The Winged Bull

by Dion Fortune

“Tell the king, on earth has fallen the glorious dwelling,

  And the water-springs that spake are quenched and

  dead.”’

  Murchison felt the misery and frustration of the world flowing over him like salt tides of darkness. It seemed to him that the candles flickered and grew dim, and in that obscurity he felt his own misery and frustration sweeping on with the tide, caught up in its movement and made part of the vast whole. It was no longer a thing personal to him, but a vast movement of life that had found a channel through him. He lost the thread of the words for a moment, and when he recovered them again the rhythm had changed from strophe to antistrophe.

  ‘And he bowed down his hopeless head

  In the drift of the wild world’s tide,

  And dying, “Thou hast conquered,” he said,

  “Galilean”; he said it, and died.’

  Murchison thought of that great pagan, Julian the Apostate, striving to make head against the set of the tide.

  When his wits returned to the mundane plane he found that the key of the chant had changed again, a note of furtive triumph was creeping into it; and he thought of the secret, guarded meetings of the witches’ sabbaths, waking the old gods and breaking through the repressions of the priest-ridden walled towns of the Middle Ages.

  ‘Yea, not yet we see thee, father, as they saw thee,

  They that worshipped when the world was theirs and thine,

  They whose words had power by thine own power to draw thee

  Down from heaven till earth seemed more than heaven divine.’

  Who was this unnamed god who was thus being evoked with such magnificent rhythm and imagery, and whose power was already filling the room with a strange excitement? Murchison was on the alert for the name to come; but somehow it eluded him, for the gorgeous imagery filled his imagination like clouds of golden smoke, shutting out sense and hearing in waves and only permitting him glimpses of his surroundings at intervals.

  ‘To the likeness of one God their dreams enthralled thee,

  Who wast greater than all gods that waned and grew;

  Son of God the shining Son of Time they called Thee,

  Who wast older, O our father, than they knew.’

  Murchison saw before his eyes such scenery as might be in the moon, and amid it, ‘grey-haired Saturn, quiet as a stone.’ The vision was fleeting, and sped before he could grasp it, but he knew that he had once again missed the actual words of evocation.

  ‘Old and younger gods are buried and forgotten

  From uprising to downsetting of thy sun,

  Risen from eastward, fallen to westward and forgotten,

  And their births are many, but their end is one.

  Divers births of godheads find one death appointed,

  As the soul whence each was born makes room for each

  God by God goes out, discrowned and disannointed,

  But the soul stands fast that gave them life and speech.’

  The words struck Murchison like a knife-thrust. The gods of men’s worship were not things in themselves, but the creations of the created — the forms under which man represented to himself his ineffable Creator and Sustainer, the form changing as man’s power of understanding increased. God and the gods, and the gods were the facets of the One. Christianity was a facet. Voodoo was a facet. The Tao was a facet. God was as many-sided as the soul of man.

  ‘Day by day Thy shadow shines in heaven beholden,

  Even the sun, the shining shadow of Thy face;

  King, the ways of heaven before Thy feet grow golden;

  God, the soul of heaven is kindled with Thy grace.’

  Murchison pricked up his ears and gave his attention to the resonant, intoning voice.

  ‘As they knew Thy name of old time could we know it,

  Healer called of sickness, slayer invoked of wrong,

  Light of eyes that saw Thy light, God, king, priest, poet,

  Song should bring Thee back to heal us with Thy song.

  For Thy kingdom is passed not away,

  Nor Thy power from the place thereof hurled;

  Out of heaven they shall cast not the day,

  They shall cast not out song from the world.

  By the song and the light they give

  We know Thy works that they live;

  With the gift Thou hast given us of speech

  We praise, we adore, we beseech,

  We arise at Thy bidding and follow,

  We cry to Thee, answer, appear,

  O Father of all of us, Paian, Apollo,

  Destroyer and healer, hear!’

  It was an invocation to the sun-god that was going on, hence the golden room and the golden robes. Brangwyn, in his rose-gold cope, was unquestionably the Priest of the Sun, but what was he, Murchison? In some manner the servitor of the sun-god, that was quite certain, but in what manner?

  The curtains on the dais fell back into place with a soft rattle of rings, and the music began again. Wild music, Tzigany music, sliding in and out of even more barbarous rhythms as Africa and its syncopations were laid under contribution. Murchison began to breathe deeply and rhythmically, in time to the music; and as he did so he felt a kind of tide beginning to flow in and out of him, energy waxing and waning with a curious, pulsating rhythm.

  The room became quiet, and very still; yet with the stillness of supreme pressure, like something that is about to burst. Then there came on that quiet air a slow and limpid tune, rhythmless, not unlike a Gregorian chant, exceedingly archaic, and Murchison felt a curious glow of warmth envelop him. He felt something behind him, overshadowing him, as if with a pair of vast hawk’s wings. He felt a sudden deep trilling in his throat, like the humming of the strings of a double-bass in a kind of pizzicato, and then a voice such as he had never heard in his life burst from him:

  ‘Ra! Ra! Ra!’

  Then there was a dead silence, and he felt himself break out in perspiration all over. Enough wits were left to him to realize that this was mediumship. A curious sense of helplessness came over him, and slight fear.

  He felt the humming gather strength in his throat again, and once more the Voice broke forth:

  ‘I am Horus, god of the morning; I mount the sky on eagle’s wings. I am Ra in mid-heaven; I am the sun in splendour. I am Toum of the downsetting. I am also Kephra at midnight. Thus spake the priest with the mask of Osiris.’

  The power slackened and passed as the last words died away, and Murchison found himself back again in waking consciousness. Everything that was Ted Murchison had been swept away and he had thrown back to some deep, primeval level of consciousness. He was in the Oldest Land. He was of a forgotten race. And he had knowledge.

  This golden temple was consecrated to the sun-god, the lord and giver of life. He knew that. Knowledge welled up within him. As each fresh object in that consecrated temple caught his eye its meaning came back to him.

  He himself was about to play his part in the great sun-rite which brings life and fertility to the earth and inspiration to the heart of man. He looked up at the dais where the high priest stood, awaiting his cue.

  The rose-gold cope shimmered and fell into heavy folds as the hands of invocation were raised.

  ‘Helios, Helios, Hellos!’ came the deep voice of the high priest. This was the cue, and he rose from his seat and took three steps towards the earth-priestess opposite. She rose, and took three steps towards him, and the rite began.

  He had no very clear remembrance of that rite, either at the time or afterwards. He knew they danced together to slow rhythms. He knew they came up to the altar and drank together from the cup of dark, resinous-tasting wine, and ate together of the broken bread dipped in the coarse salt, for he felt the tang of it on his lips for long after. Together they inhaled the wafting fragrance of the pine-branches with their little dark cones. Then they danced again.

  That was all there was of it upon the physical plane. But inwardly much more was going on. They were two forces, not two per
sons. He was the sun in heaven bringing life to the earth. She was the earth, absorbing it hungrily, drawing it from him to satisfy her crying needs. And the more she drew from him, the more flowed into him.

  He felt himself all brightness, as if he were compact of shining gold. And he felt the woman in his arms gradually light up like the earth at dawn as the sun steals over the line of the eastern hills. Finally she, too, was all brightness, and they were made one as they circled in the slow rhythms of the dance.

  Then twilight began to fall. The music moved slower, and finally there was silence. Together they stood before the altar with its pine-boughs, its bread, wine and salt. The hands of blessing were extended over them, and consciousness came back to normal.

  Ursula Brangwyn disappeared behind the dais, and he heard the door softly open and shut. A gesture from Brangwyn stayed him from following. They remained silently facing one another across the small, cubical altar; two big men in their shining robes, the one crowned with the towering tiara of Egypt, the other with his own shaggy fair hair bound by a Grecian fillet.

  CHAPTER SIX

  When Murchison awoke in the morning he knew that something had been done to him. It was as if tight cords that bound him body and soul had been released. There was a joyousness and freedom in the air instead of despondency and isolation. The events of the previous evening had an unreality about them. They were more like a vivid dream clearly remembered than actual happenings.

  When he arrived down to breakfast Brangwyn thought of Norse myth and legend and the ancient sagas. He saw that this was not the same man as the sulky, heavy-footed, clumsy-moving Murchison of overnight. He had expected that the previous night’s experience would make a difference, but not as much difference as this.

  Murchison took his seat at the table, unfurled his napkin, glanced round, and noted that the table was only laid for two. ‘Ursula all right?’ he inquired.

  ‘Quite all right, thanks,’ replied his employer. ‘I packed her off back to Wales by the night mail. She is better out of the way for the next stage of the proceedings.’

  Murchison raised his eyebrows in query.

  ‘Last night was not to be taken as a precedent,’ said Brangwyn. ‘It was a try-out, as it were. Now you have got to settle down and put in some solid work, and that young woman is a distracting influence.’

  Murchison was conscious of a sudden rush of resentment. Brangwyn had no right to interfere between him and Ursula. There was a bond between them, a very definite bond. He couldn’t define it, but he knew it was there.

  ‘Any dreams last night?’ Brangwyn asked suddenly.

  Murchison paused with the porridge-spoon half-way to his mouth, and eyed him suspiciously.

  ‘Yes,’ he said at length. ‘Any amount, but I can’t remember the half of them at the moment.’

  ‘Let’s have some bits and scraps to be going on with,’ said his employer affably.

  Now Murchison remembered a certain dream particularly well, but it had been such a wonderful experience that he was reluctant to speak of it. He could still feel the glorious sensation of that dream, the sense of swift movement and flight.

  ‘I dreamt I was riding,’ he said, ‘riding a remarkably fine beast and travelling at a great rate. I was riding over downs, or sand-dunes, near the sea. It was grey twilight, and everything was bare and grey and kind of formless, save for numbers of scattered thorn-trees. That’s all I can tell you. There wasn’t much to the dream in the way of incident, simply the sensation of riding and movement, and the landscape sliding by, and the sea not far off.’

  ‘What manner of horse was it you were riding?’

  ‘A magnificent beast, a thoroughbred all right. I could tell that by its gait. Very springy and smooth. A tremendous stride. It was like riding a race, only I was all by myself.’

  ‘What colour was the horse?’ asked Brangwyn slyly.

  ‘Black, jet-black.’

  ‘Mare or stallion?’

  ‘Oh, I dunno. I didn’t go into those anatomical details. It was a magnificent beast. That is all I know. The thing that chiefly struck me was the sense of movement. Flight through space. It was a glorious sensation. Like being set free. I can’t describe it. I don’t remember mounting, or dismounting, only riding.’

  ‘Well, what about black? What associations have you with black?’

  An association with black instantly leapt to Murchison’s mind. ‘I think of your sister’s hair,’ he said.

  Brangwyn smiled.

  ‘You see now how we use a ritual to work up a particular emotional state, and while you are in that state how something magnetic flows between you and Ursula?’

  Murchison suddenly looked up at his employer from under his heavy sandy brows. ‘What was it that spoke through me at one point in the proceedings?’

  ‘Ah, what indeed? If we knew that we should know a good deal. We don’t know what they are, we only know they are immensely powerful. My belief is that it is a great natural force, dramatized by your subconscious mind, just as Freud says repressed emotion is dramatized by dreams. But although we can’t explain it, we can use it. We can’t explain electricity, but we know how it is generated, and how conducted, and how to put it to work for heating, lighting and power. That temple is a generating station; the ritual, the dynamo; your imagination, the electric motor at the other end of the circuit; your larynx, the wheels of the train that are turned by the motor. That’s the best description I can give you. I can tell you what this thing does, but I cannot tell you what it is.’

  Silence fell between them, to be broken at length by the younger man, who removed his cigarette from his lips and said, apropos of nothing, ‘What are the gods?’

  ‘The gods, my dear boy, are lenses that wise men have made through which to focus the great natural forces. The old gods are not without significance, and we lose a lot by neglecting them. If we wake up the old gods again we recover the use of the subconscious mind, and we get into touch with great natural forces from which civilization has cut us off.’

  ‘And where do you place Christianity in this show?’

  ‘It has its place. It sweetened life when paganism had become corrupt. We lack something if we haven’t got it. But we also lack something if we get too much of it.’

  ‘After my experience of it in my brother’s church I find it difficult not to cough it up and spit it out.’

  ‘Then let it alone, my dear fellow, if you feel like that about it.’

  ‘So far as I can see,’ said Murchison, ‘you pays yer money and you takes yer choice when it comes to reading the Bible. One denomination picks out all the hell-fire literature, and another picks out all the light and love, and so the Bible suits everybody. It’s a most accommodating book.’

  ‘It isn’t a book, Murchison, it’s a collection of literature and folk-lore ranging over a thousand years. It is as if you bound up Chaucer and Shakespeare and Mallory and Bunyan and Pope together and took them all literally.

  ‘Then why bother with it?’

  ‘Because it is great spiritual literature; because it is part of our racial heritage, and we need to learn what it has to teach us. And we need to learn what Buddha has to teach us, too, and Confucius.’

  Brangwyn insisted that Murchison should take a brisk constitutional after his breakfast as the best start for the day’s work. As he let himself out of the front door he collided with a large wooden shutter of the second-hand book-shop. Out from under the shutter, like a wood-louse from under a brick, came a smallish, ferrety-faced man who stared at him sharply.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Murchison, though it was no fault of his that the collision had taken place. As he went down the Street he had the feeling that the sharp, beady eyes of the small man were observing every step he took, and, taking the opportunity to glance over his shoulder as he rounded the corner, he found that he had not been mistaken. The man stood with the shutter still in his arms, gazing after him fixedly.

  Instead of bearing north for Regen
t’s Park Murchison turned left at the end of the block, and then left again, thus bringing himself back into the far end of the road from which he had started. No one was outside the second-hand book-shop now, and Murchison passed silent-footed in front of it and turned in at the door. A large cat sat washing itself on the mat; he took a long stride over it and found himself alone among the musty piles of dog-eared literature.

  He looked round for the ferrety man, but there was no sign of him. Then, in the silence, there came a sound that explained his absence, the faint creaking of a telephone being dialled. ‘That Mr Astley? Monks speaking, sir. ‘E’s just gone out,’ followed by the sound of the receiver being hung up.

  Murchison took one stride over the abluting cat and was gone. It would not do for Monks, if that was the name of Brangwyn’s manager, to know that he had been overheard. Moreover, he had learnt all that he needed to know.

  He opened and shut the door of Brangwyn’s maisonette as quietly as he could, and prayed that the creaking of the stairs under his bulk would not convey any intelligence to the prick-ears next door.

  As he opened the door into the lounge, Brangwyn, who was sitting over the fire with a cigarette, glanced up in surprise from his paper.

  ‘Hullo, Murchison!’ he said, ‘don’t tell me you’ve been round Regent’s Park in this time!’

  ‘No,’ said Murchison, ‘But I’ve been somewhere a sight more useful. That corkscrew staircase of yours, leading down to the nether regions where you have your performances, does it lead down through the book-shop or the restaurant?’

  ‘It leads down through the book-shop, hidden behind the shelves. But why do you ask?’

  ‘I think I’ve solved the problem as to how information leaks out of the dining-room.’ Murchison explained what had happened and about Monks’ telephone call.

  ‘But are you sure? There isn’t a telephone in the shop. I never saw any occasion to put one in.’