Dark Sanctuary Read online

  DARK

  SANCTUARY

  H.B. Gregory

  Edited and Introduced by

  John Pelan

  With a Special Introduction by

  D.H. Olson

  Afterword: Discussing Dark Sanctuary

  An Interview with H.B. Gregory

  Ramble House

  Forgotten Master of the Macabre © 2012 by John Pelan

  Introduction to Dark Sanctuary © 2001 by D.H.Olson

  Discussing Dark Sanctuary © 2007 by John Pelan

  Cover Art © 2011 Gavin O’Keefe

  Dark Sanctuary

  Originally published by

  Rider & Co.

  Paternoster House

  Paternoster Row

  London, U.K.

  Cover Art: Gavin L. O’Keefe

  Preparation: Fender Tucker

  Dancing Tuatara Press #40

  TO

  MY WIFE

  FORGOTTEN MASTER OF THE

  MACABRE – H.B. GREGORY

  There are any number of books that get touted as “rare” or scarce”; words that get tossed around far more often than is seemly. Among knowledgeable booksellers, the definitions are quite a bit different from what you might expect . . . “Rare” would be a book that a resourceful bookseller or collector might see once every ten years or so. “Scarce”, now there’s a word that if used correctly signifies something very special indeed . . . A book that a resourceful collector with a huge list of contacts with similar interests and a great deal of expertise may see only once in a lifetime! The books that often get described with these terms are usually just “uncommon” or as is more often the case, “expensive”.

  The original edition of this novel is genuinely “scarce”; whereas something like Lovecraft’s The Outsider & Others is merely “uncommon” and most certainly “expensive”. Just as an aside, to demonstrate the point that Arkham House titles don’t qualify for the “rare” or “scarce” designation, I used to have a standing wager with friends that if they gave me a blank check to work with I could put together a complete set of Arkham House books within thirty days (and that was pre-internet!) Conversely, if one attempts to assemble “The Wagner List” we’re looking at a much more difficult feat, (some would say impossible, thanks in large measure to H.B. Gregory’s Dark Sanctuary.)

  My colleague Dwayne Olson discusses the Wagner List in the article that follows, and was originally used as the introduction to the Midnight House edition of Dark Sanctuary. However, in the decade since several events have occurred which allows me to cast some additional light on just how scarce the first edition of Dark Sanctuary really is . . . To start with, in 2005 I received an e-mail from Harry Gregory’s daughter! As it turns out, the Gregorys were delighted to see a new edition of the novel and while quite elderly, Harry Gregory was still sharp as a tack and had very clear memories of his foray into supernatural fiction. He was gracious enough to grant an interview, (originally published in Allen Kozsowski’s wonderful magazine Inhuman, and reprinted here as an afterword.)

  The genesis of the novel was in large part an answer to H.P. Lovecraft and his penchant for “indescribable, unspeakable horrors”, eschewing the idea that the menace is more terrifying if left entirely to the imagination, Gregory shows us the demoniacal entity and still manages to maintain the mystique and impart a genuine feeling of dread. No mean feat, as I can tell you as a writer who has used both extremes that what I leave to your imagination is bound to be far more terrifying than what I describe on the printed page. It takes exceptional control and very precise prose to fully describe a monster and do so effectively. Some examples that come to mind are Long’s “Second Night Out”, Brennan’s “Slime”, and Leiber’s “Smoke Ghost”. That puts H.B. Gregory in pretty illustrious company, quite an achievement for a first novelist with no previous experience in writing weird fiction.

  The setting of the Gregory’s honeymoon proved influential in the development of the novel; but I’ll not say too much more on that for fear of stealing Harry’s thunder in the interview that follows the novel. Suffice it to say, one of the books strengths is the strong sense of place that Gregory is able to infuse in his descriptions of Kestrel and Pentock, which are not quite as imaginary as his disclaimer would imply . . .

  A devout Christian, Gregory also dismisses the Lovecraftian view of an indifferent and amoral cosmos and makes his novel a very clear-cut struggle between Good and Evil. He does so without being trite or the slightest bit preachy, but there’s no doubt that the author subscribes to a belief that Evil is a very real force and can only be overcome by a powerful reliance on the forces of Good.

  There’s little doubt that had the book even marginal exposure it would have been lauded as a classic in the genre. What happened to the book and its subsequent resurrection is a bibliographic miracle, in itself almost so fantastic as seem the stuff of fiction.

  The publishing house of Rider was well-known for their books dealing with all aspects of theology and frequently delving into fiction, so Dark Sanctuary was a natural. Unfortunately, the company also favored tiny print runs and only 400 copies of the book were produced. Four-hundred copies is generally still enough to ensure that a book achieves a certain immortality, as at least a handful of copies will fall into the hands of collectors, some of whom may correspond about it or even get reviews published. Dark Sanctuary wasn’t so lucky . . . According to the author only review copies and “Colonial pre-orders” had shipped when the Blitz began and the warehouse holding the rest of the copies (and many other books) was burned to the ground. The author recalls the publisher asking to borrow one of his two author copies in pursuit of a foreign language sale . . . He never got it back . . .

  The number of papers that reviewed Rider publications can be counted on the fingers of two hands. The number of “Colonial pre-orders”, which would have included Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India was likely about the same number. That a copy found its way into Karl Edward Wagner’s hands was little short of miraculous . . . One of my mentors in book collecting as well as editing, Karl told me a trick he’d learned for discovering interesting supernatural titles . . . (In fairness, I think Ramsey Campbell also commented on this, so I’ll give credit to both gentlemen). Obviously, if an author has written an interesting book, it behooves one to look into the rest of that author’s output. Karl applied the same logic to publishers, reasoning that if a publisher offered one supernatural thriller, they were likely to have published others . . . Then it was all down to finding other titles from the same time frame (when the same editorial staff was likely in place) and tracking down promising-sounding titles . . . (this last can’t always be relied on, as some great books have been cursed with awful titles, The Dumpling, anyone?)

  Armed with the knowledge that Rider had been home to Warrington Dawson’s The Guardian Demons and Furze Morrish’s Bridge over Dark Gods, on one of his many trips to England, Karl had his eye out for Rider titles and discovered a copy of Dark Sanctuary. The book so impressed Karl that he listed it as one of the thirteen best supernatural horror novels in his column in The Twilight Zone, but frustratingly enough to collectors, very few were lucky enough to find a copy of their own. After all, it can reasonably be assumed that only about two-dozen copies were distributed and likely only about half of those have survived into the present. One such copy made its way onto the hands of D.H. Olson, who discusses the book and Rider & Co. in the article that follows.

  It so happened that when Dwayne mentioned the book to me, I was pretty much set on Midnight House just publishing short story collections, and wasn’t keen on deviating from a formula that had been working very well, however, there was a new publisher who had just started up by publishing another fabulous rarity and was look
ing about for his next project . . . Dwayne had brought a Xerox of Dark Sanctuary to a convention where both the other publisher and myself were exhibiting our wares, so we approached the other publisher on the last day of the convention as he was disassembling his table and told him the story of Dark Sanctuary and offered him a xerox copy . . . Much to our surprise, he seemed unimpressed by the book’s story and to our shock left the Xerox on his table when he left . . . Then and there I decided that there were enough great “lost” supernatural novels to make it worth expanding the horizons of Midnight House and promptly published a new edition of Dark Sanctuary a couple of months later.

  Dark Sanctuary proved to be one of Midnight House’s best-selling titles and all of our copies have been gone for a number of years. However, two editions of this excellent novel still comprise less than 500 copies in circulation. That fact, taken with the new information about the novel available from no less than the book’s author makes the idea of a new edition quite compelling.

  It’s not often that a novel is published with so much editorial apparatus, (two introductions and an interview with the author), but I think that after reading it you’ll agree that Dark Sanctuary is a classic of the genre that merits such special treatment. For my own part, I’m honored to be able to do my bit to keep this amazing work alive.

  John Pelan

  Midnight House

  Gallup, NM

  INTRODUCTION

  In 1983, T.E.D. Klein, editor of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone Magazine had a brilliant idea. He approached three of the best read people he knew, Thomas M. Disch, Karl Edward Wagner, and R.S. Hadji, to list, for Twilight Zone’s readership, some of their favorite “forgotten” works of fantasy and horror. The lists thus produced are some of the most amazing ever compiled. Published separately, those of Disch or Hadji would have been impressive by any standard. Yet, over time, they’ve been overshadowed by Karl Edward Wagner and his three lists of thirteen books each. “Why?” is debatable. Perhaps it was just the force of Karl’s personality. Or, maybe, it was something more intangible. Wagner’s thirty-nine books have since become legendary, drawing attention to writers who would otherwise have languished in obscurity, while simultaneously driving hard-core collectors into spasms of frustrated apoplexy. Part of this is undoubtedly due to the personality and acumen of the compiler, for Wagner, like Hadji and Disch, had a keen grasp of historical perspective and a sharp editorial bent. Wagner though, for whatever reasons, had a more unusual and eclectic vision than either of his co-selectors. He also, whether by accident or by design, produced lists that were ready-made for would-be bibliophiles.

  Of the thirty-nine books in the “Wagner list,” roughly one-third are easy to find, and even common — novels like Frankenstein or Psycho. A second third are obscure, but still relatively findable, at least to anyone with connections in the rare book market. The real key to Wagner’s list however, the thing that made it memorable and its books worthy of desire by all true bibliophiles, was the incredible scarcity of the final thirteen or so books. To this day, collectors search in vain for such rarities as Alan Hyder’s Vampires Overhead, or fantasize of finding books by obscure British authors like R.R. Ryan, Mark Hansom and Walter S. Masterman. At one time it had even been suggested that a few of Karl Wagner’s selections were not real books at all, but only titles made up to fool a gullible readership. An elaborate April Fools prank for bibliophiles. Of course, that was not the case. All of the books in Karl’s list were real, however rare and unavailable they might otherwise be.

  Among the rarest of those books was Dark Sanctuary by a certain H.B. Gregory. Exactly why this book should be so difficult is a question that may never be answered. The fact that its author never wrote another may have something to do with it. It may also have never been reprinted, unlike contemporaneous works by authors like Ryan and Hansom, whose work remains rare despite multiple editions. Then, of course, there’s the matter of time and place. London, 1939-1945, was not a healthy place for books. German fire-bombing raids clearly took a toll, especially along Paternoster Row where the offices of Dark Sanctuary’s publisher were located. Then there was the damage inflicted upon such books by the British public themselves: lending libraries went through books quickly and wartime paper-drives were a patriotic duty. Yet, for all of these, Dark Sanctuary’s biggest problem may have been its own publisher, for whom fiction was but a small sideline.

  William Rider & Son, later Rider & Co., appears to have begun life as a publishing house sometime in the first decade of the twentieth century. From the beginning their tastes were esoteric, to put it mildly. Primarily a publisher of non-fiction, Rider’s specialty were titles of an occult or metaphysical nature. Strange fact books by Eliot O’Donnell and parapsychological explorations by Hereward Carrington were two of their staples. Other typical releases included such titles as: The Mystery of Death, The Phenomenon of Astral Projection, Michael Juste’s The White Brother; an Occult Autobiography, A Search in Secret India, and Ghost Parade.

  But Rider, from its very beginning, was not content to limit itself solely to non-fiction. Deciding that its readership would occasionally like to relax with less “serious” books, they began to seek out fiction which shared plot elements or themes with their other publications. Some early examples of these were books by Bram Stoker and Marjorie Bowen, R.J. Lee’s An Astral Bridegroom, and Mrs. Campbell Praed’s Soul of Nyria: The Memory of a Past Life in Ancient Rome. To better understand Rider’s editorial slant, and Dark Sanctuary’s place in it, one need only compare it with other novels published by them at around the same time.

  By far, the most over the top of these, published just a few years after Dark Sanctuary, is Bridge Over Dark Gods by Furze Morrish. Part Gnostic/Theosophist Life of Jesus, it is also the tale of an eternal triangle between a Greek youth, a British slave girl, and the wife of the Roman Commandant of the garrisons in Palestine. Salome becomes an early Christian. Joseph of Arimathea is unmasked as a Zoroastrian sage. A youthful Jesus tours the world, honing his spiritual powers in secret Himalayan valleys and in hidden passages beneath the Pyramids of Giza. England is revealed as the future birthplace of one of the Seven Races of Man, its early church as a union of Christianity and Ceridwyn-worship. Pilate and friendly Romans plot to make Jesus King of Syrian. The Essenes are a branch of the White Brotherhood of Tibet and reincarnation an engine of spiritual atonement and reward. Toss in healthy doses of astrology, Lemuria, the mythology of the Watchers, Dualism, astral travel, elemental spirits, and Atlantean sex-cult survivals and one has a pretty good idea of the sort of subjects that Rider’s readers were most interested in. Perhaps most amazing of all, Morrish does all of this — and more! — in a slender one-hundred and sixty page book.

  Of course, the problem with most “idea” books, especially those written by true believers, is that they are seldom successful. In this, Bridge Over Dark Gods is no exception. While some of the ideas might be interesting on their own, or if developed properly, Morrish simply didn’t have the skills, or the perspective, to pull it off. In the end, Bridge Over Dark Gods is simply a huge muddle, readable only with difficulty by any but the most avid of what are now called New Agers. It’s only redeeming value, at least for fans of weird fiction, is a rather effective invocation of a powerful but mindless water elemental (Dagon) aboard a storm-wracked Phoenician cargo ship.

  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, conc
erned 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.