Dennis Wheatley - The Devil Rides Out

‘Oh, please! Be serious — you have a message for me.’

‘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.’

CHAPTER XI

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 in 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 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 invocation.’

‘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 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 time 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 will 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 the 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 in 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 Ayres 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.’