Strange Conflict Read Free Page A

having his nose too close to the charts, yet someone who has imagination and a great reservoir of general knowledge. The Nazis must be using some channel which is quite outside normal espionage methods—the sort of thing to which there is no clue but that anyone with a shrewd mind might happen on by chance.That’s why, when I saw you the other day, it occurred to me that it might be a good idea to put this damnable problem up to you.’
    De Richleau stared at Sir Pellinore for a moment. ‘You are absolutely certain that the Nazi Intelligence are not using any normal method of communication in this thing?’
    â€˜Absolutely. The fact that all sorts of other vital information does not get through proves it.’
    Then, if they are not using normal methods, they must be using subnormal—or rather, the supernatural.’
    It was Sir Pellinore’s turn to stare. ‘What the blazes d’you mean?’ he boomed abruptly.
    The Duke leant forward and gently knocked the inch-long piece of ash from his cigar into the onyx ash-tray as he said: ‘That they are using what for lack of a better term is called Black Magic.’
    â€˜You’re joking!’ gasped Sir Pellinore.
    â€˜On the contrary,’ said the Duke quietly: ‘I was never more serious in my life.’

2
Believe It or Not
    A strange expression crept into Sir Pellinore’s blue eyes. He had known the Duke for many years, but never intimately; only as one of that vast army of acquaintances who drifted across his path from time to time for a brief weekend at a country-house, in the smoking-room of a West End club or during the season at fashionable resorts such as Deauville. He had often heard de Richleau spoken of as a man of dauntless courage and infinite resource, but also as a person whom normal people might well regard as eccentric. The Duke had never been seen in a bowler-hat or wielding that emblem of English respectability, an umbrella. Instead, when he walked abroad he carried a beautiful Malacca cane. In peace-time he drove about London in a huge silver Hispano with a chauffeur and footman on the box, both dressed like Cossacks and wearing tall, grey, astrakhan
papenkas.
Some people considered that the most vulgar ostentation, while to the Duke himself it was only a deplorable substitute for the sixteen outriders who had habitually preceded his forebears in more spacious days. Sir Pellinore being a broad-minded man had put these little foibles down to the Duke’s foreign ancestry, but it now occurred to him that in some respects de Richleau had probably always been slightly abnormal and that, although he appeared perfectly sane, a near miss from a Nazi bomb might recently have unhinged his brain.
    â€˜Black Magic, eh?’ he said with unwonted gentleness. ‘Most interesting theory. Well, if you—er—get any more ideas on the subject you must let me know.’
    â€˜I shall be delighted to do so,’ replied the Duke with suave courtesy. ‘And now I will tell you what has just been passing through your mind. You have been thinking: “I’ve drawn a blank here; this fellow’s no good; he’s got a screw loose; probably sustained concussion in an air-raid. Pity, as I was rather hoping that he might produce some practical suggestions for the Intelligence people to work on. As it is, I must remember to tell my secretary to put him off politely if he rings up—one can’t waste time with fellows who’ve gone nuts, while there’s a war on.”’
    â€˜Damme!’ Sir Pellinore thumped the table with his huge fist. ‘You’re right, Duke; I admit it. But you must agree that no sane person could take your suggestion seriously.’
    â€˜I wouldn’t go as far as that, but I would agree that anyone who has no personal knowledge of the occult is quite entitled to disbelieve in it. I assume that you’ve never witnessed the materialisation of an