Come into my Parlour

by Dennis Wheatley

  Suddenly, just as Kobler had handed his pistol to one of the other men, and was stepping down into the boat, Grauber gave a cry, and sprang to his feet.

  “Lieber Gott! I must be mad! This Russian business has caused me to lose my wits. Get out of the boat, both of you!”

  Gregory felt the blood drain from his face. What hellish inspiration had come to the Gruppenführer at this, the very last moment of the eleventh hour which might yet spell ruin, torture and death for those who thought that they had tricked him?

  “Quick, Kobler!” shrilled Grauber. “The game is still in our hands! Get thirty men. Have them take five or six launches! The odds are that the Swiss will never know of it. Even if they do and there is an incident with their Government, who the hell cares about that? We will surround the Villa Offenbach, raid it in force, kill the Russian, and bring von Osterberg back.”

  Grabbing Erika by the shoulders, he added: “You heard me! Get up! Get out of the boat!”

  Erika’s heart contracted with a spasm of despair. Only a moment ago her hopes had been so high. The cruelty of the blow was unendurable. Grauber had outwitted them on the straight run home. Even her brave and resourceful lover could have no way of defeating this new plan. She was engulfed anew in a fresh wave of agonised fear.

  Then Gregory laughed. It was the quiet laugh of one still supremely confident, and he said:

  “My dear Herr Gruppenführer, you can raid the Villa Offenbach if you like; but you won’t find von Osterberg there. I know you Germans don’t give a straw for neutrality, and I was surprised that you didn’t think of this idea before. Anyhow, I provided against it. Kuporovitch has got the Count quite safely in another place, and you could hunt all night with a hundred men but you wouldn’t find it. I’ll give directions how to get there when we are within half a mile of the Swiss shore.”

  Grauber was beaten, and he knew it. With a blasphemous curse, he released Erika and ordered Kobler back into the boat. The man in the yachting cap started the engine, and the launch chugged out into the lake.

  A mile out a German patrol boat caught them, but Grauber showed his pass, and with deferential salutations from the lake police, they were allowed to proceed.

  It was a quarter to six in the morning when they approached the Swiss shore. Clouds obscured the low moon but a greyness in the eastern sky showed that the winter’s dawn was not far off. Under Gregory’s directions the launch was brought—to opposite a strip of grass that lay a little to the west of Kuporovitch’s cottage. He took out his torch and began to flash it.

  Stefan and von Osterberg had been waiting there for several hours. The Russian flashed a torch in reply.

  “How is the exchange to be made?” asked Grauber dully.

  “Erika goes ashore first,” Gregory replied. “Then von Osterberg comes on board. You’ll still have me as guarantee for his doing so. Then I’ll land myself.”

  Grauber nodded his agreement. The launch was nosed into the shallow water. Erika lowered herself over the side, splashed into it and waded to the beach. Across a thirty-foot-wide strip of foreshore she could now just make out a bank, and above it two dim figures at the point from which Kuporovitch had flashed his torch. Stumbling a little, she clambered up the bank, and as the Russian, giving a cry of joy, sprang forward to help her, she fell fainting at his feet.

  Von Osterberg, knowing that Kuporovitch meant to torture him to death if he refused to go, came reluctantly down the bank. After a moment, as he crossed the foreshore, his outline could be made out by those in the boat, and they could all see that he was limping badly. As he splashed out to the launch he almost fell, but Kobler pulled him aboard.

  Suddenly, the second von Osterberg was over the gunwale, Grauber came to life. Flinging himself on Gregory, he shouted:

  “Quick, Kobler! Quick! We’ve got this one anyway!”

  It was the one move that Gregory had not foreseen. Once again he had made the mistake of underrating his enemy. He was so tired and pain-racked that during the crossing of the lake his mind had lost its alertness, and he had thought that Grauber, too, was too dead beat to try any tricks.

  As he crashed backwards under the attack a frightful pain seared through his side. While he fought for breath he could hear Grauber snarling at the boatman:

  “Turn round the launch! Turn round the launch! Head for Germany and go like hell! That fellow on shore may start shooting at us!”

  Gregory was underneath. He kicked out violently, but his kicks met only empty air. Then he brought up his knee and jabbed it hard into Grauber’s groin. The Gruppenführer let out a squeal of pain and relaxed his grip.

  The engine of the launch had been switched on again. As Gregory struggled out from beneath his attacker he could feel the boat backing away from the shore. He had no sooner got his head up from under Grauber’s shoulder than Kobler hit him. The blow caught him on the temple and made his senses reel.

  The launch was turning now, and Grauber, his pain forgotten in this last-minute triumph, flung himself again on Gregory’s half prostrate form, his great hands clawing for his enemy’s throat. As they closed about it Gregory knew that the game was up. He no longer had the strength to fight off the two of them. He had saved Erika but the Spider had got him instead. Kuporovitch was over a hundred yards away up on the shore, and in the still uncertain light was too far off to see the boat; and, even if he could hear the sounds of the struggle going on in her, was too far off to help. All Gregory could do was to force down his chin and, with his remaining strength, endeavour to break Grauber’s grip; but he knew that nothing short of a miracle could save him now. As from a great distance, he heard Kuporovitch calling:

  “Gregory! What is the matter? Why do you not come?”

  Then Grauber’s own words of a moment before flashed again through Gregory’s tired brain. He had said, “That fellow on shore may start shooting at us.” But they could not see Kuporovitch, and would not know how he was armed, or what instructions he had been given for the night’s work. With a last desperate effort, Gregory wrenched his head free, and gasped:

  “Stop! For God’s sake stop! Or you’ll get us all killed!”

  Kuporovitch’s voice came again:

  “Gregory! What is happening down there? Are you all right?”

  Raising his own voice, Gregory yelled: “Hold it, Stefan! Don’t shoot for another minute!” Then he panted at Grauber: “Kuporovitch has got a machine-gun up there. I told him before I set out I’d rather be killed myself than let you take me back to Germany. If you don’t stop the launch he’ll mow the whole lot of us down.”

  Grauber’s physical cowardice in the face of real danger prevailed. Releasing Gregory, he stood up and shouted a furious order to the boatman. The launch turned back towards the shore. Gregory pulled himself up into a sitting position and a moment later the boat bumped on the mud. As he flopped over the side, Grauber snarled:

  “This is not the end! I’ll get you yet!”

  “Oh, we’ll meet again,” Gregory wheezed. “But it is I who will get you!”

  Still breathless and shaken with pain he staggered to dry land. The foreshore seemed a quarter of a mile in depth as he wearily dragged himself across it. Kuporovitch hailed him anxiously. He mustered a cheerful cry of response, lurched up the bank, and collapsed beside Erika.

  “Are you wounded?” the Russian enquired with quick concern.

  “No, Stefan,” he smiled, “I’ve only got a couple of cracked ribs, but we’ve pulled it off, so nothing else matters now.”

  “Have you heard the great news?” Kuporovitch asked excitedly.

  “What news?” Gregory murmured, as he slipped his arm round the now removing Erika.

  “About Russia. It’s been coming through on the radio in every bulletin for the past two days. The German army of the centre has been smashed at the very gates of Moscow and is in full retreat.”

  “So the Wehrmacht did suck in the stuff I gave to Einholtz,” Gregory laughed. “How absolutely marvel
lous!”

  “Wonderful!” sighed Erika. “What a tremendous coup!”

  “I wouldn’t care to be in von Osterberg’s shoes,” said Kuporovitch thoughtfully, as, in the growing light, he watched the faint outline of the launch disappear. “I’ve an idea that they’ll treat him worse than I did when they find out.”

  “When they find out what?” Gregory asked.

  “Well,” confessed the Russian with rather a sheepish laugh, “I’m afraid I cheated a little. He responded fairly easily after I had put a few matches between his toes. The new method of warfare is not a gas, after all. They are making giant rockets with which to bombard the British cities. There are several sizes. The biggest weighs seventy tons. It has a warhead of twenty tons of explosive. That is enough to obliterate a square quarter of a mile of any city, and these damnable things have a range of over two hundred miles, so from the Channel coast they will easily reach London.”

  “My God!” Gregory exclaimed. “What a ghastly weapon! Still, forewarned is forearmed. Thanks to you, you unscrupulous old devil, we’ll at least be able to take such counter-measures as we can. Perhaps the R.A.F. might blow Peenemünde off the map, before the experiments there get any further.”

  Just as he finished speaking a single shot rang out on the lake; then three more in quick succession.

  “Poor old von Osterberg,” Gregory murmured, looking at Erika, who was now sitting up beside him. “I don’t think you’ll need that divorce after all, my sweet. I believe you’re a widow now.” And he gathered her into his arms.

  A Note on the Author

  DENNIS WHEATLEY

  Dennis Wheatley (1897 – 1977) was an English author whose prolific output of stylish thrillers and occult novels made him one of the world's best-selling writers from the 1930s through the 1960s.

  Wheatley was the eldest of three children, and his parents were the owners of Wheatley & Son of Mayfair, a wine business. He admitted to little aptitude for schooling, and was expelled from Dulwich College, London. In 1919 he assumed management of the family wine business but in 1931, after a decline in business due to the depression, he began writing.

  His first book, The Forbidden Territory, became a bestseller overnight, and since then his books have sold over 50 million copies worldwide. During the 1960s, his publishers sold one million copies of Wheatley titles per year, and his Gregory Sallust series was one of the main inspirations for Ian Fleming's James Bond stories.

  During the Second World War, Wheatley was a member of the London Controlling Section, which secretly coordinated strategic military deception and cover plans. His literary talents gained him employment with planning staffs for the War Office. He wrote numerous papers for the War Office, including suggestions for dealing with a German invasion of Britain.

  Dennis Wheatley died on 11th November 1977. During his life he wrote over 70 books and sold over 50 million copies.

  Discover books by Dennis Wheatley published by Bloomsbury Reader at

  www.bloomsbury.com/DennisWheatley

  Duke de Richleau

  The Forbidden Territory

  The Devil Rides Out

  The Golden Spaniard

  Three Inquisitive People

  Strange Conflict

  Codeword Golden Fleece

  The Second Seal

  The Prisoner in the Mask

  Vendetta in Spain

  Dangerous Inheritance

  Gateway to Hell

  Gregory Sallust

  Black August

  Contraband

  The Scarlet Impostor

  Faked Passports

  The Black Baroness

  V for Vengeance

  Come into My Parlour

  The Island Where Time Stands Still

  Traitors' Gate

  They Used Dark Forces

  The White Witch of the South Seas

  Julian Day

  The Quest of Julian Day

  The Sword of Fate

  Bill for the Use of a Body

  Roger Brook

  The Launching of Roger Brook

  The Shadow of Tyburn Tree

  The Rising Storm

  The Man Who Killed the King

  The Dark Secret of Josephine

  The Rape of Venice

  The Sultan's Daughter

  The Wanton Princess

  Evil in a Mask

  The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware

  The Irish Witch

  Desperate Measures

  Molly Fountain

  To the Devil a Daughter

  The Satanist

  Lost World

  They Found Atlantis

  Uncharted Seas

  The Man Who Missed the War

  Espionage

  Mayhem in Greece

  The Eunuch of Stamboul

  The Fabulous Valley

  The Strange Story of Linda Lee

  Such Power is Dangerous

  The Secret War

  Science Fiction

  Sixty Days to Live

  Star of Ill-Omen

  Black Magic

  The Haunting of Toby Jugg

  The KA of Gifford Hillary

  Unholy Crusade

  Short Stories

  Mediterranean Nights

  Gunmen, Gallants and Ghosts

  This electronic edition published in 2013 by Bloomsbury Reader

  Bloomsbury Reader is a division of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 50 Bedford Square,

  London WC1B 3DP

  First published in Great Britain 1960 by Arrow Books

  Copyright © 1960 Dennis Wheatley

  All rights reserved

  You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise

  make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means

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  printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the

  publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication

  may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The moral right of the author is asserted.

  eISBN: 9781448212781

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