The Satanist (52 page)

With her heart in her mouth she waited for his return. He seemed to be away for an eternity. At last he reappeared. She could hardly believe it when she saw that his great hook-nosed face was as tranquil as ever and, after he had bellowed for Jim, saw him hand the machine unopened over to the coloured boy.

He had said nothing to her about where he meant them to stay while in London or why, instead of waiting until the Sunday, he intended to drive up there after the Esbbat, which meant that they would arrive there in the early hours of the morning. And she had not liked to ask him about his plans, from fear that he might suspect her intention of trying to get away from him. She could only assume that he was anxious to lose not an hour in opening his business negotiations, and that perhaps the people concerned were also Satanists who had a house to which he meant to take her. All she knew for certain was that he had paid his boys a fortnight’s wages; so presumably that was the period of leave he had obtained from his General.

In the afternoon, while she was doing her own packing in a big suitcase with which he had provided her, he went off to the airfield for an hour, then on his return he came upstairs and said:

‘We’ll be awake a good part of the night, so I’ve ordered additional chow for having with our coffee round five o’clock. After, we’ll catch a few hours’ shut-eye. Then come eleven we’ll eat again. At half-after I’ve a guest arriving who’ll be going with me to the Esbbat. The Lodge I run here is no big show like Cremorne – just a coven of thirteen so as initiates on the Station can keep their hand in. Soon as I’ve done the ritual I can quit; so I’ll be back to pick you up round half-after-one. And you’ll be ready on the dot. I’m working to a time schedule; so if you’ve left anything upstairs that’ll be just too bad. You’ll leave without it.’

The rest of the day went in accordance with these arrangements, up till eleven o’clock. They were in the big lounge waiting for Jim to announce that their supper was ready. Suddenly the door to the hall was thrown open and, instead of Jim, Iziah thrust his head in. A little breathlessly, his white eyeballs rolling in his black face, he blurted out,

‘I’se copt a snooper, boss. I were goin’ out to the garage to check on all bein’ dandy with the automobile, when I spots him. He were paddin’ around peepin’ in the winders. Fortunate, I had my gumshoes on. I sneaked up on him and give him the K.O. from behind. He were packing a rod, too, boss; but I’se took it off him. Jim and Buster got him in the kitchen. What’ll you want we do with him?’

‘Good work, Iziah, good work,’ smiled his master. ‘Bring the bum in, so I can run my eye over him.’

Two minutes later all three servant boys hustled in a short broad tousled figure, still only partly conscious, as was evident from the fact that his chin was on his chest and his head of short dark curls stuck forward rolling slightly.
Yet the moment he appeared in the doorway Mary realised that it was Barney.

For his having been caught while surreptitiously reconnoitring the house there could be only one explanation. Somehow he had learned that she had been carried off to it and had come there to rescue her. During the past week she had thought many harsh thoughts about him. This wiped them all out in an instant. But he had bungled it. That was no fault of his. How could anyone foresee that a garage hand would suddenly emerge from a house at eleven o’clock at night to make sure that a car was in perfect running order? Nevertheless, he had been caught. And Colonel Hendrik G. Washington was not the sort of man who would take lightly being spied upon. Certain of his activities were definitely of such a kind that he would go to any lengths to prevent their discovery.

Mary felt certain that the giant American would not hand Barney over to the police. It was much more likely that he would have the boys give him a terrible beating, then throw him out – more likely still that Wash would not rest content until he learned what had led Barney to act the spy, and use torture on him to find out.

Frantically she searched her mind for some way to save Barney from the results of his ill-starred attempt to come to her help. Suddenly a possible though dangerous line occurred to her. If it did not come off, if Barney failed to pick up her lead, or made a mess of things while trying to follow it up, they would both pay a price that she did not allow herself to contemplate. But there was no other way of attempting to explain his presence. Swallowing hard, she forced a smile and exclaimed,

‘What in the world are you doing here?’ Then, swinging round on Wash, she cried with a laugh, ‘This is a boy-friend of mine; and I’ve got it. As I’ve been missing from my flat for a week he must have become worried about me. How lovely! Learning that you’d carried me off he must have come here to play the Knight Errant and rescue me.’

The big American frowned. ‘How come he learned it was
me who took you from – from you know where – and that I’d brought you this place?’

‘From Ratnadatta, of course,’ she replied quickly. Our visitor is a neophyte. He was attending Mrs. Wardeel’s evenings at the same time as myself. That blow you hit Ratnadatta couldn’t have broken his neck, and I expect he was only too glad of a chance to…’

‘Couldn’t be,’ Wash cut in. ‘Ratnadatta doesn’t know my real name or where I am stationed.’

Barney was still groggy, but his wits were coming back to him and he had taken in every word Mary had said. Seizing the lifeline she had thrown him, he said, a trifle thickly.

‘Oh yes he does. And Margot’s right. Your blow didn’t kill him; but he’s got a bandage as thick as a board round his neck. I didn’t know how to get hold of him till tonight; but I was with him not much over an hour and a half ago. He’s got it in for you. He ferreted out particulars about you from the secret list, and came down here yesterday himself to make a recce. Of course he hadn’t got the guts to come in and have a crack at you, but he jumped at giving me the chance to do it for him.’

With a nod of thanks to the boys, their master told them to release their prisoner and get back to the kitchen. Standing up, he towered over Barney, and said with a wide smile, ‘Well, you’ve made it, buddy. Now you are here I’m invitin’ you to take a crack at me.’

‘No.’ Barney declined the honour with a slightly sheepish grin. ‘But as Margot went off without leaving any sort of message you can’t blame me for having been anxious about her.’

‘I’ve nothing against that, son,’ Wash threw out generously. ‘Even if you have been wasting your time; shows your good taste. As you’re a neophyte you’ll no doubt have chosen your Satanic name. Mine’s Twisting Snake; what’s yours?’

That was a facer. Barney had no idea how to reply, but Mary had had more time to become knowledgeable about
the history of the Black Art, so she swiftly stepped into the breach and said to Wash, ‘I’m sorry; I ought to have introduced him. He is taking the name of Doctor Dee.’

‘After the ace-high Elizabethan wizard, eh?’ The American held out his huge hand. ‘Glad to be acquainted, Doc! Put it there. You’ve driven quite a way already tonight. Right now we were about to sit down to supper. Reckon you’d better join us and stoke up a little ‘fore you hit the trail back.’

Feeling that to accept was the natural, and therefore least dangerous, line to take, Barney, who, apart from a headache, had now fully recovered, replied, ‘Thanks, that’s very kind of you. I’d like to.’

‘You’re welcome,’ said his host, and led the way through the door at the far end of the room, which gave directly on to the smaller dining-room, where Jim was waiting for the signal to serve supper.

Mary was aghast at Barney’s having accepted. That they had avoided disaster even for so short a time seemed to her a miracle. Silently she cursed him for a fool for not having said that he meant to stay the night in Cambridge, apologise for his intrusion and get out while the going was good. She thanked her stars now that she had not said that he was an initiate. If she had, knowing next to nothing of the Satanic cult he could never have got by. As a neophyte he would not be expected to know more than the rudiments, but she feared that he would never be able to sustain even that role for half an hour in conversation with such a penetrating mind as Wash possessed.

Being very far from a fool, Barney was fully conscious of that danger. In consequence, as soon as they were seated he quickly got off the subject of the occult and led his host into a discussion about the respective prospects of the Republicans and the Democrats in the forthcoming elections in the United States.

The topic served for ten minutes, and the gulf between the British and American methods of democratic government served for another ten; but then Wash asked Barney
who had sponsored him as a neophyte and when, Barney replied to the first question, ‘Ratnadatta’, which was safe enough, but he had to take a chance on the second and, having swiftly worked back the dates to a suitable Saturday, said: ‘The 9th of March.’

That was the night that Ratnadatta had given Mary dinner, then taken her on for her first visit to the Temple. And that night the giant American had been there. He said he felt sure he had, but had no recollection of a neophyte resembling Barney having been introduced. He admitted that his memory might have let him down about the date, but that such lapses did not often occur with him. Then he asked Barney if it had been Abaddon or the Great Ram who had cut the penitent’s clothing off from him.

For Mary and Barney it was a case of being saved by the gong, for at that very minute Jim came in to tell his master that the visitor he was expecting had arrived and had been shown into the sitting-room.

Without waiting for an answer to the question he had just asked, Wash came quickly to his feet and said: ‘Both of you may chalk this up as one of your lucky nights. The Great Ram is here, and I’ll make you known to him. Quit eating now and come with me.’

Obediently they left remains of the
foie gras
and toast with which they had been finishing their supper, and followed him back into the sitting-room.

Standing in front of the fireplace was a tallish slim figure. On the only previous occasion when Mary had seen the Great Ram he had been wearing his big curly-horned mask, but she recognised his cruel, beautifully curved mouth and strong, deeply dimpled chin. Owing to his extraordinary resemblance to Otto, Barney, who had never seen him before, recognised him as Lothar.

Wash took a couple of strides forward and said: ‘Exalted One, it’s great to have you with us. I’ve two neophytes here, Circe and Doctor Dee. They’d be mighty pleased to have your blessing.’

Mary and Barney were standing side by side. She touched
his hand with hers, praying that he would have the sense to follow her lead; then she went down on one knee, and taking the slim, strong left hand that the Great Ram extended to her, she kissed the splendid blood-red ruby of the ring that he wore on it.

Barney had given one quick look at the man’s eyes. He knew then that he was in the presence of something which he could not contend against; so, dropping on one knee, he followed Mary’s example.

As they touched the stone in the ring with their lips it felt as cold as an ice cube and, when they rose to stand before the Great Ram, both of them were conscious of a chill that emanated from him which gave them the sort of sensation they would have had from standing in front of an open deep freeze. As he looked at them his glance, too, was icy. Without addressing a word to them, he glanced at Wash and said: ‘I wish to speak to you alone.’

The American signed to the other two to return to the dining-room. Gladly they did so. As the door closed behind them Mary’s urge to thank Barney for having made an attempt to rescue her was overridden by an instinctive feeling that his life hung by a thread; that even if a second were wasted he might lose it. Without an instant’s hesitation she pointed to the curtains drawn across a window and said:

‘You were crazy to come here! Get out! That way! That way! But one moment, take this with you.’ Diving her hand into her bag she drew out the little nail vanish carton containing the precious recording tape, and thrust it at him.

Automatically he took it, pushed it into the pocket of his jacket, and in a puzzled voice replied, ‘But I came to get you! Go on! You go first. I’ll follow.’

‘No, no!’ She shook her head. ‘I’m in no danger, but you are. He suspects you. If we had sat here at supper another minute he’d have caught you out.’

‘I’m not going without you,’ he retorted doggedly.

Only too willingly she would have made a break for it
with him, but she knew that she could not. She knew without further experiment that she was still under the hypnotic command of her kidnapper, and that during his pleasure she was definitely chained to the house.

‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘It is not possible. I’ve got to stay.’

His brown eyes suddenly hardened. ‘There’s no question of you’re having got to. You mean you want to.’

‘No, no!’ She cried in extreme agitation. ‘It’s not that. But I’m more or less safe here; and you are not. For God’s sake stop arguing and go!’

‘You are the mistress of this American, aren’t you?’ He shot at her.

‘Of course I am,’ she snapped back. ‘Does he look like a village curate or an inmate of an old folk’s home?’

‘I guessed as much during supper, when he kept on calling you “honey”,’ Barney declared bitterly.

‘Oh, God help me!’ Mary wailed. ‘What does it matter! Open that window. Get out and run for it while you still have the chance.’

‘And leave you here, eh?’ For what now seemed weeks to Barney his mind had been obsessed with the one idea of getting her out of the clutches of the Satanists, at whose hands he had imagined her to be suffering every kind of distress and degradation. No matter what she might have done in the past, it was the woman he had come to know and love during the past two months that counted. And now he had come upon her as beautiful as ever, untroubled by fears and displaying a cheerful affection for this giant American Colonel. Her frank admission that she had become the man’s mistress was the last straw. Final disillusion caused his eyes to go black with anger and he added furiously,