I don’t like that room. I said nothing about it to Peter; but the old man was there walking about as large as life. You have to be specially prepared to see these things.
Cockie was never spiritually minded.
September 18
An alarm of burglars last night. We roused the house – but no traces could be found. The servants here are frightfully stupid. They irritate me all the time.
One can’t sleep in this house. It’s too old. The wood cracks all the time. just as one is on the verge of sleep some noise makes one more wide-awake than ever.
I can’t bear the idea of being touched. My skin is very sensitive. It’s part of the spiritualising of my life, I suppose.
I’m glad, though, that the new honeymoon didn’t last more than three or four days.
It is irritating to one’s vanity. But that is merely a memory. How can vanity co-exist with the spiritual life?
I saw the Spirit of heroin today when I went up to the magic room. It is tremendously tall and thin, with tattered rags fluttering round it, and these turn into little birds that fly off it, that come and burrow in one’s skin!
I just feel the prick of the beak, and then it disappears. They were messengers from the other world. There is a little nest of them in my liver. It is very curious to hear them chirping when they want food.
I don’t know what they’ll do so far away from their mother.
It is horrible not being able to sleep. That, too, must be a preparation for the new life.
I wandered up all alone to the magic room, and sat with my hands on the table opposite the old man, trying to get him to talk.
His lips move, but I can’t hear what he says.
I was disturbed, of course. I always am being disturbed. I am so tired. Why won’t they let me alone?
This time it was a shot. The magic room has windows all around it.
I went to see who could have fired. It was very bright moonlight; but I could see nothing.
Then there came another flash and report. I went round to the side it came from, and watched. It was by the lake. I watched a long time. Then a crouching figure hidden among the reeds sprang up, put a gun to its shoulder and fired twice in rapid succession. Then it screamed, and ran to the house throwing away its gun. I wonder what it could be.
September 20
I have found a manuscript in grandfather’s room that tells you how to invoke the Devil. It needs two people, and I don’t feel sure about Peter.
He can’t see into the spiritual world at all. On the contrary, he is getting a little queer in the head, and imagines he sees things which don’t exist at all. He’s constantly scratching himself.
He behaved very strangely at dinner. I think the butler noticed it.
At midnight we went up to the old man’s room and began to go through the ritual. A lot of it seems silly, but the climax is fine.
You keep on saying, over and over
“Io Pan Pan! Io Pan Pan! Ai Pan Pan!
Io Pan Pan! Io Pan Pan! Pan Pan Pan!
Aegipan, Aegipan, Aegipan, Aegipan, Aegipan,
Aegipan, Io Pan Pan!”
You go on till something comes. We used two black robes that we found hanging up there.
They were lovely silk robes with hoods.
You take candles in both hands and dance while you make the incantations.
We got frightfully excited. It was as if a strange force had got hold of us. It seemed to lead us all round the house and then into the grounds.
We were shouting at the top of our voices.
Once or twice we saw a servant putting out a nose through a chink of a door. It would always be shut with a little squeal, and we could hear keys turning and bolts being pushed.
We wanted to roar with laughter, but we had to keep on with the invocation. The book said you mustn’t stop it while you were outside the magic room, or the Devil could get you.
The strange thing is that I don’t remember at all what happened. Did the Devil come or not?
I don’t even remember getting back to the magic room. I must have gone to sleep, for I’ve woken up frightfully hungry.
Cockie’s awake too. He’s kneeling at the window with a shot gun. He aimed it two or three times, but didn’t fire. He came back to me after putting the gun in a corner.
He said, “It’s no good. They’re too spry. The only chance to get them is at night.”
He was hungry too. We rang for some food. Nobody answered the bell.
We rang again and again.
Then Peter got angry and went to see what was wrong. “There isn’t a soul in the place!”
It’s perfectly incomprehensible. What could have happened to them all?
Peter says it’s the Germans. Part of a plot to persecute him for what he did in the war. But I don’t think so at all.
It says in a book that you have to get rid of every one if you’re going to start the spiritual life.
I expect my spiritual guide put it into their minds to go, but I’m very doubtful about Cockie. He’s not ready for any high development. Men are always revoltingly gross.
Think how they are even about love. I must say this for Cockie, he’s all right about that. The very flower of purity – a perfect knight!
Yet we went through a period of a very evil character. No doubt we had to be purged of all our baser elements.
There is a great sympathy between us at times, and it is not soiled by any animality.
The only thing is I’m not sure whether it hasn’t been too great a strain for his mind – the process of purification.
He certainly has some very queer ideas. Sometimes I catch him looking at me with some deep suspicion in his eyes. His mind is harping on the Germans. He broke out just now into a denunciation of Gretel Webster as a German spy, and rambled on from that to say something that I couldn’t properly understand. But the gist of it was apparently that as Gretel had introduced us more or less, I was being used to do him some harm.
Of course ideas like this come to one when one’s hungry, and all this sprang up owing to the mysterious disappearance of the servants.
There was nothing for it but for Peter to go to the inn and have food sent in. But I had the devil’s own job to get him to do it. His character lacks decision.
I made him take two or three sniffs of snow. That put him right, and now he’s gone off to the inn.
I’m very glad to be alone. I always felt those servants were spying. The house is delightfully quiet.
As I write there are two beautiful people looking over my shoulder. They have been sent to watch over me and guide me, and prepare me for the great destiny which is in store for me.
Here comes Peter with the waiter and a tray. I must hide this book. The secrets of the spiritual life must be kept from the profane.
It’s all right. Peter is my soul-mate after all. We couldn’t eat much. It’s only natural; all base appetites have to be killed out before one is ready to go on. Peter ate very little himself; and then he said:
“I know why we couldn’t get the Devil to come the other night. It was having those servants about. I remember now that grandfather only had two in the house, and he used to send them away when he had anything big on. Let’s see what we can do tonight.”
That was delightful. That was his old self.
We thought it would be a good plan to coke up pretty hard before starting.
Chapter VI
COLD TURKEY
September 23
I don’t remember what happened. I know why. Basil told me long ago that the mind only kept count of material things. So these spiritual events are recorded in a higher kind of mind of which we are not conscious until we get accustomed to spiritual life. So all I can put down is that we had a complete success.
The Devil, of course, need
s a human interpreter if he is to communicate with this world, and so he took possession of Peter. He has been preparing Peter to represent him. He will make Peter pope, and I am to be in the Vatican disguised, to help him because he can’t do without me.
My own spiritual guide is named Keletiel. She is a wonderful being, wears peacock blues and greens. She has white wings like a swan, and carries a sheaf of many-coloured flowers. She has long, loose, black curling hair down to her waist. There is a golden band round her forehead, studded with sapphires, with her name on it. I can always tell her by this.
There has to be a token, because she changes her size so much. Sometimes she is a tiny thing, not up to my knee, and sometimes she is two or three times as high as the North Tower.
Peter and I are covered with blood. We came out of the circle before the Devil had gone, and he scratched us all to pieces. Luckily we got back before he killed us, but we lost consciousness and woke up a long while later. That’s why we can’t remember what happened.
I have some idea that I had a terrible quarrel with Peter, but I can’t remember any details. I think he does, though, but he won’t tell me.
I don’t know why he should act like that. The only thing I can think is that Gretel Webster may have come down to see him perhaps in her astral body, and put him against me somehow. . . .
He was lying on the sofa in his pyjamas. I wanted to be kissed, and went over to him with some cocaine. But he didn’t move. He looked at me with wide open eyes. There was some dreadful fear in them, and he said –
“Black, the plague of the pit,
Her pustules visibly fester.”
Of course, I knew he didn’t mean it, but I was hurt. I gave him the cocaine.
It roused him. He sat up and then he held me by the shoulders and looked straight at my face and said:
“Dragon of lure and dread,
Tiger of fury and lust,
The quick in chains to the dead,
The slime alive in the dust,
Brazen shame like a flame
An orgy of pregnant pollution
With hate beyond aim or name –
Orgasm, death, dissolution!”
And then he began shrieking, and ran out of the house down to the lake and dived right in. He swam a few strokes and then came out and walked slowly up to the house.
I found some towels in the linen chest. I was afraid of his catching a chill, so I rubbed him hard all over. He seemed to have forgotten everything. He was quite nice and normal but just a little scared.
I can’t make out what’s the matter with him. He acts as if he had learnt some terrible secret which he had to keep from me. He always seems afraid of being spied on or overheard.
I went up to the magic room tonight. Peter was sitting in the old man’s chair writing in a book. I couldn’t understand it at first. I had come straight up, and he was fast asleep downstairs! Then, of course, the whole mystery became clear.
While he’s asleep, his astral double comes up and does magic. I knew it was very dangerous to disturb any one’s astral double, so I tiptoed out of the room; but the double followed me noiselessly. Every time I looked over my shoulder he was there, though he was very quick at dodging back round the corner or into a doorway. . . .
Peter has been very preoccupied for some time. He writes out telegrams on forms, and then tears them up; and then he seems to think that isn’t safe, and picks the pieces up and burns them. I asked him about it; but he would say nothing, and got very angry.
I think I know what it is, though. I found a sheet of paper which he had forgotten to destroy – a letter to the War Office, warning them against German plots, and telling some things that have happened down here. I could hardly read it; his handwriting is absolutely gaga.
He talks a great deal to himself. I overheard some of it. He thinks there may be a German spy in the War Office and is afraid to trust the post or telegraph.
He kept on saying, “I’m at my wits’ end.” Then he went off into muttering about the plots against him.
I am sure I could help him out if he would only trust me. I wonder if it’s all delusion on his part. He certainly has some funny ideas.
For one thing, he pretends to see spiritual guides, which is impossible, because he is not pure enough. Besides, the things he says he sees are all horrible and disgusting.
But he says nothing at all now, any more. He begins to speak to me and checks himself. . . .
It is very dark tonight. Rain is falling. Peter has gone down to the lake with his gun.
I have taken this book from its hiding place. I am horribly frightened.
I had no appetite at lunch, and Peter wouldn’t eat. He burst out in a hysterical appeal to me, reminded me of our love, and said he couldn’t believe it was all a sham. Why had I gone into the plot to drive him to death? He doesn’t eat, because he thinks the food is poisoned; and when he saw that I wasn’t eating, it convinced him that I was in the plot against him.
I tried to tell him this was all nonsense. I told him that I was not in any plot against him. It didn’t set his mind at ease. I had to tell him my great secret that I am the woman clothed with the sun in the Book of Revelations, and that he must protect me.
I proved to him that this was the only explanation.
The reason why he couldn’t live with me as my husband was that my angel had told me that I was going to bring the Messiah into the world.
We went into a heated argument. I don’t remember what happened; but as usual, it turned into a quarrel.
One must be concentrated on the spiritual life, so the slightest interruption from the senses, if it’s only the wind in the trees, is a terribly irritating thing.
“Satan is the prince of the power of the air,” it says in the Bible, so he sends these noises in the air to disturb my mind.
How can I give birth to the Messiah if I am not caught up into the Seventh Heaven, and unconscious of material things?
The world, the flesh, and the Devil. One in three and three in one. This evil trinity must be abolished. It knows that; and that’s why it tries to interrupt me either by means of Peter or the pains of the body, or the sights and sounds of nature.
Nature is under a curse because of sex, and so this world is in the power of the Evil One. But I am chosen to redeem it, and the Holy Spirit overshadows me and sends angels to guard me. That is how we got rid of the servants.
Peter suddenly attacked me. He got me down, and put his knee on my chest, and tried to strangle me. But the angel smote him suddenly, and all his muscles relaxed and he rolled over.
His eyes were wide open, but I could only see the whites. That is a sign that he is possessed by the Devil, and that the angels are protecting me.
He has fired two or three times, and now I see him coming up from the lake. I must hide this book, and then I will go to the garage, and hide till the morning.
Keletiel tells me that this is the critical night. I will get into the big car under the sheet. He won’t look for me there, and the angels will be on the watch. . . .
It came out all right. I slept on the seat of the car. I had a dreadful nightmare, and woke sweating all over. Then I went to sleep again. I was with six angels who carried me through the air to a place which I mustn’t describe. It is a great and wonderful mystery.
It is awful and miraculously wonderful to be the woman clothed with the sun. The sublimity of it would have frightened me only a few weeks ago. I have been gently and wisely prepared for my exalted position.
This vision initiated me into the most marvellous secrets.
When I woke Keletiel came and told me that the crisis was over. I was shivering with cold, and went into the house for some heroin. That’s the only thing that keeps one warm however hot the weather is. This is because what keeps the body warm is the rush of animal life, and when one ha
s got to the stage where one becomes wholly spiritual, the body becomes cold like a corpse. . . .
A dreadful thing has happened. We have used up all the heroin, and there is hardly any cocaine. I remembered what I had sewn away in my white frock, and went to get it. It was on the floor in a corner of the drawing-room.
It was all shrunk and rumpled and dirty, and it was still quite wet. I suppose I must have gone a long walk in the rain, though I don’t remember anything about it.
All the heroin was washed away. There wasn’t a grain left. Peter came in and found me crying. He understood at once what had happened. All he said was:
“You’ll have to go back to McCall.”
I couldn’t even be angry. Men are too grossly animal to understand. How could I do such a thing, seeing who I was?
He wanted some H. badly; finding it gone, made him want it insanely.
He took one of the packets and began to chew it. “Thank God,” he said, “it’s quite bitter. There must be a lot in the dress.”
I was shivering and faint. I got another packet, and put it in my mouth. He went wild and clutched me by the hair, and forced open my jaws with his finger and thumb. I struggled and kicked and scratched; but he was too strong. He got it out and put it in his own mouth. Then he hit me in the face as I sat. I went flat and limp, and began to howl. He picked up the dress and the packets, and started to go. I caught at his ankles desperately; but he kicked himself free, and went out of the room with the dress.
I was too weak and hurt to go after him, and my nose was bleeding.
But I had got some H., and I remembered who I was. This was all part of the ordeal. At any moment I might manifest my glory, and he would fall down at my feet and worship me. After all, he has a wonderful destiny himself; like St. Joseph – or else perhaps he may be the Dragon that will try to destroy me and the Messiah.
In my position the actual H. isn’t really necessary any more than food is. The spiritual idea is sufficient. That I suppose is the lesson I had to learn. I had been relying on the stuff itself. It says in the Bible “Angels came and ministered unto him.” My angels will bring me the manna that cometh down from heaven.
Diary of a Drug Fiend Page 22