Gateway to Hell

by Dennis Wheatley

  They were on their second round of drinks when Don Salvador spotted the Baron coming in from his morning round, and called to him to come over.

  Von Thumm made a far from attractive figure, owing to serious injuries he had sustained as a result of an aircraft in which he was travelling, towards the end of the war, having been shot down. He was short, broad, ungainly and walked with a limp which caused his left shoulder to stand up permanently higher than his right. In addition, his face was twisted as though he had been the victim of an attack of apoplexy. His right eye and the corner of his mouth below it were both drawn down.

  Nevertheless, his misfortune had not lessened his amiability, although he greeted them in a deep, harsh voice. As soon as a drink had been ordered for him, Don Salvador asked if he knew of Rex’s whereabouts.

  The Baron gave a crooked smile, and replied in very heavily accented English. ‘No. Our good friend Van Ryn left Buenos Aires about three weeks ago. For me his departure quite unexpected was. Also for me this causes annoyance. For a good time now, many weeks, he has been a member of the Saturday evening school of poker that I haf. That he fail to turn up leave us one short.’

  Don Salvador then explained that Rex’s English friends were particularly anxious to get in touch with him about an urgent financial matter, and asked the Baron if he could suggest anyone who might know of Rex’s whereabouts.

  After a moment, von Thumm said, ‘One person only I know that for certain Van Ryn would where he was going haf told. That is Silvia Sinegiest. But she is no longer in Buenos Aires. If to question her you wish, you will haf to make a journey to the end of the world.’

  4

  Where there’s a Will there’s a way

  ‘Silvia Sinegiest?’ Richard repeated. ‘Wasn’t she a film star in the thirties?’

  ‘In two big films she starred, then found it less hard work to marry her producer,’ von Thumm gave his crooked smile. ‘That was three marriages ago. The name under which she starred she still uses. Since then she makes two marriages and is much talked about. Her last two husbands haf been millionaires. If she married yet again, I think it all odds it would not be a man who had less than a million. Those of only modest fortune—well-known actors, authors and big-game hunters—haf to be content with being her lovers.’

  ‘From what you said, I gather that Van Ryn is a close friend of this woman’s?’

  With a twisted grin, the Baron nodded. ‘Most close. He was crazy about her, and judging by her past record I should be much surprised if his mistress she had not become.’

  ‘In that case, there is certainly a good chance that she knows where he is to be found. But what on earth do you mean by saying that to see her I’ll have to go down to the end of the world?’

  Don Salvador smiled. ‘Von Thumm means Punta Arenas. It is known here as the End of the World, because it is at the extreme tip of Chile, and further south than any other large town. Beautiful women who are free to go where they will, rarely remain in Buenos Aires during December and January, They find the heat-waves such as we are now experiencing too great a tax on their vitality and looks; so they can go down to one of the watering places in the south.’

  Richard looked across at the Baron. ‘Are you certain that Madame Sinegiest is in Punta Arenas?’

  ‘I make a big bet on it. She is fond of gardening. At present season the flowers there are beautiful. A few years ago she lease a house just outside the town. Since then she spend about six week down there every winter.’

  ‘I thought that part of the world was quite god-forsaken—perpetual ice and snow.’

  ‘So it is during our winter,’ said Don Salvador, ‘but at this time of the year it can be quite pleasant. Personally I would prefer Rio Gallegos, which is on the Atlantic coast, or Puerto Montt, just over the border in Chile. Those places are somewhat warmer, and there is much more to do in them.’

  The Baron nodded agreement. ‘Truly so; but, as I haf told you, Silvia Sinegiest has the lease of this house at Punta Arenas. Down to it she went a few days after from Buenos Aires Van Ryn disappeared.’

  ‘Could you give me an introduction to Madame Sinegiest?’ Richard enquired.

  ‘With much pleasure. Where do you stay?’

  ‘The Plaza.’

  ‘Very good.’ The Baron stood up. ‘Tomorrow morning I will send a line round to your hotel. Now you excuse please. I lunch with a friend.’

  When he had clicked his heels in the approved German fashion and bowed himself away, Richard thanked Don Salvador for the introduction, then he added, ‘I find it surprising that Van Ryn should have made such a close friend of von Thumm. Ever since the war he has displayed a rooted dislike of all Germans.’

  ‘I, too, am surprised that they became intimates,’ Don Salvador agreed. ‘But they must have had some interest in common. Perhaps it was the Baron’s poker school, or Silvia Sinegiest may have acted as a bridge between them.’

  After a pleasant lunch, Richard returned to the Plaza, stripped and—an unusual thing for him as he infinitely preferred a proper bath—had a cold shower. He then lay naked on his bed for the siesta hour. When he roused, Simon was still absent and did not appear until close on six o’clock. When he did, Richard asked:

  ‘Where have you been? I was getting quite worried about you.’

  Simon replied airily. ‘Oh, out to Rex’s place. After last night, thought I ought to take his niece a few flowers. She asked me to stay to lunch; so, with you off on your own, I naturally accepted.’

  ‘Visiting the sick, eh?’ Richard commented. ‘Jolly decent of you. And you didn’t run out on the girl after the meal either, or was it that you didn’t reach the coffee stage until five o’clock?’

  ‘Owing to her near blindness and poor, scarred face, Miranda leads a lousy life,’ Simon countered. ‘But I didn’t spend the afternoon with her out of charity. Stayed on because I was enjoying myself. She’s a fine person. Brave, intelligent and fun to be with. You don’t deserve it, but I’m taking you to lunch with her tomorrow. She doesn’t normally entertain at all, but she wants to meet you because you’re such an old friend of her uncle’s.’

  ‘I’ll be delighted to meet her,’ Richard replied. ‘That is, if we are still in Buenos Aires. But if transport is available, we’ll be on our way to Punta Arenas.’ He then told Simon about the lead he had been given by von Thumm.

  Simon agreed that no time must be lost in their endeavours to trace Rex; so they went down to make enquiries about travel facilities to the far south. It soon emerged that they were minimal. Punta Arenas was fourteen hundred miles from Buenos Aires and the railway ran only a quarter of that distance. The last thousand miles had to be covered on horseback, as in many places the tracks through the mountains were too dangerous for cars. The alternative, adopted by the majority of people going there, was a three-day voyage by ship down to the Straits of Magellan. However, it transpired that, during the past year, an intermittent air service had been started, and a small ’plane left each Wednesday, if enough passengers to justify it had booked seats.

  Time being important, Simon asked the hall porter to get on to Argentine Airways, book seats for Richard and himself, and say that he would also pay for any seats that might be left vacant, in order to ensure that the ’plane would fly on Wednesday next, the 9th.

  That evening they dined at a restaurant where there was a cabaret show. The dancing proved excellent, and there was an amusing mock bull-fight, where two men played the part of the bull and, as a finale, a pretty girl dressed as a matador leapt on the dying bull’s back, jabbed it into new life and rode it off the stage. But the show was strictly decorous, owing to Eva Peron’s ordinances aimed at eliminating vice spots.

  On the Monday morning, as Punta Arenas was just over the Chilean border, they went to the Chilean Consulate to get their passports visaed. On returning to the hotel, they found both von Thumm’s promised letter of introduction to Silvia Sinegiest, and Pinkerton’s report on Rex’s friends. As Simon had feare
d, the latter proved of no value. All the people Rex had entertained with any frequency were highly respectable, and had no known idiosyncrasies. They then drove out to lunch with Miranda.

  On the two previous occasions when Simon had had a meal with her, they had enjoyed it tête-à-tête; but that day Miss Pinney was present, to make a fourth, so they kept off the subject of Rex’s disappearance. Apart from Miranda’s beautiful blank eyes, Richard thought her scarred face worse than the description Simon had given of it; but he formed an immediate liking for her, and was filled with admiration at the way she made light of her disability.

  As they were leaving, she said to Simon, ‘Your coming to Buenos Aires has proved a wonderful tonic for me, and I do want to see as much as I can of you before you fly down to Punta Arenas on Wednesday. Will you come to dinner with me again tonight?’

  He shook his head. ‘Ner, I’m terribly sorry. I’d love to but I’ve accepted an invitation to meet Richard’s friend, Don Carlos Escalente, and dine with him.’

  ‘Lunch tomorrow then?’ she suggested.

  He hesitated a moment, then smiled. ‘Yes; but on one condition. That in the evening you let me take you out to dinner.’

  ‘That is quite impossible,’ Miss Pinney broke in. ‘It would be most distressing for Miranda to show herself in a restaurant. Besides, the light would be very harmful to her eyes.’

  ‘Nothing’s impossible,’ Simon retorted firmly, ‘and I give my solemn word that she shall neither be embarrassed nor her sight harmed. I’ve thought of a way to overcome that. Miranda, what do you say?’

  She smiled at him. ‘How can I not trust you? Yes, I will if you like.’

  The party that evening, for which they changed into dinner jackets, proved most enjoyable. It was given by Don Carlos in his own apartment. Like that of Rex, it overlooked the park and was even more luxurious. Being situated on a corner of another of the great blocks, it had two balconies, and it contained a fine collection of paintings. Donna Escalente was a dark, lovely woman; well read, amusing and vivacious. Richard had known her in London and she showed great delight in seeing him again. The party consisted mainly of diplomats and their wives. A dozen of them sat down to dinner at a table sparkling with crystal glasses and bright with a great centrepiece of tropical flowers. Each delectable course was washed down with wines from the best European vineyards and, out of consideration for Richard, mainly English was spoken throughout the meal.

  Afterwards, tactful enquiries by him revealed that several of those present knew Rex, but none of them showed any inkling that there was anything unusual about his absence from Buenos Aires, and supposed that he had gone off on a holiday.

  On the Tuesday morning, the two friends woke to the sound of teeming rain. The weather had at last broken, and it was pouring in torrents. Soon after breakfast, Simon said that, in spite of the rain, he must go out, as he had to make certain preparations which would ensure Miranda’s having a happy evening. Half an hour later, Richard finished the paperback he was reading; and, although he could have bought another down in the hotel lobby, it occurred to him that he had so far seen very little of South America’s largest city, and he might never have another opportunity of exploring it. So he too donned his mackintosh and went out.

  A map provided by the hall porter showed him that Buenos Aires consisted of several hundred blocks, divided by parallel streets, so a stranger could not get lost. Two great boulevards, each the best part of a mile in length and about two hundred yards in width, formed a cross in the centre of the city. One was the Avenida del Mayo and the other the Avenida 9th de Julio.

  As the former ran right down to the waterfront, Richard first made his way there, to find, at its end, the handsome Presidential Palace, which was Peron’s residence and, on one side of the Plaza on which it faced, a cathedral that looked like a great temple.

  Turning about, Richard splashed his way up the wide, tree-lined thoroughfare until he reached the other great boulevard that crossed it. Between the belts of trees lining a huge square, there reared up the tall Radio Tower, and a lofty obelisk. Having made the round of the vast open space along the sides of which there were many cafés and passable shops, he entered the upper section of the Avenida del Mayo. At the far end stood the imposing Congress building. From there he walked down several side streets to the Palais de Justice, on the corner of the Plaza Lavalle: a square made particularly attractive by its great palm trees and huge magnolias. From there he found no difficulty in threading his way back to the Plaza.

  He reckoned that he must have walked a good seven miles, and all the time the downpour had never ceased; but the atmosphere was so warm that the rain was almost tepid and he felt no discomfort from it. Having made this tour of the principal streets and squares, he had no desire to stay longer in Buenos Aires, or to return there. Apart from the few fine buildings and blocks of luxury flats that overlooked the park, he had found the city to be shoddy and populated by gloomy-looking, down-at-heel people, which made it depressing.

  On his return it occurred to him to make some enquiries about Silvia Sinegiest, so he telephoned Pinkerton’s office and got on to the man there who had sent Simon the report about Rex’s friends. She was so well known in Buenos Aires that the following information was sent round in less than an hour.

  Her age was uncertain; but, as she had made her two films in the mid-nineteen-thirties, it could be assumed that she was at least forty. She had been born an American but was of Swedish extraction. Hers was no case of ‘Poor girl makes good’. Her father had been an engineer, and sufficiently well-off to send her to a college of good standing. She had then gone to New York and swiftly became the top model in a leading fashion house. This had given her the entrée to wealthy ‘Café Society’. She had not gone to Hollywood; it had come to her, in the person of Gabriele Carrjano, the film producer. He had met her in New York, decided that she was star material, taken her back to California with him and groomed her for her new role. For the trouble he had taken he had been well rewarded by her success and, after her second film, he had married her. But evidently life in Hollywood had not appealed to Silvia, as she had parted from her husband a year later, and left the ‘Coast’, never to return.

  Her second husband had been Sir Walter Willersley, the millionaire chairman of one of Britain’s largest shipping lines. She had travelled extensively with him and, as his wife, been accepted into English society. The war had put an end to that, presumably pleasant, period of her life. During the greater part of the war she had remained in London, and had been decorated for bravery while driving an ambulance in the blitz. In 1943 she had had an affaire with a Swedish diplomat, which led to her being divorced by Sir Walter.

  For some years after the war she had led an unsettled life in Europe, the United States, Mexico and the Caribbean. Contemptuous of public opinion she had, during that time, lived more or less openly with the pianist Ladoloski, the author Brian Stores and the playwright François Debré. In 1948 she had married again. This time it was the Argentine meat-packing king, Edouardo Varodero. But the marriage had been dissolved eighteen months later and, while remaining based on Buenos Aires, she had resumed her restless existence.

  When Simon returned from his lunch with Miranda, Richard told him all this, upon which Simon grinned and remarked, ‘This Silvia must be quite a girl.’

  ‘Hardly a girl,’ responded Richard. ‘She cannot now be far off fifty, but she is undoubtedly a personality. Her wartime record shows that she has guts, and the fact that she does not seek to hide her illicit amours, moral courage. Moreover, while millionaires quite frequently fall for women whose only assets are their looks, for her to have captured men like Stores, Debré and Rex required a considerable degree of intelligence.’

  ‘You’re right there,’ Simon nodded. ‘Rex is certainly not the sort of chap to get all steamed up about a glamour-puss. Wonder if he’s making a bid to marry her? Seems her price for getting hitched up is seven figures plus; d’you think he could h
ave pinched that million as part of a campaign to make her Mrs Van Ryn?’

  ‘No, Simon. That doesn’t make sense. The money Rex made off with is stolen. Unless he takes a new identity he would be called to account for it, and a woman like Silvia Sinegiest would never be willing to live in secret under a false name. What use would a million be in such circumstances? To enjoy it, they’d have to come out into the open; and that would be impossible as long as Rex is wanted for embezzlement.’

  ‘He’s not. Not by the police, anyway. If he does reappear, what could his family do, except grin and bear it? They’d never prosecute.’

  ‘But Rex must have much more than a million dollars of his own.’

  ‘Maybe he has some reason for not wanting to draw on it for the time being, and the lady was impatient. She may have demanded that he settle a million on her before she agreed to become hitched up. If Rex was really bats about her, he could have taken this way to clinch matters, while intending to repay the bank later.’

  ‘That seems a bit far-fetched. Still, I agree that it is a possibility. Anyhow, it looks as though Madame Sinegiest holds the key to our riddle. With luck, we’ll get it out of her in a few days’ time.’

  When Simon was driven out to Rex’s apartment that evening, he took with him a jeweller’s leather case which, at one time, had contained a necklace supporting a large central pendant. Assuming that Miranda would have no evening dresses, he had not put on a black tie, but he found her in a black cocktail frock, trimmed with beautiful lace that she told him she had made herself. Miss Pinney was with her, radiating intense disapproval; but it was clear that she had failed to persuade Miranda to alter her decision to dine out.