
Marie Lou screamed and tried to tear herself from De Rich-
leau's grip, but his slim fingers were like a steel vice upon
her arm. He remained there, ashen-faced but rigid, fronting the
huge beast which seemed about to trample all three of them under
foot.
As it plunged forward the only thought which penetrated
Richard's brain was to protect Marie Lou, Instead of leaping
back, he sprang in front of her with his automatic levelled and
pressed the trigger.
The crash of the explosion sounded like a thunder-clap in that
confined space. Again-again-again, he fired while blinding
flashes lit the room as though with streaks of lighting. For a
succession of seconds the whole library was as bright as day and
the gilded bookbacks stood out so clearly that De Richleau could
even read the titles across the empty space where, so lately,
the great horse had been.
The silence that descended on them when Richard ceased fire
was so intense that they could hear each other breathing, and
for the moment they were plunged in utter darkness.
After that glaring succession of flashes from the shots, the
little rivers of light around the cornice seemed to have shrunk
to the glimmer of night lights coming beneath heavy curtains.
They could no longer even see each other's figures as they
crouched together in the ring.
The thought of the servants flashed for a second into
Richard's mind. The shooting was bound to have fetched them out
of bed. If they came down their presence might put an end to
this ghastly business. But the minutes passed. No welcome sound
of running feet came to break that horrid stillness that had
closed in upon them once more. With damp hands be fingered his
automatic and found that the magazine was empty. In his frantic
terror he had loosed off every one of the eight shots.
How long they remained there, tense with horror, peering again
into those awful shadows, they never knew, yet each became
suddenly aware that the steed of the Dark Angel, who had been
sent out from the underworld to bring about their destruction,
was steadily re-forming.
The red eyes began to glow in the long dark face. The body
lengthened. The stallion's hoof-beats rang upon the floor as it
stamped with impatience to be unleashed. The very smell of the
stable was in the room. That gleaming harness stood out plain
and clear. The reins rose sharply from its polished bit to bend
uncannily in that invisible grip above its saddle bow. The black
beast snorted, reared high in to the air, and then the crouching
humans faced that terrifying charge again.
The Duke felt Marie Lou sway against him, clutch at his
shoulder, and slip to the floor. The strain had proved too great
and she had fainted. He could do nothing for her-the beast was
actually upon them.
It baulked, upon the very edge of the pentacle, its fore hoofs
slithering upon the polished floor, its back legs crashing under
it as though faced with some invisible barrier.
With a neigh of fright and pain it flung up its powerful head
as though its face had been brought into contact with a red-hot
bar. It backed away champing and whinnying until its steaming
hindquarters pressed against the book-lined wall.
Richard stooped to clasp Marie Lou's limp body. In their fear
they had all unconsciously retreated from the middle to the edge
of the circle. As he knelt his foot caught one of the cups of
Holy Water set in the vales of the pentacle. It toppled over.
The water spilled and ran to waste upon the floor.
Instantly a roar of savage triumph filled the room, coming
from beneath their feet. The ab-human monster from the outer
circle-that obscene sack-like Thing-appeared again. Its body
vibrated with tremendous rapidity. It screamed at them with
positively frantic glee. With incredible speed the stallion was
swung by its invisible rider at the gap in the protective
barrier. The black beast plunged, scattering the gutted candles
and dried mandrake, then reared above them, its great, dark
belly on a level with their heads, its enormous hoofs poised in
mid-air about to batter out their brains.
For one awful second it hovered there while Richard crouched
gazing upward, his arms locked tight round the unconscious Marie
Lou, De Richleau stood his ground above them both, the sweat
pouring in great rivulets down his lean face.
Almost, it seemed, the end had come. The the Duke used his
final resources, and did a thing which shall never be done
except in the direst emergency when the very soul is in peril of
destruction. In a clear sharp voice he pronounced the last two
lines of the dread Sussamma Ritual.
A streak of light seemed to curl for a second round the
stallion's body, as though it had been struck with unerring aim,
caught in the toils of some gigantic whip-lash and hurled back.
The Thing disintegrated instantly in sizzling atoms of
opalescent light. The horse dissolved into the silent shadows.
Those mysterious and unconquerable powers, the Lord of Light,
the Timeless Ones, had answered; compelied by those mystic words
to leave their eternal contemplation of Supreme Beatitude for a
fraction of earthly time, to intervene for the salvation of
those four small flickering flames that burned in the
beleaguered humans.
An utter silence descended upon the room. It was so still that
De Richleau could hear Richard's heart pounding in his breast.
Yet he knew that by that extreme invocation they had been
carried out of their bodies on to the fifth. Astral plane. His
conscious brain told him that it was improbable that they would
ever get back. To call upon the very essence of light requires
almost superhuman courage, for Prana possesses an energy and
force utterly beyond the understanding of the human mind. As it
can shatter darkness in a manner beside which a million candle
power searchlight becomes a pallid beam, so it can attract all
lesser light to itself and carry it to realms undreamed of by
infinitesimal man.
For a moment it seemed that they had been ripped right out of
the room and were looking down into it. The pentacle had become
a flaming star. Their bodies were dark shadows grouped in its
centre. The peace and silence of death surged over them in great
saturating waves. They were above the house. Cardinals Folly
became a black speck in the distance. Then everything faded.
Time ceased, and it seemed that for a thousand thousand years
they floated, atoms of radiant matter in an immense immeasurable
void-circling for ever in the soundless stratosphere-being shut
off from every feeling and sensation, as though travelling with
effortless impulse five hundred fathoms deep below the current
levels of some uncharted sea.
Then, after a passage of eons in human time they saw the house
again, infinitely far beneath them, their bodies lying in the
pentacle and that darkened room. In an utter eerie silence the
dust of centuries was falling . . . falling. Softly, impalpably,
like infinitely tiny particles of swansdown, it seemed to cover
them, the room, and all that was in it, with a fine grey powder.
De Richleau raised his head. It seemed to him that he had been
on a long journey and then slept for many days. He passed his
hand across his eyes and saw the familiar bookshelves in the
semi-darkened library. The bulbs above the cornice flickered and
the light came full on.
Marie Lou had come to and was struggling to her knees while
Richard fondled her with trembling hands, and murmured; 'We're
safe, darling-safe.'
Simon's eyes were free now from that terrible maniacal glare.
The Duke had no memory of having unloosened his bonds but he
knelt beside them looking as normal as he had when they had
first entered upon that terrible weaponless battle.
'Yes, we're safe-and Mocata is finished,' De Richleau passed a
hand over his eyes as if they were still clouded. 'The Angel of
Death was sent against us tonight, but he failed to get us, and
he will never return empty-handed to his dark Kingdom. Mocata
summoned him so Mocata must pay the penalty.'
'Are-are you sure of that?' Simon's jaw dropped suddenly.
'Certain. The age-old law of retaliation cannot fail to
operate. He will be dead before the morning.'
'But-but,' Simon stammered. 'Don't you realise that Mocata
never does these things himself. He throws other people into a
hypnotic trance and makes them do his devilish business for him.
One of the poor wretches who are in his power will have to pay
for this night's work.'
Even as he spoke there came the sound of running footsteps
along the flagstones of the terrace. A rending crash as a heavy
boot landed violently on the woodwork of the french-windows.
They burst open, and framed in them stood no vision but Rex
himself. Haggard, dishevelled, hollow-eyed, his face a ghastly
mask of panic, fear and fury.
He stood there for a moment staring at them as though they
were ghosts. In his arms he held the body of a woman; her fair
hair tumbled across his right arm, and her long silk-stockinged
legs dangled limply from the other.
Suddenly two great tears welled up into his eyes and trickled
slowly down his furrowed cheeks. Then as he laid the body gently
on the floor they saw that it was Tanith, and knew, by her
strange unnatural stillness, that she was dead.
28
Necromancy
'Oh, Rex!' Marie Lou dropped to her knees beside Tanith,
knowing that this must be the girl of whom he had raved to her
that afternoon. 'How awful for you!'
'How did this happen?' the Duke demanded. It was imperative
that he should know at once every move in the enemy's game, and
the urgent note in his voice helped to pull Rex together.
'I hardly know,' he gasped out. 'She got me along because she
was scared stiff of that swine Mocata. I couldn't call you up
this afternoon and later when I tried your line was blocked, but
I had to stay with her. We were going to pass the night together
in the parlour, but around midnight she left me and then-oh,
God! I fell asleep.'
'How long did you sleep for?' asked Richard quickly.
'Several hours, I reckon. I was about all in after yesterday,
but the second I woke I dashed up to her room and she was,
dressed as she is now-lying asleep, I figured-in an armchair. I
tried to wake her but I couldn't. Then I got real scared-
grabbed hold of her-and beat it down those stairs six at a time.
You've just no notion how frantic I was to get out of that place
and next thing I knew-I saw your light and came bursting in
here. She-she's not dead, is she?'
'Oh, Rex, you poor darling,' Marie Lou stammered as she chafed
Tanith's cold hands. 'I-I'm afraid--'
'She isn't-she can't be!' he protested wildly. 'That fiend's
only thrown her into a trance or something.'
Richard had taken a little mirror from Marie Lou's bag. He
held it against Tanith's bloodless lips. No trace of moisture
marred its surface. Then he pressed his hand beneath her breast.
'Her heart's stopped beating,' he said after a moment. 'I'm
sorry, old chap, but-well, I'm afraid you've got to face it.'
'The old-fashioned tests of death are not conclusive,' Simon
whispered to the Duke. 'Scientists say now that even arteries
can be cut and fail to bleed, but life still remains in the
body.
They've all come round to the belief that we're animated by a
sort of atomic energy-call it the soul if you like-and that the
body may retain that vital spark without showing the least sign
of life. Mightn't it be some form of catalepsy like that?'
'Of course,' De Richleau agreed. 'It has been proved time and
again that the senses are only imperfect vessels for collecting
impressions. There is something else which can see when the eyes
are closed and hear while the body is being painlessly cut to
ribbons under an anaesthetic. All the modern experimenters agree
that there are many states in which the body is not wholly alive
or wholly dead, but I fear there is little hope in this case.
You see we know that Mocata used her as his catspaw, so the poor
girl has been forced to pay the price of failure. I haven't a
single doubt that she is dead.'
Rex caught his last words and swung upon him frantically.
'God! this is frightful. I-I tried to kid myself but I think I
knew it the moment I picked her up. Her prophecy's come true
then.' He passed his hand over his eyes. 'I can't quite take it
in yet-this and all of you seem terribly unreal-but is she
really dead? She was so mighty scared that if she died some
awful thing might remain to animate her body.'
'She is dead as we know death,' said Richard softly. 'So what
could remain?'
'I know what he means,' the Duke remarked abruptly. 'He is
afraid that an elemental may have taken possession of her
corpse. If so drastic measures will be necessary.'
'No!' Rex shook his head violently. 'If you're thinking of
cutting off her head and driving a stake through her heart, I
won't have it. She's mine, I tell you-mine!'
'Better that than the poor soul should suffer the agony of
seeing its body come out of the grave at night to fatten itself
on human blood,' De Richleau murmured. 'But there are certain
tests, and we can soon find out. Bring her over here.'
Simon and Richard lifted the body and carried it over to the
mat of sheets and blankets in the centre of the pentacle, while
De Richleau fiddled for a moment among his impedimenta.
'The Undead,' he said slowly, 'have certain inhibitions. They
can pass as human, but they cannot eat human food and they
cannot cross running water except at sunset and sunrise. Garlic
is a most fearsome thing to them, so that they scream if only
touched by it, and the Cross, of course, is anathema. We will
see if she reacts to them.'
As he spoke he took the wreath of garlic flowers from round
his neck and placed it about Tanith's. Then he made the sign of
the Cross above her and laid his little gold crucifix upon her
lips.
The others stood round, watching the scene with horrified
fascination. Tanith lay there, calm and still, her pale face
shadowed by the golden hair, her tawny eyes now closed under the
heavy, blue-veined lids, the long, curved eyelashes falling upon
her cheeks. She had the look of death and yet, as De Richleau
set about his grim task, it seemed to them that her eyelids
might flicker open at any moment. Yet, when the garlic flowers
were draped upon her, she remained there cold and immobile, and
when the little crucifix was laid upon her lips she showed no
consciousness of it, even by the twitching of the tiniest
muscle.
'She's dead, Rex, absolutely dead, De Richleau stood up again.
'So, my poor boy, at least your worst fears will not be
realised. Her soul has left her body but no evil entity has
taken possession of it, I am certain of that now.'
A new hush fell upon the room. Tanith looked, if possible,
even more beautiful in death that she had in life, so that they
marvelled at her loveliness. Rex crouched beside her, utterly
stricken by this tragic ending to all the wonderful hopes and
plans which had seethed in his mind the previous afternoon after
she had told him that she loved him. He had known her by sight
for so long, dreamed of her so often, yet having gained her love
a merciless fate had deprived him of it after only a few hours
of happiness. It was unfair-unfair. Suddenly he buried his face
in his hands, his great shoulders shook, and for the first time
in his life he gave way to a passion of bitter tears.
The rest stood by him in silent sympathy. There was nothing
which they could say or do. Marie Lou attempted to soothe his
anguish by stroking his rebellious hair, but he jerked his head
away with a quick angry movement. Only a few hours before, in
those sunlit woods, Tanith had run her fingers through his curls
again and again during the ecstasy of the dawning of their
passion for each other, and the thought that she would never do
so any more filled him with the almost unbearable grief and
misery.
After a while the Duke turned helplessly away and Simon,
catching his eye, beckoned him over towards the open window out
of earshot from the others. The seemingly endless night still
lay upon the garden, and now a light mist had arisen. Wisps of
it were creeping down the steps from the terrace and curling
into the room. De Richleau shivered and refastened the windows
to shut them out.
'What is it?' he asked quickly.
'I-er-suppose there is no chance of her being made animate
again?' hazarded Simon.
'None. If there had been anything there it would never have
been able to bear the garlic and the crucifix without giving
some indication of its presence.'
'I wasn't thinking of that. The vital organs aren't injured in
any way as far as we know, and rigor mortis has not set in yet.
I felt her hand just now and the fingers are as flexible as
mine.'
De Richleau shrugged. 'That makes no difference. Rigor mortis
may have been delayed for a variety of reasons but she will be
'as stiff as a board in a few hours' time just the same. Of
course her state does resemble that of a person who has been
drowned, in a way, but only superficially; and if you are
thinking that we might bring her back to life by artificial
respiration I can assure you that there is not a chance. It
would only be a terrible unkindness to hold out such false hopes
to poor Rex.'
'Ner-you don't see what I'm driving at.' Simon's dark eyes
flickered quickly from De Richleau's face to the silent group in
the centre of the pentagram and then back again. 'No ordinary
doctor could do anything for her, I know that well enough; but
since her body is still in the intermediate stage there are a
few people in this world who could, and I was wondering if
you--'
'What!' The Duke started suddenly then went on in a whisper:
'Do you mean that I should try and bring her back?'
'Urn,' Simon nodded his head jerkily up and down. 'If you know
the drill-and you seem to know so much about the great secrets,
I thought it just on the cards you might?'
De Richleau looked thoughtful for a moment. 'I know something
of the ritual,' he confessed at length, 'but I have never seen
it done, and in any case it's a terrible responsibility.'
At that moment there was a faint sighing as the breeze
rippled the leaves of the trees out in the garden. Both men
heard it and they looked at each other questioningly,
'Her soul can't be very far away yet,' whispered Simon.
'No,' the Duke agreed reluctantly. 'But I don't like it,
Simon. The dead are not meant to be called back. They do not
come willingly. If I attempt this and succeed it would only be
by the force of incredibly powerful conjurations which the soul
dare not disobey, and we are not justified in taking such steps.
Besides, what good could it do? At best, I should not be able to
bring her back for more than a few moments.'
'Of course, I know that; but you still don't seem to get my
idea,' Simon went on hurriedly. 'As far as Rex is concerned,
poor chap, she's gone for good and all, but I was thinking of
Mocata. You were hammering it into us last night for all you
were worth that it's up to us to destroy him before he has the
chance to secure the Talisman. Surely this is our opportunity.
In Tanith's present physical state her spirit can't have gone
far from her body. If you could bring it back for a few moments,
or even get her to talk, don't you see that she'll be able to
tell us how best to try and scotch Mocata. From the astral
plane, where she is now, her vision and insight are limitless,
so she'll be able to help us in a way that she never could have
done before.'
'That's different,' De Richleau's pale face lit up with a
tired smile. 'And you're right, Simon. I have been under such a
strain for the past few hours that I had forgotten the thing
that matters most of all. I would never consent to attempt it
for any other purpose, but to prevent suffering and death coming
to countless millions of people we are justified in anything.
I'll speak-to Rex.'
Rex nodded despondently, numb now with misery, when the Duke
had explained what he meant to try to do. 'Just as you like,' he
said slowly. 'It won't hurt in any way, though- I mean her
soul-will it?'
'No,' De Richleau assured him. 'In the ordinary way it might.
To recall the soul of a dead person is to risk interfering with
their karma, but Tanith has virtually been murdered and,
although it is not the way of the spirit to seek revenge against
people for things which may have happened in this life, it is
almost a certainty that she is actually wanting to come back for
just long enough to tell us how to defeat Mocata, because of her
love for you.'
'All right then,' Rex muttered, 'only let's get over with it
as quickly as we can.'
'I'm afraid it will take some time,' De Richleau warned him,
'and even then it may not be successful, but the issues at stake
are so vital, you must try and put aside your personal grief for
a bit.'
He began to clear the pentacle of all the things which he had
used the previous evening to form protective barriers, the holy
water, the little cups, the horseshoes, placing them with the
garlic and dried mandrake back in the suitcase. He then took
from it seven small metal trays, a wooden platter, and a box of
powered incense; and pouring a little heap of the dark powder on
the platter went up to Rex.
'I'm afraid I've got to trouble you if we're going to see this
through.'
Trouble away,' said Rex grimly, with a flash of his old
spirit. 'You know I'm with you in anything which is likely to
let me get my hands on that devil's throat.'
'Good.' The Duke took out his pocket knife and held the blade
for a moment in the flame of a match. 'You've seen enough of
this business now to know that I don't do anything without a
purpose, and I want a little of your blood. I will use my own if
you like but yours is far more likely to have the desired
effect, since you felt so strongly for this poor girl and she,
apparently, for you.'
'Go ahead.' Rex pulled up his cuff and bared his forearm, but
De Richleau shook his head.
'No. Your finger will do, and it will hardly be more than a
pin-prick. I only need a few drops.'
With a swift movement he took Rex's hand and, having made a
slight incision in the little finger, squeezed out seven drops
of blood on to the incense.
Then he walked over to Tanith and, kneeling down, took seven
long golden hairs from her head. Next he proceeded to form the
mixture of incense and blood into a paste out of which he made
seven cones, in each of which was coiled one of Tanith's long
golden hairs.
With Richard's assistance he carefully oriented the body so
that her feet were pointing towards the north and drew a fresh
chalk circle, just large enough to contain her and the bedding,
seven feet in diameter.
'Now if you will turn your backs, please,' he told them all,
'I will proceed with the preparation.'
For a few moments they gazed obediently at the book-lined
walls while he did certain curious things, and when he bade them
turn again he was placing the seven cones of incense on the
seven little metal trays, each engraved with the Seal of
Solomon, in various positions round the body.
'We shall remain outside the circle this time,' he explained,
'so that the spirit, if it comes, is contained within it. Should
some evil entity endeavour to impersonate her soul it will thus
be confined within the circle and unable to get at us.'
He lit the seven cones of incense, completed the barrier round
about the body with numerous fresh signs, and then, walking over
to the doorway, switched out the lights.
The fire was quite dead now, and the candles had never been re-
lit, but after a moment greyness began to filter through the
french-windows. The light was just sufficient for them to see
each other as ghostly forms moving in the darkness, while the
body, lying in the circle, was barely visible, its position
being indicated by the seven tiny points of light from the cones
of incense burning round it.
Simon laid an unsteady hand on the Duke's arm. 'Is it- is
it-quite safe to do this? I mean, mightn't Mocata have another
cut at us now we're in the dark and no longer have the
protection of the pentacle?'
'No,' De Richleau answered decisively. 'He played his last
card tonight when he sent the Dark Angel against us and caused
Tanith's death. That stupendous operation will have exhausted
his magical powers for the time at least. Come over here, all of
you, and sit down on the floor in a circle.'
Leading them over to Tanith's feet he arranged them so that
Rex and Marie Lou both had their backs to the body and would be
spared the sight of any manifestations which might take place
about it. He sat facing it himself, with Richard and Simon
either side of him; all five of them clasped hands.
Then he told them that they must preserve complete quiet and
under no circumstances break the circle they had formed. He
warned them too, that if they felt a sudden cold they were not
to be frightened by it as they had been of the horrible wind
which had swirled so uncannily in that room a few hours before.
It would be caused by the ectoplasm which might be drawn from
Tanith's body and, he went on to add, if a voice addressed them
they were not to answer. He would do any talking which was
necessary and they were to remain absolutely still until he gave
orders that the circle should be broken up.
They sat there, hand in hand, in silence, while it seemed that
an age was passing. The square frame of the window gradually
lightened but so very slowly that it was barely perceptible, and
if dawn was breaking at last upon the countryside it was shut
out from them by the grey, ghostly fog.
The cones of incense burned siowly, giving a strange, acrid
smell, mixed with some queer and sickly eastern perfume. From
their position in the circle Richard and Simon could see the
faint wreaths of smoke curling up for a few inches above the
tiny points of light to disappear above, lost in the darkness.
Tanith's body lay still and motionless, a shadowy outline upon
the thin mat of makeshift bedding.
De Richleau had closed his eyes and bowed his head upon his
chest. Once more he was practising that rhythmic, inaudible Raja
Yoga breathing, which has such power to recruit strength or to
send it forth, and he was using it now while he concentrated on
calling the spirit of Tanith to him.
Richard watched the body with curious expectancy. His
experience of the last few hours had been too recent for him to
collate his thoughts, and while he had so sturdily rejected the
idea of Black Magic the night before he would more or less have
accepted the fact of Spiritualism. It was a much more general
modern belief, and this business as far as he could see, except
in a few minor particulars such as the incense compounded with
blood, was very similar to the spiritualistic seances of which
he had often heard. The only real difference being that, in this
instance, they had a newly dead body to operate on and therefore
were far more likely to get results. As time wore on, however,
he became doubtful, for if their vigil had lasted many hours
this one, now that he was utterly weary, seemed like a
succession of nights.
It was Simon who first became aware that something was
happening. He was watching the seven cones of incense intently,
and it seemed to him that the one which was farthest from him,
set at Tanith's head, gave out a greater amount of smoke than
the rest. Then he realised that he could see the cone more
clearly and the eddying curls of aromatic vapour which it sent
up had taken on a bluish hue which the rest had not.
He pressed De Richleau's hand and the Duke raised his head.
Richard too had seen it, and as they watched, a faint blue light
became definitely perceptible.
It gradually solidified into a ball about two inches in
diameter and moved slowly forward from the head until it reached
the centre of Tanith's body. There it remained for a while,
growing in brightness and intensity until it had became a strong
blue light. Then it rose a little and hovered in the air above
her, so that by its glow they could clearly see the curves of
her figure and her pale, beautiful face, lit by that strange
radiance.
Intensely alert now, they sat still and watchful, until the
ball of light began to lose colour and diffuse itself over a
wider area. The smoke of the incense wreathed up towards it from
the seven metal platters, and it seemed to gather this into
itself, forming from it the vague outline of a head and shoul
ders, still cloudy and transparent but, after another few
moments, definitely recognisable as an outline of the bust of
the figure which lay motionless beneath it.
With pounding hearts they watched for new developments, and
now it seemed that the whole process of materialisation was
hurried forward in a few seconds. The bust joined itself, by
throwing out a shadowy torso, to the hips of the dead body, the
face and shoulders solidified until the features were distinct,
and the whole became surrounded by an aureole of light.
Upon the strained silence there came the faintest whisper of a
voice:
'You called me. I am here.'
'Are you in truth, Tanith?' De Richleau asked softly.
'I am.'
'Do you acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ?'
'I do.'
A sigh of relief escaped De Richleau, for he knew that no
impersonating elemental would ever dare to testify in such a
manner, and he proceeded quietly:
'Do you come here of your own free will, or do you wish to
depart?'
'I come because you called, but I am glad to come.'
'There is one here whose grief for your passing is very great.
He does not seek to draw you back, but he wishes to know if it
is your desire to help him in the protection of his friends and
the destruction of evil for the well-being of the world.'
'It is my desire.'
"Will you tell us all that you can of the man Mocata which may
prove of help?'
'I cannot, for I am circumscribed by the Law, but you may ask
me what you will and, because you have summoned me, I am bound
by your command to answer,'
'What is he doing now?'
'Plotting fresh evil against you.'
'Where is he now?'
'He is quite near you.'
'Can you not tell me where?'
'I do not know. I cannot see distinctly, for he covers himself
with a cloak of darkness, but he is still in your
neighbourhood.'
'In the village?'
'Perhaps.'
'Where will he be this time tomorrow? '
'In Paris.'
'What do you see him doing in Paris?'
'I see him talking with a man who has lost a portion of his
left ear. It is a tall building. They are both very angry.'
'Will he stay in Paris for long?'
'No. I see him moving at great speed towards the rising sun.'
'Where do you see him next?'
'Under the earth.'
'Do you mean that he is dead-to us?'
'No, He is in a stone-flagged vault beneath a building which
is very very old. The place radiates evil. The red vibrations
are so powerful that I cannot see what he does there. The light
which surrounds me now protects me from such sights.'
'What is he planning now?'
To draw me back.'
'Do you mean that he is endeavouring to restore your soul to
your body?'
'Yes. He is already bitterly regretting that in his anger
against you he risked the severance of the two. He could force
me to be of great service to him on your plane but he cannot do
so on this.'
'But is it possible for him to bring you back-permanently?'
'Yes. If he acts at once. While the moon is still in her dark
quarter.'
'Is it your wish to return?'
'No, unless I were free of him-but I have no choice. My soul
is in pawn until the coming of the new moon. After that I shall
pass on unless he has succeeded.'
'How will he set about this thing?'
'There is only one way. The full performance of the Black
Mass.'
'You mean with sacrifice of a Christian child?'
'Yes. It is the age-old law, a soul for a soul. That is the
only way and the soul of a baptised child will be accepted in
exchange for mine. Then if my body remains uninjured I shall be
compelled to return to it.'
'What are--'
The Duke's next question was cut short by Rex, who could stand
the strain no longer. He did not know that De Richleau was only
conversing with Tanith's astral body and thought that he had
succeeded in restoring the corpse which lay behind him, at least
to temporary lif e again.
'Tanith,' he cried, breaking the circle and flinging himself
round. Tanith!'
In a fraction of time the vision disintegrated and dis
appeared. His eyes blazing with anger, De Richleau sprang to his
feet.
'You fool!' he thundered. 'You stupid fool.' In the pale light
of dawn which was now at last just filtering through the fog, he
glared at Rex. Then, as they stood there, angry recriminations
about to burst from their lips, the whole party were arrested in
their every movement and remained transfixed.
A shrill, clear cry had cut like a knife into the heavy,
incense-laden atmosphere, coming from the room above.
'That's Fleur,' gasped Marie Lou. 'My precious, what is it?'
In an instant, she was dashing across the room to the little
door in the bookshelves which led to the staircase up to -the
nursery. Yet Richard was before her.
In two bounds he had reached the door and was fumbling for the
catch. His trembling fingers found it. He gave a violent jerk.
The little metal ring which served to open it came away in his
hand.
Precious moments were lost as they clawed at the bookbacks. At
last it swung free. Richard pushed Marie Lou through ahead of
him and followed, pressing at her heels. The others stumbled up
the old stone stairs in frantic haste behind them.
They reached the night nursery. Rex ran to the window. It was
wide open. The grey mist blanketed the garden outside. Marie Lou
dashed to the cot. The sheets were tumbled. The imprint of a
little body lay there fresh and warm-but Fleur was gone.
29
Simon Aron Takes a View
'Here's the way they went,' cried Rex. 'There's a ladder under
this window.'
'Then for God's sake get after him,' Richard shouted, racing
across the room. 'If that damn door hadn't stuck we'd have
caught him red-handed-he can't have got far.'
Rex was already on the terrace below, Simon shinned down the
ladder and Richard flung his leg over the sill of the window to
follow.
Marie Lou was left alone with De Richleau in the nursery. She
stared at him with round, tearless eyes, utterly overcome by
this new calamity. The Duke stared back, shaken to the very
depths by this appalling thing which he had brought upon his
friends. He wanted most desperately to comfort and console her,
but realised how hopelessly inadequate anything that he could
say would be. The thought of that child having been seized by
the Satanist to be offered up in some ghastly sacrifice, was
utterly unbearable.
'Princess,' he managed to stammer, 'Princess.' But further
words would not come, and for once in his life he found himself
powerless to deal with a situation.
Marie Lou just stood there motionless and staring, held rigid
by such extreme distress that she could no longer think
coherently.
With a tremendous effort De Richleau pulled himself together.
He knew that he had earned any opprobrium that she and Richard
might choose to heap upon him for having used their house as a
refuge, stated that no harm could befall them if they followed
his instructions, and yet been the means of perhaps causing the
death of the child whom they both idolised. But it was no time
to offer himself for the whipping-post now. They must act and
quickly.
'Where is nurse?' he shot out hoarsely.
'In-in her bedroom.' Marie Lou turned to a door at the end of
the room which stood ajar.
'It's extraordinary that she should not have woken with all
this noise,' De Richleau strode over and thrust it open.
In Fleur's nursery a greyness blurred the outlines of the
furniture and shadowed the corners of the room, but in the
nurse's bedroom, the curtains being drawn, it was still com
pletely dark.
The Duke jerked on the electric light and saw at once that
Fleur's nannie was lying peacefully asleep in bed. He walked
over and touched her swiftly on the shoulder. 'Wake up,' he
said, 'wake up!'
She did not stir, and Marie Lou, who had followed him into the
room, peered at the woman's face anxiously, then cried on a
louder note: 'Wake up, nannie! Wake up!'
De Richleau shook the nurse roughly now, but her head rolled
helplessly upon her shoulders and her eyes remained tightly
shut.
'She's been drugged, I suppose,' Marie Lou said miserably.
'I don't think so.' The Duke bent over and sniffed. 'There is
no smell of chloroform or anything here. It's more likely that
Mocata plunged her into a deep hypnotic sleep directly he
arrived. Best leave her,' he added after a moment. 'She'll wake
in due course, and obviously she cannot tell us anything if she
has been in a heavy induced sleep all the time.'
They returned to the nursery and the Duke switched on the
lights there to make a thorough examination. Almost at once his
eye fell on a paper which lay at the foot of Fleur's empty cot.
He snatched it up and quickly scanned the close, typewritten
lines.
Please do not worry about the little girl. She will be
returned to you tomorrow morning providing that certain
conditions are complied with. These are as follows:
In this exceptional case I have been compelled to resort to
unusual methods which bring me within the scope of the law. I
have no doubt, therefore, that one of you will suggest calling
in the police to trace the child. Any such action might
embarrass my operations and therefore you are not to even
consider such a proceeding. You cannot doubt by now that I have
ways and means of informing myself regarding all your actions
and, in the event of your disobeying my injunction in this
respect, I shall immediately take steps which will ensure that
you never recover the child alive.
My failure last night was regrettable, since it has caused the
death of a young woman recently discovered by me as an
exceptional medium, for whom I might have had some further use.
Mr. Van Ryn removed her body while I slept and it is now in your
keeping; I am anxious that every care should be taken of it. You
will leave the body just as it is in your library until further
instructions and refrain from taking any steps towards a
coroner's examination or its burial. If you disobey me in this
matter, I shall command certain forces at my disposal, of which
Monsieur Le Duc de Richleau may be able to inform you, to take
possession of it.
All of you will confine yourselves in the libary during the
coming day, giving such reasons as you choose to your servants
that you are not to be disturbed.
Lastly, my friend Simon Aron is to rejoin me for the con
tinuance of those experiments in which we are engaged. He will
leave the house alone at mid-day and proceed on foot to the
cross-roads which lie a mile and a half to the south-west of
Cardinals Folly, where I shall arrange for him to be met and,
having surrendered himself to my representative, he must agree
to give me his willing co-operation in the ritual to Satan
tonight, which is necessary for the rediscovery of the Talisman
of Set.
If any of these injunctions are disregarded in the least
degree, you already know the penalty, but if they are carried
out to my entire satisfaction, Simon Aron shall return to you
sane and well after I have carried out my operations, and the
child shall be restored as innocent and happy as she was
yesterday.
Marie Lou read the document over De Richleau's shoulder.
'Oh, what are we to do?' she wailed, wringing her hands to-
gether. 'Greyeyes, this is too awful. What are we going to
do?'
'God knows,' De Richleau muttered miserably. 'He has the whip
hand of us now with a vengeance. The devil of it is that I don't
trust his promise to return the child even if Simon is game to
sacrifice himself.'
At that moment Simon's head appeared above the window sill,
and he scrambled up the last rungs of the ladder into the room.
'Well!' the Duke shot at him, but Simon shook his head.
"The three of us have been round the grounds but in this
filthy fog it's impossible to see any distance. He's got clean
away by now.'
'I feared as much,' the Duke murmured despondently, and with a
new access of miserable unhappiness, he watched Richard climb
into the room.
'Not a trace,' Richard exclaimed hoarsely. 'No footmarks, even
on the flower beds, to show which way he went. Where the hell is
nurse? I'll sack the woman for her damned incompetence, With her
door ajar, there's no excuse for her not having heard Flew cry
out.'
'It was not her fault,' said De Richleau mildly. 'Mocata threw
her into a deep sleep and she is sleeping still. Until the time
he has set it will be impossible to rouse her.'
Rex followed the others through the window, muttering angrily:
'This filthy mist! A dozen toughs might be racketing round the
garden, but we'd never get a sight of them. Is it supposed to be
daylight yet, or isn't it?'
Simon glanced at the clock on the nursery mantelpiece.
'According to this it's only ten to five. Surely it must be
later than that.'
'It's stopped,' announced Richard, 'but it can't be much after
half past six, or the servants would be getting up, and when I
ran round the far side of the house just now, there were no
lights in their windows.'
'All the better,' said the Duke abruptly. 'Mocata's left a
letter, Richard, with certain instructions which he orders us to
carry out if Fleur is tp remain unharmed.'
'Let's see it.' Richard held out his hand.
De Richleau hesitated. 'I'd rather you read it when we are
downstairs again, if you don't mind. It doesn't help us for the
present and there are certain things which we should do at
once-before the servants start moving about.'
'Good Lord, man! I mean to have the lot of them out oё bed
inside ten minutes. We shall need their help.'
'I wish, instead, that while I connect the telephone again and
see if I can find out anything from the inn, you would write a
brief note to Malm saying that our experiments are still in
progress and that we are to be left undisturbed in this wing of
the house for the whole day.'
'If you think I'm going to stay here twiddling my thumbs while
Fleur's in danger-you're crazy!' cried Richard indignantly.
The Duke knew that his suggestion of continued inactivity must
make his apparent negligence seem even worse, but he had never
yet been known to lose his head in a crisis and he managed to
keep his voice quiet and even.
'I would like you to see this letter first and talk it over
with Marie Lou before you do anything reckless. In any case
Tanith's body is still downstairs. It must remain there for the
moment and that is quite sufficient reason for the servants to
be kept away from the library. You, Rex, go along to the
kitchen, take Simon with you, and between you bring us back the
best cold meal that you can muster. We're half starved, and
fasting has its limits of usefulness, even in an affair like
this.'
Marie Lou stood there listening to the argument. She could not
really believe that this awful thing had actually happened to
her. If she had lost Fleur she would die. Even Richard would
never be able to console her. It simply could not be true. The
four men were phantoms-talking-, yet she could see every object
in the room with a curious supernormal clarity. Strange that she
had never noticed one handle on the old walnut chest of drawers
to be odd before, or that one of the wires in the fireguard
protruded a little. Fleur might cut herself if she fell against
it. She must tell nannie to have it seen to tomorrow. Yet all
the time these thoughts were drifting through her mind she was
conscious of what the others were saying and of an urgent need
to comfort De Richleau. Her poor 'Greyeyes' was feeling
desperately unhappy, she knew, and held himself entirely
responsible for the terrible thing which could not possibly be
true. When he mentioned breakfast she said at once: 'I will go
down and cook you some eggs or something.'
'No, no, my dear,' De Richleau looked round and then lowered
his eyes quickly, his heart wrung at the sight of her dead-white
face. 'Please go down to the library and read this letter of
Mocata's through again quietly with Richard. Then you can talk
it over together and will have made up your minds what you think
best by the time the rest of us get back.'
Richard gave in to the Duke's wishes for the moment. They all
descended to the ground floor again and, when the other three
had gone off to the kitchen quarters, he remained with Marie Lou
and read Mocata's letter quickly.
As he finished he looked up at her in miserable indecision.
'My poor sweet. This is ghastly for you.'
'It's just as bad for you,' she said softly. Then, with a
little cry, she flung her arms round his neck. 'Oh, Richard,
darling, what are we to do? '
'Dearest.' He hugged her to him, soothing her gently as best
he could now that the storm had broken. Her small body heaved
with desperate sobbing, while great tears ran down her cheeks,
falling in large, damp splashes upon his hands and neck.
As he held her, murmuring little phrases of endearment and
optimistic comfort, he thought her weeping would never cease.
Her body trembled as it was swept with terrible emotion at the
loss of her cherished Fleur.
'Marie Lou, my angel,' he whispered softly, 'try and pull
yourself together, do, or else you'll have me breaking down as
well in a minute. No harm can have happened to her yet, and it
isn't likely to until tonight at the earliest. Even then, he'll
think twice before he carries out his threat. Only a fool
destroys his hostage to spite his enemy. Mocata may be every
sort of rogue, but he's a civilised one at least, so he won't
maltreat her in any way, you can be sure of that, and if we only
play our cards properly, we'll get her back before it comes to
any question of his carrying out this appalling threat.'
'But what can we do, Richard? What can we do?' she cried,
looking at him wildly from large, tear-dimmed eyes.
'Get after him the second the others come back,' Richard
declared promptly. 'He's human, isn't he? He had to use a ladder
to get up to the nursery just like any other thug. If we act at
once we'll have him under lock and key by nightfall.'
De Richleau's quiet voice broke in from behind them, 'You have
decided, then, to call in the police?'
'Of course.' Richard turned to stare at him. 'This is totally
different from last night's affair. It is a case of kidnapping,
pure and simple, and I'm going to pull every gun I know to get
the police of the whole country after him in the next half hour.
If you've reconnected that line, I'll get straight through to
Scotland Yard-now.'
'Yes, the telephone is all right. I've been through to the inn
and had old Wilkes out of bed. He remembers Rex and Tanith
dining there last night, of course, but when I described Mocata
to him, he said he hadn't seen anyone who answers to that
description there at all, either yesterday or this morning. Have
you written that letter for the servants?'
'Not yet. I will.' Richard left the library just as Simon and
Rex came in, carrying a collection of plates and dishes on two
trays, prominent upon which were a large China teapot and the
half of a York ham.
'Please don't phone Scotland Yard just yet,' Marie Lou called
after Richard. 'I simply must talk to you again before we burn
our boats.'
'The Duke gave her a sharp glance from under his grey
eyebrows. 'You are not then in favour of calling in the police?'
'I don't know what to do,' she confessed miserably. 'Richard
is so sane and practical that I suppose he's right, but you read
the letter and I should never forgive myself if our calling in
the police forced Mocata's hand. Do you-do you really think that
he has the power to find out if we go against his instructions?'
De Richleau nodded. 'I'm afraid so. But Simon can tell you
more of his capabilities in that direction than I can.'
Simon and Rex had put down their trays and were reading
Mocata's letter together. The former looked up swiftly.
'Um. He can see things when he wants to in that mirror I told
you of, and once he gets to London he'll have half-a-dozen
mediums that he can throw into a trance to pick us up. It will
be child's play for a man of his powers to find out if we leave
this room.'
'That's my view,' the Duke agreed. 'And if we once turn to the
police, we have either to go to them or else bring them here.
Telephoning won't be sufficient. They will want photographs of
Fleur and to question every one concerned, so Mocata stands a
pretty good chance of seeing us in conference with them, if he
keeps us under psychic observation, whichever way we set to
work.'
'We should be mad to even think of it,' said Simon jerkily.
'It's pretty useless for me to say I'm sorry, but I brought this
whole trouble on you all and there's only one thing to do, that
obvious.'
'For us to sit here like a lot of dummies while you go off to
give yourself up at twelve o'clock, I suppose?' Richard, who had
just rejoined them, cut in acidly.
'I have been expecting that, knowing Simon,' the Duke
observed. 'Terrible as the consequences may be for him and
although the idea of surrender makes my blood boil I must
confess that I think he's right, with certain modifications!
'Oh, isn't there some other way?' Marie Lou exclaimed
desperately, catching at Simon's hand. 'It's too awful that
because of our own trouble we-should even talk of sacrificing
you.'
One of those rare smiles that made him such a lovable person
lit Simon's face. 'Ner,' he said softly, 'it's been my muddle
from the beginning. I'm terribly grateful to you all for trying
to get me out of it, but Mocata's been too much for us, and I
must throw my hand in now. It's the only thing to do.'
'It is my damned incompetence which has let us in for this,'
grunted the Duke. 'I deserve to take your place, Simon, and I
would-you know that-if it were the least use. The devil of it is
that it's you he wants, not me.'
Rex had been cutting thin slices from the ham and pouring out
the tea. Richard took a welcome cup of his favourite Orange
Pekoe from him and said firmly:
'Stop talking nonsense, for God's sake I Neither of you is to
blame. After what we've all been through together in the past
you did quite rightly to come here. Who should we look to for
help in'times of trouble if not each other? If I was in a real
tight corner I shouldn't hesitate to involve either of you-and I
know that Marie Lou feels the same. This blow couldn't possibly
have been foreseen by anyone. It was just- well, call it an
accident, and the responsibility for protecting Fleur was ours
every bit as much as yours. Now let's get down to what we mean
to do.'
'That's decent of you, Richard.' De Richleau tried to smile,
knowing what it must have cost his friend to ease their feeling
of guilt when he must be so desperately anxious about his child.
'Damned decent,' Simon echoed. 'But all the same I'm going to
keep the appointment Mocata's made for me. It's the only hope
we've got.'
Richard stuck out his chin. 'You're not, old chap. You placed
yourself in my hands by coming to rny house, and I won't have
it. The business we went through last night scared me as much as
anyone, I admit it; but because Greyeyes has proved right about
Satanic manifestations, there is no reason for you all to lose
your sense of proportion about what the evil powers can do. They
have their limitations, just like anything else. Greyeyes
admitted last night that they were based on natural laws, and
this swine's gone outside them. He's operating now in country
that is strange to him. He confesses as much in his letter. You
can see he is scared of calling in the police, and that's the
very way we're going to get him. You people seem to have lost
your nerve.'
'No,' the Duke said sadly. 'I haven't lost my nerve, but look
at it if you like on the basis which you suggest, Richard- that
this is a perfectly normal kidnapping. Say Fleur were being held
to ransom by a group of unscrupulous gangsters, such as operate
in the States, the gang being in a position to to know what is
going on in your house. They have threatened to kill Fleur if
you bring the police into the business. Now, would you be
prepared to risk that in such circumstances?'
'No, I should pay up, as most wretched parents seem to, on the
off-chance that the gang gave me a square deal and I got the
child back unharmed. But this is different. I'll stake my oath
that Mocata means to double-cross us anyhow. If it were only
Simon that he wanted he might be prepared to let us have Fleur
back in exchange. You seem to forget what Tanith told you. He
doesn't know that we know his intentions, but she was absolutely
definite on three points. One, he means to do his damnedest to
bring her back. Two, he will fail unless he makes the attempt in
the next few days. Three, the only way that can be done is by
performing a full Black Mass, including the sacrifice of a
baptised child. Kidnappings take time to plan in a civilised
country unless you want the police on your track. Mocata has
succeeded in one where he thinks there is a fair chance of
keeping the police out of it, and no one in their senses could
suggest that he's the sort of man who would run the risk of
doing another just for the joy of keeping his word with us. It's
as clear as daylight that he is using Fleur as bait to get hold
of Simon and then he'll do us down by killing the child in the
end.'
De Richleau slit open a roll and slipped a slice of ham inside
it. 'Well,' he said as he began to trim the ragged edges neatly,
'it is for you and Marie Lou to decide. The prospect of sitting
in this room for hours on end doing nothing is about the grim
mest I've ever had to face in a pretty crowded lifetime. I would
give most things I really value for a chance to have another cut
at him. The only thing that deters me for one moment is the risk
to Fleur.'
'I know that well enough,' Richard acknowledged, 'but I am
convinced our only chance of seeing her alive again is to call
in the police, and trust to running him to earth before
nightfall.'
'I wouldn't,' Simon shook his head, 'I wouldn't honestly,
Richard. He's certain to find out if we take steps against him.
We shall waste hours here being questioned by the local bigwigs,
and it's a hundred to one against their being able to corner him
in a single day. Fleur is safe for the moment-for God's sake
don't make things worse than they are. I know the man and he's
as heartless as a snake. It's signing Fleur's death warrant to
try and tackle him like this.'
Marie Lou listened to these conflicting arguments in miserable
indecision. She was torn violently from side to side by each in
turn. Simon spoke with such absolute conviction that it seemed
certain Richard's suggested intervention would precipitate her
child's death, and yet she felt, too, how right Richard was in
his belief that Mocata was certain to double-cross them, and
having trapped them into surrendering Simon, retain Fleur for
this abominable sacrifice which Tanith had told them he was so
anxious to make. The horns of the dilemma seemed to join and
form a vicious circle which went round and round in her aching
head.
The others fell silent and Richard looked across at her.
'Well, dearest, which is it to be?'
'Oh, I don't know,' she moaned. 'Both sides seem right and yet
the risk is so appalling either way.'
He laid his hand gently on her hair. 'It's beastly having to
make such a decision, and if we were alone in this I wouldn't
dream of asking you. I'd do what I thought best myself unless
you were dead against it, but as the others disagree with me so
strongly what can I do but ask you to decide?'
Wringing her hands together in agonised distress at this
horrible problem with which she was faced, Marie Lou looked
desperately from side to side, then her glance fell on Rex. He
was sitting hunched up in a dejected attitude on the far side of
Tanith's body, his eyes fixed in hopeless misery on the dead
girl's face.
'Rex,' she said hoarsely, 'you haven't said what you think
yet. Both these alternatives seem equally ghastly to me. What do
you advise?'
'Eh?' He looked up quickly 'It's mighty difficult and I was
just trying to figure it out. I hate the thought of doing
nothing, waiting about when you've got a packet of trouble is
just real hell to me, and I'd like to get after this bird with a
gun. But Simon's so certain that if we did it would be fatal to
Fleur, and I guess the Duke thinks that way to. They both know
him, you must remember, and Richard doesn't, which is a point to
them, but I've got a hunch that we are barking up the wrong
tree, and that this is a case for what Greyeyes calls his
masterly policy of inactivity. The old game of giving the enemy
enough rope so he'll hang himself in the end.
'Any sort of compromise is all against my nature, but I reckon
it's the only policy that offers now. If we stay put here and-
carry out Mocata's instructions to the letter, we'll at least be
satisfied in our minds that we are not bringing any fresh danger
on Fleur. But let's go that far and no farther. We all know
Simon is willing enough to cash in his checks, but I don't think
we ought to let him. Instead, we'll keep him here. That is going
to force Mocata to scratch his head a whole heap. He'll not do
Fleur in before he's had another cut at getting hold of Simon,
so it will be up to him to make the next move in the game, and
that may give us a fresh opening. The situation can't be worse
than it is at present, and when he shows his hand again, given a
spot of luck, we might be able to ring the changes on him yet.'
De Richleau smiled, for the first time in days, it seemed. 'My
friend, I salute you,' he said, with real feeling in his voice.
'I am growing old, I think, or I should have thought of that
myself. It is by far and away the most sensible thing that any
of us have suggested yet.'
With a sigh of relief, Marie Lou moved over and, stooping
down, kissed Rex on the cheek. 'Rex, darling, bless you. In our
trouble we've been forgetting yours, and it is very wonderful
that you should have thought of a real way out for us in the
midst of your sorrow. I dreaded having to make that decision
just now more than anything that I have had to do in my whole
life.'
He smiled rather wanly. "That's all right, darling. There's
nothing so mighty clever about it, but it gives us time, and you
must try and comfort yourself with the thought that time and the
angels are on our side.'
Even Richard's frantic anxiety to set out immediately in
search of his Fleur d'amour was overcome for the time being by
Rex's so obviously sensible suggestion. In his agitation he had
eaten nothing yet, but now he sat down to cut some sandwiches,
and set about persuading Marie Lou that she must eat the first
of them in order to keep up her strength. Then he looked over at
the Duke.
'I left that note for Malin where he's bound to see it-
slipped it under his bedroom door, so we shan't be disturbed
here. Is there anything at all that we can do?'
'Nothing, I fear, only possess ourselves with such patience as
we can, but we're all at about the end of our tether, so we
ought to try and get some sleep. If Mocata makes some fresh move
this evening it's on the cards that we shall be up again all
night.'
'I'll get some cushions,' Simon volunteered. 'I suppose
there's no harm in bringing used articles into this room now?'
'None. You had better collect all the stuff you can and we'll
make up some temporary beds on the floor.'
Simon, Richard and Rex left the room and returned a few
moments later with piles of cushions and all the rugs that they
could find. They placed some fresh logs on the smouldering ashes
of the fire and then set about laying out five makeshift resting-
places.
When they had finished, Marie Leu allowed Richard to lead her
over to one of them and tuck her up, although she protested
that, exhausted though she was, she would never be able to
sleep. The rest lay down, and then Richard switched out the
light.
Full day had come at last, but it was of little use, for the
range of vision was limited to about fifteen yards. The mist
outside the windows seemed, if anything, denser than before, and
it swirled and eddied in curling wreaths above the damp stones
of the terrace, muffling the noises of the countryside and
shutting out the light.
None of them felt that they would be able to sleep. Rex's
gnawing sorrow for Tanith preyed upon his mind. The others,
racked with anxiety for Fleur, turned restlessly upon their
cushions. Every now and then they heard Marie Lou give way to
fits of sobbing as though her heart would break. But the stress
of those terrible night hours and the emotions they had passed
through since had exhausted them completely. Marie Lou's bursts
of sobbing became quieter and then ceased. Richard fell into an
uneasy doze. De Richleau and Rex breathed evenly, sunk at last
in a heavy sleep.
Hours later Marie Lou was dreaming that she was seated in an
ancient library reading a big, old-fashioned book, the cover of
which was soft and hairy like a wolf's skin, and that as she
read it a circle of iron was bound about her head. Then the
scene changed. She was in the pentacle again, and that loathsome
sack-like Thing was attacking Fleur. She awoke -started up with
a sudden scream of fear.
Her waking was little better than the nightmare when memory
flooded back into her mind. Yet that too and the present only
seemed other phases of the frightful dream; the comfortable
library denuded of its furniture; Tanith's dead body lying in
the centre of the floor and the dimness of the room from those
horrible fog banks shutting out the sunshine. They could not
possibly be anything but figments of the imagination.
The men had roused at once, and crowded round her, shadowy
figures in the uncertain light. De Richleau pressed the electric
switch. They blinked a little, and looked at each other
sleepily, then their eyes turned to the place where Simon had
lain. With one thought their glances shifted to the window and
they knew that while they slept their friend had gone out,
into that ghostly unnatural night, to keep his grim appointment.
30
Out Into the Fog
It was Rex who noticed the chalk marks on the floor. He
stepped over and saw that Simon, lacking pencil and paper, had
used these means to leave them a short message. Slowly he
deciphered the scribbled words and read them out:
'Please don't fuss or try to come after me. This is my
muddle, so am keeping appointment. Do as Mocata has
ordered. Am certain that is only chance of saving
Fleur.
Love to all. Simon.'
'Aw, Hell!' exclaimed Rex as he finished. 'The dear heroic
little sap has gone and put paid to my big idea. Mocata has got
him and Fleur now on top of having killed Tanith. If you ask me
we're properly sunk.'
De Richleau groaned. 'It is just like him. We ought to have
guessed that he would do this.'
'You're right there,' Richard agreed sadly. 'I've known him
longer than any of you, and I did my damnedest to prevent him
sacrificing himself for nothing, but it seems to me he's only
done the very thing you said he should.'
'That's not quite fair,' the Duke protested mildly. 'I only
said I thought it right that he should with certain
modifications. I had it in my mind that we might follow him at a
distance. We should have arrived at the rendezvous before Mocata
could have known that we had left this place, and we might have
pulled something off. As it was, I thought Rex's idea so much
better that I abandoned mine.'
'I'm sorry,' Richard apologised huskily. 'But Simon's my
oldest friend you know, and this on top of all the rest:'
'Do you-do you think the poor sweet is right, and that his
having given himself up will be of any use?' whispered Marie
Lou.
Richard shrugged despondently. 'Not the least, dearest. I hate
to seem ungracious, and you all know how devoted I am to Simon
but in his anxiety to do the right thing he's handed Mocata our
only decent card. We can sit here till Doomsday, but there's no
chance now of making any fresh move which might give us a new
opening. We've wasted the Lord knows how many precious hours,
and we're in a worse hole than we were before. I'm going to
carry out my original intention and get on to the police.'
'I wouldn't do that,' Rex caught him by the arm. 'It'll only
mean our wasting further time in spilling long dispositions to a
bunch of cops, and you're all wrong about our not having made
anything on the new deal. We've had a sleep which we needed
mighty badly, and we've lulled Mocata into a false sense of
security. Just because we've remained put here all morning like
he said and Simon's come over with the goods, he'll think he's
sitting pretty now and maybe let up on his supervision stunt.
Let's cut out bothering with the police and get after him
ourselves this minute.'
Marie Lou shivered slightly and then nodded. 'Rex is right,
you know. Mocata has got what he wants now, so it is very
unlikely that he is troubling to keep us under observation any
more, but how do you propose to try to find him?'
'We will go straight to Paris,' De Richleau announced, with a
display of his old form. 'You remember Tanith told us that by
tonight he would be there holding a conversation with a man who
had lost the upper portion of his left ear. That is Castelnau,
the banker, I am certain, so the thing for us to do is to make
for Paris and hunt him out.'
'How do you figure on getting there?' asked the practical Rex.
'By plane, of course. Mocata is obviously travelling that way
or he could never get there by tonight. Richard must take us in
his four-seater, and if Mocata has to motor all the way to
Croydon before he can make a start, we'll be there before him.
Is your plane hi commission, Richard?'
'Yes, the plane's all right. It's in the hangar at the bottom
of the meadow, and when I took her out three days ago she was
running perfectly. I don't much like the look of this fog,
though, although, of course, it's probably only a ground mist.'
They all glanced out of the window again. The grey murk still
hung over the terrace, shutting out the view of the Botticelli
garden where, on this early May morning, the polyanthus and
forget-me-nots and daffodils, shedding their green cocoons, were
bursting into colourful life.
'Let's go,' said Rex, impatiently. 'De Richleau's right.
'You'd best get some clothes on, then we'll beat it for Paris
the second you're fit.'
The rest followed him out into the hall and upstairs to the
rooms above. The house was silent and seemingly deserted. The
servants were obviously taking Richard's orders in their most
literal sense and, released for once from their daily tasks,
enjoying an unexpected holiday in their own quarters.
Marie Lou looked into the nursery and almost broke down again
for a moment as she once more saw the empty cot, but she hurried
past it to the nurse's bedroom and found the woman still
sleeping soundly.
In Richard's dressing-room the men made hasty preparations,
Rex was clad in the easy lounge suit which he had put on in De
Richleau's flat, but Richard and the Duke were still in pyjamas.
When they were dressed Richard fitted the others out as well as
he could with top clothes for their journey. The Duke was easy,
being only a little taller than himself, and a big double
overcoat was found for Rex, into which he managed to scramble
despite the breadth of his enormous shoulders. Marie Lou joined
them a few moments later, clad in her breeches and leather
flying coat, which she always used whenever she went up with
Richard.
Downstairs again, they paused in the library to make another
hurried meal. Then the door was locked, and after casting a last
unhappy glance at Tanith's body, which remained unaltered in
appearance, Rex led the way out on the terrace.
They walked quickly down the gravel path beside the Botticelli
border, the sound of their footsteps muffled by the all-
pervading mist-through Marie Lou's own garden, with its long
herbaceous borders, and past the old sundial-round the
quadrangles of tessellated pavement which fell in a succession
of little terraces to the pond garden, with its water lilies,
and so to the meadow beyond.
When they reached the hangar Richard and Rex ran out the plane
and got it in order for the flight. De Richleau stood watching
their operations with Marie Lou beside him, both of them
fretting a little at the necessary delay, since now that the
vital decision had been taken every member of the party was
impatient to set out,
They settled themselves in the comfortable four-seater. Rex
swung the propeller, well accustomed to the ways of aeroplanes,
and the engine purred upon a low steady note. He watched it for
a second, and then, as he scrambled aboard, there came the long
conventional cry: 'All set.'
The plane moved slowly forward into the dank mist. The hedges
and trees on either side were shut out by banks of fog, but
Richard knew the ground so well that he felt confident of
judging his distance and direction. He taxied over the even
grass of the long field, and turned to rise. The plane lifted,
touched ground again gently twice, and they were off.
As they left the earth a new feeling came over Richard. He was
passionately fond of flying, and it always filled him with
exhilaration, but this was different. It was as though he had
suddenly come out into the daylight after having been walking
down a long, dark, smoky tunnel for many hours. At long
intervals there had been brightly lit recesses in the sides of
it where figures stood like tableaux at a waxworks show. The
slug-like Thing and Fleur; Rex standing at the window with
Tanith in his arms; Simon whispering something to the Duke;
Marie Lou's face as she stood with her hand resting on the rail
of Fleur's empty cot, and a dozen others. The rest of that
strange journey he seemed to have made, consisted of long
periods of blankness only punctuated by little cries of fear and
scraps of reiterated argument, the purpose of which he could no
longer remember. Now-his brain was clear again, and he settled
himself with new purpose to handle the plane with all his skill.
In those few moments they had risen clear of the ground mist
and were soaring upwards into the blue above. As De Richleau
looked down he saw a very curious thing. Not only was the fog
that had hemmed them in local, but it seemed to be concentrated
entirely upon Cardinals Folly. He could just make out the
chimneys of the house rising in its centre, as from a grey sea,
and from the buildings it spread out in a circular formation for
half a mile or so on every side, hiding the gardens from his
view and obscuring the meadows between the house and the
village, but beyond, all was clear in the brilliant sunshine of
the earfy summer afternoon.
Rex was beside Richard in the cockpit. Automatically he had
taken on the job of navigator, and, like Richard, his brain
numbed before with misery, had started to function properly
again directly he set to busying himself with the maps and
scales.
The Duke, sitting in the body of the machine with Marie Lou,
felt that there was nothing he could say to comfort her, but he
took her hand in his and held it between his own. From his quick
gesture she felt again his intense distress that he should ever
have been the means of bringing her this terrible unhappiness,
so, to distract his thoughts, she put her mouth right up against
his ear and told him of the odd dream she had had; about reading
the old book. He gave her a curious glance and began to shout
back at her.
She could not catch all he said owing to the noise of the
engine, but enough to tell that he was intensely interested. He
seemed to think that she had been dreaming of the famous Red
Book of Appin, a wonderful treatise on Magic owned by the
Stewards of Invernahyle, who were now extinct. The book had been
lost and not heard of for more than a hundred years, but her
description of it, and the legend that it might only be read
with understanding by those who wore a circlet of iron above
their brow made him insistent that it must be this which she had
seen in her dream. He pressed her to try and remember if she had
understood any portion of it.
After some trouble she managed to convey to him that she had
read one sentence on a faded vellum page, and that although the
lettering was quite different from anything which she had ever
seen before, she understood it at the time, but could not recall
the meaning now. Then, as talking was so difficult, they fell
silent.
At a hundred miles an hour the plane soared above the English
counties, but they took little heed of the fields and hedges,
woods and hills, which fled so swiftly from beneath them.
Somehow they seemed to have stepped out of their old life
altogether. Time no longer existed for them, only the will to
arrive at their destination in order to be active once again.
All their thoughts were concentrated now upon Paris and the man
who had lost half his ear. Would he be there? Could they find
him if he was? And would they arrive before Mocata?
They passed over the Northern end of the English Channel
almost without noticing it; Marie Lou felt a little shock when
the plane banked steeply and Richard brought it circling down.
The sun was sinking behind great banks of cloud and, as the
plane tilted, she saw that a thick mist lay below them in which
glowed dull patches of half-obscured light. Richard and Rex knew
them, however, to be fog flares of the Le Bourget lauding
ground.
A few seconds more and they had seen the last of the sunset. A
thin greyness closed about them. One of the flares showed
bright, and the plane bounded along the earth until Richard
brought it to a standstill.
Almost in a daze they answered the questions of the officers
at the airport and passed the Customs, secured a fast-looking
taxi and, packed inside it, were heading for the centre of
Paris.
As they ran through the streets, with the familiar high-
pitched note of the taxi's horn continually sounding and the
subtle smell of the epiceries in their nostrils-the very scent
of Paris-they noticed half-unconsciously that night had fallen
once more.
Here and there the electric sky-signs on the tall buildings,
advertising Savan Cadum or Byrrh, glowed dully through the murk,
and the lights of the cafes illuminated little spaces of the
boulevards through which they passed, throwing up the figures
that sat sipping their aperitifs at the marble-topped tables and
dappling the young green of the stunted trees that lined the
pavements.
None of them spoke as the taxi swerved and rushed, seeking
every opportunity to nose its way through the traffic. Only Rex
leant forward once, soon after they left the aerodrome, and
murmured: 'I told him the Ritz. We'll be able to hunt up this
bird's address when we get there.'
They ran past the Opera, down the Boulevard de la Madeleine,
and turned left into the Place Vendome. The cab pulled up with a
jerk. A liveried porter hurried forward to fling open the door,
and they scrambled out.
'Pay him off, with a good tip,' Rex ordered the hotel servant.
'I' see-yer-later, inside.' Then he led the way into the hotel.
One of the under-managers at the bureau recognised him and
came forward with a welcoming smile.
'Monsieur Van Ryn, what a pleasure! You require accomo-dation
for your party? How many rooms do you desire? I hope that you
will stay with us some time.'
Two single rooms and one double, with bathrooms, and we'd best
have a sitting-room on the same floor,' replied Rex curtly. 'How
long we'll be staying I can't say. I've got urgent business to
attend to this trip. Do you happen to know a banker named
Castelnau-elderly man, grey-haired, with a hatchet face, who's
had a slice taken out of his left ear?'
'Mais oui, monsieur. He lunches here frequently.'
'Good. D'you know where he lives?'
"For the moment, no, but I will ascertain. You permit?' The
manager moved briskly away and disappeared into the office. A
few moments later he returned with a Paris telephone directory
open in his hand.
'This will be it, monsieur, I think. Monsieur Laurent Castel
nau, 72, Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau. That is a block of
flats. Do you wish to telephone his apartment?'
'Sure,' Rex nodded, 'Call him right away, please.' Then, as
the Frenchman hurried off, he nodded quietly to the Duke: 'Best
leave this to me. I've got a hunch how to fix him.'
'Go ahead,' the Duke acquiesced. He had been keeping well in
the background, and now he smiled a little unhappily as he went
on in a low voice:
'How I love Paris. The smell and the sight and the sound of
it. I have not been back here for fifteen years. The Government
have never forgiven me for the part that I played in the
Royalist rising which took place in the 90's. I was young then.
How long ago it all seems now. But never since have I dared to
venture back to France, except a few times, secretly on the most
urgent business. I believe the authorities would, still put me
into some miserable fortress if they discovered me on French
soil.'
'Oh, Greyeyes, dear! You ought never to have come.' Marie Lou
turned to him impulsively. 'With all these awful things
happening I had forgotten. Somehow I always think of.you really
as an Englishman, not as a French exile who lives in England as
the next best thing. It would be terrible if you were arrested
and tried as a political offender after all these years.'
He shrugged and smiled again. 'Don't worry, Princess. The
authorities have almost forgotten my existence, I expect, and
the only risk I run is in knowing so many people who constantly
travel through France. If someone recognised me and spoke my
name too loud it is just possible that it might strike a chord
in some police spy's memory, but beyond that there is very
little danger.
They sat down at a little table in the lounge while Rex was
telephoning. When he rejoined them he nodded cheerfully.
'We're in luck, and Lord knows we need it. I spoke to
Castelnau himself, used the name of my old man's firm-The
Chesapeake Banking and Trust Corporation-and spun a yarn that he
had sent me over on a special mission to Europe connected with
the franc. Told him the whole thing was far too hush-hush for me
to make a date to see him at his office tomorrow morning, where
his clerks might recognise me as the representative of an
American banking house, and that I must see him tonight
privately. He hedged a bit until I put it to him that I had
power to deal in real big figures, and he fell for that like a
sucker. He couldn't see me yet though, because he's busy putting
on his party frock for some official banquet, but he figures
he'll be back at the apartment round about ten o'clock, so I
said I'd be along to state my business then.'
To fill in time we might go upstairs and have a bath, remarked
Richard, feeling his bristly chin. 'Then we'd better go out and
dine somewhere, though God knows, I've never felt less like food
in my life.'
'All right,' De Richleau agreed, 'only let us go somewhere
quiet for dinner. If we go to one of the smart places it will
add to the chance of my running into somebody that I know.'
'What about Le Vert Galant?' Richard suggested. 'It's on the
right bank down by La Cite, old-fashioned, quiet, but excellent
food, and you're unlikely to see the sort of people that we know
there in the evening.'
'Is that still running?' De Richleau smiled. 'Then let us go
there by all means. It's just the place.' And they moved over
towards the lift.
Upstairs they bathed and tidied themselves, but almost auto
matically, for their uneasy sleep that morning seemed to have
done little to recruit their lowered energy. As though still in
a bad dream, Marie Lou undressed,' and dressed again, while
Richard moved about the room, for once apparently unconscious of
her presence, silently and mechanically eliminating the traces
of the journey. Then he submitted to the ministrations of the
hotel barber with one curt order, that the man was to shave him
and not to talk.
Rex finished first and wandered into their room, where he sat
uncomfortably perched upon a corner of the bed, but he stared at
his large feet the whole time that he sat there and did not make
any effort whatever at conversation.
De Richleau joined them shortly afterwards, and Marie Lou,
rousing for a moment from her abject misery, noted with a little
start how spick and span he had become again, after the
attentions of the barber and his bath. He had produced one of
his long Hoyos, and appeared to be smoking it with quiet
enjoyment. Richard and Rex, despite the removal of their
incipient beards, still looked woebegone and haggard, as though
they had not slept for days, and were almost contemplating
suicide, but the Duke still maintained his air of the great
gentleman for whose pleasure and satisfaction this whole
existence is ordered.
Actually his appearance was no more than a mask with which
long habit had accustomed him to disguise his emotions, and at
heart he was racked by an anxiety equal to that of any of the
others. He was suppressing his impatience to get hold of
Castelnau only by a supreme effort; his feet itched to be on the
move, and his fingers to be on the throat of the adversary; but
as he came into the room he smiled round at them, kissed Marie
Lou's hand with his usual gallantry, and presented a huge bunch
of white violets to her.
'A few flowers, Princess, for your room.'
Marie Lou took them without a word; the tears brimming in her
eyes spoke her thanks that he should have thought of such a
thing at such a time, and his perfect naturalness served to
steady them all a little as they went down afterwards in the
lift. Rex changed some money at the caisse, and they went out
into the night again.
'Queer-isn't it,' remarked Richard as he looked out of the
taxi window at the fog-bound streets. 'I've always said what fun
it is to make a surprise visit for a couple of nights to Paris
-in May. It's like stealing in on summer in advance-tea in the
open at Arrnenonville-a drive to Fontamebleau, with the forest
at its very best-and all that. 'I never thought I might come to
Paris one May like this.'
'I've a feeling there's something wrong about it-or us,' said
Rex slowly. 'Those servants in the hotel back there didn't seem
any more natural than the weather to me. It was as though I was
watching them act in some kind of play.'
De Richleau nodded. 'Yes, I felt the same, and I believe
Mocata is responsible. Perhaps he surrounded Cardinals Folly
with a strong atmospheric force, and we have brought the
vibrations of it with us, or he may be interfering with our
auras in some way. I'm only guessing, of course, and can't
possibly explain it.'
At the Vert Galant De Richleau ordered dinner without
reference to any of them. He was a great gourmet, and knew from
past experience the dishes that pleased them best, but as a meal
it was one of the most dismal failures which it had ever been
his misfortune to witness.
He knew and they knew that his apparent preoccupation with
food and wine was nothing but a bluff; an attempt to smother
their anxiety and occupy their thoughts until the time to go to
Castelnau's apartment should arrive, The cooking was excellent,
the service everything that one could desire, and the cellar of
Le Vert Galant provided wines to which even De Richleau's
critical taste gave full approval, but their hearts were not in
the business.
They toyed with the Lobster Cardinal, sent away the Paujllac
Lamb untasted, and drank the wines as a beverage to steady their
nerves rather than with the consideration and pleasure which
they deserved.
The fat maiire d'hotel supervised the service of each course
himself, and it passed his understanding how these three men and
the beautiful little lady could show so little appreciation.
With hands clasped upon a large stomach, he stood before the
Duke and murmured his distress that the dishes they had ordered
should not appear to please them, but the Duke waved him away,
even summoning up a little smile to assure him that it was no
fault of the restaurant and only their unfortunate lack of
appetite.
Throughout the meal De Richleau talked unceasingly. He was a
born raconteur, and ordinarily, with his charm and wit, could
hold any audience enthralled. Tonight, despite his own anxiety,
he made a supreme attempt to lift the burden from the shoulders
of his friends by exploiting every venue of memory and
conversation, but never in his life had his efforts met with
such a cold reception. In vain he attempted to divert their
thoughts, laughing a little to himself, as he reached the
denouement in each of his stories, and hoping against hope that
he might raise a smile in those three anxious faces that faced
him across the table.
For Marie Lou the meal was just another phase of that horrible
nightmare through which she had been passing since the early
hours of the morning. Mechanically she sampled the dishes which
were put before her, but each one seemed to taste the same, and
after a few mouthfuls she laid down her fork, submitting
miserably to the frantic, gnawing thoughts which pervaded her
whole being.
Richard said nothing, ate little, and drank heavily. He was in
that state when he knew quite well that it was impossible for
him to drink too much. Great happiness or great distress has
that effect upon certain men, and he was one of them. Every
other minute he glanced at the clock on the wall, as it slowly
registered the passage of time until they could set forth once
more on their attempt to save his daughter.
There was still half an hour to go when the fruit and brandy
were placed upon the table, and then at last De Richleau
surrendered.
'I've been talking utter nonsense all through dinner,' he
confessed gravely; 'only to keep my thoughts off this wretched
business, you understand. But now the time has come when we can
speak of it again with some advantage. What do you intend to do,
Rex, when you see this man?'
Marie Lou lifted her eyes from the untasted grapes which lay
upon her plate. 'You've been splendid, Greyeyes, dear. I haven't
been listening to you really, but a sentence here and there has
been just enough to take my mind off a picture of the worst that
may happen, which keeps on haunting me.'
He smiled across at her gratefully. 'I'm glad of that. It's
the least that I could try to do. But come now, Rex, let's hear
your plan.'
'I've hardly got one,' Rex confessed, shrugging his great
shoulders. 'We know he'll see me, and that's as far as I have
figured it out. I presume it'll boil down to my jumping on him
after a pretty short discussion and threatening to gouge out his
eyeballs with my hands unless he's prepared to come clean with
everything he knows about Mocata.'
De Richleau shook his head. That is roughly the idea, of
course, but there are certain to be servants in the flat, and we
must arrange it that you have a free field for your party.'
'Can't you take us along with you?' Richard suggested. 'Say
that we're privately interested in this deal you're putting up.
If only the three of us can get inside that flat God help
anybody who tries to stop us forcing him to talk.'
'Sure,' Rex agreed. 'I see no sort of objection to that. We
can park Marie Lou at the Ritz again, on our way, before we beat
this fellow up.'
'No!' Marie Lou gave a sudden dogged shake of her head. 'I am
coming with you. I'm quite capable of taking care of myself, and
I will keep out of the way if there is any trouble. You cannot
ask me to go back to the hotel and sit there on my own while you
are trying to obtain news of Fleur. I should go mad and fling
myself out of the window. I've got to come, so please don't
argue about it.'
Richard took her hand and caressed it softly. 'Of course you
shall, my sweet. It would be better, perhaps, for you not to be
with us when we see Castelnau, but there's no reason why you
shouldn't wait for us in his hall.'
De Richleau nodded. "Yes, in the circumstances it is im
possible to leave Marie Lou behind, but about these servants
-did you bring that gun that you had last night with you?'
'Yes, I brought it through the Customs in my hip pocket, and
it's fully loaded.'
'Right. Then if necessary you can use it to intimidate the
servants while Rex and I tackle Castelnau. It is a quarter to.
Shall we go?'
Rex sent for the bill and paid it, leaving a liberal tip which
soothed the dignity of the injured maitre d'hotel, then they
filed out of the restaurant.
'Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau,' De Richleau told the
driver sharply as they climbed into the taxi, and not a word was
spoken until the cab drew up before a palatial block of modern
flats, facing on to the little green park where the children of
the rich in Paris take their morning airing.
'Monsieur Castelnau?' the Duke inquired of the concierge.
This way, monsieur'; the man led them through a spacious stone
faced hall to the lift.
It shot up to the fifth floor and as he opened the gates, the
concierge pointed to a door upon the right.
'Number Seventy-two,' he said quietly. 'I think Monsieur
Castelnau has just come in.'
The gates clanged behind them, and the lift flashed silently
down again to the ground floor. De Richleau gave Rex a swift
glance and, stepping towards the door of Number Seventy-two,
pressed the bell.
31
The Man With the Jagged Ear
The tall, elaborately carved door was opened by a bald,
elderly man-servant in a black alpaca coat. Rex gave his name,
and the servant looked past him with dark, inquiring eyes at the
others.
'These are friends of mine who're seeing Monsieur Castelnau on
the same business,' Rex said abruptly, stepping into the long,
narrow hall. 'Is he in?'
'Yes, monsieur, and he is expecting you. This way, if you
please.'
Marie Lou perched herself on a high couch of Cordova leather,
while the other three followed the back of the alpaca jacket
down the corridor. Another tall, carved door was thrown open,
and they entered a wide, dimly-lit salon, furnished in the old
style of French elegance: gilt ormolu, tapestries, bric-a-brac,
and a painted ceiling where cupids disported themselves among
roseate flowers.
Castelnau stood, cold, thin, angular and hatchet-faced, with
his back to a large porcelain stove. He was dressed in the
clothes which he had worn at the banquet. The wide, watered silk
ribbon with the garish colours of some foreign order cut across
his shirt front and a number of decorations were pinned to the
lapel of his evening coat.
'Monsieur Van Ryn.' He barely touched Rex's hand with his cold
fingers and went on in his own language. 'It is a pleasure to
receive you. I know your house well by reputation, and from time
to time in the past my own firm has had some dealings with
yours.' Then he glanced at the others sharply. These gentlemen
are, I assume, associated with you in this business?'
'They are.' Rex introduced them briefly. 'The Duke de
Richleau-Mr. Richard Eaton.'
Castelnau's eyebrows lifted a fraction as he studied the
Duke's face with new interest. 'Of course,' he murmured.
'Monsieur le Due must pardon me if I did not recognise him at
first. It is many years since we have met, and I was under the
impression that he had never found the air of Paris good for
him; but perhaps I am indiscreet to make any reference to that
old trouble.'
'The business which has brought me is urgent, monsieur,' De
Richleau replied suavely. "Therefore I elected to ignore the ban
which a Government of bourgeois and socialists placed upon me.'
'A grave step, monsieur, since the police of France have a
notoriously long memory. Particularly at the present time when
the Government has cause to regard all politicals who are not of
its party with suspicion. However,' the banker bowed slightly,
'that, of course, is your own affair entirely. Be seated,
gentlemen. I am at your service.'
None of the three accepted the proffered invitation, and Rex
said abruptly: 'The bullion deal I spoke of when I called you on
the telephone was only an excuse to secure this interview. The
three of us have come here tonight because we know that you are
associated with Mocata.'
The Frenchman stared at him in blank surprise and was just
about to burst into angry protest when Rex hurried on. 'It'll
cut no ice to deny it. We know too much. The night before last
we saw you at that joint in Chilbury, and afterwards with the
rest of those filthy swine doing the devil's business on
Salisbury Plain. You're a Satanist, and you're going to tell us
all you know about your leader.'
Castelnau's dark eyes glittered dangerously in his long, white
face. They shifted with a sudden furtive glance towards an open
escritoire.
Before he could move, Richard's voice came quiet but steely.
'Stay where you are. I've got you covered, and I'll shoot you
like a dog if you flicker an eyelid.'
De Richleau caught the banker's glance, and with his quick,
cat-like step had reached the ornate desk. He pulled out a few
drawers, and then found the weapon that he felt certain must be
there. It was a tiny .2 pistol, but deadly enough. Having
assured himself that it was loaded, he pointed it at the
Satanist. 'Now,' he said, icily, 'are you prepared to talk, or
must I make you?
Castelnau shrugged, then looked down at his feet. 'You cannot
make me,' he replied with a quiet confidence, 'but if you tell
me what you wish to know, I may possibly give you the
information you require in order to get rid of you.'
'First, what do you know of Mocata's history?'
'Very little, but sufficient to assure you that you are ex
ceedingly ill-advised if, as it appears, you intend to pit
yourself against him.'
To hell with that!' Rex snapped angrily; 'get on with the
story.'
'Just as you wish. It is the Canon Darnien Mocata to whom you
refer, of course. When he was younger he was an officiating
priest at some church in Lyons, I believe. He was always a
difficult person, and his intellectual gifts made a thorn in the
sides of his superiors. Then there was some scandal and he left
the Church; but long before that he had become an occulist of
exceptional powers. I met him some years ago and became
interested in his operations. Your apparent disapproval of them
does not distress me in the least. I find their theory an
exceptionally interesting study, and their practice of the
greatest assistance in governing my business transactions.
Mocata lives in Paris for a good portion of the year, and I see
him from time to time socially in addition to our meetings for
esoteric purposes. I think that is all that I can tell you.'
'When did you see him last?' asked the Duke.
'At Chilbury two nights ago, when we gathered again after the
break-up of our meeting, I suppose you were responsible for
that?' Castelnau's thin lips broke into a ghost of a smile, 'If
so, believe me, you will pay for it.'
'You have not seen him then today-this evening?'
'No, I did not even know that he had returned to Paris.' There
was a ring in the banker's voice which made it difficult for his
questioners to doubt that he was telling them the truth.
'Where does he live when he is in Paris?' the Duke enquired.
'I do not know. I have visited him at many places. Often he
stays with various friends, who are also interested in his
practices, but he has no permanent address. The people with whom
he was staying last left Paris some months ago for the
Argentine, so I have no idea where you are likely to find him
now.'
'Where do you meet him when these Satanic gatherings take
place?'
'I am sorry but I can't tell you.' The Frenchman's voice was
firm.
De Richleau padded softly forward and thrust the little Mstol
into Castefnau's ribs, just under his heart. 'I am afraid 'ou've
got to,' he purred silkily. 'The matter that we are engaged upon
is urgent.'
, The banker held his ground, and to outward appearances
remained unruffled at the threat. 'It is no good,' he said
quietly, I cannot do it, even if you intend to murder me. Each
one of us goes into a self-induced hypnotic trance before
proceeding to these meetings, and wakes upon his arrival. In my
conscious state I have no idea how I get there; so this apache
attitude of yours is completely useless.'
'I see.' De Richleau nodded slowly and withdrew the automatic.
'However, you are going to tell me just the same, because it
happens that I am something of a hypnotist. I shall put you
under now, and we shall proceed to follow all the stages of your
unconscious journey.'
For the first time Castelnau's face showed a trace of fear.
'You can't,' he muttered quickly. 'I won't let you.'
De Richleau shrugged. 'Your opposition will make it slightly
more difficult, but I shall do it, nevertheless. However, as it
may take some time, we will make fresh arrangements in order to
ensure that we are not disturbed. Press the bell, and when your
servant comes, give him definite instructions that as we shall
be engaged in a long conference, upon no pretext whatsoever are
you to be disturbed.'
'And if I refuse?' Castelnau's dark eyes suddenly flashed
rebellion.
'Then you will never live to give another order. The affair we
are engaged upon is desperate, and whatever the consequences may
be, I shall shoot you like the rat you are. Now ring.' De
Richleau put the pistol in his pocket but still held the banker
covered, and after a moment's hesitation Castelnau pressed the
bell.
'You, Richard,' the Duke said in a sharp whisper, 'will leave
us when the servant has taken his instructions. Wait for us with
Marie Lou in the entrance hall. You have your gun. Prevent
anyone leaving the apartment until we have finished. Open the
door to anyone who rings yourself, and if Mocata arrives, as he
may at any moment, don't argue-shoot. I take all
responsibility.'
'I am only waiting for the chance,' said Richard grimly, just
as the servant entered.
Castelnau gave his orders in an even voice, with one eye upon
the Duke's pocket, then Richard, in his normal voice, remarked
casually:
'Well, since the matter is confidential, I had better wait
outside with rny wife until you are through,' and followed the
elderly alpaca-coated man out into the hall.
'Rex,' De Richleau lost not an instant once the door was
closed. Take that telephone receiver off its stand so that we
are not interrupted by any calls. And you,' he turned to the
banker, 'sit down in that chair.'
'I won't!' exclaimed Castelnau furiously. 'This is abominable.
You invade my apartment like brigands. I give you such
information as I can, but what you are about to do will bring me
into danger, and I refuse-I refuse, I tell you.'
'I shall neither argue with you nor kill you,' De Richleau
answered frigidly, 'You are too valuable to me alive. Rex, knock
him out!'
Castelnau swung round and threw up his arms in a gesture of
defence, but Rex broke through his guard. The young American's
mighty fist caught him on the side of the jaw and he crumpled
up, a still heap on his own hearth-rug.
When the banker came to he found himself sitting in a straight
chair; his hands were lashed to the back and his ankles to the
legs with the curtain cords. His head ached abominably and he
saw De Richleau standing opposite to him, smiling relentlessly
down into his face.
'Now,' said the Duke, 'look into my eyes. The sooner we get
this business over the sooner you will be able to get to bed and
nurse your sore head. I am about to place you under, and you are
going to tell us what you do when you go to these satanic
meetings.'
For answer Castelnau quickly closed his eyes and lowered his
head on to his chest, resisting De Richleau's powerful
suggestion with all the force of his will.
This doesn't look to me as though it's going to be any too
easy,' Rex muttered dubiously. 'I've always thought that it was
impossible to hypnotise people if they were unwilling. You'd
better let me put the half-Nelson on him until he becomes more
amenable and sees reason.'
'That might make him agree verbally,' De Richleau replied,
'but it won't stop him lying to us afterwards, and it is quite
possible to hypnotise people against their will. It is often
done to lunatics in asylums. Get behind him now, hold back his
head and lift his eyelids with your fingers so that he cannot
close them. We've got to find out about this place. It is our
only hope of geting on to Mocata.'
Rex did as he was bid. The Duke stood before the chair, his
steel-grey eyes fastened without a flicker upon those of the
unwilling Satanist.
Time passed, and every now and then De Richleau's voice broke
the silence of the quiet, dimly-lit room. 'You are tired now,
you will sleep. I command you.' But all his efforts were
unavailing. The Satanist sat there rigid and determined not to
succumb.
The ormolu clock upon the mantelpiece ticked with a steady,
monotonous note, until Rex was filled with the mad desire to
throw something at it. The hands crawled round the white
enamelled dial; its silvery chime rang out, marking the hours
eleven, twelve, one. Still the Frenchman endured De Richleau's
steady gaze. He knew that they were expecting Mocata to arrive
at his apartment. Mocata was immensely powerful. If only he
could hold out until then the whole position might be saved.
With a fixed determination not to give in, his eyelids held back
by Rex's forefingers, he stared blankly at De Richleau's chin.
Outside, on the sofa of Cordova leather, Richard and Marie Lou
sat side by side. It seemed to her again that she must be
dreaming. The whole fantastic business of this flight to Paris
and their dinner at the Vert Galant had been utterly unreal. It
could not be real now that Mocata was somewhere in this city
preparing to kill her darling Fleur in some ungodly rite, while
she sat there with Richard in that strange, silent apartment and
the night hours laboured on.
She thought that she slept a little, but she was not certain.
Ever since she had fainted in the pentacle and come to with the
sensation that she was above Cardinals Folly, floating in the
soundless ether, all her movements had been automatic and her
vision of their doings distorted, so that whole sections of time
were blotted out from her mind, and only these glimpses of
strange places and faces seemed to register.
The black-coated servant appeared once at the far end of the
corridor, but seeing them still there, disappeared again.
Almost the whole of that long wait Richard sat with his eyes
glued to the front door, his hand clasped ready on the pistol in
his pocket, expecting the ring that would announce Mocata's
arrival.
He too felt that somehow this person, grown desperate from an
unbearable injury and lusting with the desire to kill, re
gardless of laws and consequences, could not possibly be
himself. With every movement that he made he expected to wake
and find himself safely in bed at Cardinals Foily, with Marie
Lou snuggled down close against him and Fleur peacefully asleep
only a few doors away.
Had he wholly believed that Fleur had been taken from him and
that he was never to see her again, he could not possibly have
endured those dreary hours of enforced idleness while the Duke
battled with Castelnau. He would have been forced to interrupt
them or at least leave his post to watch their proceedings, for
his inactivity would have become unbearable.
In the richly furnished salon, Rex and the Duke continued
their long-sustained effort without a second's intermission. The
clock struck two, and as Rex stood behind the Frenchman's chair,
shifting his weight from foot to foot now and then, he seemed at
times to drop off into a sort of half-sleep where he stood.
At last, a little after two, he was roused to a fresh
attention by a sudden sob breaking from the dry lips of the
banker.
'I will not let you, I will not,' he cried hysterically, and
then began to struggle violently with the curtain cords that
tied him to the chair.
'You will,' De Richleau told him firmly, the pupils of his
grey eyes now distended and gleaming with an unnatural light.
Castelnau suddenly ceased to struggle; a cold sweat broke out
on his bony forehead, and his head sagged on his neck, but Rex
held it firmly and continued to press back his eyelids so that
it was impossible for him to escape the Duke's relentless stare.
He began to sob then, like a child who is being beaten, and at
last De Richleau knew that he had broken the Frenchman's will.
In another ten minutes Rex was able to remove his fingers from
the banker's eyelids for he no longer had the power to close
them, but sat there gazing at De Richleau with an imbecile
glare.
In a low voice the Duke began to question him and, after one
last feeble effort at resistance, it all came out. The meeting
place was in a cellar below a deserted warehouse on the banks of
the Seme at Ashieres. They secured full directions as to the way
to reach it and how to get into it when they arrived.
As Castelnau answered the last question, De Richleau glanced
at the clock. Three and a quarter hours,' he said with a sigh of
weariness. 'Still, it might well have taken longer in a case
like this.'
'What'll we do with him?' Rex motioned towards the Frenchman
who, with his head fallen forward on his chest, was now sound
asleep.
'Leave him there,' answered the Duke abruptly. The servants
will find him in the morning, and he's so exhausted that he will
sleep until then. But stuff your handkerchief in his mouth just
in case he wakes and tries to make any trouble for us. Be
quick!'
Castelnau did not even blink an eyelid as Rex gagged him. They
left him there and hurried out to the others.
'Come on!' cried the Duke.
'What about Mocata?' Richard asked. 'If we leave here we
may miss him.' 'We must chance that.' De Richleau pulled open
the door and
made for the stairs.
As they dashed down the long flights he flung over his
shoulder: Tanith may have been wrong. Messages from the astral
plane are often unreliable about time. As it does not exist
there, they have difficulty in judging it. She may have seen him
here a week hence or in the past even. It's so late now that I
doubt if he will turn up tonight. Anyhow, we got out of
Castelnau the place where he's most likely to be-and God knows
what he may be doing if he is there. We've got to hurry!' They
fled after him out of the silent building.
Round the corner they managed to pick up a taxi and, at the
promise of a big tip, the man got every ounce out of his engine
as he whirled the four harassed-looking people away through the
murky streets up towards the Boulevard de Clichy. Topping the
hill, they descended again towards the Seine, crossed the river
and entered Asnieres.
In that outlying slum of Paris with its wharves and ware
houses, narrow, sordid-looking streets and dimly-lit passages,
there was little movement at that hour of the morning. They paid
off the taxi outside a closed cafe which faced upon a dirty-
looking square. A market wagon rumbled past with its driver
huddled on the seat above the horses, his cape drawn close to
protect him from the damp mist rising from the river. The
bedraggled figure of a woman was huddled upon the steps of a
shop with Tabac' in faded blue letters above it, but otherwise
there was no sign of life.
Turning up the collars of their coats and shivering afresh
from the damp chill of the drifting fog, they followed the
Duke's lead along an evil-looking street of tumbledown dwelling
houses. Then, between two high walls, along a narrow passage
where the rays of a solitary lamp, struggling through grimy
glass, were barely sufficient to dispel a small circle of gloom
in its own area. When they had passed it the rest was darkness,
foul smells, greasy mud squishing from beneath their feet, and
wisps of mist curling cold about their faces.
At the end of that long dark alley-way they came out upon a
deserted wharf. De Richleau turned to the left and the others
followed. To one side of them the steep face of a tall brick
building, from which chains and pulleys hung in slack festoons,
towered up into the darkness. On the other, a few feet away, the
river surged, oily, turgid, yellow and horrible as it hurried to
the sea.
As if in a fresh phase of their nightmare, they stumbled
forward over planks, hawsers and pieces of old iron, the
neglected debris of the riverside, until fifty yards farther on
De Richleau halted.
'This is it,' he announced, fumbling with a rusty padlock.
'Castelnau hadn't got a key and so we'll have to break this
thing. Hunt around, and see if you can find a piece of iron that
we can use as a jemmy. The longer the better. It will give us
more purchase.'
They rummaged round in the semi-darkness, broken only by a
riverside light some distance away along the wharf and the
masthead lanterns of a few long barges anchored out on the
swiftly flowing waters.
This do?' Richard pulled a rusty lever from a winch and,
grabbing it from him, the Duke thrust the narrow end into the
hoop of the padlock.
'Now then,' he said, as he gripped the cold, moist iron,
'steady pressure isn't any good. It needs a violent jerk, so
when I say "go!" we must all throw our weight on the bar
together. Ready? Go!'
They heaved downwards. There was a sudden snap. The tongue of
the padlock had been wrenched out of the lock. De Richleau
removed it from the chain and in another moment they had the
tall wooden door open.
Once inside, De Richleau struck a match, and while he shaded
it with his hands the others looked about them. From what little
they could see, the place appeared to be empty. They moved
quickly forward, striking more matches as they went, in the
direction where Castelnau had told them they would find a trap-
door leading to the cellars.
In a far corner they halted. 'Stand back all of you.' whis
pered Rex, and while the Duke held up a light he pulled at the
second in a row of upright iron girders, apparently built in to
strengthen the wall. As Castelnau had said in his trance, it was
a secret lever to operate the trap. The girder came forward and
a large square of flooring lifted noiselessly on well-oiled
hinges.
De Richleau blew out his match and produced the small
automatic which he had taken from the banker. 'I will go first,'
he said, 'and you, Rex, follow me. Richard, you have the other
gun so you had better come last. You can look after Marie Lou
and protect our rear. No noise now, because if we're lucky our
man is here.'
Feeling about with his foot he ascertained that a flight of
stairs led downwards. His shoes made no noise, and it was
evident .that they were covered with a thick carpet. Swiftly but
cautiously he began to descend the flight and the others fol
lowed him down into the pitchy darkness.
At the bottom of the stairs they groped their way along a
tunnel until the Duke was brought up sharply by a wooden
partition at which it seemed to end. He fumbled for the handle,
thinking that it was a door. The sides were as smooth and
polished as the centre, yet it moved gently under his touch, and
after a moment he found it to be a sliding panel. With the
faintest click of ball bearings it slid back on its runners.
Straining their eyes they peered into the great apartment upon
which it opened. A hundred feet long at least and thirty wide,
it stretched out before them. Two lines of thick pillars, acting
as supporters to the roof above, and rows of chairs divided in
the centre by an aisle which led up to a distant altar, gave it
the appearance of a big private chapel. It was lit by one
solitary lamp which hung suspended before the altar, and that
distant beacon did not penetrate to the shadows in which they
stood.
On tiptoe and with their weapons ready they moved forward
along the wail. De Richleau peered from side to side as he
advanced, his pistol levelled. Rex crept along beside him, the
iron winch lever which they had used to smash the padlock
gripped tight in his big fist. At any moment they expected their
presence to be discovered.
As they crept nearer to the hanging lamp, they saw that the
place had been furnished with the utmost luxury and elegance for
those unholy meetings. It was, indeed, a superbly equipped
temple for the worship of the Devil. Above the altar a great and
horrible representation of the Goat of Mendes, worked in the
loveliest coloured silks, leered down at them; its eyes were two
red stones which had been inset in the tapestry. They flickered
with dull malevolence in the dim light of the solitary lamp.
On the side walls were pictures of men, women and beasts
practising obscenities only possible of conception in the brain
of a rnad artist. Below the enormous central figure, which had
hideous, distorted, human faces protruding from its elbows,
knees and belly, was a great altar of glistening red stone,
worked and inlaid with other coloured metals in the Italian
fashion. Upon it reposed the ancient 'devil's bibles' containing
all liturgies of hell; broken crucifixes and desecrated chalices
stolen from churches and profaned here at the meetings of the
Satanists.
Luxurious armchairs upholstered in red velvet and gold with
eleborate canopies of Jace above, such as High Prelates use in
cathedrals when assisting at important ceremonies, flanked the
altar on either side. Below the steps to the short chancel, on a
level with where they stood, were arranged rows and rows of
cushioned prie-dieux for the accommodation of the worshippers.
No sound or movement disturbed the stillness of the heavy
incense laden air and with a sinking of the heart De Richleau
knew that they had lost their man. He had gambled blindly upon
Tanith's message and she had proved wrong as to time. Mocata
might not be in Paris for days to come; perhaps he had divined
their journey and, knowing that he would be unmolested while
they were abroad, returned to Simon's house where, even now, he
might be foully murdering poor little Fleur. It seemed that
their last hope had gone.
Then as they stepped from the side aisle they suddenly saw a
thing that had been hidden from them by the rows of chair
backs-a body, clad in a long white robe with mystic signs
embroidered on it in black and red, lay spreadeagled, face
downwards on the floor, at the bottom of the chancel steps,
'It's Simon!' breathed the Duke.
'Oh, hell, they've killed him!' Rex ran forward and knelt
beside the body of their friend. They turned him over and felt
his heart. It was beating slowly but rhythmically. The Duke
pulled out of his waistcoat pocket a little bottle, without
which he never travelled, and held it beneath Simon's nose. He
shuddered suddenly and his eyes opened, staring up at them.
'Simon, darling, Simon. It's us-we're here.' Marie Lou grasped
his limp hands between her own.
He shuddered again and struggled into a sitting position.
'What-what's happened?' he murmured, but his voice was normal.
'You left us, you dear, pig-headed ass!' exclaimed Richard.
'Gave yourself up and ruined our whole plan of campaign. What's
happened to you! That's what we want to know.'
'Well, I met him.' Simon gave the ghost of a smile. 'And he
took me to Paris in his plane. Then to some place down on the
riverside.' He gazed round and added quickly: 'But this is it.
How did you get here?'
'Never mind that,' De Richleau urged him. 'Have you seen
Fleur?'
'Yes. He sent a car for me, and when I reached the plane she
was already in it. We had an argument and he swore he'd keep his
word unless I went through with this.'
The ritual to Saturn?' asked De Richleau.
'Um. He said that if I'd do it without making any fuss he'd
let me take Fleur out of here immediately afterwards and back to
England.'
'He's double-crossed you, as we thought he. would,' Rex
grunted. 'There's not a soul in this place. He's quit, and taken
Fleur with him. Can't you say where he'll be likely to make
for?'
'Ner.' Simon shook his head. 'Directly we started on the
ritual he put me under. I let him, but of course he would have
done that anyway. The last I saw of Fleur' she was sound asleep
in that armchair and the next thing I knew you were all staring
down at me just now.'
'If you completed the ritual, Mocata knows now where the
Talisman is,' De Richleau said abruptly.
'Yes,' Simon nodded.
'Then he will have gone to wherever it is-from here.'
'Of course,' Richard cut in. 'That's his main objective. He
wouldn't lose a second.'
Then Simon must know the place to which he's gone.'
'How's that? I don't quite get you.' Rex looked at the Duke
with a puzzled frown.
'In his subconscious, I mean. Our only hope now is for me to
put Simon under again and make him repeat every word that he
said when the ritual was performed. That will give us the hiding-
place of the Talisman and the place to which I'll stake my life
Mocata is heading at the present moment. Are you game, Simon?'
'Yes, of course. You know that I would do anything to help.'
'Right.' The Duke took him by the arm and pushed him gently.
'Sit down in that chair to the right of the altar and we'll go
ahead.'
Simon settled himself and leaned back on the comfortable
cushions, his white robe with its esoteric designs in black and
red settling about his feet like the long skirts of a woman. De
Richleau made a few swift passes. 'Sleep, Simon,' he commanded.
Simon's eyelids trembled and closed. After a moment he began
to breathe deeply and regularly. The Duke went on: 'You are in
this temple with Mocata. The ritual to Saturn is about to begin.
Repeat the words that he made you speak then.'
Dreamily but easily, Simon spoke the words of power which were
utterly meaningless to Richard, -Rex and Marie Lou, who stood, a
tensely anxious audience, at the bottom of the chancel steps.
'On,' commanded De Richleau. 'Jump a quarter of an hour.'
Simon spoke again, more sentences incomprehensible to the
uninitiate.
'On again,' commanded De Richleau. 'Another quarter of an hour
has passed.'
'--was built above the place where the Talisman is buried,'
said Simon. 'It will be found in the earth beneath the right
hand stone of the altar.'
'Go back one minute,' ordered De Richleau, and Simon spoke
once more.
'--Attila's death the Greek secreted it and took it to his own
country. In the city of Yanina, upon his return, he became
possessed of devils and was handed over to the brethren at the
monastery above Metsovo, which stands in the mountains twenty
miles east of the city. They failed to cast out the spirits
which inhabited his body and so imprisoned him in an underground
cell and there, before he died, he buried the Talisman. Seven
years later the dungeons were demolished and the crypt built in
their place on the same site, with the great church above it.
The Talisman remained undisturbed in its original hiding place.
Its power gradually pervaded the whole of the Brotherhood,
filling it with lechery and greed, so that it disintegrated and
was finally disbanded before the invasion by the Turks-. The
chapel to the left in the crypt was built above the place where
the Talisman is buried.'
'Stop,' ordered the Duke. 'Awake now.'
'By Jove, we've got it!' exclaimed Rex. But as he spoke a
slight noise behind them made him swing upon his heel.
Four figures stood there in the shadows. The tallest suddenly
stepped forward.
Richard's hand leapt to his gun but the tall man snapped:
'Stand still, man vieux, I have you covered,' and they saw that
he held an automatic.
The other two strangers came forward. The fourth was
Castelnau.
The leader of the party turned to a little old man, who stood
beside him wearing an out-of-date bowler hat that came almost
down to his ears, then nodded towards the Duke.
'Is that De Richleau, Verrier? You should be able to recognise
him, since he was in your time.'
'Oui monsieur,' declared the little old man. 'That is the
famous Royalist who caused us so much trouble when I was young.
I would know his face again anywhere.'
'Son! All this is very interesting.' The tall, hard-eyed man
glanced from the obscene pictures on the walls to the mag
nificent appurtenances of Satanic worship upon the altar, and
went on in a silky tone: 'I have had an idea for some time that
a secret society has been practising devil worship in Paris and
is responsible for certain disappearances, but I could never lay
my hands on them before. Now I have got five of you red-handed.'
He paused for a moment then gave a jerky little bow. 'Madame
et Messieurs, permit me to introduce myself. I am le Chef de la
Surete, Daudet. Monsieur le Due, I arrest you as an enemy of the
Government upon the old charge. The rest of you I shall hold
with him, as persons suspected of kidnapping and the murder of
young children at the practice of infamous rites.'
32
The Gateway of the Pit
For ten seconds the friends stood there staring at the de
tective. Castelnau's presence gave them the key to this grotes
que but highly dangerous situation. Mocata must have left the
warehouse at almost the same time they had left the banker's
apartment. Perhaps their taxis had even passed within a few feet
of each other, racing in opposite directions. Tanith had proved
right after all when she had told them that she could see Mocata
talking with Castelnau that night in his flat.
Mocata had found the banker there, released and revived him,
and then listened to his story; realising at once that, since it
was possible for De Richleau to hypnotise Castelnau against his
will, it would be easy for him to do the same to Simon, learn
the hiding place of the Talisman, and follow him to it.
Now that they had discovered the secret Satanic temple which
was his headquarters in Paris, the place would be useless to him
and only a source of danger. Unmentionable crimes had been
committed there, and it would be far too great a risk for him,
ever to visit it again. Then the brilliant decision that, since
the place had to be abandoned, he could at least use it to
destroy his enemies.
The whole thing flashed through De Richleau's brain in those
few seconds. Mocata's first idea that, if only he could get the
police to the warehouse before they left it, he would have
involved them in all the crimes associated with such a place and
thrown them off his trail for good. Next, the vital question,
how to get the police there in time. Would they act at once if
Castelnau were sent to tell them a tale about Satanic orgies or
only laugh at him? What practical crime could his enemies be
charged with? Then the perfect inspiration. If the authorities
were told that De Richleau, the Royalist exile, was a party to
the business they would not lose a second, but seize on it as a
heaven-sent opportunity to throw discredit upon their political
opponents. What a magnificent scandal for the Government Press
to handle. 'Secret Royalist Society practises Black
Art'-'Satanic Temple raided at Asnieres'- 'Notorious exile
arrested while performing Blasphemous Rites.' The Duke could see
the scurrilous headlines and hear the newsboy's cry.
And the trick had worked. They had actually been discovered in
that house of hell with Simon in the tell-tale robes, seated
before the altar, while he performed what must certainly have
appeared to the police as some evil ceremony and the other three
had stood there, forming a small congregation.
How could they possibly hope to persuade the tall, suspicious-
eyed Monsier le Chef de la Surete Daudet of their innocence,
much less get him to agree to their immediate release? Yet, as
they stood there, Mocata was on his way to the place where he
kept his special plane, if not already aboard it. Night flying
would have no terrors for him who, if he wished, could invoke
the elements to his aid. Fleur would be with him and he meant to
murder her as certainly as they stood there. His determination
to secure the return of Tanith made the sacrifice of a baptised
child imperative, and before another twenty-four hours had gone
he would be in possession of the Talisman of Set, bringing upon
the world God alone knew what horrors of war, famine,
disablement and death.
De Richleau knew that there was only one thing for it-even if
he was shot down there and then-he sprang like a panther at the
Chef de la Surete's throat.
The detective fired from his hip. Flame stabbed the semi-
darkness of the vault. The crash hit their eardrums like the
explosion of a slab of gelignite. The bullet seared through the
Duke's left arm, but his attack hurled the Police-Chief to the
ground.
Simon and Marie Lou flung themselves simultaneously upon the
old detective Verrier. The thoughts which had passed through De
Richleau's mind in those breathless seconds had also raced
through hers. If they submitted to arrest their last hope would
be gone of saving her beloved Fleur.
Richard had no chance to pull his gun. The third man had
grabbed him round the body but Rex rapped the policeman on the
back of the head with his iron bar. The man grunted and toppled
on the the chancel steps.
Rex leapt over the body straight for Castelnau. Quick as a
flash, the banker turned and ran, his long legs flicking past
each other as he bounded down the empty aisle, but Rex's legs
were even longer. He caught the Satanist at the entrance of the
passage and grabbed him by the back of the neck. Castelnau tore
himself away and stood panting for a second, half crouching with
bared teeth, his back against the wall. Then for the second time
that night Rex's leg-of-mutton fist took him on the chin and he
slid to the ground like a pole-axed ox.
De Richleau, his wounded arm hanging limp and useless, writhed
beneath the Chef de la Surete who had one hand on his throat and
with the other was groping for his fallen gun.
His fingers closed upon it. He jerked it up and fired at
Richard, who was dashing to De Richleau's help. The shot went
thudding into the belly of the Satanic Goat above the altar.
Next second the heavy prie-dieu which Richard had swung aloft
came crashing down upon the Police-Chief's head.
Rex only paused to see that the banker was completely knocked
out, then rushed back to the struggling mass of bodies below the
altar steps.
Simon and Marie Lou had managed the little man between them.
Almost insane with worry for her child, her thumb nails were dug
into his neck and, while he screeched with pain, Simon was
lashing his hands behind his back.
Richard was pulling the Duke out from beneath the unconscious
Chef de la Surete's body. Rex lent a ready hand and then,
panting with their exertions, they surveyed the scene of their
short but desperate encounter.
'Holy smoke! That's done me a whole heap of good,' Rex grinned
at Richard. 'I'm almost feeling like my normal self again.'
'The odds were with us but we owe our escape to Greyeyes'
pluck.' Richard looked swiftly at the Duke. 'Let's see that
wound, old chap. I hope to God the bullet didn't smash the
bone.'
'I don't think so-grazed it though, and the muscle's badly
torn.' De Richleau closed his eyes and his face twisted at a
stab of pain as they lifted his arm to cut the coat sleeve away.
'I know what you must be feeling,' Simon sympathised. Til
never forget the pain of the wound I got that night we dis
covered the secret of the Forbidden Territory.'
'Don't fuss round me,' muttered the Duke, 'but get that damned
priest's robe off. If these people don't return to the Surete
more police will come to look for them. We've got to get out of
here-quick.'
In frantic haste Marie Lou bandaged the wound while Richard
made a sling and the other two wrenched off the clothes of the
detective that Rex had knocked out. Simon scrambled into them
and, as he snatched up the man's overcoat, the others were
already hurrying towards the entrance to the passage at the far
end'of the temple.
Richard rushed Marie Lou along the dark corridor and they
tumbled up the flight of steps. Everything seemed to fade again
after those awful moments when they had been so near arrest. She
felt the cold air of the wharf-side damp upon her cheeks-they
were running down the narrow passage between the high brick
walls-back in the gloomy square where the old woman still sat
crouched upon the steps near the squalid cafe. Rex had taken her
other arm and, her feet treading the pavements automatically,
they were hastening through endless, sordid, fog-bound streets.
They crossed the bridge over the Seine and, at last, under the
railway arches at Courcel-les, found a taxi. When next she was
conscious of her surroundings they were in a little room at the
airport and the four men were poring over maps. Snatches of the
conversation came to her vaguely.
Twelve hundred miles-more. Northern Greece. You cannot cross
the Alps-make for Vienna, then south to Trieste- no, Vienna-
Agram-Fiume. From Agram we can fly down the valley of the River
Save; otherwise we should have to cross the Dolomites. That's
right! Then follow the coastline of the Adriatic for five
hundred miles south-east to Corfu. Yanina is about fifty miles
inland from there. You can follow the course of the river
Kalamans through the mountains-Shall we be able to land at
Yanina, though-yes, look, the map shows that it's on a big lake.
The circuit of the shore must be fifteen miles at least. It
can't all be precipitous-certain to be sandy stretches along it
somewhere-how far do you make it to Metsovo from there?-twenty
miles as the crow flies. That means thirty at least in such a
mountainous district. The monastery is a few miles beyond, on
Mount Peristeri-pretty useful mountain-look. The map gives it as
seven thousand five hundred feet-we must abandon the plane at
Yanina. If we're lucky we'll get a car as far as Metsova-God
knows what the roads will be like-after that we'll have to use
horses in any case. How soon do you reckon you can make it,
Richard?'
'Fourteen hundred miles. We should be in Vienna by midday.
Fiume, say, half-past two. I ought to make Vanina by eight
o'clock with Rex taking turn and turn about flying the plane.
After that it depends on what fresh transport we can get.'
Next, they were in the plane again-lifting out of fog-bound
Paris to a marvellous dawn, which gilded the edges of the clouds
and streaked the sky with rose and purple and lemon.
Richard was flying the plane in a kind of trance, yet never
for a moment losing sight of important landmarks or the dials by
which he adjusted his controls. The others slept.
When Marie Lou roused, the plane was at rest near a long line
of hangars dimly glimpsed through another ghostly fog. Someone
said 'Stuttgart' and then she saw Simon standing on the ground
below her, conversing in German with an airport official.
'A big, grey, private plane,' he was saying urgently. 'The
pilot is a short, square-shouldered fellow; the passengers a
big, fat, baldheaded man and a little girl.'
Marie Lou leaned forward eagerly but she did not catch the
airport man's reply. A moment later Simon was climbing into the
plane and saying to the Duke:
'He must be taking the same route, but he's an hour and a half
ahead of us. I expect he had his own car in Paris. That would
have saved him time while we were hunting for that wretched
taxi.'
Rex had taken over the controls and they were in the air once
more. Richard was sitting next to Marie Lou, sound asleep. For
an endless time they seemed to soar through a cloudless sky of
pale, translucent blue. She, too, must have dropped off again,
for sl.e was not conscious of their landing at Vienna, only when
she woke in the early afternoon that the pilots had changed over
and Richard was back at the controls.
'Yet, in some curious way, although she had not actually been
aware of their landing, fragments of their conversation must
have penetrated her sleep at the time. She knew that there had
also been fog at Vienna, and that Mocata had left the airport
there only an hour before them, so in the journey from Paris
they had managed to gain half an hour on him.
The engine droned on, its deep note soothing their frayed
nerves. Richard hardly knew that he was flying, although he used
all the skill at his command. It seemed as though some other
force was driving the aeroplane on and that he was standing
outside it as a spectator. All his faculties were numbed and his
anxiety for Fleur deadened by an intense absorption with the
question of speed-speed-speed.
At Fiume there was no trace of fog. Glorious sunshine, warm
and lifegiving, flooded the aerodrome, making the hangars
shimmer in the distance. The Duke crawled out from the couch of
rugs and cushions that had been made up in the back of the cabin
to accommodate a fifth passenger, and chosen by him as more
comfortable for his wounded arm. He questioned the landing-
ground officials in fluent Italian, but without success.
'From Vienna Mocata must have taken another route,' he told
Richard as he climbed back. 'Perhaps a short cut over the
Dinarie Alps or by way of Sarajevo. If so he will have more than
made up his half hour lead again. I feared as much when I saw
that there was no fog here. I can't explain it but I have an
idea that he is able to surround us with it, yet only when we
follow him to places where he has been quite recently himself.'
Rex took over for the long lap down the Dalmatian coast above
the countless islands that fringe the Yugoslavian mainland and
lay beneath them in the sparkling Adriatic Sea.
They slept again, all except Rex who, a crack pilot, was now
handling the machine with superb skill.
As he flew the plane half his thoughts were centred about
Tanith. He could see her there, lying cold and dead, in the
library a thousand miles away at Cardinals Folly. That dream of
happiness had been so brief. Never again would he see the sudden
smile break out like sunshine rising over mountains on that
beautiful, calm face. Never again hear the husky, melodious
voice whispering terms of endearment. Never again -never again!
But he was on the trail of her murderer and if he died for it he
meant to make that inhuman monster pay.
The Adriatic merged Into the Ionian Sea. The endless rugged
coastline rushed past below them on their left; its mountains
rising steeply to the interior of Albania, and its vales
breaking them here and there to run down to little white fishing
villages on the seashore. Villages that in Roman times had been
great centres of population through the constant passage of mer
chandise, soldiers, scholars, travellers between Brindisi, upon
the heel of Italy, and the Peninsula of Greece.
Then they were over Corfu. Banking steeply, he headed for the
mainland and picked up the northern mouth of the River Kalamas.
The deep blue of the sea flecked by its tiny white crests
vanished behind them. Twisting and turning, the plane drove
upwards above desolate valleys where the river trickled, a
streak of silver in the evening light. The sun sank behind them
into the distant sea. They were heading for the huge chain of
mountains, which forms the backbone of Greece.
A mist was rising which obscured the long, empty patches and
rare cultivated fields below. The Sight faded, its last rays lit
a great distant snow-capped crest which crowned the watershed.
A lake lay below them, placid and calm in the evening light
but glimpsed only through the banks of fog. At its south-western
end the white buildings of a town were vaguely discernible now
and then as Rex circled slowly, searching for a landing-place.
Suddenly, through a gap in the billowing whitish-grey, his eye
caught a big plane standing in a level field.
'That's Mocata's machine,' yelled Simon who was in the cockpit
beside him.
Rex banked again and, coming into the wind, brought them to
earth within fifty yards of it. The others roused and scrambled
out.
The mist which Rex had first perceived, a quarter of an hour
before, from his great altitude, now hemmed them in on every
side.
A man came forward from a low, solitary hangar as the plane
landed. De Richleau saw him, a vague figure, half obscured by
the tenuous veils of mist; went over to him and said, when he
rejoined them:
'That fellow is a French mechanic. He tells me Mocata landed
only half an hour ago. He came in from Monastir but had trouble
in the mountains, which delayed him; nobody but a maniac or a
superman would try and get through that way at all. This fellow
thinks that he cah get us a car; he runs the airport, such as it
is, and we're darned lucky to find any facilities here at all.'
Richard had just woken from a long sleep. Before he knew what
was happening he found that they were all packed into an ancient
open Ford with a tattered hood. Simon was on one side of him and
Marie Lou on the other. Rex squatted on the floor of the car at
their feet and De Richleau was in front beside the driver.
They could not see more than twenty yards ahead. The lamps
made little impression upon the gloom before them. The road was
a sandy track, fringed at the sides with coarse grass and
boulders. No houses, cottages or white-walled gardens broke the
monotony of the way as they rattled and bumped, mounting
continuously up long, curved gradients.
De Richleau peered ahead into the murk. Occasional rifts gave
him glimpses of the rocky mountains round which they climbed or,
upon the other side, a cliff edge falling sheer to a mist-filled
valley.
He, too, could only remember episodes from that wild journey;
an unendurable weariness had pressed upon him once they had
boarded the plane and left Paris. Even his powers of endurance
had failed at last and he had slept during the greater part of
their fourteen hundred mile flight. He was still sleepy now and
only half awake as that unknown demon driver, who had hurried
them with few words into the rickety Ford, crouched over his
wheel and pressed the car, rocketing from hairpin bend to
hairpin bend, onwards and upwards.
The last light had been shut out by the lower ranges of
mountains behind them as they wound their way through the
valleys to the greater peaks which, unseen in the mist and
darkness, they knew lay towering to the skies towards the east.
Deep ruts in the track, where mountain torrents cut it in the
winter cascading downwards to the lower levels, made the way
hideously uneven. The car jolted and bounded, skidding violently
from time to time, loose shale and pebbles rocketing from its
back tyres as it took the dangerous bends.
In the back Richard, Marie Lou and Simon lurched, swayed, and
bumped each other as they crouched in silent misery, their teeth
chattering with the cold of the chill night that was now about
them in those lofty regions...
They were in a room, a strange, low-ceilinged, eastern room,
with a great, heavy, wooden door, under which they could see the
fog wreathing upwards in the light of a solitary oil lamp set
upon a rough-hewn table. Bunches of onions and strips of dried
meat hung from the low rafters. The earthen floor of the place
was cold underfoot. On a deep window recess in a thick wall
stood a crude earthenware jug, and a platter with a loaf of
coarse bread upon it, which was covered by a bead-edged piece of
muslin.
Marie Lou roused to find herself drinking coarse, red wine out
of a thick, glass tumbler. She saw Rex sitting on a wooden bench
against the wall, staring before him with unseeing eyes at the
grimy window. The others stood talking round the lopsided table.
A peasant woman, with a scarf about her head, whose face she
could not see, appeared to be arguing with them. Marie Lou had
an idea that it was about money, since De Richleau held a small
pile of notes in his hand. Then the peasant woman was gone and
the others were talking together again. She caught a few words
here and there,
'I thought it was a ruin . . . inhabited still . . . they beg
us not to go there . . . not of an official order or anything to
do with the Greek Church. They look on them as heathens here . .
. associates of Mocata's?-- No, more like a community of outlaws
who have taken refuge there under the disguise of a religious
brotherhood . . . Talisman has affected them, perhaps. Forty or
fifty of them. The people here shun the place even in the
daytime, and at night none of them would venture near it at any
price. . . . You managed to get a driver?-- Yes, of a kind--
What's wrong with him?-- I don't know. The woman didn't seem to
trust him, but I had great difficulty in understanding her at
all-- Sort of bad man of the village, eh? . . . Have to trust
him if no one else will take us.'
De Richleau passed his hand across his eyes. What was it that
they had been talking about? He was so tired, so terribly tired.
There had been a peasant woman, with whom he had talked of the
ruined monastery up in the mountains. She seemed to be filled
with horror of the place and had implored him again and again
not to go. He began to wonder how they had conversed. He could
make himself understood in most European languages, but he had
very little knowledge of modern Greek; but that did not matter
they must get on- get on...
The others were standing round him like a lot of ghosts in the
narrow, fog-filled village street. A little hunchback with
bright, sharp eyes was peering at him. The fellow wore a dark
sombrero, and a black cloak, covering his malformed body,
dangled to his feet; the light from the semi-circular window of
the inn was just sufficient to illuminate his face. A great, old-
fashioned carriage, with two lean, ill-matched horses harnessed
to it, stood waiting.
They piled into it. The musty smell of the straw-filled
cushions came strongly to their nostrils. The hunchback gave
them one curious, cunning look from his bright eyes, and climbed
upon the box. The lumberiag vehicle began to rock from side to
side. The one-storeyed, flat-topped houses in the village
disappeared behind them and were swallowed up in the mist.
They forded a swift but shallow river outside the village,
then the roadway gave place to a stony track. Ghostlike and
silent, walls of rock loomed up on either side. The horses
ceased trotting and fell into a steady, laboured walk, hauling
the great, unwieldy barouche from bend to bend up the rock-
strewn way into the fastness of the mountains.
Simon's teeth were chattering. That damp, clinging greyness
seemed to enter into his very bones. He tried to remember what
day it was and at what hour they had left Paris. Was it last
night or the night before or the night before that? He could not
remember and gave it up.
The way seemed interminable. No one spoke. The carriage jolted
on, the hunchback crouched upon his seat, the lean horses
pulling gallantly. The curve of the road ahead was always hidden
from them and no sooner had they passed it than they lost sight
of the curve behind.
At last the carriage halted. The driver climbed down off his
box and pointed upwards, as they stumbled out on the track. De
Richleau was thrusting money into his hand. He and his aged
vehicle disappeared in the shadows. Richard looked back to catch
a last glimpse of it and it suddenly struck him then how queer
it was that the carriage had no lamps.
The rest were pressing on, stumbling and slithering as they
followed the way which had now become no more than a footpath
leading upwards between the huge rocks.
After a little, the gloom seemed to lighten and they perceived
stars above their heads. Then, Founding a rugged promontory,
they saw the age-old monastery standing out against the night
sky upon the mountain slope above.
It was huge and dark and silent, with steep walls rising on
two sides from a precipice. A great dome, like an inverted bowl,
rose in its centre, but a portion of it had fallen in and the
jagged edges showed plainly against the deep blue of the starlit
night beyond.
With renewed courage they staggered on up the steep rise
toward the great semi-circular arch of the entrance. The gates
stood open wide, rotted and fallen from their hinges. No sign of
life greeted their appearance as they passed through the
spacious courtyard.
Instinctively they made for the main building above which
curved the broken arc of the ruined Byzantine dome. That must be
the Church, and the crypt would lie below it.
They crossed the broken pavements of the forecourt, the Duke
leaning heavily on Rex's arm. He nodded towards a few faint
lights which came from a row of outbuildings. Rex followed his
glance in silence and they hurried on. That was evidently the
best-preserved portion of the ruin, in which these so-called
monks resided. A gross laugh, followed by the sound of smashing
glass and then a hoarse voice cursing, came from that direction,
confirming their thought.
All the way up from the inn half-formed fears had been
troubling De Richleau that they might fall foul of this ill-
omened brotherhood. He assumed them to be little less than
robbers under a thin disguise, who probably eked out a miserable
existence by levying toll in corn and oil and goats' milk upon
the neighbouring peasantry, but this great pile upon the slopes
of Mount Peristeri was so much more vast than anything that he
had imagined. A matter of fifty men might easily be lost among
its rambling courts and buildings.
They advanced through another great courtyard, surrounded by
ruined colonnades which were visible only by the faint starlight
from above. Built by some early Christian saint, when Byzantium
was still an Empire and Western Europe labouring through the
semi-barbarous night of the Dark Ages, the colossal ruin must
once have housed thousands of earnest men, all engaged day by
day in pious study, or various active tasks to provide for that
great community. Now it was as dead as those African temples
which have been overgrown by jungle, only a small fragment of it
occupied by a small band of dissolute uncultured rogues.
In wonder and awe they passed up the broad flight of steps,
through the vast portico on which the elaborate carvings, worn
and disfigured by time, were just discernible, into the body of
the Church.
The starlight, filtering dimly through the great rent in the
dome a hundred feet above their heads, was barely sufficient to
light their way as they scrambled over broken pillars and heaps
of debris round the walls until they found a low door. From it,
a flight of steps led down into the Stygian blackness of the
volts below.
Marie Lou, stumbling along half-bemused between Simon and
Richard, found herself wondering what they could be doing in
this ancient ruin, then memory flooded back. It was here, below
them, that the Talisman of Set was buried. There had been no fog
in the courtyard outside so they must have got there before
Mocata after all-but where was Fleur? She was going to die-she
felt that she was dying-but first she must find Fleur.
The others had halted and Richard noticed then that De
Richleau was carrying an old-fashioned lantern, which he
supposed he had borrowed at the inn. The Duke lit the stump of
candle that was inside it and led the way down those time-worn
stairs. The others, treading instinctively on tiptoe, now
followed him into the stale, musty darkness.
At the bottom of the steps they came out into a low, vaulted
crypt which, by the faint light of the lantern, seemed to spread
interminably under the flagstones of the Church;
De Richleau turned to the east, judging the altar of the crypt
to be situated below the one in the Church above, but when he
had traversed twenty yards he halted suddenly. A black, solid
mass blocked their path in the centre of the vault.
'Of course,' Marie Lou heard him murmur. 'I forgot that this
place was built such centuries ago. Altars were placed in the
centre of churches then. This must be it.'
'We've beaten him to it, then,' Rex's voice came with a little
note of triumph.
'Perhaps he couldn't get anyone to drive him up from Metsovo
at this hour of night,' Richard suggested. 'Our man was supposed
to be mad, or something, and they said that no one else would
go.'
'Those stones are going to take some shifting.' Rex took the
lantern and bent to examine the black slabs of the solid, oblong
altar,
'Are you certain that this is the right one?' Richard asked.
'My brain seems to be going. I can't remember things properly
any more but I thought when we got the information from Simon in
his trance he said something about a side-chapel in the crypt.'
No one answered. While his words were still ringing in their
ears each one of them suddenly felt that he was being overlooked
from behind.
Rex dropped the lantern, De Richleau swung round, Marie Lou
gave a faint cry. A dull light had appeared only ten paces in
their rear. Leading to it they saw a short flight of steps.
Beyond, a chapel with a smaller altar, from which the right-hand
stone had been wrenched. And there, standing before it, was
Mocata.
With a bellow of fury, Rex started forward, but the Satanist
suddenly raised his left hand. In it he held a small black cigar-
shaped thing, which was slightly curved. About it there was a
phosphorescent glow, so that, despite the semi-darkness, the
very blackness of the thing itself stood out clear and sharp
against its surrounding aura of misty light. The rays from it
seemed to impinge upon then' bodies, instantly checking their
advance. They found themselves transfixed-brought to a
standstill in a running group-half-way between the central altar
and the chapel steps.
Without uttering a word, Mocata came down the steps and slowly
walked round them, carrying the thing which they now guessed to
be the Talisman aloft in his left hand. A glowing phosphorescent
circle appeared on the damp stone flags in his tracks and, as he
completed the circuit, they felt their limbs relax.
Again they rushed at him, but were brought up with a jerk. It
was impossible to break out of that magic circle in which he had
confined them.
With slow steps, the Satanist returned to the chapel and
proceeded to light a row of black candles upon the broken altar
there. Then, with a little gasp of unutterable fear, Marie Lou
saw that Fleur was crouching in a dark corner near the upturned
earth from which the Talisman had been recovered.
'Fleur-darling!' she cried imploringly, stretching out her
arms, but the child did not seem to hear. With round eyes she
knelt there near the altar, staring out towards the crypt, but
apparently seeing nothing.
Mocata lit some incense in a censer and swung it rhythmically
before the broken altar,murmuring strange invocations.
He moved so smoothly and silently that he might have been a
phantom but for the lisping intonation of his low musical voice.
Then Fleur began to cry, and the sobbing of the child had an
unmistakable reality which tore at the very fibre of their
hearts.
Again and again they tried to break out of the circle, but at
last, forced to give up their frantic attempts, they crouched
together straining against the invisible barrier, watching with
fear-distended eyes as a gradual materialisation began to form
in the clouds of incense above the altar stone.
At first it seemed to be the face of Mocata's black familiar
that Rex had seen in Simon's house, but it changed and
lengthened. A pointed beard appeared on the chin and four great
curved horns sprouted from the head. Soon it became definite,
clear and solid. That monstrous, shaggy beast that had held
court on Salisbury Plain, the veritable Goat of Mendes, glared
at them with its red, baleful, slanting eyes, and belched
foetid, deathly breaths from its cavernous nostrils.
Mocata raised the Talisman and set it upon the forehead of the
Beast, laying it lengthwise upon the flat, bald, bony skull,
where it blazed like some magnificent jewel which had a strange
black centre. Then he stooped, seized the child and, tearing off
her clothes, flung her naked body full length upon the altar
beneath the raised fore-hooves of the Goat.
Sick with apprehension and frantic with distress, the
prisoners in the circle heard the sorcerer begin to intone the
terrible lines of the Black Mass.
Horrified but powerless, they watched the swinging of the
censer, the chanting of the blasphemous prayers, and the
blessing of the dagger by the Goat, knowing that at the con
clusion of the awful ceremony, the perverted maniac playing the
part of the devil's priest would rip the child open from throat
to groin while offering her soul to Hell.
Half crazy with fear, they saw Mocata pick up the knife and
raise his arm above the little body, about to strike.
33
Death of a Man Unknown,
From Natural Causes
Rex stood with the sweat pouring down his face. The muscles of
his arms jerked convulsively. His whole will was concentrated in
an effort to fling himself forward, up the steps; yet, except
for the tremors which ran through his body, the invisible power
held him motionless in its grip.
De Richleau prayed. Silent but inceasing, his soundless words
vibrated on the ether. He knew the futility of any attempt at
physical intervention, and doubted now if his supplications
could avail when pitted against such a terrible manifestation of
evil as the Goat of Mendes.
Richard crouched near him, his face white and bloodless, his
eyes staring. His arms were stretched out, as though to snatch
Fleur away or in an appeal for mercy, but he could not move
them.
Marie Lou had one hand resting on his shoulder. She was past
fear for herself, past all thought of that terrible end which
might come to them in a few moments, past even the horror of
losing Richard should they all be blotted out in some awful
final darkness.
She did not pray or strive to dash towards her child. The
pulsing of her heart seemed to be temporarily suspended. Her
brain was working with that strange clarity which only comes
upon those rare occasions when danger appears to be so over
whelming that there is no possible escape. Into her mind there
came a clear-cut picture of herself as she had been in her
dream, holding what De Richleau said was the great Red Book of
Appin. Her fingers could feel the very cover again with its soft
hairy skin.
Simon dropped to his knees between the Duke and Rex. He made
an effort to cast himself forward but rocked very slightly from
side to side, stricken with an agony of misery and remorse. It
was his folly which had led his friends into this terrible pass
and now he did the only thing he could to make atonement. His
brain no longer clouded, but with full knowledge of the enormity
of the thing, he offered himself silently to the Power of
Darkness if Fleur might be spared.
Mocata paused for a moment, the knife still poised above the
body of the child, to turn and look at him. The thought
vibration had been so strong that he had caught it, but he had
already drawn all that he needed out of Simon. Slowly his pale
lips crumpled in a cruel smile. He shook his head in rejection
of the offer and raised the knife again.
The Duke's hand jerked up in a frantic effort to stay the blow
by the sign of the cross, but it was struck down to his side by
one of the rays from the Talisman, just as though some powerful
physical force had hit it.
Richard's jaws opened as though about to shout but no sound
issued from them.
With a supreme effort Rex lowered his head to charge, but the
invisible weight of twenty men seemed to force back his
shoulders.
Before the mental eyes of Marie Lou the Red Book of Appin lay
open. Again she saw the stained vellum page and the faded
writing in strange characters upon it. And once more as in her
drearn she could understand the one sentence: 'They only who
Love without Desire shall have power granted to them in the
Darkest Hour.'
Then her lips opened. With no knowledge of its meaning, and a
certainty that she had never seen it written or heard it
pronounced before, she spoke a strange word-having five
syllables.
The effect was instantaneous. The whole chamber rocked as
though shaken by an earthquake. The walls receded, the floor
began to spin. The crypt gyrated with such terrifying speed that
the occupants of the circle clutched frantically at each other
to save themselves from falling. The altar candles swayed and
danced before their distended eyes. The Talisman of Set was
swept from between the horns of the monstrous Goat, and bouncing
down the steps of the chapel, came to rest on the stone flags at
De Richleau's feet.
Mocata staggered back. The Goat reared up on its hind legs
above him. A terrible neighing sound came from its nostrils and
the slanting eyes swivelled in their sockets; their baleful
light flashing round the chamber. The Beast seemed to grow and
expand until it was towering above them all as they crouched,
petrified with fear. The stench of its foetid breath poured from
between the bared teeth until they were retching with nausea.
Mocata's knife clattered upon the stones as he raised his arms
in frantic terror to defend himself. The awful thing which he
had called up out of the Pit gave a final screaming neigh and
struck with one of its great fore-hooves. He was thrown with
frightful force to the floor, where he lay sprawled head
downmost on the chapel steps.
There was a thunderous crash as though the heavens were
opening. The crypt ceased to rock and spin. The Satanic figure
dissolved in upon itself. For a fraction of time the watchers in
the circle saw the black human face of the Malagasy, distorted
with pain and rage, where that of the Goat had been before. Then
that too disappeared behind a veil of curling smoke.
The black candles on the altar flickered and went out. The
chamber remained lit only by the phosphorescent glow from the
Talisman. De Richleau had snatched it from the floor and held it
in his open hand. By its faint light they saw Fleur sit up. She
gave a little wail and slid from the low altar stone to the
ground; then she stood gaping towards her mother, yet her eyes
were round and sightless like those of one who walks in her
sleep.
Suddenly an utter silence beyond human understanding descended
like a cloak and closed in from the shadows that were all about
them.
Almost imperceptibly a faint unearthly music, coming from some
immense distance, reached their ears. At first it sounded like
the splashing of spring water in a rock-bound cave, but
gradually it grew in volume, and swelled into a strange chant
rendered by boys' voices of unimaginable purity. All fear had
gone from them as, one by one, they fell upon their knees and
listened entranced to the wonder and the beauty of that litany
of praise. Yet all their eyes were riveted on Fleur.
The child walked very slowly forward but, as she advanced,
some extraordinary change was taking place about her. The little
body, naked a moment before, became clothed in a golden mist.
Her shoulders broadened and she grew in height. Her features
became partially obscured, then they lost their infant roundness
and took on the bony structure of an adult. The diaphanous cloud
of light gradually materialised into the graceful folds of a
long, yellow, silken robe. The dark curls on the head
disappeared leaving a high, beautifully proportioned skull.
As the chant ceased on a great note of exultation all sem
blance to the child had vanished. In her place a full-grown man
stood before them. From his dress he had the appearance of a
Thibetan Lama, but his esthetic face was as much Aryan as
Mongolian, blending the highest characteristics of the two; and
just as it seemed that he had passed the barriers of race, so he
also appeared to have cast off the shackles of worldly time. His
countenance showed all the health and vigour of a man in the
great years when he has come to full physical development, and
yet it had the added beauty which is only seen in that of a
frail, scholarly divine who has devoted a whole lifetime to the
search for wisdom. The grave eyes which were bent upon them held
Strength, Knowledge, and Power, together with an infinite
tenderness and angelic compassion unknown to mortal man.
The apparition did not speak by word of mouth. Yet each one of
the kneeling group heard the low, silver, bell-like voice with
perfect clearness.
'I am a Lord of Light nearing perfection after many lives, It
is wrong that you should draw me from my meditations in the
Hidden Valley-yet I pardon you because your need was great. One
here has imperilled the flame of Life by seeking to use hidden
mysteries for an evil purpose; another also, who lies beyond the
waters, has been stricken in her earthly body for that same
reason. The love you bear each other has been a barrier and
protection, yet would it have availed you nothing had it not
been for She who is the Mother. The Preserver barkens ever to
the prayer which goes forth innocent of all self-desire and so,
for a moment, I am permitted to appear 'to you through the
medium of this child whose thoughts know no impurity. The
Adversary has been driven back to the dark Halls of Shaitan and
shall trouble you no more. Live out the days of your allotted
span. Peace be upon you and about you. Sleep and Return.'
For a moment it seemed that they had been ripped right out of
the crypt and were looking down into it. The circle had become a
flaming sun. Their bodies were dark shadows grouped in its
centre. The peace and silence of death surged over them in great
saturating waves. They were above the monastery. The great ruin
became a black speck in the distance. Then everything faded.
Time ceased, and it seemed that for a thousand thousand years
they floated, atoms of radiant matter in an immense immeasurable
void-circling, for ever circling in the soundless
stratosphere-beings shut off from every feeling and sensation,
as though travelling with effortless impulse five hundred
fathoms deep, below the current levels of some uncharted sea.
Then, after a passage of eons in human time they saw Cardinals
Folly again infinitely far beneath them, their bodies lying in
the pentacle-and that darkened room. In an utter eerie silence
the dust of centuries was falling . . . falling. Softly,
impalpably, like infinitely tiny particles of swansdown it
seemed to cover them, the room, and all that was in it, with a
fine grey powder.
* * * * *
De Richleau raised his head. It seemed to him that he had been
on a long journey and then slept for many days. He passed his
hand across his eyes and saw the familiar bookshelves in the
semi-darkened library. The bulbs above the cornice flickered and
the lights came full on.
He saw that Simon's eyes were free from that terrible maniacal
glare, but that he still lay bound in the centre of the
pentacle.
As he bent forward and hastily began to untie Simon's turning
they saw him. Tall-haggard-distraught-a dark fondling her and
murmuring. 'We're safe, darling-safe.'
'She-she's not dead-is she?' It was Rex's voice, and turning
they saw him. Tall-haggard-distraught-a dark silhouette against
the early morning light which filtered in through the french-
windows-bearing Tanith's body in his arms.
Marie Lou sprang up with a little wailing cry. With Richard
behind her she raced across the room and through the door in the
wall which concealed the staircase to the nursery.
The Duke hurried over to Rex. Simon kicked his feet free and
stood up, exclaiming: 'I"ve had a most extraordinary dream.'
'About all of us going to Paris?' asked De Richleau, as the
three of them lowered Tanith's body to the floor, 'and then on
to a ruined monastery in northern Greece?'
'That's it-but how-did you know?'
'Because I had the same myself-if it was a dream!'
An hysterical laugh came from the stairway and next moment
Marie Lou was beside them, great tears streaming down her face,
but Fleur clutched safely in her arms.
The child, freshly woken from her sleep, gazed at them with
wide, blue eyes, and then she said: 'Fleur wants to go to
Simon.'
The Duke was examining Tanith. Simon rose from beside him. His
eyes held all the love that surged in the great heart which beat
between his narrow shoulders. He covered his short-sighted eyes
with his hands for a second then backed away. 'No, Fleur,
darling-I've been-I'm still ill you know.'
'Nonsense-that's all over,' Richard cried quickly, 'go on- for
God's sake take her-Marie Lou's going to faint.'
'Oh, Richard! Richard!' As Simon grabbed the child, Marie Lou
swayed towards her husband, and leaning on him drew her fingers
softly down his face. 'I will be all right in a moment -but it
was a dream-wasn't it?'
'She's alive!' exclaimed the Duke suddenly, his hand pressed
below Tanith's heart. 'Quick, Rex-some brandy.'
'Of course, dearest,' Richard was comforting Marie Lou. 'We've
never been out of this room-look, except Rex, we are still in
pyjamas.'
'Why, yes-I thought-- Oh, but look at this poor girl!' She
slipped from his arms and knelt beside Tanith.
Rex came crashing back with a decanter and a glass. De
Richleau snatched the brandy from him. Marie Lou piliowed
Tanith's head upon her knees and Richard held her chin. Between
them they succeeded in getting a little of the spirit down her
throat; a spasm crossed her face and then her eyes opened.
'Thank God!' breathed Rex. 'Thank God.'
She smiled and whispered his name, as the natural colour
flooded back into her face.
'Never-never have I had such a terrible nightmare!' exclaimed
Marie Lou. 'We were in a crypt-and that awful man was there.
He...'
'So you dreamed it too!' Simon interrupted. 'About you finding
me at that warehouse in Asnieres and the Paris police?'
'That's it,' said Richard. 'It's amazing that we should all
have dreamed the same thing but there's no other explanation for
it. None of us can possibly have left this house since we
settled down in the pentacle-- Yes, last night!'
'Then I've certainly been dreaming too.' Rex lifted his eyes
for a moment from Tanith's face. 'It must have started with me
when I fell asleep at the inn-or earlier, for I'd have sworn De
Richleau and I were out all the night before careering around
half of England to stop some devilry.'
'We were,' said the Duke slowly. 'Tanith's presence here
proves that, but she was never dead except in our dream, and
that started when you arrived here with her in your arms. The
Satanists at Simon's house, our visit there afterwards, and the
Sabbat were all facts. It was only last night, while our bodies
slept, that our subconscious selves were drawn out of them to
continue the struggle with Mocata on another plane.'
'Mocata!' Simon echoed. 'But-but if we've been dreaming he is
still alive.'
'No, he is dead.' The quiet, sure statement came from Tanith
as she sat up, and taking Rex's hand scrambled to her feet.
'How is it you're so certain?' he asked huskily.
'I can see him. He is not far from here-lying head downwards
on some steps.'
That's how we saw him in the dream,' said Richard, but she
shook her head.
'No, I. had no dream, I remember nothing after Mocata entered
my room at the inn and forced me to sleep-but you will find
him-somewhere quite near the house-out there.'
'The age-old law,' De Richfeau murmured. 'A life for a life
and a soul for a soul. Yes, since you have been restored to us I
am quite certain that he will have paid the penalty.'
Simon nodded. 'Then we're really free of this nightmare at
last?'
'Yes. Dream or no dream, the Lord of Light who appeared to us
drove back the Power of Darkness, and promised that we should
all live unmolested by it to the end of our allotted span. Come,
Richard,' the Duke took his host's arm, 'let us find our coats
and take a look round the garden-then we shall have done with
this horrible business.'
As they moved away Tanith smiled up at Rex. 'Did you really
mean what you said last night?'
'Did I mean it!' he cried, seizing both her hands. 'Just you
let me show you how!'
'Simon,' said Marie Lou pointedly, 'that child will catch her
death of cold in nothing but her nightie-do take her back to the
nursery while I get the servants to hurry forward breakfast.'
And the old familiar happy smile parted his wide mouth as Fleur
took a flying leap into his arms.
Tanith's face grew a little wistful as Rex drew her to him.
'My darling,' she hesitated, 'you know that it will be only for
a little time, about eight months-no more.'
'Nonsense!' he laughed. 'You were certainly dead to all of us
last night, so your prophecy's been fulfilled and the evil
lifted-we're both going to live together for a hundred years.'
She hid her face against his shoulder, not quite believing
yet, but a new hope dawning in her heart, from his certainty
that she had passed through the Valley of the Shadow and come
out again upon the other side. Her happiness, and his, demanded
that she accept his view and act henceforth as though the danger
to her life was past.
'Then if you want them, my days are yours,' she murmured,
'whatever their number may be.'
There was no trace of fog and a fair, true dawn was breaking
when, outside the library windows, De Richleau and Richard found
Mocata's body. It lay on the stone steps which fed up to the
terrace, sprawling head downwards, in the early light of the May
morning.
The coroner will find no difficulty in bringing in a verdict,'
the Duke observed after one glance at the face. 'They'll say it
is heart, of course. It is best not to touch the body, presently
we will telephone the police. None of us need say we have ever
seen him before if you tell Malin to keep quiet about his visit
yesterday afternoon. You may be certain that his friends will
not come forward to mention his acquaintance with Simon or the
girl.'
Richard nodded. 'Yes. "Death of a Man Unknown, from Natural
Causes," will be the only epilogue to this strange story.'
'Not quite, but this must be between us, Richard. I prefer
that the others should not know. Take me to your boiler-house.'
'The boiier-house-whatever for?'
Til tell you in a minute,'
'Alt right!' With a puzzled look Richard led the Duke along
the terrace, round by the kitchen quarters and into a small
building where a furnace gave a subdued roar.
De Richleau lifted the latch and the door swung back,
disclosing the glowing coke within. Then he extended his right
fist and slowly opened it.
'Good God!' exclaimed Richard, 'However did you come by that?'
In De Richleau's palm lay a shrunken, mummified phallus,
measuring no more than the length of a little finger, hard, dry,
and almost black with age. It was the Talisman of Set, just as
they had seen it in their recent dream adorning the brow of the
monstrous Goat.
'I found myself clutching it when I awoke,' he answered
softly.
'But-but that thing must have come from somewhere!'
'Perhaps it is a concrete symbol of the evil that we have
fought, which has been given over into our hands for destruc
tion.'
As the Duke finished speaking he cast the Talisman into the
glowing furnace where they watched it until it was utterly
consumed.
'If we were only dreaming how can you possibly explain it?'
Richard insisted.
'I cannot.' De Richleau shrugged a little wearily. 'Even the
greatest seekers after Truth have done little more than lift the
corner of the veil which hides the vast Unknown, but it is my
belief that during the period of our dream journey we have been
living in what the moderns call the fourth dimension- divorced
from time.'
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