Graham Masterton - The Devils of D-Day

Mr. Sparks said, “Are you there? Are you still there?”

“Yes, Mr. Sparks, sorry. Listen, I need to know where the twelve remaining sacks were taken. You left one behind in Normandy. Where are the rest? Were they shipped to the States? Or were they left in England?”

There was another silence. Then Mr. Sparks said: “Well… I’m not sure I’m allowed to tell you that.”

“Mr. Sparks, please. It’s a matter of life or death. That devil you left behind in Normandy has got out of its tank. We have to find the rest of them.”

“Well, Mr. McCook, we called them ANPs, which was short for Assisting Non-Military Personnel. We certainly never knew them as, well, devils. They were ANPs.”

“All right, Mr. Sparks. ANPs. But where were they taken? Are they hidden in the States?”

“No, they aren’t,” said Mr. Sparks, reluctantly. “They were shipped back to England, and put into cold storage, militarily speaking. I believe that General Eisenhower wanted them taken back to the States, but the problems of carrying them over and keeping them under lock and key were too tricky right then. We knew very little about them, and so we left them where they were.”

“And where was that?”

“Well, we wanted to take them back to St. Thaddeus, where they originally came from. But we’d made a deal with the Bishop that we would take them off his hands. So we transported them to London, and they were sealed up in a house that belonged to the British War Office.”

“You mean they’re still there? Now?”

“As far as I know. I’ve never heard any news to the contrary.”

The blood was beginning to dry on the back of my hand. Madeleine was staring at me anxiously, and through the door I could see the Reverend Taylor, pouring himself another Scotch. I can’t say that I blamed him.

I said hoarsely, “Mr. Sparks, do you know where the house is? Even roughly?”

“Why sure. Eighteen Huntington Place, just off the Cromwell Road.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure I’m sure. I had to go there four or five times.”

I leaned back against the brown flowers of the Reverend Taylor’s wallpaper, and closed my eyes.

“Mr. Sparks,” I said, “I don’t know how to thank you.

“Don’t bother. I shouldn’t be telling you anyway.”

“If we get out of this alive,” I told him, “I’ll pay you a personal visit and bring you a bottle of brandy.”

There was a long pause. I could hear another faint voice on a crossed line. Then ex-Colonel Sparks said: “What do you mean—if you come out of this alive?”

I didn’t know what to answer. I just set down the telephone receiver and said to Madeleine, “He knew where they were. We’re going to have to drive to London.”

The Reverend Taylor came out to the hall and his face was even more flushed than ever. “Are you sure you won’t have another drink?” he asked us. “Or how about some sandwiches? My woman’s going home in a moment, but she could rustle up some tongue sandwiches.”

“Really,” I said, “that’s very kind of you, but we have to go right away.”

The vicar looked at me nervously. “Did Colonel Sparks know where they were? Did he tell you?”

I nodded. “He knew where they were sealed away after the war. Whether they’re still there or not is another matter. But we’re going to have to go to find out.”

“Oh, dear,” said the Reverend Taylor, “this is all very distressing. I told them it would come to a bad end.”

Madeleine said, “It wasn’t your fault, Mr. Taylor. You weren’t to know.”

“But I feel dreadfully responsible,” he told us worriedly. “I feel as if it was my negligence that killed poor Father Anton.”

“Well, maybe you can make up for it,” I suggested. “Maybe you can give us some idea of how to protect ourselves against these thirteen devils and against Adramelech.”

The Reverend Taylor’s face fell. “My dear fellow, I hardly know what to say. It was only because we had such a great number of priests during the war that we were able to keep the devils under control. But as for Adramelech himself—well, I’m afraid I don’t know what to tell you. Adramelech is one of the greatest and most terrible of the evil Sephiroth. Perhaps only one of the divine Sephiroth would be able to help you, and according to what is written about them, the divine Sephiroth are almost as unmanageable as the evil ones. Adramelech’s counterpart among God’s ranks is Hod, the seraph of majesty and glory; but whether Hod could possibly be summoned to help you—well, I really couldn’t say. It’s all so infernally mythical.”

I lit a fresh cigarette. This time, my fingers stayed intact. Perhaps Elmek had realized that we had the information that we’d come for, and that he’d soon be rejoining his malevolent brethren.

I said, “Do you really believe in all this? In Adramelech and Hod? And all these devils. I never knew the Protestant church held with devils.”

The Reverend Taylor stuck his hands in his pockets and looked a little abashed.

“You will rarely find a Protestant cleric who admits to the actual physical existence of devils,” he said. “But every Anglican priest is told in strict confidence of the evidence that exists to support them. I couldn’t possibly divulge what the books say, but I assure you that the evidence I have personally seen for the existence of the divine and the evil Sephiroth is more than overwhelming. There are demons and devils, Mr. McCook, just as there are angels.”

Just then, I felt a low-frequency vibration tremble through the house. It was like a sinister train passing, a train that blew a deep dark whistle. I looked up at the ceiling, and I saw a hairline crack that ran all the way from one plaster moulding to the other.

The Reverend Taylor looked up, too. “What on earth’s that?” he blinked. “Did you feel it?”

“Yes. I tell it,” said Madeleine. “Maybe it was a supersonic plane passing.”

The Reverend Taylor frowned. “I don’t think Concorde flies this way, my dear. But I suppose it could—”

There was another rumble, louder this time. The floors shook and a fiery log dropped out of the grate and into the hearth. The Reverend Taylor hurriedly unhooked the tongs from the firedog, and stacked the log back on the fire.

I said, “It’s Elmek. I’m sure of it. He’s restless. Come on, Madeleine, I think we ought to get out of here before anything worse happens.”

The Reverend Taylor raised his hand. “You mustn’t leave on any account. I was just as responsible for what happened as anybody. And perhaps I can help.”

He went across to his bookshelves, and spent three or four minutes searching for what he wanted. He tugged it out at last—a small book as thin as a New Testament, with black leather covers and a frayed silk bookmark. Holding the book long sightedly at arm’s length, he licked his thumb and leafed through six or seven pages. Madeleine and I waited impatiently, while the clock struck nine.

“Ah, here it is. The invocation of angels.”

“I have a French book about that in my luggage,” I told him. “ L’Invocation des Anges by Henri St. Ermin. The trouble is, I can hardly understand a word of it.”

Again, the house trembled. A china donkey with a dried-up cactus in its pannier was shaken off its shelf, and shattered on the floor. Two or three books dropped out, and the windows vibrated in their frames with a sound that set my teeth on edge.

“ L’Invocation des Anges is just what you need,” said the Reverend Taylor, a little breathless. “But this book will help you identify each of the twelve other devils in turn and call an appropriate angel to dismiss it. Did Father Anton mention the seven tests to you?”