Season of the Witch

by James Leo Herlihy

  At that moment there was a really gruesome coincidence: Hank stopped talking and the chanting from upstairs came to an abrupt end. It was as if his hideous prophecies had brought about this sudden awful silence. Hank’s face muscles were working, and his jaws were clamped tight shut. He seemed to be overwhelmed with emotion, but I couldn’t tell what the emotion was.

  Peter stood up. “You know what I’d like to do?” he said. “I’d like to see the sky. Does anyone want to come with me to the roof?”

  Doris said, “Oh! I do!” And Roy said, “Me, too!”

  I looked at Hank. “Will you come with us?”

  He shrugged. It’s hard for him to say yes to anything.

  Peter led the way. We climbed the stairs in silence. The closer we got to the attic, the better I felt. On the top floor we stopped and looked into the attic. There in a circle, surrounding a votive candle and holding hands, sat ten beautiful people. All their eyes were closed, and each of them had a smile on his face. I could tell by the way Hank stared that he’d never seen anything like it, and so for a brief moment I looked at the scene through his eyes. Ten naked people experiencing peace together, real peace. I suddenly realized how unusual my life is, and how exceptionally lucky I am to be me, to have such brothers and sisters. We don’t even know very much about each other—certainly not things like facts and histories—and yet we are intimate friends. I’d never even seen the Boulder people until three hours ago, and yet I knew I could show myself to them, inside and out, with perfect trust.

  Another thing I flashed on was how different each of them looked sitting there in that circle. The range was celestial. Everything from the fragile super-white of Motherlove Ford to the great ebony elegance of Nyoom—and all the different shadings of sex and color and hair and size in between. I thought of all the different moon signs and sun signs and rising signs each of them lived under, all the different pressures and problems and hangups each of them had to cope with, and how many different backgrounds they’d come from—ghetto and suburb, east and west, rich and poor. And yet they were together, really together.

  Seeing them like that—maybe because of Hank’s presence —was an overwhelmingly strong experience. I’m trying to isolate the things I felt most keenly, so that I can name them. But it’s hard. A lot of it was love, I’m sure. But I know security was part of it, too. They say there isn’t any such thing as real security. Maybe not. But there is something that feels a lot like it. Also pride. I felt as if I’d invented them all, or written them, or given birth to them.

  If Hank is right, and something awful has to happen to America, I hope whatever it is will come at such a moment, when I’m with my brothers and sisters sitting in a circle. If it did, I feel it wouldn’t matter so terribly much. Our souls would just go right on holding hands.

  The time it took for all these thoughts to flash through me was actually quite short. We’d only been standing there a few seconds when Cary opened his eyes and smiled at us. Then all the others looked at us, too.

  Cary said, “You want to join us?”

  And Peter said, “No. We’re on our way to the roof. We want to see the sky.”

  The stars have to be extra bright to counteract the lights of New York. Otherwise they don’t have much impact on you. On this night everything was bright, the city, the stars, all of our faces looking up and out—and Hank’s eyes.

  Especially Hank’s eyes.

  Moonlight washed away so many of his years, I saw him 20 instead of 45. But it wasn’t groovy to see him that way. It made me feel the most excruciating wave of anxiety. And I didn’t even realize why—until later on, in the street, when he said something that forced me to know what was happening to me.

  On the roof, in the midst of all these confusing feelings, Roy started talking to Peter, and he said some things that shook everyone up. Not Hank. But Doris and Peter. And seeing these two giant types knocked off balance made me feel the earth was trembling underneath me.

  During most of it, I was studying Hank, and Hank was studying the uptown skyline. At least that’s what he was doing with his eyes. But I had a feeling his ears were quivering with interest.

  Peter put his foot on this low wall, then leaned on his knee with one elbow. His other arm was draped around Roy’s shoulder.

  PETER: Tell me, lad, if you could start from scratch, what kind of a world would you make?

  ROY: Wow, you mean pretend I’m the absolute ruler or something? And I can just say how it’s got to be?

  PETER: Yeah. What would you do?

  ROY: Well, I personally would make it so everybody was free to do his thing for real reasons instead of money. That’d be number one. And the only way you could have that, I guess, is if you gave everybody the basics to start with. I don’t mean in exchange for work either. I mean just for being born. I’d get on TV and I’d tell everybody to stop being uptight about other people not working. I’d try to make ‘em understand that there was enough for everybody, and all those thousands of years of people having to sweat their asses off was over with. We could find real cool ways of getting the necessary work done. Like say, if nobody wanted to empty the garbage, I’d think up ways to make it a gas. Maybe I’d put stereo in all the garbage trucks and pass out free joints. And I’d make the world so fantastically great, young guys would be glad to put in a couple of years as garbage men. It’d be a goddam honor! You know, like being a soldier used to be. So then it’d not only be groovy but patriotic. A guy would love the world so much, he’d really dig getting his hands dirty for it. And he’d be born knowing he’d always have enough food and shelter and wheels and medicine, too. And all around him he’d see these millions of other happy people doing their thing, and he’d get the idea working was kind of great. He’d never think of it as a hassle, because there’d be nothing around to give him that idea. And then when he got to where he knew what his own special thing was, he could start doing that.

  DORIS: What if somebody’s “special thing” was having a lot of money?

  ROY: Well, then, I’d let him have it, I guess. Because nobody else’d want it. I really think money is something people want just so they won’t be hassled for not having it. Isn’t that true? I mean if nobody’s hassling you about the rent or the phone bill, then money’s not going to be such a big thing to you, is it?

  DORIS: I don’t know about that. People like power, and that’s what money means to them, doesn’t it?

  ROY: Now, yeah. But what if you couldn’t buy people with it? What if nobody had to put himself up for sale any more? Then money would stop being power. In fact, I’m not even sure you’d have to have money at all. I’ll bet you could just paper the walls with it and forget about it.

  DORIS: Oh, Roy, you’ve got such beautiful ideas in your head, it makes me worry for you.

  ROY: No, but I really mean it. Think how much safer the world’d be, too. You wouldn’t be getting mugged and ripped off all the time either. And you could practically close down all the courts and jails.

  PETER: He’s right. Money’ll have to be done away with sooner or later, or there’s just no hope.

  ROY: And you know what else could close down? Banks and insurance companies and places where they do just middleman crap and bookkeeping. They could all close down. And you wouldn’t need salesmen or tax collectors or stockbrokers, and hardly any lawyers and cops and judges. Cops could be just public helpers. Like if some poor asshole is hurting somebody else, then the cop could just gently stop him, and lead him away to some really nice place where he’d get turned on. So instead of jails you’d have these turnon-orariums with experts teaching people to be groovier.

  PETER: It’s true, it’s true! I know he’s right! It could work! I know it could! And I’m a fucking authority.

  DORIS: All right now, let’s just back up a minute. I want someone to tell me what’s to become of all these poor salesmen and bookkeepers, all these people you just threw out of work. What’s to become of them?

  PETER: Don�
��t you see? The way Roy’s got it figured, they’ll be just fine. He’ll get on TV and tell them all to relax and go fishing or make love or something.

  DORIS: I know you’re both half serious. Aren’t you?

  PETER: No, not half. Completely.

  ROY: Me, too.

  DORIS: Something’s terribly wrong with all this. Isn’t there?

  ROY: I don’t see what’s so wrong about eliminating this whole big fantastic load of work that money causes. Why not leave people more and more free? Free to groove and just enjoy this absolutely super planet. And there could be this whole new science, the Science of Enjoyment. And all these people that don’t know how to do anything but work, they could be retrained. You know, rehabilitated. They could be taught to be happy. And you could have all these experts teaching them how.

  DORIS: Fine. And where do you get all these experts?

  ROY: Me!

  PETER: All of us! That’s something we’re all getting pretty good at, isn’t it? And there could be lots of movies and TV shows showing people how.

  ROY: And probably acid would help, too.

  HANK: Jesus Christ!

  ROY: Why not? It’s good for that, isn’t it? So why not use it?

  HANK: Holy God. Such Communists this country produces.

  ROY: Okay, so maybe we’re not Communists. I never said I was, you know. I just think what I think, that’s all. I haven’t got any big fancy political name for it.

  HANK: Boy, I’m telling you something. I’m twice your age. Wouldn’t hurt to listen. LSD is a product of decadence.

  ROY: But how do you know that, sir? I’ll bet you’ve never even tripped.

  HANK: I don’t say any more. I talked enough tonight.

  (Long pause.)

  PETER: You know, Roy, I really like your utopia. It’s a lot like mine. Tell me something, do you suppose we’ll ever live to see it?

  ROY: Sure we will. And it’ll be really good, too. If I didn’t believe that, I’d just check out.

  PETER: What do you mean, check out?

  ROY: Oh, I’d just find some way out. Drugs, or kill myself, I don’t know. But I just wouldn’t want to live in a world where it could be beautiful, and the only thing that kept it from being beautiful was bullshit.

  PETER: Okay, now what about this: Do you think it’ll come about through the media, and TV, and everybody getting turned on? Or do you think like Hank does, that America’ll have to be smashed first?

  ROY: You really want a straight answer?

  PETER: You know I do.

  ROY: Then I have to say I think you’re both right. The world’ll get really beautiful—but this country—well, it’ll probably have to get smashed up pretty bad first. (Pause.) I don’t like to say that, because I don’t like to bum you. But it seems to me like, well, it’s already happening. And it doesn’t seem to be slowing down any. (Pause.) I think I’m bumming everybody. Am I bumming everybody?

  PETER: That’s not important. We have to know what you feel. And think.

  ROY: Maybe I’m wrong, though. I really hope I am. What I’d like is to see America get liberated in some nice peaceable way.

  PETER: Liberated, huh?

  DORIS: Tell me, baby, what do you think’s got hold of it?

  ROY: Capitalism.

  (Peter and Doris glanced at each other in a way that made me see them in a new light. They were like some suburban couple who have just discovered their son has some radical thoughts in his head.)

  DORIS: Don’t you think capitalism can be reformed?

  ROY: No. Because who needs it any more? You know what I mean?

  DORIS: No, I don’t, Roy. I really don’t.

  ROY: Well, it’s not making things better for people, not any more. All it does is go around defending itself. Isn’t that true? I mean it’s all courts and cops and soldiers now, isn’t it?

  DORIS: Yes, darling, but Communist countries have all that, too, don’t they?

  ROY: Yeah, but they wouldn’t have to have it so much, would they, if it wasn’t for us?

  DORIS: Oh, but sweetheart, they’re fighting among themselves, too. China and Russia are at each other’s throats.

  ROY: Well, let them be. Maybe Communism’s lousy, too. I’m not talking about that, I’m just talking about capitalism.

  DORIS: But, honey, if they’re both awful, what else is there?

  ROY: I’m getting sort of mixed up. See, I’m not really sure either of them are a hundred per cent awful.

  DORIS: Whew, that’s a real relief to hear you say that.

  ROY: Why? You mean because—

  DORIS: It’s just that I’m glad you realize capitalism has some value. I was beginning to worry.

  ROY: But I’m not sure it has value. I think it used to though.

  DORIS: And now it’s done its thing? Past tense? . . .

  ROY: Yeah, because it’s not doing it any more.

  DORIS: Please tell me what it did that it isn’t doing any more.

  ROY: Um, actually, what it did was, it developed stuff, stuff that really needed developing. You take your real old-timey capitalists, they were fucking geniuses. Like Henry Ford, he put wheels under millions of people, and that was just a fantastic thing to do. He wasn’t just sitting around, you know what I mean? He was really doing something, and those old cars he made were really put together. Okay. So that’s what capitalism used to do. It used to develop this really good stuff. But then, instead of spreading the good stuff around to the whole world, it started developing shit. You know, cars that fall apart. Bombs. Flamethrowers, napalm. Toothpaste with stripes. Real shit. And so what it seems like to me is this—you get to a point where you’ve had enough capitalists, and then when you keep getting more and more and more, pretty soon you’ve got too many. And none of them are really doing anything any more, so naturally the whole thing has to go. For instance, my dad, he says he’s an analyst, right? But what he really is is a capitalist. He wants to get hold of enough money and invest it so he can sit on his ass. And most of the people you meet that dig capitalism so much, that’s where they’re at. They don’t care about developing something fabulous like old Henry Ford did. All they want to develop is more money. And when you get to where millions and millions of people are in this money bag, well, my personal opinion is, this is really sick.

  (Pause.)

  DORIS: Peter, why don’t you answer him, darling? I know something’s awfully wrong about all this, but I’m just not terribly political.

  PETER: Neither am I. And I suppose that’s one reason the country’s in such trouble. None of our generation was terribly political. Roy’s given this whole thing a lot more good clear thought than I have.

  DORIS: Oh, God.

  PETER: What’s the matter?

  DORIS: I’m sort of wrecked.

  PETER: Me, too. Maybe we’re learning something.

  ROY: I’ll bet I know why you feel sort of wrecked.

  PETER: Why?

  ROY: Because Americans tend to get democracy and capitalism all mixed up in their heads. They’re not really all that connected though.

  PETER: How do you mean?

  ROY: Well, one’s a political thing, and one’s economic.

  DORIS: Should that make us feel better?

  ROY: I don’t know, but I think a lot of Americans are depressed because they feel like democracy’s what’s fucking everything up. And they’re scared to think it even. Because it’d be just really sad to think of all our founding fathers and the Gettysburg Address and Thomas Jefferson and the flag all going down the toilet, you know? And if democracy doesn’t work, what the hell else is there? Right? So naturally this is very scary and depressing. But it’s not democracy that’s fucking everything up. It’s capitalism. The kind of capitalists around now, Jesus, old Thomas Jefferson, he wouldn’t fart in their direction. And why should he? They exploit democracy, they sell it right down the river. Like Vietnam, they want you to think when you go there you’re defending democracy, they want you to be really c
onfused about all this. And most guys are, too. You talk to Army guys, they don’t say they’re fighting for capitalism. They say it’s freedom and democracy. And if you say, No, it’s capitalism you’re fighting for, then they say, What’re you, a Communist? I mean, let’s face it, these guys are programmed. Even after they get over there and see what it is, a big fascist cesspool with no free elections and no free press —they still fight for it. That’s how fucked up they are. And meanwhile, the generals are all running around going crazy trying to figure out why seventy-five per cent of these cats are smoking grass. Man, if I was over there, I wouldn’t be smoking grass, I’d be shooting up.

  (This confused Hank. He had to have it explained to him that shooting up didn’t mean shooting up the Vietnamese, it meant dope. Then Roy went on.)

  ROY: Man, I think people have got to feel good about what they’re doing. Otherwise it makes them really crazy. And I don’t think Americans feel really good about what they’re doing any more. Not only in the war either, I mean right fucking here! For instance, why does my dad want to be a capitalist? This is nuts. He works six days a week because he wants that half a million, and I think this is pretty disgusting. For instance, why isn’t he interested in healing people? If he felt good doing that, he wouldn’t want to retire, would he? He’d be digging his work too much.

  DORIS: Aren’t you being pretty hard on him?

  ROY: Well, maybe. But I don’t want to get into my father. He’s only a symbol anyway.