Gateway to Hell Read online

  GATEWAY TO HELL

  Dennis Wheatley

  Edited by Miranda Vaughan Jones

  For those to whom my wife and I owed many years of happiness and comfort at Grove Place, Lymington: Our housekeeper Betty Pigache, her husband Captain George, and young George My secretary Kay Turi Mrs. Shaw and Mrs. Colby, and in the garden Bob Smith and Joy Ibbetson.

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Introduction

  1 No Cause for Celebration

  2 The Search Begins

  3 Enter the Crooked Baron

  4 Where there’s a Will there’s a way

  5 The Lady in the Case

  6 The Search for the Barbecue

  7 The Barbecue

  8 The Victim

  9 The Great Gamble

  10 A Desperate Situation

  11 A Perilous Journey

  12 At the Mercy of a Fiend

  13 Black Power

  14 The Horrors that came by Night

  15 The Raising of the Whirlwind

  16 The Agony of Simon Aron

  17 The Satanic Marriage

  18 Caught in the Toils

  19 The Opening of the Pit

  A Note on the Author

  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 the situations in this book are entirely imaginary but, in the inquiry necessary to 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 a woman of Power, I feel that it is only right to urge them, most strongly, to refrain from being drawn into the practise 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

  Introduction

  Dennis Wheatley was my grandfather. He only had one child, my father Anthony, from his first marriage to Nancy Robinson. Nancy was the youngest in a large family of ten Robinson children and she had a wonderful zest for life and a gaiety about her that I much admired as a boy brought up in the dull Seventies. Thinking about it now, I suspect that I was drawn to a young Ginny Hewett, a similarly bubbly character, and now my wife of 27 years, because she resembled Nancy in many ways.

  As grandparents, Dennis and Nancy were very different. Nancy’s visits would fill the house with laughter and mischievous gossip, while Dennis and his second wife Joan would descend like minor royalty, all children expected to behave. Each held court in their own way but Dennis was the famous one with the famous friends and the famous stories.

  There is something of the fantasist in every storyteller, and most novelists writing thrillers see themselves in their heroes. However, only a handful can claim to have been involved in actual daring-do. Dennis saw action both at the Front, in the First World War, and behind a desk in the Second. His involvement informed his writing and his stories, even those based on historical events, held a notable veracity that only the life-experienced novelist can obtain. I think it was this element that added the important plausibility to his writing. This appealed to his legions of readers who were in that middle ground of fiction, not looking for pure fantasy nor dry fact, but something exciting, extraordinary, possible and even probable.

  There were three key characters that Dennis created over the years: The Duc de Richleau, Gregory Sallust and Roger Brook. The first de Richleau stories were set in the years between the wars, when Dennis had started writing. Many of the Sallust stories were written in the early days of the Second World War, shortly before Dennis joined the Joint Planning Staff in Whitehall, and Brook was cast in the time of the French Revolution, a period that particularly fascinated him.

  He is probably always going to be associated with Black Magic first and foremost, and it’s true that he plugged it hard because sales were always good for those books. However, it’s important to remember that he only wrote eleven Black Magic novels out of more than sixty bestsellers, and readers were just as keen on his other stories. In fact, invariably when I meet people who ask if there is any connection, they tell me that they read ’all his books’.

  Dennis had a full and eventful life, even by the standards of the era he grew up in. He was expelled from Dulwich College and sent to a floating navel run school, HMS Worcester. The conditions on this extraordinary ship were Dickensian. He survived it, and briefly enjoyed London at the pinnacle of the Empire before war was declared and the fun ended. That sort of fun would never be seen again.

  He went into business after the First World War, succeeded and failed, and stumbled into writing. It proved to be his calling. Immediate success opened up the opportunity to read and travel, fueling yet more stories and thrilling his growing band of followers.

  He had an extraordinary World War II, being one of the first people to be recruited into the select team which dreamed up the deception plans to cover some of the major events of the war such as Operation Torch, Operation Mincemeat and the D-Day landings. Here he became familiar with not only the people at the very top of the war effort, but also a young Commander Ian Fleming, who was later to write the James Bond novels. There are indeed those who have suggested that Gregory Sallust was one of James Bond’s precursors.

  The aftermath of the war saw Dennis grow in stature and fame. He settled in his beautiful Georgian house in Lymington surrounded by beautiful things. He knew how to live well, perhaps without regard for his health. He hated exercise, smoked, drank and wrote. Today he would have been bullied by wife and children and friends into giving up these habits and changing his lifestyle, but I’m not sure he would have given in. Maybe like me, he would simply find a quiet place.

  Dominic Wheatley, 2013

  1

  No Cause for Celebration

  It was New Year’s Eve, 1953. Normally the Duke de Richleau would have been occupying a suite at the Reserve at Beaulieu; for it was his custom to leave England shortly after Christmas and spend a month or so in the South of France. But this year he had other plans that had temporarily delayed his departure.

  Usually, too, Richard Eaton would have been playing host to a carefree party of neighbours down at his ancient and gracious home in Worcestershire, Cardinal’s Folly. But his wife—that enchanting pocket Venus, the Princess Marie-Lou, whom he and his friends had brought out of Russia some years before the war–had had to have an hysterectomy. So, after the Christmas festivities, they had come to London, and Marie-Lou was in King Edward VII Nursing Home, having had the operation four days earlier. Their daughter, Fleur, was about to enter London University, so had been installed in a flat she was to share with two other girl students, and Richard was staying with his friend, Simon Aron.

  It was at a pleasant little Georgian house in Pond Street, Hampstead, which Simon had bought shortly after the war, that the three of them had dined that night, and they were still sitting round the table.

  Simon and de Richleau delighted in producing for each other epicurean meals and fine wines. The dinner had consisted of smoked cods’ roe, beaten up with cream and served hot on toast, aft
er being put under the grill, followed by a Bisque d’Homard fortified with sherry, a partridge apiece, stuffed with foie-gras, and an iced orange salad laced with crème de menthe. With the roes they had had a glass of very old Madeira, with the soup a Marco-brunner Kabinet ’33, with the partridge a Château Latour ’28, and with the orange salad a small cup of cold China tea. Now, having cleared their palates with the tea, and as they lit up the eight-inch-long Hoyo de Monterreys which were the Duke’s favourite cigars, Simon was giving them an Imperial Tokay of 1908.

  Sitting there, they made a very diverse trio who, to a casual observer, would have appeared to have little in common.

  De Richleau was in his seventies: a Frenchman who had long since made his home in England and acquired British nationality. He was of medium height and spare figure. The exercises he did each morning, learned from a Japanese, had kept him in excellent trim and, for his age, his muscles still concealed surprising strength. His lean features were those of a born aristocrat: a broad forehead beneath neatly brushed white hair; a haughty, aquiline nose; firm mouth and chin; grey eyes flecked with yellow which, at times, could flash with piercing brilliance and, above them, upward-slanting ‘devil’s’ eyebrows.

  Simon was also slim, with a frailer body and narrow shoulders. His sloping forehead, great beak of a nose and slightly receding chin would have called to mind the head of a bird of prey had it not been for his gentle and often smiling expression. When young he had been afflicted with adenoids, and his parents had neglected to have them removed until his early teens. By then the growth had caused him to keep his full-lipped mouth always a little open, and it was a habit he had never lost. His hair was black, his eyes dark and short-sighted, so that he tended to peer at people, unless he was wearing his spectacles. He was descended from Spanish Jews; but his family had lived in England for many generations and had a high reputation as merchant bankers.

  Richard was a typical English country gentleman. In recent years he had put on weight; but hunting and shooting saved him from a middle-aged spread, and the worst weather never shook his nerve when flying his private aircraft. His eyes were brown, as was his hair which came down to his forehead in a ‘widow’s peak’ with attractive wings of grey above the ears. He had a good, straight nose, a mouth with laughter lines on either side of it, and a chin that suggested that, on occasion, he could be very aggressive.

  It was de Richleau who picked up the Tokay bottle, looked at the label and raised an eyebrow. ‘By Jove! 1908 Essence; the last vintage that old Franz-Joseph thought good enough to have bottled at the Hofberg. What a treat you are giving us, Simon.’

  ‘Must have cost you a packet,’ added Richard. ‘Where did you get it?’

  ‘Justerini’s,’ Simon replied in his jerky fashion. ‘You’re right about the stuff costing a packet these days. Still, what’s the good of “mun”, except for what it’ll buy you? Like to give you a toast. Here’s luck to all of us in 1953 and—er—specially to old Rex. ’Fraid he needs it.’

  His words carried the thoughts of the others to Rex Van Ryn, the great, hulking American with the enormous sense of fun. Before the war he had been the most popular playboy between Paradise Beach in the Bahamas and Juan les Pins, and a record-breaking airman. During the war he had been one of the pilots who, in 1939, had volunteered to fight for Britain, formed the Eagle Squadron and had covered themselves with glory. He was the fourth of that gallant little company, christened by him ‘we Modern Musketeers’. In Russia, Spain, the Balkans, the West Indies and many other places, they had adventured together and survived many perils.

  As Simon sipped the thick, richly-scented, honey-coloured wine, his companions followed suit; but his reference to Rex had taken their minds off the wine. De Richleau was recalling Rex’s dictum about cocktails, ‘Never give a guy a large one; make ’em small and drink ’em quick. It takes a fourth to get an appetite.’ He looked a question at his host. Richard anxiously voiced it.

  ‘What’s this, Simon? You imply that Rex is in trouble. Have you just heard from him?’

  ‘Ner.’ Simon shook his bird-like head as he used the negative peculiar to him, owing to his failing to fully close his mouth. ‘Not from, but about. Old Rex must be in a muddle–a really nasty muddle. He’s embezzled a million dollars.’

  ‘What!’ exclaimed Richard. ‘I don’t believe it. This is some absurd rumour you’ve picked up in the City. It’s the most utter nonsense.’

  De Richleau had raised his pointed eyebrows in amazement, and said more slowly, ‘It is almost impossible to credit. As we all know, apart from the nouveau riche Texan oil kings, the Van Ryns are one of the richest families in the United States. Rex inherited several million from his father, and is one of the biggest stockholders in the Chesapeake Banking and Trust Corporation. What possible reason could he have had for doing such a thing?’

  ‘Don’t know,’ Simon shrugged. ‘Could have gone haywire and tried to beat the market.’

  ‘No,’ de Richleau declared firmly. ‘Rex has risked his neck a score of times in making long-distance flights, in battle, and in private ventures when he has been with us. But he has never been a gambler where money is concerned.’

  Simon nodded vigorously. ‘You’re right there. Can only tell you what I’ve heard. Family is keeping it dark, of course. They’d never prosecute. But we bankers have our special sources—better very often than those of the “cloak and dagger” boys in M.I.6. A fortnight or so ago Rex disappeared, and he made off with a million.’

  ‘He’s been in Buenos Aires for the past year or so, hasn’t he?’ Richard asked. ‘Was it from there that he absconded?’

  ‘Umm. The Chesapeake have big interests in South America. You’ll recall that, when the old man died, Rex’s cousin, Nelson Van Ryn, became President. It was after the war that Rex decided to cease being a playboy and take an active part in the family business. In the autumn of ’49, Nelson asked him to take over their South American interests. Good man for the job, Rex. Gets on with everybody. The Latin tycoons were soon eating out of his hand. He made his H.Q. in Buenos Aires, but did a round of Brazil, Chile, Bolivia and the rest. Made excellent connections. Now this. But why? God alone knows.’

  Richard took another sip of the Tokay, then said with a worried frown, ‘It’s past belief. Simply incredible. But I know your intelligence on this sort of thing can be graded A1. And one thing sticks out like a sore thumb. To have chucked everything and made off into the blue with a wad of his bank’s funds, Rex must be in very serious trouble.’

  ‘There can be no doubt of that,’ de Richleau agreed. ‘And I won’t be happy until I know that he is out of it.’

  Simon’s dark eyes flickered from one to the other. Covering his mouth with the hand that held the long cigar, he gave a little titter. ‘Yes, Rex must be in a muddle—a really nasty muddle. Felt sure that when I told you about it, you’d agree that it’s up to us to get him out. We’ll have to take a little trip to South America.’

  2

  The Search Begins

  On January 2nd, Simon and Richard left for New York. Changing aircraft there, they flew down to Rio, changed again and arrived in Buenos Aires on the morning of the 4th. Richard had been reluctant to leave Marie-Lou, but she was sufficiently recovered from her operation to be out of all danger, and had insisted that he should accompany Simon, because it would have seriously upset de Richleau’s plans to do so. Now that he was ageing, he found the winter months in England trying, even with a break on the Riviera after Christmas; so he was thinking of making his future home on the sunny island of Corfu. He had been invited out there to stay in the lovely villa of an old friend of his, with a view to buying it, and was loath to forgo this opportunity. He had told the others that he would be back in London by the beginning of February and that, should they by then still have failed to solve the mystery about Rex, he would fly out to help them.

  Simon had met Rex’s cousin, Nelson Van Ryn, on several occasions and, before leaving England, had had a
long conversation with him over the transatlantic telephone. As soon as the President of the Chesapeake Banking and Trust Corporation was made aware that news of Rex’s disappearance had reached his English friends, he spoke of that most worrying matter fully, but in guarded terms.

  Apart from the mammoth embezzlement, Rex’s affairs appeared to be in perfect order. He was, as Simon had believed, very rich and, in recent months, had made no inroads into his fortune. While living in Buenos Aires, his life had been the normal one of a wealthy man moving in the highest circles of American and Argentine society. His health was as robust as ever, and everyone questioned had declared that he had shown no indication that he was a prey to any kind of worry. The loss to the bank had promptly been made good from the family’s private funds and, in no circumstances, were the Press to be allowed to know what had occurred. But Nelson had instructed the Pinkerton Agency that, while preserving the strictest secrecy, they were to do everything possible to trace his cousin. So far, half a dozen of that famous firm’s ‘private eyes’ had failed to produce a single clue to Rex’s disappearance.

  When Simon said that he and Richard were so worried about their old friend that they had decided to fly out to Buenos Aires, on the chance that they might be able to help in the search, Nelson willingly agreed to inform his top man there—a Mr. Harold B. Haag—of their intention, and tell him that he was to withhold nothing from them.

  The friends landed at Buenos Aires airport at a little after ten o’clock on the morning of the 4th. When they left the Customs hall, they were approached by a tall, fair-haired young man who introduced himself as Silas Wingfield, and said he had been sent by his chief, Mr. Haag, to meet them. He dealt efficiently with the shouting porters and drove his charges away in a huge car.

  Although not yet mid-morning, it was already very hot and, to the east, a blazing sun was mounting rapidly in a brassy sky. On either side of the broad motorway spread what appeared to be an endless park of undulating grassland, planted here and there with groups of specimen trees. When Richard commented that the city had an unusually beautiful approach, Wingfield replied, ‘The quickest route from the airport to the city is real tatty, mainly through slums and shanty towns. This is a few miles longer, but a sight more pleasant.’