“Maybe, maybe not,” the detective said noncomittally, obeying the police rule of never accusing anyone of anything in hearing of a witness unless ready to make an arrest. But he was already quite sure that Professor Marsh would never reappear to be subject to arrest or any other harassment by those who had not entered his special world of lost civilizations, vanished cities, lloigors, dols, and fnords. To this day, the file on the Joshua N. Marsh case in the Arkham police department bears the closing line: “Probable cause of death: suicide during drug psychosis.” Nobody ever traced the change in Professor Marsh back to a KCUF meeting in Chicago and a strangely spiked punch; but the young detective, Daniel Pricefixer, always retained a nagging doubt and a shapeless disquiet about this particular investigation, and even after he moved to New York and went to work for Barney Muldoon, he was still addicted to reading books on pre-history and thinking strange thoughts.
SIMON MAGUS. You will come to know gods.
After the disappearance of Saul Goodman and Barney Muldoon, the FBI went over the Malik apartment with a fine-tooth comb. Everything was photographed, fingerprinted, analyzed, catalogued, and where possible shipped back to the crime laboratory in Washington. Among the items was a short note on the back of a Playboy Club lunch receipt, not in Malik’s handwriting, which meant nothing to anybody and was included only for the sake of the completeness so loved by the Bureau.
The note said: “Machen’s dols = Lovecraft’s dholes?”
VECTORS. You will come to no gods.
On April 25, most of New York was talking about the incredible event that had occurred shortly before dawn at the Long Island mansion of the nation’s best-known philanthropist, Robert Putney Drake. Danny Pricefixer of the Bomb Squad, however, was almost oblivious of this bizarre occurrence, as he drove through heavy traffic from one part of Manhattan to another interviewing every witness who might have spoken to Joseph Malik in the week before the Confrontation explosion. The results were uniformly disappointing: aside from the fact that Malik had grown increasingly secretive in recent years, none of the interviews seemed to provide any useful information. A killer smog had again settled on the city, for the seventh straight day, and Danny, a nonsmoker, was very aware of the wheeze in his chest, which did nothing to improve his mood.
Finally, at three in the afternoon, he left the office of ORGASM at 110 West Fortieth Street (an associate editor there was an old friend of Malik’s and frequently lunched with him, but had nothing substantial to offer in leads) and remembered that the main branch of the New York Public Library was only half a block away. The hunch had been in the back of his mind, he realized, ever since he glanced at Malik’s weird Illuminati memos. What the hell, he thought, it’ll only be a few more wasted minutes in a wasted day.
For once, the congestion at the window in the main reference room was not quite as bad as a Canal Street traffic jam. Atlantis and Its Gods by Professor J. N. Marsh was delivered to him in seventeen minutes, and he began leafing through it looking for the passage he vaguely remembered. At last, on page 123, he found it:
Hans Stefan Santesson points out the basic similarity of Mayan and Egyptian investiture rituals, as previously indicated in Colonel Churchward’s insightful but wrongheaded books on the lost continent of Mu. As we have demonstrated, Churchward’s obsession with the Pacific, based on his having received his first clues about our lost ancestors in an Asiatic temple, led him to attribute to the fictitious Mu much of the real history of the actual Atlantis. But this passage from Santesson’s Understanding Mu (Paperback Library, New York, 1970, page 117) needs little correction:
Next he was taken to the Throne of Regeneration of the Soul, and the Ceremony of Investiture or Illumination took place. Then he experienced further ordeals before attaining to the Chamber of the Orient, to the Throne of Ra, to become truly a Master. He could see for himself in the distance the uncreated light from which was pointed out the whole happiness of the future … In other words, as Churchward puts it, both in Egypt and in Maya the initiate had to “sustain” (i.e., survive) “the fiery ordeal” to be approved as an adept. The adept had to become justified. The justified must then become illuminate…. The destruction of Mu was commemorated by the possibly symbolic House of Fire of the Quiche Mayas and by the relatively later Chamber of Central Fire of the Mysteries which we are told were celebrated in the Great Pyramid.
Substituting Atlantis for Mu, Churchward and Santesson are basically correct. The god, of course, could choose the shape in which He would appear in the final ordeal, and, since these gods, or lloigor in the Atlantean language, possessed telepathy, they would read the initiate’s mind and manifest in the form most terrifying to the specific individual, although the shoggoth form and the classic Angry Giant form such as appears in Aztec statues of Tlaloc were most common. To employ an amusing conceit, if these beings had survived to our time, as some occultists claim, they would appear to the average American as, say, King Kong or, perhaps, Dracula or the Wolf-Man.
The sacrifices demanded by these creatures evidently contributed significantly to the fall of Atlantis, and we can conjecture that the mass burnings practised by the Celts at Beltain and even the Aztec religion, which turned their altars into abbatoirs, were minor in comparison, being merely the result of persistent tradition after the real menace of the lloigor had vanished. We, of course, cannot fully understand the purpose of these bloody rituals, since we cannot fathom the nature, or even the sort of matter or energy, that comprised the lloigor. That the chief of these beings, is known in the Pnakotic Manuscripts and the Eltdown Shards as Iok-Sotot, “Eater of Souls,” suggests that it was some energy or psychic vibration of the dying victim that the lloigor needed; the physical body was, as in the case of the corpse-eating cult of Leng, consumed by the priests themselves, or merely thrown away, as among the Thuggee of India.
Thoughtfully and quietly, Danny Pricefixer returned the book to the clerk at the checkout window. Thoughtfully and quietly, he walked out on Fifth Avenue and stood between the two guardian lions. Who was it, he wondered, who had asked, “Since nobody wants war, why do wars keep happening?” He looked at the killer smog around him and asked himself another riddle, “Since nobody wants air pollution, why does air pollution keep increasing?”
Professor Marsh’s words came back to him: “if these beings had survived to our time, as some occultists claim…. ”
Walking toward his car, he passed a newsstand and saw that the disaster at the Drake Mansion was still the biggest headline even in the afternoon editions. It was irrelevant to his problem, however, so he ignored it.
Sherri Brandi continued the chant in her mind, maintaining the rhythm of her mouth movements … fifty-three big rhinoceroses, fifty-four big rhinoceroses, fifty-five—Carmel’s nails dug into her shoulders suddenly and the salty gush splashed hot on her tongue. Thank the Lord, she thought, the bastard finally made it. Her jaw was tired and she had a crick in her neck and her knees hurt, but at least the son-of-a-bitch would be in a good mood now and wouldn’t beat her up for having so little to report about Charley and his bugs.
She stood up, stretching her leg and neck muscles to remove the cramps, and looked down to see if any of Carmel’s come had dribbled on her dress. Most men wanted her naked during a blow job, but not creepy Carmel; he insisted she wear her best gown, always. He liked soiling her, she realized: but, hell, he wasn’t as bad as some pimps and we’ve all got to get our kicks some way.
Carmel sprawled back in the easy chair, his eyes still closed. Sherri fetched the towel she had been warming over the radiator and completed the transaction, drying him and gently kissing his ugly wand before tucking it back inside his fly and zippering him up. He does look like a goddam frog, she thought bitterly, or a nasty-tempered chipmunk.
“Terrif,” he said finally. “The Johns really get their money’s worth from you, kid. Now tell me about Charley and his bugs.”
Sherri, still feeling cramped, pulled over a footstool and perched on its
edge. “Well,” she said, “you know I gotta be careful. If he knows I’m pumping him, he might drop me and take up with some other girl…. ”
“So you were too damned cautious and you didn’t get anything out of him?” Carmel interrupted accusingly.
“Oh, he’s over the loop,” she answered, still vague. “I mean, really crazy now. That must be … uh, important … if you have to deal with him….” She came back into focus. “How I know is, he thinks he’s going to other planets in his dreams. Some planet called Atlantis. Do you know which one that is?”
Carmel frowned. This was getting stickier: first, find a commie: then, find how to get the info out of Charley despite the FBI and CIA and all the other government people; and now, how to deal with a maniac…. He looked up and saw that she was out of focus again, staring into space. Dopey broad, he thought, and then watched as she slid slowly off the stool onto a neat sleeping position on the floor.
“What the hell?” he said out loud.
When he kneeled next to her and listened for her heart, his own face paled. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, he thought standing up, now I got to get rid of a fucking corpus delectus. The damned bitch went and died.
“I can see the fnords!” Barney Muldoon cried, looking up from the Miami Herald with a happy grin.
Joe Malik smiled contentedly. It had been a hectic day—especially since Hagbard had been tied up with the battle of Atlantis and the initiation of George Dorn—but now, at last, he had the feeling their side was winning. Two minds set on a death trip by the Illuminati had been successfully saved. Now if everything worked out right between George and Robert Putney Drake …
The intercom buzzed and Joe answered, calling across the room without rising, “Malik.”
“How’s Muldoon?” Hagbard’s voice asked.
“Coming all the way. He sees the fnords in a Miami paper.”
“Excellent,” Hagbard said distractedly. “Mavis reports that Saul is all the way through, too, and just saw the fnords in the New York Times. Bring Muldoon up to my room. We’ve located that other problem—the sickness vibrations that FUCKUP has been scanning since March, It’s somewhere around Las Vegas and it’s at a critical stage. We think there’s been one death already.”
“But we’ve got to get to Ingolstadt before Walpurgis night….” Joe said thoughtfully.
“Revise and rewrite,” Hagbard said. “Some of us will go to Ingolstadt. Some of us will have to go to Las Vegas. It’s the old Illuminati one-two punch—two attacks from different directions. Get your asses in gear, boys. They’re immanentizing the Eschaton.”
WEISHAUPT. Fnords? Prffft!
Another interruption. This time it was the Mothers March Against Muzak. Since that seems the most worthwhile cause I’ve been approached for all day, I gave the lady $1. I think that if Muzak can be stamped out, a lot of our other ailments will disappear too, since they’re probably stress symptoms, caused by noise pollution.
Anyway, it’s getting late and I might as well conclude this. One month before our KCUF experiment—that is, on September 23, 1970—Timothy Leary passed five federal agents at O’Hare Airport here in Chicago. He had vowed to shoot rather than go back to jail, and there was a gun in his pocket. None of them recognized him … And, oh, yes, there was a policeman named Timothy O’Leary in the hospital room where Dutch Schultz died on October 23, 1935.
I’ve been saving the best for last. Aldous Huxley, the first major literary figure illuminated by Leary, died the same day as John F. Kennedy. The last essay he wrote revolved around Shakespeare’s phrase, “Time must have a stop”—which he had previously used for the title of a novel about life after death. “Life is an illusion,” he wrote, “but an illusion which we must take seriously.”
Two years later, Laura, Huxley’s widow, met the medium, Keith Milton Rinehart. As she tells the story in her book, This Timeless Moment, when she asked if Rinehart could contact Aldous, he replied that Aldous wanted to transmit “classical evidence of survival,” a message, that is, which could not be explained “merely” as telepathy, as something Rinehart picked out of her mind. It had to be something that could only come from Aldous’s mind.
Later that evening, Rinehart produced it: instructions to go to a room in her house, a room he hadn’t seen and find a particular book, which neither he nor she was familiar with. She was to look on a certain page and a certain line. The book was one Aldous had read but she had never even glanced at; it was an anthology of literary criticism. The line indicated—I have memorized it—was: “Aldous Huxley does not surprise us in this admirable communication in which paradox and erudition in the poetic sense and the sense of humor are interlaced in such an efficacious form.” Need I add that the page was 17 and the line was, of course, line 23?
(I suppose you’ve read Seutonius and know that the late J. Caesar was rendered exactly 23 stab wounds by Brutus and Co.)
Brace yourself, Joe. Worse attacks on your Reason are coming along. Soon, you’ll see the fnords.
Hail Eris,
p.s. Your question about the vibes and telepathy is easily answered. The energy is always moving in us, through us, and out of us. That’s why the vibes have to be right before you can read someone without static. Every emotion is a motion.
To Arlen and Yvonne
There is no god but man.
Man has the right to live by his own law—to live in the way that he wills to do: to work as he will: to play as he will: to rest as he will: to die when and how he will.
Man has the right to eat what he will: to drink what he will: to dwell where he will: to move as he will on the face of the earth.
Man has the right to think what he will: to speak what he will: to write what he will: to draw, paint, carve, etch, mold, build as he will: to dress as he will.
Man has the right to love as he will.
Man has the right to kill those who thwart these rights.
—The Equinox: A Journal of
Scientific Illuminism, 1922 (edited
by Aleister Crowley)
Believe not one word that is written in The Honest Book of Truth by Lord Omar nor any that be in Principia Discordia by Malaclypse the Younger; for all that is there contained are the most pernicious and deceptive truths.
—“Epistle to the Episkopi,” The Dishonest
Book of Lies, by Mordecai Malignatus, K.N.S.
THE SIXTH TRIP, OR TIPARETH
(THE MAN WHO MURDERED GOD)
To choose order over disorder, or disorder over order, is to accept a trip composed of both the creative and the destructive. But to choose the creative over the destructive is an all-creative trip composed of both order and disorder.
—“The Curse of Grayface and the Introduction
of Negativism,” Principia Discordia, by
Malaclypse the Younger, K.S.C.
April 25 began, for John Dillinger, with a quick skimming of the New York Times; he noticed more fnords than usual. “The fit’s about to hit the shan,” he thought grimly, turning on the eight o’clock news—only to catch the story about the Drake Mansion, another bad sign. In Las Vegas, in rooms where the light never changed, none of the gamblers noticed that it was now morning; but Carmel, returning from the desert, where he had buried Sherri Brandi, drove out of his way to look over Dr. Charles Mocenigo’s home, hoping to see or hear something helpful; he heard only a revolver shot, and quickly sped away. Looking back, he saw flames leaping toward the sky. And, over the mid-Atlantic, R. Buckminster Fuller glanced at his three watches, noting that it was two in the morning on the plane, midnight at his destination (Nairobi) and 6 a.m. back home in Carbondale, Illinois. (In Nairobi itself, Nkrumah Fubar, maker of voodoo dolls that caused headaches to the President of the United States, prepared for bed, looking forward to Mr. Fuller’s lecture at the university next morning. Mr. Fubar, in his sophisticated-primitive way, like Simon Moon in his primitive-sophisticated way, saw no conflict between magic and mathematics.)
In Washington, D.C., the c
locks were striking five when Ben Volpe’s stolen Volkswagen pulled up in front of the home of Senator Edward Coke Bacon, the nation’s most distinguished liberal and leading hope of all those young people who hadn’t yet joined Morituri groups. “In quick and out quick,” Ben Volpe said tersely to his companions, “a cowboy.” Senator Bacon turned in his bed (Albert “the Teacher” Stern fires directly at the Dutchman) and mumbled, “Newark.” Beside him, his wife half woke and heard a noise in the garden (Mama mama mama, the Dutchman mumbles): “Mama,” she hears her son’s voice saying, as she sinks back toward a dream. The rain of bullets jolts her awake into a sea of blood and in one flash she sees her husband dying beside her, her son twenty years ago weeping for a dead turtle, the face of Mendy Weiss, and Ben Volpe and two others backing out of the room.
But, in 1936, when Robert Putney Drake returned from Europe to accept a vice presidency in his father’s bank in Boston, the police already knew that Albert the Teacher really hadn’t shot the Dutchman. There were even a few, such as Elliot Ness, who knew the orders had come from Mr. Lucky Luciano and Mr. Alphonse “Scarface” Capone (residing in Atlanta Penitentiary) and had been transmitted through Federico Maldonado. Nobody, outside the Syndicate itself, however, could name Jimmy the Shrew, Charley the Bug and Mendy Weiss as the actual killers—nobody except Robert Putney Drake.
On April 1, 1936, Federico Maldonado’s phone rang and, when he answered it, a cultivated Boston voice said conversationally, “Mother is the best bet. Don’t let Satan draw you too fast.” This was followed by an immediate click as the caller hung up.
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