"She worked in a carpet factory."
"What kind of car did she drive? Tell me about your grandparents? Where did they live? Where did you go to elementary school? Did Bobby ever have any injuries?" There seemed no end to the Egyptian's questions. The volley back and forth went on for hours. I focused my eyes on his mouth as he spoke, studying the gaps between his teeth in an attempt to stay alert. "Did you have any pets in Georgia?"
"No," I said automatically. I snuffed out the cigarette and dropped the butt in with the twenty plus others.
"Did your mom have any lovers while you were growing up?"
"Huh?" I said snapping out of a daze.
"Your mother Judith. Did she--" The old man in the center raised his hand to cut him off.
"Let's break for the night. It's a very good start Mr. Michaels." His long white beard danced under his chin as he spoke. "We'll pick it up here tomorrow."
Poppy lead me out of the room while the others milled around and talked. "You look tired," she said, walking above me up the stairs.
"I'm exhausted, mentally. What time will it start tomorrow?"
"After dinner again. I'll come and get you when we're ready."
"I was hoping you would join me for dinner. I haven't really seen you since we came here."
"I ah... sure, I could do that. I might have to leave a bit early though, for preparations."
"Great." I took several steps before continuing. "I have a question for you," I said up to her. "I have several questions actually. First of all, is that spear on the wall the same one you told me about, the one they once used to kill candidates?"
She laughed. The sounds carried up the slanting shaft and shot back down at us. "You make it sound so morose, but yes it is the same one."
"Why is it still hanging behind the panel?"
"I don't know really. I suppose we keep it as a symbol of discerning the truth. Speaking of which, you did well tonight. I was thinking about halfway through tonight’s proceedings that this whole Ascension could go very quickly."
"Why is that?"
"Two reasons. It's relatively easy to verify historical facts these days. And number two you only have two trips worth of material to account for. The last person who went through this in the 1920's, the one who was older than I, took months of sessions like that one tonight. That would be a real grind. I shouldn't think yours would take that long at all.
"The rest of your questions will have to wait," she said opening the door at the top. "I'm going to sleep and I suggest you do the same. I'll see you later today." She walked quickly down the hall and up the stairs to her suite. I looked out the window in my room as I undressed for bed. Light purple and blue bands of light clung low to the city's morning skyline.
"What time is it?" I asked Diltz on the way to the kitchen.
"3:00 p.m. sir. There's still some food left in the dining room."
"If it's no trouble, I'd like to have a driver for the rest of the day. I want to see the city, get some fresh air," I said.
"It is no trouble. When would you like to leave?"
"Right after I get a quick bite to eat." He nodded. "When do I need to be back?"
"Seven o'clock sir."
"Oh I almost forgot. Poppy will be dining with us tonight Mr Diltz."
"I'll make the necessary preparations sir."
The driver knew every part of the city, but less than a dozen words in English. And after three silent hours of alpine vistas, I was eager to get back and continue.
"How was your tour sir?" Mr. Diltz said, opening the front door.
"Excellent. The scenery around here is wonderful. I think I'd like to take a cruise on the lake next time."
"I will make the arrangements sir."
I noticed something peculiar as I walked in and it struck me as odd that I hadn't noticed it before. There was no handle or latch on the outside of the door. There wasn't even a place for a key to activate the locks. The door could only be opened from the inside. There always had to be someone inside the building. It was never vacant, ever.
"We'll dine in the same room as last night. I spoke to Poppy moments ago. She'll be down to join us shortly."
We raided the pristine platters in the main dining room, then retreated to the side room.
"I must admit I enjoy dining with you like this," Diltz said, taking his seat. "I almost always eat alone."
"Don't you have a family?"
"No, I do not. My position here is a full time one, and affords me little time to be social. Besides, the secrecy that I'm entrusted with doesn't lend itself to intimacy."
I didn't know how to respond. I wouldn't say he was happy about his condition from the way he spoke, but he was disciplined about it. He was perfectly suited to his job, or his job was perfectly suited to him. I couldn't tell which, probably both.
Poppy came in carrying a plate and a bottle of wine.
"How are they getting along in there Madame?" Diltz asked her.
"Oh fine."
"Thank you for joining us," I said, taking the bottle from her.
"It's pleasantly quiet in here."
"Yes it is quiet, and it presents my opportunity to ask a few questions we didn't have time for last night."
"Alright," she said, taking a seat.
"What is the story behind that grotto we were in last night? It's enormous, and it looks very old."
"It was once part of an old church. For hundreds of years the Cognomina had access to the grotto by paying the church a tribute. When the church was destroyed by fire in 1743, we bought the ruin and built this edifice over the foundation and the grotto."
"How old is it?"
"No one knows for sure, but it was probably excavated by the Romans as part of an old temple. A Mithraic temple[21] would be my guess," she said.
"It's beautiful," I said starting at my plate of food.
"It's bigger too, much bigger than the part you saw. You'll see it soon enough I think. The festival will be held in the larger part."
I let my mind wander and fantasize about what was beyond the curtain. We ate for a few minutes in silence. I could tell she was quite distracted by not being involved in the noise down the hall. "Is there anything else you wanted to talk about?" she asked.
"Yes there is. I've been thinking about something you said the night before we left. We were talking about humanity as it relates to our condition and you mentioned that you thought man lives unnaturally."
"Yes?"
"I think I understand what you're talking about, but I'm not sure."
"It's simple. Modern man lives in an unnatural world. He lives in a world dominated by dogma. Take Christianity for example, though any religion will do since they all work on the same principle. Modern man, Christian man, lives unnaturally because every day of his life he bites back on his desire and restrains himself from what he really yearns to do and say. And for what purpose? So it will get him into heaven, so that it will get his name in the book of life? Rubbish!" she dismissed with a wave of her fork. “You and I are proof that this is nothing more than a hoax, a farce. Each day that he bites back only propagates another day and another day and another day of the same mundane existence, the same unfulfilled existence that is so pathetic and weak. You know it's true. You ask any Christian man what they would do if they knew the world would end at sundown of that day. The answers would boggle your mind: Husbands wouldn't know their wives, mothers wouldn't know their sons, brothers wouldn't know their sisters for the answers you would find. You would find the true being that lives under the false Christian exterior, shackled and estranged from the completely natural desires that flow like a strong ancient river through the transitory and fickle sediments of dogma and religion."
Diltz placed his fork down. "These sentiments might very well be true, but I don't know as I would go so far as to call Christianity a hoax," he said.
"Christianity, and Judaism before that," she continued, "is the biggest hoax ever perpetrated on the human rac
e. It robs man of his dignity and his freedom. People say that Christianity is the basis of our civilization. I say to you verily that it is a corruption of all that man is. Man lives his life in some socially engineered family unit and sells his time by the hour because he is too afraid to live in those hours. He is afraid to look beyond the veil that surrounds him because he knows no other way, because he is born into this bondage. And it is this way because some ancient text tells him this is how he should live. That is the corruption. That is man's true fall from grace. But man is told a lie about that even. He is told that his fall from grace happened because one man and one woman supposedly sinned at the beginning of time and that we are guilty simply by being men and women by way of that original sin. That is the least original ‘joke’ ever told. Unfortunately for man, it is the most prolific.
"The main tenet of Christianity is that as men we are estranged from God and made to feel ashamed to walk around naturally and act upon the impulses we feel. As men we are told that the only way to overcome this estrangement is to seek salvation in some mystic that supposedly lived two millennia ago. We are told that the only way to get in touch with God is to participate and thereby propagate this hoax called Christianity.
"But it's different for us, like I told you before we left L.A., the same rules don't apply. You see the enforcer to this entire hoax, is guilt. You ask any Christian and they will freely admit that. Their system simply doesn't work without guilt. But ours Evan, ours is truly Eden. We run through Elysian fields, free from their bondage because in our world guilt has no meaning or purpose or place. This is paradise," she said in a husky voice, looking at me. "And welcome."
Diltz and I ate in silence, trying to digest her words along with the meal. Having thought some of these thoughts before, I understood where it came from. We were on the same line, a time line. She was just farther along it than I. And once again I found myself unwilling to begrudge her any reaction to obstacles farther down that time line. I felt in a word, melancholy.
"What about Eastern religions?" Diltz asked.
"The Buddhists and Hindus are little better. Sure they got it right that we all come back, but they have to taint it again with guilt, only they call it Karma. You see religion is universal in that it doesn't work without guilt. The tenet of Karma, that if you lead a self-depreciating, self-abasing virtuous life in this trip that your position in the next will be improved, that your spirit will be cleansed and purified by wasting life after life so that you will eventually reach nirvana is obviously as misguided as it's western counterpart. We've all tried it. We have found by the most accurate methods possible that it doesn't work that way. And that method is experience.
"The idea of Karma, the idea of retributive justice, is as silly as the story parents tell their children about Santa Claus keeping track of who's naughty and who's nice. Parents only tell children that to make them behave in November and December. It's the same principal at work, only on a larger scale. It is a hoax. There is no one in heaven or nirvana with a pen and pad keeping score on us. And if there ever was, he died a long time ago."
She drank the last of her wine and placed the napkin on the plate. "I should check to see if they're ready. If you'll excuse me."
Mr. Diltz and I looked at each other between bites, not quite sure how to start a conversation that could diffuse the charged words Poppy had left in the room with us. We ate without speaking until she came back.
The members of the panel and the gallery were already in place when Poppy and I walked in.
"Welcome back Mr. Michaels," said the Egyptian. "I'd like to start with some questions about your first incarnation, as Vasili."
I nodded.
"Tell me about your first memories as a child."
"Vasili grew up on his father's farm. Playing outside quite often, usually alone but sometimes with friends. He often played with three brothers around his own age that lived 5 minutes walk away."
"What were their names?"
"Hristo, Sorgi, and Thaxos."
"Last name and patronymic please."
"Siltykov, Hristovich." I said, pouring some water.
"Tell me more about that childhood," the Egyptian said leaning back as though he expected a long answer.
"There's not much to tell really. Vasili lived with his mother and father on an eighty acre farm near the village of Voditza. He worked on the farm, took schooling at home from his father and took mass twice a week in town. It was that way until 1915 when the army was mobilized and he left to begin military training[22]."
"You said you took mass twice a week. What religion?"
"It was simply the religion back then. I know it now to be Eastern Orthodox."
"Was your family religiously devoted?"
"My father was, so everyone was. He was raised and educated in an Orthodox monastery near the Greek border. He taught me the language, the scriptures and the organ. I played every week for Sunday mass."
"You said you can read and write Bulgarian now, can you play the organ as well?"
"Yes." I lit a cigarette as he conferred with the old man and Nadya.
"You said you were in the military. Did you fight in the Great War?"
"I was in the Bulgarian army from 1916 until the armistice was signed in 1918."
"What did you do after that?"
"I returned home and helped my father with the farm for one season. I was in the process of acquiring my own land when my father died. I built a home for myself on the eighty acres and tended the land and my mother until her death the next year. That same year, 1920, I took a wife." I crushed out the cigarette in the ashtray.
"Go on."
"I met Vanya in Voditza. She was the daughter of the livery stable owner. I went into town to buy a horse and saw her. We were married four months later."
"What were your children's names?"
"We had no children."
"Why not?"
"Infertility I suppose. It wasn't for lack of trying I can assure you. If any of you have ever tended a large plot of land you know how valuable farm hands are."
The Egyptian stared at me for what seemed like an eternity. "Were the babies lost or were there no pregnancies?"
"She never became pregnant," I said getting angry with his line of questioning. The young Spaniard to his right tapped him on the shoulder breaking his concentration. I lit another cigarette as they whispered.
"I would make a motion that we change the topic for a moment. I would like to hear the testimony of the witness for the candidate." the young man on the end said.
"I concur," said the old man. Poppy straightened in her chair.
"Please begin," the Egyptian said nodding to her.
She looked at the old man when she spoke. "It was at my home in Los Angeles, most of you know the place. I went outside to watch the fire brigades pass. I was closing the door behind me on the way back in when I heard the gunshot. I knew the shot was close, but dismissed it along with all the other shots I'd heard in recent years. I wasn't concerned until my servant alerted me to a loud knocking on the basement door. Gun in hand, I went down to investigate. Evan Michaels turned out to be the source of the noise. He had been shot in the foot by the police while fleeing the scene of a fire." Poppy stopped to take a drink of water and I noticed the rotund man I'd met at the front door the night before perk up and lean forward in his seat in the gallery.
"I was about to fire a shot next to his head to give him a good scare when he first tipped me off. I remember he had the most peculiar reaction when I leveled the gun at him. He became angry, no furious is a better word. He shouted over and over at me to kill him. He had this crazed look in his eye that was unnerving. 'Kill me, Kill me,' he said. 'I'll probably just come back again anyway.' Those were his exact words. That was my first clue obviously.
"I took him in, attended his wound and encouraged him to stay in the hope I could pursue my hunch."
"How precisely did you do that?"
"The second clue
came the same night," she said reaching under her robe. She produced a pack of cigarettes and held them out toward Diltz, who came over and handed them to the Egyptian. "Can you read the Turkish on that?" she asked.
He tilted his narrow head back so that the light from the torch on the wall behind him illuminated the pack. "The Pride of the Turks. Why?"
"It used to say 'Centuries of Flavor'. Evan knew that. The slogan changed in 1960. I called the company the following day and checked. He knew that, I found out later, because he smoked those same cigarettes while living in exile in Istanbul after the Second World War. Two days later I took him to my funerary vault in Los Angeles and told him about myself. More accurately, he figured it out when he saw the concurrent dates on the monuments. That was the same day I called Diltz."
"What was his reaction when he figured it out?" the Egyptian asked as though I were an inanimate piece of furniture.
"He was quite visibly shaken. He sat down and was motionless for some time. After he came around he was very inquisitive about me and about this," she said, looking around the grotto.
"Is it your opinion that the candidate to your right is a palingenesist?"
My heart quickened as the old man finished the question. Poppy turned to me as she answered. "Yes. He is one of us."
The panel was silent for several minutes before the old man spoke. "Let's take a short break."
"I want to know about the fire," the Egyptian said starting in again. "Is her story accurate? Were you at the fire she spoke of?"
I filled my water glass and took a drink as I weighed several different stories in my head. They were all underweight.
I thought better of lying by the time I finished the glass. If I got caught in a lie about the fire it could jeopardize this whole process. That's the trouble with lies, they have to propagate. They must procreate to cover each other. There is safety in numbers; one lie is never enough. "Yes I was at the fire. I started it."
"Why did you start it?"
"I was paid to burn the building down." I saw the large man in the gallery come to attention again out of the corner of my eye.
The Reincarnationist Papers Page 19