Flicker (69 page)

This left me with a tricky problem in social etiquette. How did I
extricate myself from this now irredeemably absurd situation without being too brutal to people who were, for all their inanity, cordial and well-intentioned? I was in the process of concocting the best lie I could fabricate on short notice, when my attention was drawn to Mrs. Feather. At first, I assumed she was watching one of the planes pass overhead. For there was an especially thunderous jet in the sky above us—or so I thought until I too looked up and realized that the sky was clear. Apparently the plane had passed behind the trees in the next yard, though its roar continued to rumble menacingly all around us in the air. My gaze returned to the reverend's wife; she was still staring skyward. No, not staring, not looking at all. Her eyes had rolled back in their sockets, so far back that they were nearly out of sight, leaving two gaping white ovals in her face. The effect was so grotesque, I cringed. Had she, I wondered, taken sick? I was about to ask, when the woman rose, opened her mouth, let out a long, thin wail, then pitched forward onto the lawn. There she lay face down, trembling from head to foot. It was only at this point that the others gave her their attention.

“Ah,” said the reverend, “Guillemette has joined us. Shall we make the circle?”

I'd already risen to go to Mrs. Feather's assistance, but felt the reverend's hand on my arm restraining me. The others in the flock were busily shifting their chairs with an obviously well-rehearsed precision until they had formed a circle with the fallen Mrs. Feather at the center. I was the only person not yet part of the ring. I glanced at the reverend, who was indicating a place for my chair alongside his own. His expression was calm, there was even the hint of a polite smile. So far no one was making any effort to come to the aid of poor Mrs. Feather, who had rolled over on her back and was now stretched out rigid on the ground undergoing what I assumed must be an epileptic seizure. At that point, one of the men stepped forward to cover her with a comforter; he laid it over her quite casually and withdrew to take his seat. This was clearly the only help the stricken woman was going to receive.

Utterly bewildered, I searched every face in the circle. All were now looking down in a prayerful posture, hands folded in their laps. Only the reverend, with his hands clasped about the cross on his chest, kept his eyes on his writhing wife. After several agonizing moments of gagging and slobbering, Mrs. Feather began to speak, though not at all coherently. It sounded like Italian, soft, fluid, but
the vowels were odd: long, drawn out, slightly nasal. A made-up language, I assumed, yet flowing from her at a remarkable clip in a voice nothing like her own. It was a youthful, even girlish voice with a distinctly musical lilt to it, though strained to the point of frenzy.

“In her previous life,” I heard the reverend saying at my side as casually as if he were recounting yesterday's weather, “my wife was Guillemette Testaniére. She was executed by the Inquisition in 1242 at Montaillou. She was eighteen years old. Four members of her family were burned with her, along with nearly a hundred residents of the village. Her passion was quite terrible. The faggots, you see, were still very green. The fire was not hot enough to kill quickly. There were some who actually survived the flames. For these the garrote was reserved.”

He spoke so calmly against the background of his wife's tormented groaning that I felt myself chill. If this was a charade, it was in very bad taste. For by this time, Mrs. Feather's anguish had become extreme. Or was she faking it? The phrase “self-hypnosis” sprang to mind as a conveniently rational alternative to the reverend's totally unacceptable explanation. Yes, that's what it was: simply a bit of hysterical autosuggestion. I wasn't sure I knew what these words meant, but they were helping me keep my nerve—though just barely. The fact was, I didn't like this, not one little bit. And it was getting worse. Mrs. Feather's skin was becoming distinctly raddled, turning a bright, ruddy hue.

“Aren't you going to do something?” I asked—almost demanded.

“This will pass,” the reverend assured me. “The connections never last longer than ten or twelve minutes. When she recovers, Mrs. Feather will remember none of the pain. You see, this is a sign on to us, intended for our instruction. Lest we forget the passion.”

“You seriously believe she's been … possessed?”

“Not possessed. We would say regressed. By the grace of Abraxas, some have received the gift of reentering their previous identity.”

Perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised. I now recalled coming across the doctrine of metempsychosis in my reading. It was an article of faith for some Cathar sects. When I brought it up with Brother Justin, he told me we would return to the subject “in good time.” That was the last I heard of the matter, which was fine with me. Reincarnation was one of those subjects I preferred to treat with adamant neglect. And still intended to do so. At the back of my mind
a small silent curse was taking shape:
Damn you, Faustus, for involving me with these loonies!

Though I kept reminding myself that the woman was in some kind of hysterical trance and probably feeling nothing, her simulated suffering was growing more unbearable. Moreover, as the moments wore on, my eyes began to play tricks on me. In the dimming light of evening, a dull glow seemed to gather about her body as if she might be engulfed in flames. At one point, I was certain I could see her skin begin to swell into blisters, crack, and turn ashen. I finally had to glance away. All the while her babbling continued, growing more strained, more mingled with suppressed panic.

“She is invoking the true God,” the reverend informed me as if he might be describing a spectator sport. “Soon He will take her troubled spirit into His gracious care and leave her corrupted flesh to perish.”

As spectacular as Mrs. Feather's tribulations had become, my attention was drawn off across the circle. One of the other women—it was tiny Althea who had served the tea—was now lolling in her chair, eyes rolled back, mouth gaping. She too was connecting, speaking in a voice very different from her own. I couldn't make out what she was saying—Mrs. Feather was now nearly screaming—but I was sure it wasn't English. A few minutes later and still another member of the flock had slipped into trance, this time one of the men. His voice was loud enough for me to overhear. The words definitely weren't English, but some kind of singsong linguistic hash.

Mrs. Feather's passion continued to build until she seemed about to explode. At that point, her howling took on a different quality. She was singing! Her voice became strong and spirited. Though the words were slurred, I guessed they were meant to be Latin. Even more certainly, I could identify the song. It was a wailing, dragged-out version of the tune she'd played on the organ: “Bye Bye Blackbird” in a minor key. Her singing swelled up, then abruptly stopped with a terrible retching cough. Mrs. Feather's eyes popped open, her tongue protruded. I could watch no more.

“Now they are strangling her,” Reverend Feather bent to inform me quietly. As if I might be suffering more than his wife, he patted my hand and assured me, “Soon it will be over.”

It was. For several seconds there was silence in the garden. I had never been so glad to hear the L.A. freeway. When I looked back, Mrs. Feather was sitting up. As if she had done no more than sneeze,
she picked herself off” the ground, rubbed at her still-glowing cheeks, smiled, and returned to her seat, waiting for the others to finish their more subdued connections. There was a brief silent prayer; five minutes after that, the congregation was excusing itself and drifting away. I might have done the same, but the Feathers were eagerly soliciting me to stay and talk, perhaps to have dinner. Oddly enough, I felt obliged to linger. After sitting through so singular a performance, I would have felt churlish departing without some word of… I couldn't call it appreciation, but at least acknowledgment.

“How long have you had this … capacity?” I asked Mrs. Feather as she fussed to brew another pot of tea after the flock had departed. We'd moved into the house that adjoined the antique shop. It was no more than a few rooms behind a curtained doorway that divided it from the store. The kitchen where we were sitting was neat enough, but depressingly dingy. Its only note of cheer was an assortment of china cups and saucers that filled the better part of one wall, probably the best of Aunt Natalie's wares.

“It came to me as a child,” she answered brightly. “Guillemette was my secret companion, a sort of make-believe older sister. We did not connect for the first time until I was a young woman of her age. That was when I realized she and I were one.”

“But by that time you'd studied the Albigenses?”

“Oh, not at all. I had no idea who these people were. And if I had, I would have regarded them as heretics. I should have had to. My father, you see, was a curate. Very devout. Very High Church, don't you know. That's what led Cecil and me to emigrate. Once my family found out about Guillemette, they were scandalized. Oh, they wouldn't hear of such a thing! I'm afraid they thought I was quite balmy.”

“California,” the reverend explained, “has proved to be so much more hospitable. There is a certain …”

“Yes, isn't there?” Mrs. Feather agreed.

“… atmosphere.”

“An atmosphere, exactly so. Of course later, after I met Cecil, who knew so very much more about it all, I did some reading, not much. The books seem so lifeless after you have known the true story. Guillemette has taught me what I know. I think of it as a deep, deep memory, far more reliable than any book could be.”

“The language you were speaking … where did you learn it?”

“I never did. It's Guillemette's language. I don't even know common French.”

I turned to the reverend. “And do you also experience connections?”

“Oh yes. But nothing as arduous as Natalie. My life stream reaches back to the age of Marcus Aurelius. I was an Alexandrian scholar converted to the faith at that time. That was before the Church of Rome was in a position to strike at its enemies. In that respect I was more fortunate. But it leaves me with less to offer my little flock.”

“You are much too modest, my dear,” his wife chided. “Cecil was one of the teachers of the great Origen.”

“Ah, but the passion of Guillemette, of all our long-departed confreres,” the reverend insisted, “it does so much more to teach the evil of this world. That the Children of Light should be made to suffer so.

I mentioned that I'd noticed a few of the others connecting. “Althea, for example …”

“Oh yes. Her life stream goes back to ancient Persia, the days of Zoroaster.”

Dr. Byx had said “older than Jesus.” Apparently the two Cathar congregations agreed on that much. “Your church goes back that far?”

“Brenda McVey goes back even farther. She is the oldest among us. She was a priestess at the Egyptian court in the earliest days of our faith. At the temple of Thoth. All the members of our little flock have manifested their spiritual core.”

“Except for poor Mr. Glassman,” his wife reminded him. “He is still in search.”

“True,” the reverend answered. “But he is making excellent progress. We have the highest hopes for him.”

“How exactly do you experience a connection?” I asked Mrs. Feather. I was honestly curious to know. Why not take advantage of the occasion? I never expected to meet a team of eccentrics like this again—not if I could help it. “Do you feel any pain?”

Mrs. Feather proved to be blithely forthcoming. “Not really. You see, I am not in my physical body at the time. It's more as if I am observing from somewhere high above, rather than actually being in the scene. But it's all so very horrifying, I can't keep from crying out. Do you follow me?”

I saw what looked like a small, fortuitous opening and moved to
squeeze a key question through it. “You mean it's like watching a movie?”

“… movie?”

“Haven't you ever thought it might make a good movie? The persecution of the Cathars?” The reverend and his wife exchanged a bewildered glance. “It's my particular interest. Movies. The story of the Cathars has so many …”

All at once, it was as if I were staring across the table into the eyes of two dead fish. The Feathers had gone cold on me.

“You are from Hollywood?” Mrs. Feather asked, naming the city as if it might rank just behind Sodom and Gomorrah.

“Oh no. I teach film studies.”

“Film? I understood you to say you were an historian,” the reverend reminded me in a tone that suggested I might be an imposter.

“I am,” I hastened to assure him. “The history of the movies. Just now, for example, I'm studying …”

But no example was going to save the situation now. Especially not if I should be forced to identify Max Castle as the man who made movies about ghouls, vampires, and zombies. The look Reverend Feather had fixed on me made me feel like a kid who had farted in church. “We have always regarded the motion pictures,” he informed me, “as a particularly worldly form of amusement. Not at all compatible with a serious view of life.”

“Have you some intention of filming?” Mrs. Feather asked, a distinct note of distress, even insult in her voice. “Here? Us?”

“No, no. Not at all.” Under vigorous cross-examination, I issued the disclaimer two or three more times before I resigned myself to the fact that, like it or not, I'd stumbled upon as efficient a way as any to extricate myself from the Albigensi Fellowship. The movies may have ranked high with the Orphans; but not with the two Cathars I was sharing tea and biscuits with that evening. As far as the Feathers were concerned, movies meant Looney Tunes and skin flicks. Even my status as a scholar was sullied by the association. Our conversation was turning more frigid by the moment.