Dennis Wheatley - The Satanist

'No,' she agreed. 'And the sooner I can get my dress into soak the better chance there will be of the stains not showing after I've had it dyed a less attractive colour.'

'O.K. Let's go then!' Abruptly he stood up and pulled out the table for her. 'Go and get your coat. I'll settle the bill later.'

She had hardly had time to think before he put her into a taxi. And he did not follow her into it. He gave the driver her address and some silver then, with a casual wave, he wished her an unsmiling 'good night' and stalked off back into the restaurant. They had been on edge with one another for three-quarters of an hour, but when the blow-up came it lasted less than four minutes. On her way home Mary cursed herself whole-heartedly. She had meant to play the siren with Barney that evening, and so convert the interest he had shown in her from the first into a much warmer feeling. But now, for the second time, she had behaved in a manner which could only lead him to believe that, attractive as her looks might make her, she was so stupid, prudish, and naturally ill-tempered that it would be folly to cultivate her further. From the manner in which he had left her, it was clear that he did not mean to ask her out again.

Since she had lost Teddy everything had gone wrong. She had given up her home, and the friends who might have comforted her, to set out on a wild-goose chase; or at least one that fear had forced her to abandon. And now she had thrown away the last human link which could provide her with an interest. She was, and must continue to be for some time to come, as utterly alone in the world as if she had become marooned on a desert island. Unless, far worse, when she least expected it, Ratnadatta appeared on the scene to exact payment from her for having ignored his warning. Her day had started with such promise, yet ended with catastrophe. That night she wept herself to sleep.

CHAPTER VIII A PREY TO LONELINESS

The saying that 'hope springs eternal in the human breast' certainly applies to most healthy people, and there was nothing in the least wrong with Mary, either mentally or physically. In consequence, after a sound sleep, she began to view her situation more cheerfully. The occult manifestations she had witnessed on Saturday night were of a potency sufficient to have struck terror into anyone's mind; so it was hardly to be wondered at that only twenty-four hours later her nerves were still so jumpy that she had accepted an accident as evidence that the Brotherhood was keeping watch on her by supernatural means, and had the power to make her let drop a glass of wine.

But when she had woken and thought about the matter for a while, she decided that she had panicked unnecessarily. For the Satanists to keep a round-the-clock watch on her, they would need to employ a whole team of clairvoyants, and surely that was rating her importance to them much too high? To suppose that when anyone was about to betray their secrets an occult alarm bell rang to inform them of it was hardly credible; and, if they did have some such telepathic control, why should they have let her go on for several minutes describing the temple, its congregation and the things she had seen happen in it, before stopping her? On top of that the idea that they had the power temporarily to paralyse her fingertips from a distance seemed altogether too fantastic. The truth of the matter must be that she had simply been careless in taking the glass, and the fact that she had dropped it just as she was on the point of telling Barney about the black imp had been no more than a coincidence.

Much comforted by this logical banishing of her overnight fears, while she lay in her bath she sought again for some interest to occupy her mind now that she had abandoned her crusade to bring Teddy's murderer to justice, and some weeks must elapse before she could restore her old appearance to a point when she could take up once more, without embarrassment, with the people they had known.

The modelling work on which she had started only recently had, as yet, brought her few new acquaintances. It would bring more in time, but she knew that the majority of the men in the so-called 'rag' trade regarded the models they employed only as dummies to display clothes on, and the girls themselves, enjoying a much higher than average standard of good looks, all had either husbands or numerous boy-friends, who kept them fully occupied.

The previous night she had resigned herself to having lost Barney and had not been able to make up her mind if she was glad or sorry. Despite her long nurtured grievance against him, while in his company she enjoyed his gay, intelligent conversation and, subconsciously, was still strongly attracted to him physically. To know that she would not now have the satisfaction of making him fall for her, then being thoroughly beastly to him, was a sad disappointment; but she tried to console herself with the thought that two wrongs did not make a right, so perhaps it was as well that her plan to avenge herself on him had been nipped in the bud.

Yet the thought of him was like a worrying tooth and as she lay in her bath she toyed with the idea of trying to get in touch with him. Had she known his address she would have written him a line of apology for her behaviour, and so tried to start the ball rolling between them again that way, but she did not. It then occurred to her that he would be in the telephone book; so. getting out of the bath, she dried herself quickly and got the book, but no Lord Larne was listed in it. Throwing it down she upbraided herself for a fool for having even bothered to look, as she ought to have realized that, having no right to the title, he would not have had the face to use it publicly. That settled the matter. She must accept it that he had once more gone out of her life.

The only other people she had met after changing her personality to Margot Mauriac were those who attended the meetings at Mrs. Wardeel's. She now knew several of them by name and could, if she chose, develop a friendship with them. As they were nearly all considerably older than herself, and earnest seekers after truth, that would not prove very exciting. But at the thought of whole days, when she had no modelling engagements, spent in aimless window-gazing, and with no prospect in the evening but going to a cinema on her own, she decided that such human contacts would be better than nothing.

She had not meant to go to Mrs. Wardeel's again, because that would entail meeting Ratnadatta. But if the spilling of the wine had been, as she was now convinced, a normal accident, she had nothing to fear from him. Instead of simply not keeping her appointment with him next Saturday she would tell him on Tuesday night that, having thought the matter over, she had now decided that she was still too conventionally minded to prove a suitable candidate for initiation into his Brotherhood.

She began to wonder then if, from anger at her having wasted his time, he might bring some form of trouble on her. But suddenly a new thought entered her mind. Barney would be at the meeting too. Why hadn't she thought of that before? Here was her chance to recapture him. She would get him to walk home with her afterwards, tell him that as a compensation for having spoilt his evening on Saturday she had prepared a little supper for them, and bring him up to her flat.

The more she thought over this new plan, the more it pleased her, and the urge she felt to carry it out soon overcame her vague fears of meeting Ratnadatta again. That afternoon she went up to the West-End to model some swim-suits for the coming summer season, and in the evening thoroughly enjoyed a film. Tuesday she had no engagement; so she spent the morning turning out her sitting-room and in the afternoon spread herself at Harrods, buying smoked Westphalian ham, cold salmon, materials for a salad, cheese straws and fruit. As she laid the table she again regretted her own much nicer things at Wimbledon, but she had bought plenty of flowers to make the room gay and the wine-salesman had assured her that the bottle of Hock he had recommended was really good.