Diary of a Drug Fiend

by Aleister Crowley

  “Alas I, my dear Mr. Platt,” I replied gloomily, as the stage directions seemed to indicate, “I am a very young and ignorant man, and I am unable at present to see any part for me in the design. My mere approval of your product – ” I took it out and treated myself to a long, languishing kiss – yes, kiss, there is no other word for it! “My long-lost love, home to my heart once more!”

  Platt in his turn assumed an air of Stygian melancholy. “My dear Sir Peter,” he pursued, with a heavy sigh, “you can easily understand that, huge as my fortune, thanks to the inscrutable ways of Destiny, now is, time is necessary to realise it fully – and, by a singular and most unfortunate conjunction of circumstances, not only time is required, but – Capital.”

  “Unfortunate conjuncture of circumstances?” I echoed dreamily – my mind was royally racing in the Circus of Infinity, a billion leagues from where anybody sat.

  “Unfortunate, that is, for me,” corrected Platt, “no, no, I won’t say that, since it is fortunate for my friend – for you!”

  “For me?”

  “For you, my dear Sir Peter! I told Mrs. Webster of the state of the case – and she immediately suggested your name. She has come to the rescue splendidly herself, I need hardly tell you – took all the shares she could – but there is still a matter of three thousand pounds to find. And remember, after insuring against all risks, and so forth, we shall be paying at the very least four thousand per cent.”

  I have never been any sort of a business man; but a child of twelve could grasp the gigantic nature of the proposition.

  “I have brought the papers for your inspection, my dear Sir Peter. You will see that the capital is only £20,000 in shares of £1 fully paid up – and I am offering you £3,000 at par.”

  “It’s princely, my dear sir,” I exclaimed. “You overwhelm me. But – excuse me – I don’t see why you need the money at all, or why you don’t sell the shares through a broker.”

  At this moment Lou popped into the room. It annoyed me. Did I show it? Her face went suddenly white as marble. She stood in the doorway of the bedroom for a moment, swaying; and then went swiftly and softly through the room to the hallway. The portiere swung to behind her – and I instantly forgot her existence, after vaguely supposing that she had gone to get her furs to show to Gretel, returning to the bedroom by the other door so as not to disturb us.

  Platt was explaining the situation. “A most unfortunate affair, Sir Peter! I fear I am overmuch preoccupied with the welfare of my fellows – and in consequence neglect my own. I certainly was surprised, when I went to my bank to see if I had enough money to purchase these chemical works, to find my balance so large – I am only too accustomed, alas! to find that my impulsive charity has denuded my little savings. But I only discovered last month that £3,000 of the amount did not belong to me at all; it was part of a fund of which I am trustee. I am not allowed by our foolish laws to invest trust funds in such securities as this Schneezugchemischerwerke of ours; and I must replace the £3,000 by the end of the month, or the consequences may be really most disastrous.” He broke off short, trembling with fear. He was not playing a part about this. He undoubtedly felt that it might be difficult to explain to an unsympathetic jury how a Trust Fund had lost its way to the extent of wandering into the Trustee’s private account without his suspecting it had behaved in so erratic a manner.

  “You are a man of the world, Sir Peter,” he declared, almost blubbering, “and I feel sure you understand.”

  I am not altogether a man of the world, as a matter of fact; but, whether helped by the cocaine or not, I really did think I understood fairly well what had happened.

  “But why not go to the City?” I repeated, “they ought to fight like wolves over such a plump little doe as the Schneezug!”

  “My dear Sir Peter!” He raised his hands in horrified surprise. “Surely, surely you realise that it may take years and years to educate the public to appreciate the difference between our Pure Cocaine, a wholesome household tonic, and the Impure Cocaine, which is a Deadly and Deleterious Habit-forming Drug! I felt I could approach you, because you are a man of the world, and a connoisseur, and – to be frank with you – because I took a liking for you the first time I saw you, so handsome and splendid with your beautiful young bride! But what, oh what, would people say if it became known that Jabez Platt had the majority of the shares in a Cocaine Factory? My dear Sir Peter, we are in England, remember!”

  I wasn’t deceived by any of the nauseating humbug of the scoundrel, but it was evident that his proposal was a genuine good thing.

  The Schneezugchemischewerke had been paying well enough in the ordinary way when he bought them.

  I determined to sell the necessary securities and take over the shares. My state of mind was exceedingly complex. My reasons for the purchase were not merely various but mutually exclusive. For one thing, the Satanistic idea of working evil for its own sake; for another, the schoolboy delight in doing things on the sly; then there was the simple and straightforward money lust. Again, my hatred of hypocrisy had turned into a fascination. I wanted to enjoy a taste of so subtle and refined a vice.

  On the top of this there was a motive which really encroached on the category of insanity. On the one side I was exuberantly delighted to find myself in possession of boundless supplies of cocaine; on the other I was enraged with mankind for having invented the substance that had ruined my life, and I wanted to take my revenge on it by poisoning as many people as I could.

  These ideas were tossed about in my mind like pieces of meat in boiling soup. The fumes intoxicated me. I shook Platt’s hand and promised to go down to my bank at once and make the necessary arrangements.

  I swelled with the delirious pride of the great man of affairs who sees the golden opportunity and grasps it. More crazily still, I enjoyed the sensation of being the generous benefactor to a brother man in misfortune.

  Platt pulled out his watch. “We could drive down at once and have our lunch in the city. Bless my soul,” he interrupted himself, “I shall never forgive myself for being so rude. I had quite forgotten Lady Pendragon and Mrs. Webster.”

  “Oh, they’ll be delighted,” I tittered. “They’ll have a horrible lunch on cream buns and watercress and mince pies and champagne and go shopping afterwards like good little millionairesses.”

  “Yes, indeed,” said Platt heartily and quite genuinely, “they’re that all right. As for us, we’ll lunch at Sweeting’s on oysters and stout and drink to the prosperity of Parliamentary Institutions.”

  I laughed at the little joke, like a madman, and shouted wildly:

  “Come in, girls, and hear the news. We’re all going to be elected to the Diamond Dog-collar Club.”

  Gretel appeared in the doorway. She was wearing a worried look which was perfectly incomprehensible.

  “Where is Lou?” she said at once, her shrill voice off pitch with agitation.

  “Isn’t she with you?” I snapped back idiotically.

  A sudden spasm of alarm set me shivering. What the devil could have happened?

  Platt was more upset than any of us, of course. He had pulled off a delicate and dangerous intrigue; and at the moment of success he saw that his plan was in some incomprehensible danger. His mind’s spy-glass showed him a bird’s-eye view of the Old Bailey. The fact that there was no tangible reason for alarm only intensified the feeling of uneasiness.

  “She must be hiding for a joke,” said Gretel in a hard, cold voice, mastering her anxiety by deliberate violence.

  We hunted over the apartment. There was no sign of her; and her fur coat and cap were missing from the hall. I turned to Mrs. Webster.

  “What happened?” I asked curtly.

  The woman had resumed her mask. She threw a defiant glance at Platt, whose eyes shot a venomous question.

  “I can’t understand it at all,” she said slowly. �
��She seemed very uneasy all the time she was in the bedroom. I thought she was missing her dope. If I had had any on me, I’d have given her a big jolt. Dummer Esel! I’ll never go out without it again so long as I live. I forget what excuse she made. I thought it was just camouflage to go and get her heroin.”

  Silence fell between us. Platt was afraid to say what he wanted to say. I was honestly puzzled. The incident had destroyed the effect of the cocaine I had taken. (It’s extraordinary how easy it is to break the spell.)

  I went to the Tantalus and poured out three brandies, dropping a pinch of snow into mine to make sure of getting back to where I was.

  Mrs. Webster had recovered her equipoise.

  “We’re really very foolish children,” she said gaily, as she sipped her brandy, “making all this fuss about nothing at all. There are a thousand and one reasons why she may have taken it into her head to go out. Why, of course – it’s awfully hot in here, she probably thought she’d take a turn in the fresh air. Anyhow, you don’t have to bother about me. You boys had better get down to the city and do your business. I’ll wait here for her until she turns up, and spank her hard for frightening us all like this.”

  Platt and I put on our hats and coats. We were just shaking hands with Gretel, telling her to order herself a good lunch from downstairs, when we heard the latch-key put into the lock.

  “There she is,” cried Gretel gaily. “What babies we have been!”

  The door opened; but it was not Lou who came in. It was Maisie Jacobs, and her face was stern and set. She gave two quick formal bows to the others, took my hand, and said in a deep, tense voice: “You must come with me at once, Sir Peter. Lady Pendragon needs you.”

  I went white. Once again I had been brought back from a complex chaos of conflicting emotions to the bed-rock truth which had been buried so elaborately and so often.

  The deepest thing in myself was my love for my wife. I resented the realisation, and yet I could not bring myself to admit it. I asked, stupidly enough: “Is anything wrong?” as if Maisie’s face, to say nothing of her appearance, were not sufficient guarantee of the seriousness of the situation.

  “Come with me,” she repeated.

  Gretel had been watching the dialogue like a cat. She flashed forked lightning at Platt, thinking that his fears might betray him into saying something irrevocably stupid.

  “Of course, there’s only one thing to be done,” she said hurriedly, summing the psychology of the situation in a brilliant synthesis. “You must go at once with Miss Jacobs, Sir Peter. I needn’t say how terribly anxious I feel; but I hope there is nothing really wrong. I’ll look in late this afternoon with Mr. Platt for news; and if everything is all right – I won’t allow myself to think that it can be otherwise – we can make an appointment for the morning over our business affairs. Don’t let’s lose any time.”

  I shook hands hastily and slipped my hand into Maisie’s arm. She ran downstairs with me, leaving the others to wait for the lift.

  Chapter IV

  OUT OF HARM’S WAY

  Lamus’s motor was at the door. Maisie sprang to the wheel and drove off without saying a word. I shivered at her side, filled with inexplicable qualms. The exaltation of the cocaine had completely left me. It seemed to increase my nervousness; and yet I resorted to it again and again during the short drive.

  When we got to the studio, Lala was sitting as usual at the desk, but Lamus was walking up and down the room with his hands behind his back; his head bowed in thought so deep that he seemed not to notice our arrival. Lou had not removed her furs. She was standing like a statue in the middle of the room. The only sign of life was that her face continually flushed from white to red and back again. Her eyes were closed. For some reason or other she reminded me of a criminal awaiting sentence.

  Lamus stopped short in his stride and shook hands with me.

  “Take your things off, and sit down, Sir Peter,” he said brusquely. His manner was completely different from anything I’d ever seen in him. He turned away and flung himself into a chair, searched in his pockets for an old black pipe, filled it and lit it. He seemed the prey of a peculiar agitation. That again was utterly unlike him. He cleared his throat and got up, with an entire change of behaviour. He offered me one of his millionaire cigars and motioned to Lala to get me a drink.

  “This is the latest fashion in the studio,” said Lala gaily. She was obviously trying to relieve the tension. “Basil invented it last night. We call it Kubla Khan No. 2. As you see, it’s half gin and half Calvados, with half a teaspoonful of crème de menthe and about twenty drops of laudanum. You filter it through cracked ice. It’s really the most refreshing thing I know.”

  I accepted the luxuries automatically, but I couldn’t help fidgeting. I wanted to get down to business. I could feel that something urgent was on hand. I didn’t like the way Lou was acting. She stayed so absolutely still and silent, it was uncanny.

  Lamus had taken three matches to light his pipe and it kept on going out between almost every puff. By-and-by he threw it angrily on the carpet and lighted a cigar. There was a club fender round the grate. Maisie was sitting on it swinging her legs impatiently. We all seemed to be waiting for something to happen and it was as if nobody knew where to begin.

  “Tell him, Lou,” said Lamus suddenly.

  She started as if he had struck her. Then she turned and faced me. For the first time in my life I realised how tall she was.

  “Cockie,” she said, “I’ve come to the cross-roads.” She made a movement of swallowing, tried to go on, and failed.

  King Lamus sat up in his chair. He had completely recovered himself; and was watching the scene with impersonal, professional interest. Lala bent over his chair, and whispered long and earnestly in his ear. He nodded.

  Again he cleared his throat, and then began to speak in a strained voice.

  “I think the simplest way in the long run is for Lady Pendragon to tell Sir Peter, as she has already told us, exactly what has happened, as if she were in the witness-box.”

  Lou began to twist herself about uneasily.

  “I’m fed up,” she burst out at last.

  “The witness will kindly control herself,” remarked Lamus, judicially.

  The callousness of his tone restored Lou not merely to herself, but to herself as she might have been before I ever knew her.

  “When those people arrived this afternoon,” she said quite calmly, “I saw at once that they were up to some game. I knew why Gretel wanted to get me out of the room, and I tackled her about it point-blank. She told me the truth, I think, as nearly as a woman of that sort can ever get to it. Something about buying shares in a chemical works?”

  “Yes, certainly,” I returned, and I could feel the hostility creeping into my voice. “And why not? It’s a wonderful investment and the chance of my life financially, and I don’t see why women have to poke their noses into men’s business which they don’t understand and never will. Between you, you may have made me miss my chance. Confound you! If I knew where to find Platt, I’d go around and sign the contract this moment. As it is, I can go down to the bank and arrange to get the money.”

  I pulled out my watch.

  “I can’t even have my lunch, I suppose,” I went on, working myself up deliberately into a fury.

  Lou walked a few steps away and then turned back and faced me.

  “Accept my apologies, Sir Peter,” she said, in icy, deliberate tones. “I have no right whatever to interfere with your plans. After all, they don’t concern me any more.”

  I rose to my feet and flung away the half-smoked cigar into the fireplace.

  “What do you mean by that?” I said passionately. I had something else in mind to say, but all of a sudden my whole being seemed to falter. I sat down weakly in the chair, gasping for breath. Through my half-shut eyes I could see Lou take an impulsive
step towards me; and then, controlling herself, she recoiled as a man might who had approached what he thought was a beautifully marked piece of fallen timber and recognised it for a rattlesnake.

  The pulse of my brain was beating feebly and slowly; but she went on with pitiless passion, and swept me away with the tempestuous rush of her contempt.

  “I made an excuse, and came to see what was going on. I found you had utterly forgotten the facts. You were sniffing cocaine, not as an experiment, not because of any physical need, but as a vice pure and simple. You were already insane with it. I might have stood that, for I loved you. But that you should plan to become the partner of that murderous villain with his hypocritical piety, that was another matter. That was a matter of honour. I don’t know how long I stood there. I lived a lifetime in a second, and I made up my mind once for all to be done with such dirt. I slipped out and came here. I’m half insane myself at this moment with craving for H.; but I won’t take it till I’ve seen this thing through. The pain of my body helps me to bear up against the mortal anguish of my soul. Oh, I know it’s heroics and hysterics – you can call me what you like – what you say doesn’t count any more. But I want to live; and I have asked Basil to take me away as once he promised to do long before I met you. He has promised to cure me, and I hold him to that. He has promised to take me away, and I hold him to that. You can get a divorce. You’d better. For I never want to look upon your face again.”

  The other three people in the room did not exist for me. I had to brace myself to meet Lou’s attack. There was absolute silence except for the sound of my sniffing. I became my own master again, and broke out into a fit of yelling laughter.

  “So that’s the game, is it?” I answered at last.

  “You are selling me out to buy a third share in that cad!”

  I stopped to try to think of some viler insults; but my brain refused to work. It merely prompted me to abuse of the type usually associated with bargees. I spluttered out a torrent of foul language; but I felt even at the time that I was not doing myself justice.