The twosome endeavor to understand the nature
of their prisoner, who demonstrates no ability to
talk. It is shaped like a human, although oddly
muscular and contorted. They are entirely unable
to understand its nature or origin, however, and it
eventually dies of starvation despite their best ef-
forts to find something that will sustain it.
Part of the story’s thrust is based on a conver-
sation between the two men in which they specu-
late about the greatest element of terror, that is,
the one thing that is more frightening than any-
thing else. The author seems to be suggesting that
no familiar fear has that quality, that it must be
fear of something completely unknown and un-
knowable, although in fact the two men show no
fear at all once the creature is secured and unable
to harm them. Their efforts to understand it, in-
cluding making a mold of its body, have resulted in
the story being described occasionally as science
fiction, but, in fact, O’Brien never offers even the
faintest hint about the invisible attacker’s origin
and makes no effort to rationalize its existence.
Wheatley, Dennis(1897–1977)
The British writer Dennis Wheatley produced a
fairly large number of thrillers, about equally split
between espionage stories and tales of black magic
and the occult, with occasional forays into science
fiction. Wheatley’s first novel of the supernatural
was The Devil Rides Out(1935), one of his best and
part of the Duke de Richleau series, not all of
which involve the supernatural. A band of friends
discover that one of their number has fallen under
the influence of a modern-day sorcerer, so they kid-
nap him in order to break the villain’s control. By
doing so they become the targets of his dark magic.
The same group returns in Strange Conflict(1941),
this time traveling to the astral plane, where they
battle the disembodied forces raised by Nazi agents
who have recruited the help of a voodoo practi-
tioner who uses his ability to function outside of his
body in order to spy on allied planning during
World War II. The duke and his friends have one
further occult adventure, Gateway to Hell(1970).
One of their circle abruptly undergoes a change of
character, embezzles the family fortune, and flees to
South America. They pursue him and discover that
he has fallen under the mystical influence of a cult
of satanists who are using his wealth to help them
precipitate a supernatural catastrophe.
The Haunting of Toby Jugg(1948), despite the
title, is not a ghost story. Toby Jugg is a powerful
and wealthy man, though an invalid, who begins to
experience incidents of a supernatural origin that
initially make him doubt his sanity, although even-
tually he realizes that he is the target of a cabal of
black magicians who wish to replace him with a
doppelgänger in order to acquire his power.
Through other magical means he is cured and
eventually takes the initiative, destroying his ene-
mies. To the Devil—A Daughter(1953) is about the
corruption of innocence. A young woman assumes
an entirely different personality after darkness falls,
as though she were possessed by some evil spirit.
The novel was considered sexually suggestive for
its day, although it is innocuous by contemporary
standards. A series of chases and escapes in much
the same vein as the Duke de Richleau series fol-
lows, and a fairly loyal film version was produced
in 1976. Wheatley wrote a sequel, The Satanist
(1960), a kitchen sink novel filled with espionage
and the occult, plots to explode nuclear weapons
in England, devil worshippers, a conjured imp, and
other subplots. The novel is exciting but at times
almost incoherent.
The Ka of Gifford Hilary(1956) is his only
other significant novel of the supernatural. A fi-
nancier is apparently murdered by a mysterious
new weapon, but although his body is functionally
dead, his personality has been set free and roams
about spying out secrets before finally returning to
reanimate his own corpse and tell all. Several other
novels have fantastic elements, but they are usu-
ally subsidiary to the main plot. The Rape of Venice
(1959), part of Wheatley’s Roger Brook historical
adventure series, involves genuine satanists and
evil manifestations. One of his later exploits, The
Irish Witch(1973), does as well. They Used Dark
Forces(1964), part of the Gregory Sallust spy se-
ries, involves supernatural weapons employed
against Adolf Hitler. There is genuine voodoo in
The White Witch of the South Seas(1968), another
Sallust story.
Wheatley’s short fiction is generally slight, al-
though “The Snake” (1943) is an effective story of378 Wheatley, Dennis