A far more successful Rider title, and one that predates Dark Sanctuary by a dozen years, is The Guardian Demons by American diplomat and novelist Warrington Dawson. It tells the story of Noel and Sibylla, an independently wealthy but high-strung southern couple who make the mistake of sitting in on an amateur séance. Exposed to such otherworldly forces, Sibylla finds herself haunted by two “Guardian Demons,” who inform her that they will remain with her until her death, upon which they will steal her soul. Noel, in an ill-fated attempt to save his wife, makes contact with Olive and Dr. Moyle, a shady spiritualist couple. The result is disaster for all. Sibylla dies and Noel, concerned for the safety of her eternal spirit, becomes more involved with Moyle’s spiritualistic explorations. Then a séance goes horribly awry and Moyle meets his end as well. Noel, an unconscious but powerful medium in his own right, succumbs to Olive’s influence and soon finds his life spiraling even more rapidly out of control, as even faked séances explode into riots of materializations and malevolent visitations. Finally, at rock-bottom and ready to end his life, Noel is saved by the very people who had inadvertently caused his problems in the first place. Their intervention brings him not just salvation, but the realization that Sibylla’s soul had never really been in jeopardy at all. It was, in fact, his own that had been in real danger.
Like Bridge Over Dark Gods, The Guardian Demons is an idea novel. Unlike the former, however, it is a novel with a single message, which does not confuse or detract from the development of the tale’s plot. One may find Demons’ end trite or even anti-climatic, but it still retains a level of readability even to those who would discount the author’s message. For that message, while implicit within the plot structure, is only explicitly stated in the book’s closing pages.
Dark Sanctuary, unlike most novels published by Rider, is hardly what one would call a message novel. Yet, it’s not all that far removed either. Like The Guardian Demons, or Bridge Over Dark Gods, it is imbued with a certain ethos from which it cannot be separated.
The novel opens with Anthony Lovell, Sr., master of the ancient abbey of Kestrel and its like-named island off the Cornish coast, raving in madness and fear over the ancient family curse that “dwells in the bowels of the abbey rock.” What has caused his madness is unclear, but it is obviously linked to something seen or experienced in Kestrel’s ancient crypts. Lovell’s son is called back from London and, soon thereafter, John Hamilton, a free-lance journalist and friend to the younger Lovell, makes his way to Kestrel as well. Of the remaining plot, little more need be said in this context. Of the Universe in which the plot is set, however, there are many observations that can be made.
The first thing worth noting in Dark Sanctuary is its use of a historical record to provide authenticity. The history of Kestrel given in chapter one is as fictitious as the abbey and island itself, but it includes just enough real historical data to be believable. Positioned as it is, early in the novel, it also has the benefit of pulling the reader into the story almost immediately.
More important is the spiritual worldview against which the action is set, for when all is said and done, Dark Sanctuary is a very Christian novel. By this, I mean not that Gregory is preachy in the way a Benson or Blackwood or Roger Pater can sometimes be, but rather that the author’s viewpoint includes both for proactive evil and for an equally active and far more powerful good. In this, and in its depiction of Kestrel’s true horror, Dark Sanctuary is actually very similar to both Adrian Ross’ The Hole of the Pit and Eleanor Ingram’s much-neglected The Thing From the Lake.
Still, being a Rider novel, there are also differences. When Ingram introduces supernatural intervention to the climax of her novel it seems slightly out of place, not least because a religious element is almost wholly lacking up until that point. Gregory does not make the same mistake. Partly that’s because Dark Sanctuary is, from very early on, quite clearly the story of a struggle between good and evil; a conflict between the godly Michael Bennett, rector of St. Martins, and the worldly Dr. Grant, who would willingly free the demon trapped beneath the Abbey and send it out to ravage the world.
The result is an unusual but very entertaining mix. Black Masses vie with Christian epiphanies. The belief in “a personal God” clashes with the ideal of “union with the Ultimate Reality.” Christian miracles are contrasted with the miracles of other beliefs and systems (“magic leads to egotism”… etc.). Nor is that all. Hauntings, astral bodies, elemental spirits, and the tri-part nature of man are referenced, as is the legendary Merlin, who has a role of his own in the Kestrel mystery. Even a smattering of theosophy makes its way into the mix. When Michael Bennett says, “Mr. Hamilton, when you reach my age you will learn never to scoff at other people’s beliefs, because those beliefs often come to have a real existence, simply because they are believed in,” he is restating an idea that was not only used in Bridge Over Dark Gods, but which also underlies a large amount of classic supernatural fiction, including at least two of Jack Mann’s “Gee’s” novels.
Religious and philosophical elements notwithstanding, what makes Dark Sanctuary worth reading is the power of its story. In classic pulp and weird mystery tradition, Gregory produces both solid heroes and solid villains, but he also throws in some twists and turns along the way. And, when the conflict veers into the cosmic, it becomes hard for the reader to predict how the plot will eventually play itself out.
Sadly, Dark Sanctuary is H.B. Gregory’s only known book. Did the author, having produced the one novel which he had been impelled to write simply put down his pen and move on to other things? Was it the first novel of a career cut short and a life lost in World War II? We may never know. And while we can regret that the pen that brought us such a memorable place as the stormy, accursed isle of Kestrel never again put nib to paper, we can at least be thankful that its one creation is now back in print and ready to thrill new readers the way that it once thrilled a young aficionado of the obscure named Karl Edward Wagner. I think it is fair to say that Karl would be pleased by such a development.
D.H. Olson
Minneapolis, MN
December, 2000
Chapter I
I
The doctor passed a weary hand over his eyes and looked down half incredulously at the still figure on the bed. It seemed almost impossible that less than half a minute before those white, silent lips had been screaming the most horrible words it had ever been the misfortune of a little country doctor to hear. Struggling to maintain his professional calm, he began methodically to dismantle the shining syringe from which that merciful oblivion had come. The two servants who stood watching looked at each other. The man spoke:
“Will he be all right, Doctor?”
“For the moment, yes.” He must not let these people see how bewildered and uncertain he was. “But his son must be sent for; he’s in London, I suppose?”
“Yes, Doctor. I’ll send him a wire at once.”
“Do.”
Without another word the manservant went out. The woman made as if to follow him, but turned back to the doctor once more.
“Doctor — is it — the curse?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, my good woman!” There was nervous anger in his voice. “He’s had a bad shock, that’s all. Now go and rest. I don’t want another patient on my hands.”