The Complete Simon Iff

by Aleister Crowley

  "So that swine squealed!"

  "No, that swine did not squeal. I told him how we were on to the whole business; Mr. Teake promised to send him to the chair on his confession unless he came across; we tried everything. But he was absolutely confident in the power of these people to save him.

  "So I just sat in Mr. Teake's car with him, and held his hand. His muscles told me when I was 'getting hot' or 'cold', as they say in the old game. At first it was rather difficult; but, when he saw that I was gradually getting nearer all the time, his nerves gave out, and he reacted splendidly."

  "Magnificent," said Simon Iff.

  "And so say I," cried Teake heartily. "But I guess I had better take these men; see you later."

  "Don't take Berkeley!" begged the mystic. "He's all right; I want him to stay for a bit in a colony I founded for reformed Oxford men."

  "Quite your old form!" cried Dolores, delighted.

  For the first time the Prince uttered a protest. "What am I charged with?" he asked, a gleam of cunning in his eyes.

  "It hardly matters, does it? Just a lot of tedious formalities - a terrible fuss to make over electrocuting anybody!"

  "What are you talking about?" roared von Arnberg. "Is this more of your follery? What have I done?"

  "Well, there's one thing I know of, myself. You listened to all that I told you. Curiosity killed the cat, don't you know?"

  The man's face broke into a cold sweat.

  "My God, it's true," he cried in agony. "I wouldn't let any one live, myself, who knew all that." His head fell hopelessly on his breast. They led him and von Weibheim away. Berkeley followed. "I'll call to-night," he said to the magician humbly and gratefully. Iff shook his hand, and he went out.

  At that moment Mollie gave way; the reaction took her. She fell trembling on Simon's shoulder. He put an arm about her to support her. "Take it easy," he said, smiling. "Cephas means rock, doesn't it?"

  "Mr. Iff," said Dolores severely, "I am exceedingly angry with you. If I had not turned up, you would most certainly have been killed."

  "But you did turn up," he protested mildly.

  Something in his tone caught her ear. She shot a quick inquiring gaze, which grew fixed.

  "She held him with her glittering eye, The wedding guest was still," laughed he. "It's very simple. As I told you before, the way to manage this business was just not to interfere, to let everything happen quite quite naturally."

  "Dig on!"

  "Yes, my child, I judged that it would be in your nature to want to follow me, and to be able to do so. I felt perfectly safe, thank you."

  "You are a perfect Beast!" she cried angrily. "If I'd guessed that!"

  "I thought you might guess at least that as it was your case originally, I should not want to rob you of the glory of it. It was the natural thing to do."

  "Indeed, indeed, you are adorable!"

  "Also, I am leaving America next week, and I wanted a final proof that the continent was in competent hands."

  Mollie woke up. "What! you are going away?"

  "On the Deutschland. It's the safest boat, by a strange paradox; it would never never do for me to have an accident just now. Crasingens iterabimus aequor."

  "You're going away! You're going away!"

  "The Deutschland is quite a large boat."

  Dolores broke into a musical laugh. Mollie could only wail, "You're going away!"

  "We're going away." He put his other arm about her and held her tightly. "This little bunch of red mischief offered her life for mine just now, Dolores!" he said softly. "I'm really and truly puzzled for once; so we had better go away for a little, and find out what it all means."

  "You silly man," smiled Mollie demurely, perfectly herself again. "It's no puzzle at all to me. It's the natural thing to do."

  "Perhaps it is," said Simon Iff.

  Simon Iff Abroad

  Desert Justice

  The sun broke violent over a harsh blue-grey line of hills, and his beam shot through a ragged gap to strike the face of Lord Juventius Mellor. “Damnation!” cried the boy. He had overslept himself again. He might be the son of a duke, but he was also the disciple of Simon Iff; and there was Simon Iff quietly rising from the posture of meditation to greet the dawn. “Hail!” he cried, in those great words that have come down to us from countless centuries of Egyptian kings and priests. “Hail unto Thee who art Ra in thy rising, even unto Thee who art Ra in they strength, that travellest over the heavens in thy bark at the uprising of the Sun! Tahuti standeth in his splendor at the prow, and Ra Hoor abideth at the helm; hail unto Thee from the abodes of night!”

  And Simon Iff had bidden him to be most particular not to neglect the dawn-meditation. Now it was already hot. Damnation!

  But Simon Iff was busy kindling the fire. It was a great meal. The old man had got a gazelle on the previous evening, and there were steaks. There were dried dates, and Garibaldi biscuits, and fried rice; and there was real Turkish coffee such as no millionaires can buy. Moreover there was the best sauce, the best sauce of the proverb, for Simon Iff and his disciple had come eighty miles across the desert in two days. They had no attendants; Simon was just about to start on what he called a Great Magical Retirement, which involved finding a place where there was absolutely nobody at all, and that is not easy, even if you go to the Sahara. However, another twenty miles would bring them to Ouled Djellal, from which village they could probably find the road to Nowhere.

  Breakfast was not a tedious festival; there were no newspapers to read. Only, while smoking ‘the earliest pipe of half-awakened birds’ as he sometimes called it, when feeling not so good, he traced various signs in the sand with a curious carved walking stick which he was wont to carry. “It will be a hot day, Ju,” he prophesied cheerfully; “We meet a horse and an ass, we find a house. There is a woman; the day ends with trouble.”

  “Already,” said Juventius, who had eyes like a hawk or an Arab, “I see the horse and the ass.” Indeed, on the horizon appeared a cloud of dust, with a speck in front of it which might have been anything. Simon Iff looked. “There’s a man on a horse,” he said. “Probably,” remarked Lord Juventius quietly, “the man is an ass.”

  “Oh, discredit to your puff-adder mother, and shame to the burnt bones of your unknown father,” replied Simon with asperity, “you can make a fool of the aged adept, but you cannot fool the Lord’s Overseers who inspect the punch-clocks of young brethren. What, may I be permitted to ask, was the subject of the dawn-meditation?”

  They were already well on their way. Simon Iff, as his vow bade him, recited continuously the Chapter of the Unity from the Qu’ran: “Say thou, Allah is One; Allah is eternal; nor hath He Son, Equal, or Companion.” And after every recitation he bowed himself to the earth. He had to do this 1001 times a day, in 11 series of 91, because 91 is the numeration of the Great Name Amen, and is seven times thirteen; the eleven series made it efficacious, because Eleven is the Number of True Magick. This was merely his practice, medicine-ball stuff; when he settled down he would use what Mohammedan Sheikhs declare to be “A Great Word to become mad and run about naked.” And when he had cried this without intermission day and night until the desired result had occurred, his disciple would look after him with unusual care till he came out of the trance, which was usually a matter of a week or two; and then they would go back swiftly to syphilization, and plunge into secret diplomacy, with crime-detection as a diversion.

  His first series was over. “But who is this,” he cried, “that cometh forth in the wilderness from the tents of Kedar? Is it the Sultan of the Ivory City, or the Lord of the Mountains of Bronze?”

  “It is certainly a considerable cavalcade,” returned the boy, “but the man on horseback looks to me like a missionary.”

  “Another series should elucidate our bewilderment.”

  “And alarm.”

  But Simon had already started his eternal Qol Hua Allahu Achad and the rest of it.

  “The world’s all rose
and blue and yellow,” mused the boy, “except ourselves, in white, and yonder rider in black. The universe needs its shadows, I suppose; let me see. Letter in Defence of the Clergy. How should I start? H’m. Analogy from Whistler, who used black as a harmonizer—black but comely—the Black Prince. Yes, by Jove, it is a missionary—and the Queen of Sheba, to judge by the camels.”

  They came upon the man of God just as he halted for breakfast. It was a very different affair to Simon Iff’s; four servants hustled in its preparation. According to custom, Iff gave the desert salutation, and would have passed; but the missionary was astonished to see two Europeans in Arab clothes, walking unattended. “Here, you fellows,” he called in bad French, “come here! Who are you?” Simon Iff went across very briskly as if he were repelling an attack at the charge. But he spoke very humbly. This is Lord Juventius Mellor, sir,” he said, “and I am his servant.

  “Delighted to meet you, your Grace,” cried the missionary, ignoring Iff, and running eagerly to the young man. “I think I had the pleasure of preaching before your Grace’s father, three years ago, at Bellows Falls.”

  “Sorry,” returned the disciple, “but that was not my father; it was Virgil Abishag Curtiss; they sent him up the river last year.”

  “Dear me, how very, very sad! But won’t you partake, your Grace, of the frugal hospitality of a poor servant of our dear Lord and Master?”

  “We have just breakfasted, but we shall be glad to take a cup of coffee with you.” One must never refuse hospitality in the Sahara; to do so is a Declaration of War.

  “And are these all your camels?” asked Lord Juventius, after having falsely explained that he was consumptive and had come on this walking tour as his last chance.

  “They are,” smirked the minister. “The Lord has been pleased to bless my efforts greatly.”

  Offerings of grateful converts?”

  “Alas, the converts are but few. There seems a lack of understanding in this people: truly said Esaias.”

  “They accuse you of multiplying gods, don’t they?”

  “Indeed, that is the substance of the difficulty. Only the Holy Ghost can prepare their hearts to receive our dear Lord and Master.”

  “Have you three gods or five?”

  “Ah, your Grace refers to the Papists! I am from the American Baptist Mission.”

  “Splendid, splendid! I have often longed to meet one of you hero martyrs. Have you gleaned long in the Lord’s field?”

  “Twelve years in Africa, my dear young Grace.”

  “You are going home now?”

  “Only for a season. Candidly and frankly, I have heard the call of China. The teeming millions! The perishing millions!”

  “That is a long way off.”

  “For our dear Lord and Master, I would go further yet.”

  “Indeed I humbly trust it may be so,” interrupted Simon piously. Juventius smiled sweetly and continued. “But how many converts have you made here?” The good man’s face fell.

  “As I told your Grace, there is a certain difficulty—an obstacle to the Grace of God, as it were, so to speak.”

  “But you hope for better luck in China?”

  “Indeed, yes; your Grace will observe that we have a means which we use with the Chinese; we find so many many slaves to the Opium Habit. And we cure them. That gives us a claim on their gratitude and so prepares the way for their salvation.”

  “How do you cure them?” asked Iff, suddenly. He knew China as he did his own house.

  “We administer morphia, in what seems to us suitable doses. That helps greatly, for of course only converts can be supplied with morphia.”

  “Excuse me,” said Simon, “but I knew a man who got left badly in China once. I hope you aren’t going out there without a hard and fast contract with the Drug Ring.”

  “Indeed not, my bood fellow; I should guess not.”

  “Quite right,” said Simon, rising—he had not tasted his coffee.

  “Look out—there’s a horned viper on the path.” Two servants had already seen the reptile, and were striking it with long sticks.

  “That’s a clumsey way to kill them,” he continued over his shoulder to the missionary, “you should let them bite you.”

  “Good-morning and a pleasant journey and restored health to your Grace,” cried the missionary despairingly to the departing Juventius.

  II

  “This is pretty good dawamesk,” said Simon Iff in Arabic to the big white-bearded Sheikh who acted as Patriarch to Ouled Djellal. (Dawamesk is a preparation of hashish, or The Grass, as the Arabs call it.) They were seated outside the little inn which is the principal building of the village.

  “Abu’dDin,” returned the Arab, (for Simon Iff was known all over the desert by this title of “Father of Justice,” Din meaning Truth, Law, Faith, but above all Justice.)

  “It is good dawamesk. It is made in Djelfe by a wise and holy man who can balance himself upon one thumb, o thou who also art most wise and holy!”

  “It is indeed The Grace, o Father of Lions, and I am refreshed in my spirit by its soft influence. Allah is munificent as he is great.”

  “There standeth no man before His face,” returned the Sheikh, “and not by dawamesk alone, though it be one-third hashish, shall man behold his glory.”

  “Nay, but by right intentness, with an holy life.”

  “But hashish doth indeed assist us who are weak in soul, and whose lives are defiled with iniquity.”

  “There was a great king,” said the magician, “in a country beyond Suleiman’s, whose name was Nebuchadnezzar. For seven years did this holy man live upon Grass, becoming mad and running about naked. These things are written to encourage us. I am myself made bold to find a secret place in the sand where I may seek this blessing, for I have the Great Word from a certain Ulema of Alkahira, the most cunning reputed in all Al Misr.”

  The old man clasped the knees of Simon Iff in pathetic entreaty. “O my father, wilt thou not reveal it to me? I swear by the Beard of the Prophet of Allah that I will not profane it.”

  “Thou must first renounce all human ties and duties; wilt thou leave thy children to perish in the desert for lack of thy wisdom?”

  The Sheikh sighed. “My father, it is hard to wait for Paradise.”

  “It is also a mistake,” said Simon, on whom the hashish was having a delightful effect, “as in the case of Mohammed (Peace be upon him!) when he waited for the mountain to come to him.”

  The Sheikh began to laugh uproariously; a mild blasphemy is much appreciated by the simply pious. Nor is judicious dawamesk any impediment to mirth. Iff took him by the arm.

  “Let us go to the entertainment. Have you good dancing-girls in Ouled Djellal?”

  “We have pride in Fatima, the Scorpion,” replied the old man with enthusiasm; “she is like a young date palm heavy with fruit. Her teeth are like pearls, but her bite is like a scorpion’s sting, and hence is her lakab (nick-name, said Iff to Lord Juventius, aside) the Scorpion. She is like the air of the desert at dawn when she dances, and when she loves it is a simoon.”

  “And the others?”

  “They are soft like shadows upon the sand dunes in the belly of the Desert, and she is the full moon.”

  “I am certainly encouraged in my determination to see her.”

  They were walking across the big square of the village. It was only a few steps; but the dawamesk made the way seem long, and infinitely brilliant. The universe was stainless, ineffable, silent. The moon lit the world with incorruptible phantasy. All was white, even the sand, save only for the soft blue shadows, and the gold stars in the impenetrable indigo of Heaven. Only the low monotonous clang of cymbals stirred the night. Only the flitting forms of men, like ghosts, disturbed the shrine-like sanctity of the square. Now they were at the dancing-hall, a long room with tables and benches with a wide aisle and a dais at the end where sat the dancers and the musicians.

  “There is Fatima,” said the Sheikh, “look how
the eyes of Muley Husein are fixed on her. He goes to the South to-morrow to his own house; it is said that he will take her with him.” Muley Husein was an enormous negro, fierce and proud, with a green turban, and an aigrette of uncut jewels to fasten it. Two Arabs, with their hands upon their daggers, stood behind him to guard him.

  Simon Iff seated himself and drank the coffee brought by the attendant as he watched the dance. There is no fascination in the world like this: if you have enough coffee, and enough tobacco, and just the right amount of hashish, you can sit all night and every night, and never wax weary of that splendid show. There is no question of a performance inthe Anglo-Saxon sense of the word. It resembles nothing so much as ocean. There is no object, not even play. The dance simply existed, indifferent to all things. For those who can stop grasping the streams of event and float upon that ocean, it is very Paradise. If you expect something to happen, or want something to happen, it is Hell.

  The girl who had been dancing sat down, without warning, as she had begun. In these Arabian Nights nobody takes apparent notice of anything. But there was a murmur as of the birth of some hot deadly wind, when, after a pause, Fatima advanced to the front of the dais. She was tall and slim, but sturdy. Her head-dress, her necklaces, her amulets and her anklets were all of Napoleons strung on gold wire. As she stood and swayed, there were a couple of thousand dollars on her in gold currency. She was of rich yellow-brown skin, like an autumn leaf at its most golden. There were purple shadows, lucious as ripe plums. All blended admirably with the dull blue of her tattoo marks, and the Indian red of the big sash which accentuated her hips. It was fastened with a huge brooch, circular, of rough pearls; and with her glances and her gestures her whole dance seemed to say, “Look at my brooch!” Simon Iff looked. His eyes left her body, that swayed just as a snake does when it hears music of the right kind, her head that jagged from shoulder to shoulder with an insanely impossible jerk, and came to the brooch. It rose and fell like the breast of a sleeping child; then it made circles, loops, whorls, sinuous, and subtle, as if the moon were drunken on old wine; then with savage ecstasy it gave a series of strong jerks, straight up and down, and Simon thought that it could drag his soul to Hell, and he would love her for it. He contrasted her mentally with a fat hag from Tunis, Jewish and Greek, he thought, who banged a cymbal in the background. The flabby piece of paste! The old Sheikh noticed the magician’s glance wander, and told him that the object of his animadversion was Fatima’s mother.