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By Root 745 0

by Rendang alone) and partly Astrological (these days, say the Experts, are uniquely favorable for a joint venture by Rams—myself and Murugan—and that typical Scorpion, Colonel D.) it has been decided to precipitate an Action originally planned for the night of the lunar eclipse next November. This being so, it is essential that the three of us here should meet without delay to decide what must be Done, in these new and swiftly changing Circumstances, to promote our special interests, material and Spiritual. The so-called “Accident” which brought you to our shores at this most critical Moment of Time was, as you must recognize, Manifestly Providential. It remains for us to collaborate, as dedicated Crusaders, with that divine POWER which has so unequivocally espoused our Cause. SO COME AT ONCE! Murugan has the motorcar and will bring you to our modest Bungalow, where, I assure you, my dear Farnaby, you will receive a very warm welcome from bien sincèrement vôtre, Fatima R.

Will folded up the three odorous sheets of scrawled blue paper and replaced them in their envelope. His face was expressionless; but behind this mask of indifference he was violently angry. Angry with this ill-mannered boy before him, so ravishing in his white silk pajamas, so odious in his spoiled silliness. Angry, as he caught another whiff of the letter, with that grotesque monster of a woman, who had begun by ruining her son, in the name of mother love and chastity, and was now egging him on, in the name of God and an assortment of Ascended Masters, to become a bomb-dropping spiritual crusader under the oily banner of Joe Aldehyde. Angry, above all, with himself for having so wantonly become involved with this ludicrously sinister couple, in heaven only knew what kind of a vile plot against all the human decencies that his refusal to take yes for an answer had never prevented him from secretly believing in and (how passionately!) longing for.

“Well, shall we go?” said Murugan in a tone of airy confidence. He was evidently assuming as axiomatic that, when Fatima R. issued a command, obedience must necessarily be complete and unhesitating.

Feeling the need to give himself a little more time to cool off, Will made no immediate answer. Instead, he turned away to look at the now distant puppets. Jocasta, Oedipus and Creon were sitting on the palace steps, waiting, presumably, for the arrival of Tiresias. Overhead, Basso Profundo was momentarily napping. A party of black-robed mourners was crossing the stage. Near the footlights the boy from Pala had begun to declaim in blank verse:

“Light and Compassion,” he was saying,

“Light and Compassion—how unutterably

Simple our Substance! But the Simple waited,

Age after age, for intricacies sufficient

To know their One in multitude, their Everything

Here, now, their Fact in fiction; waited and still

Waits on the absurd, on incommensurables

Seamlessly interwoven—oestrin with

Charity, truth with kidney function, beauty

With chyle, bile, sperm, and God with dinner, God

With dinner’s absence or the sound of bells

Suddenly—one, two, three—in sleepless ears.”

There was a ripple of plucked strings, then the long-drawn notes of a flute.

“Shall we go?” Murugan repeated.

But Will held up his hand for silence. The girl puppet had moved to the center of the stage and was singing:

“Thought is the brain’s three milliards

Of cells from the inside out.

Billions of games of billiards

Marked up as Faith and Doubt.

“My Faith, but their collisions;

My logic, their enzymes;

Their pink epinephrin, my visions;

Their white epinephrin, my crimes.

“Since I am the felt arrangement

Of ten to the ninth times three,

Each atom in its estrangement

Must yet be prophetic of me.”

Losing all patience, Murugan caught hold of Will’s arm and gave him a savage pinch. “Are you coming?” he shouted.

Will turned on him angrily. “What the devil do you think you’re doing, you little fool?” He jerked his arm out of the boy’s grasp.

Intimidated, Murugan changed his tone. “I just