Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (13 page)

‘…instead of going out into the manifold, to forsake it for the one, and to float upwards towards the divine fount of being whose stream flows from within him. You ask: how can we know the Infinitive? I answer: not by reason. It is the office of reason to distinguish and define. The finite, therefore, cannot be ranked among its objects. You can only apprehend the Infinite by a faculty superior to reason, by entering into a state in which you are your finite self no longer – in which the divine essence is communicated to you. This is ecstasy. It is the liberation of your mind from its finite consciousness. Like can only apprehend like, when you thus cease to be finite, you become one with the infinite. It is the reduction of your soul to its simplest self, its divine essence, you realize this union – this identity.

‘But this sublime condition is not of permanent duration. It is only now and then that we can enjoy this elevation above the limit of the body and the world. I myself have realized it but three times as yet, and Porphyry hitherto not once.

‘All that tends to purify and elevate the mind will assist you in this attainment, and facilitate the approach and the recurrence of these happy intervals. There are, then, different roads by which this end may be reached. The love of beauty, which exalts the poet; that devotion to the
One
and that ascent of science which makes the ambition of the philosopher, and that love and those prayers by which devout and ardent souls tend in their moral purity towards perfection – these are the great highways conducting to the height above the actual and the particular, where we stand in the Immediate presence of the
Infinite,
who shines out as from the depths of the soul.’

He finished reading the paper and put it on the table.

‘Such was one of Plotinus’ letters to Flaccus,’ he said slowly. This one I especially wanted you to hear because it coincides, as you know, with my own theory of knowledge founded upon the idea of the expansion of receptivity. Shall we concentrate on this for perhaps a minute or two?’

He bowed his head and so did the others. Jinx looked at me out of the corner of his eye, moving his head slightly. I frowned and winked and bowed my head, showing him that we should do as the others were doing. He bowed his head. I raised mine a little, pulling my eyes up, trying to find the girl with the white face and the black hair. Doc Green lifted his head, gazing at the people, waiting for them to lift theirs too, which they did in surprising unison, and now, for the first time there were sounds of movement, deferential movement. The lecture was over.

‘Now, my friends,’ the old man said. ‘There is some new literature which Miss Dobson will distribute as you leave. Do study it and meditate upon it. Incidentally, I wish you would not insist on leaving contributions with Miss Dobson. As I have repeatedly told you, we do not take up collections. If the time ever comes when we need money I shall not hesitate to ask for it. All I want is your sincere interest. And now, my friends, I am tired. You must excuse me. Goodnight, and thank you for coming.…’

He walked away from the table and went through a side door, somewhere to the rear. The people stood up and started moving towards the front door, by ones and twos and threes, middle-aged people, although I saw a couple of girls who couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen years old. There still was very little noise and no talking at all. There was in the room an air of humility and respect, even awe. I rose, pulling Jinx up with me, and on the back edge of the crowd we drifted into the hall. The swinging door had been pushed outward and propped open, and the girl with the white face and the black hair was standing there holding a stack of pamphlets in her arm, handing them out one by one. There still was very little noise, just the light sounds of a few scuffling feet and the low-spoken good nights between the girl and the disciples. I loitered with Jinx at the rear of the crowd so we would be the last ones out, but inching towards the door so as not to be conspicuous. So far, nobody had paid any attention to us. Jinx and I finally reached the door, the last ones.

‘Good night,’ the girl said, handing me a pamphlet. ‘Good night,’ she said, handing Jinx a pamphlet.

‘Good night…’ I said, lingering for a moment, waiting for the man and woman just ahead to get through the outer door. When it was shut and the three of us were alone, I said to the girl: ‘May I speak to Doctor Green for a moment?’

‘Never after a reading does the Master give personal interviews,’ she said politely. ‘He is always very tired.’

‘I realize that, of course,’ I said. ‘But this is very important.’

‘Those are his orders,’ she said. ‘He is available for consultations and interviews every morning between ten and twelve.’

‘Unfortunately, this matter won’t keep,’ I said. ‘It is very vital. Otherwise, I would not think of disturbing him.’ White face or not, black hair or not, I meant to see him. ‘Won’t you please ask him?’

‘He knows me,’ Jinx said shortly. ‘Just tell him that I’m …’

‘I’m sure it’ll be all right,’ I said cutting in swiftly, giving Jinx an admonishing look.

She hesitated asking: ‘May I have your names?’

‘I’m Paul Murphy,’ I said. ‘This is Joseph Stockton. Although I don’t think they’ll mean much to him.…’

‘I shall speak with the Master,’ she said, moving away and again I could smell her perfume, a microcosm now, four or five times removed from a fragment, but still smellable, and this time recognizable. Once, somewhere, I had smelled that perfume before … She was attractive from the rear too; she wore rawhide moccasins and her long legs were bare and her buttocks were thin but rounded enough to fit nicely into the palms of your hands. Walking, this girl did not have the sensual roll that Holiday had, but then this girl did not need it.

‘… This is something new,’ Jinx was saying. ‘It wasn’t like this the last time.’

I winked at him to keep quiet and he shook his head uncertainly and handed me the pamphlet, shrugging that he did not understand it. It was a small, mimeographed pamphlet, and on the cover in mimeographed capitals was printed:

THE VOICE OF STONES

Stones from the walls of a Church and stones from the walls of a prison are completely different things.

(interpreting Ouspensky)

The Similarity between Christian Mysticism and the Vedanta and the Upanishads.

(interpreting Prof. James)

‘I told you, didn’t I?’ Jinx whispered.

I gestured for him to keep quiet, laying the pamphlets on a chair, and I heard a sound and looked around and the girl was leading in the Master. He had removed his coat and tie, and his collar was unbuttoned. He glimpsed us briefly but there was no sign in his face that he had ever seen Jinx before.

‘Master,’ the girl said, ‘this is Paul Murphy and Joseph Stockton.’

‘How do you do,’ I said, putting out my hand. He made no move to take it. There was nothing impolite about this, it was just as if he had never heard of the custom.

‘I do not wish to be rude, gentlemen,’ he said in a weary tone, ‘but I am very tired. Cannot this matter wait?’

‘Believe me, sir,’ I said, ‘if it could have waited we would have kept it waiting. I am a stranger to you, but I think you know my friend.…’

He looked squarely at Jinx but there was not even a glimmer of recognition.

‘I don’t recall it,’ he said calmly. ‘Well, gentlemen, what is it?’

‘Could we see you alone, sir?’ I asked.

‘You may speak freely,’ he said. ‘I have no secret from Miss Dobson.’

‘This matter, sir, is not concerned with Cosmic Consciousness,’ I said.

His eyes flashed a little and his jaw muscles tightened. ‘There are no other matters on which I wish to be consulted,’ he said.

The girl looked at him self-consciously and said: ‘Excuse me, Master. I shall take my leave.’

‘I have no secrets from you, Miss Dobson,’ he said.

‘Of course not, Master,’ she said quietly. ‘It is simply that I too am tired. May I be excused?’

‘If you insist,’ he said stiffly.

She nodded perfunctorialy to Jinx and me, bowed to the Master, and went out the front door, bareheaded and coatless. She did not look back. I was disappointed. I could not hope that I had aroused in her what she had aroused in me, I could not hope that she was even interested in a transient disciple. I resolved then that before I got through with her she’d be interested.… The Master took two long strides to the swinging door and kicked loose the wedge, the prop that was holding it open. The door swung shut. When he turned around, facing Jinx, all the weariness was gone from his face and frame and his eyes were wide and irate.

‘How dare you come here?’ he said. ‘How
dare
you!’

This was better. This was more like it.

‘Wait a minute, Doc…’ I said.

‘I refuse to have anything to do with it,’ he said. ‘That life for me is over. Over and done with. They all know it all of them. I shall heal no more bodies. I shall heal only minds.…’

‘Stop getting your bowels in such an uproar,’ Jinx said.

‘Shut up!’ I said to him. ‘Lissen, Doc – there’s nobody to heal. All I want is advice for which I’m willing to pay. We need a lawyer bad. We don’t know who to go to.’

‘How dare you disturb my meditations for such a childish reason?’ he said. The classified section of the telephone book is filled with lawyers, thousands of them.…’

‘Goddamn it!’ Jinx said, irritably.

‘Will you please shut up!’ I said. ‘Lissen, Doc – we can’t pick a lawyer that way.’

‘I don’t know the kind you seek.…’

‘Please, Doc’ I said, ‘let’s be reasonable about this. You couldn’t do business with the guys you did business with and not know
somebody.
…’

‘That was years ago.’

‘Two,’ Jinx said. ‘Just two …’

‘Now, look here, Doc …’ I said. ‘This is no skin off your nose. It so happens that we need a lawyer and we need him fast. I can understand your apprehension at the thought of becoming involved with these guys again, I not only understand it, I sympathize with it. But you’ll not be dragged into anything. We’ll not come here again.’ How can I see the girl without coming here again? I wondered. ‘There must be
somebody
you’ve heard of. You don’t want to be bothered with us any more, do you?’

‘No,’ he said.

‘Then think of somebody,’ I said.

He stared at me, biting his lip, and then stared at Jinx. Jinx’s face was grim. He was sore and he was about ready to give up talking and try something else. That was plain.

‘Try Keith Mandon,’ he said finally. ‘Cherokee Mandon.’

‘Where can I find him?’

‘He has an office in town.’

‘Where in town?’

‘I don’t know where. One of the buildings …’

‘Get the telephone book,’ I said.

He squinted at me, but moved down the hall to a taboret and picked up the telephone book.

‘Mandon …’ I said, taking the book. ‘M-a-n-d-o-n?’

‘Yes,’ he said.

I found the M-a’s. Mandle, Mandler, Mandon.

MANDON KEITH atty 424 Broad CU 9491 MANDON KEITH r 608 Iris BA 1-9055

‘Look,’ I said to the old man, pointing with my finger, ‘is this the one?’

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Thanks,’ I said, handing him the book.

‘The only way you can thank me is not to come here again,’ he said.

Not until tomorrow night, I thought. Not until the girl comes again. I turned and walked out, followed by Jinx. As we reached the porch the light in the living-room, where all the chairs were, went off, and halfway to the street the light in the opposite room went off, and when we reached the pavement the light on the sign in the yard went off. We turned up the street towards town.

‘You got to watch that temper of yours,’ I said. ‘You got to learn to get along with people.’

‘He’s bug-house. You can see now why the guys gave him up.’

‘He may not be as bug-house as you think,’ I said.

‘I don’t trust him. I wouldn’t trust this Mandon, either.’

‘We haven’t got time to do any picking,’ I said. ‘We have to take what we can…’

‘What do we do now?’

‘We try to find Mandon, that’s what we do now,’ I said.

He touched my arm in a quick startled warning and I turned my head to see what it was, reaching for the automatic in my right-hand hip pocket. It was a roadster, a big, powerful roadster that had crept up from behind us with the headlights off, and was rolling slowly along next to the kerbing, keeping pace with us, five feet away. The top was down. The girl with the white face and the black hair was driving. I smiled to myself and let the automatic be. I’d been right about this babe, after all.…

‘Would you like a lift?’ she asked.

‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Come on,’ I said to Jinx.

She stopped the roadster, leaning over and opening the door, and I got in. Jinx stepped in beside me, sitting down, closing the door.

‘Are you comfortable?’ I asked him. ‘Got plenty of room?’

‘I’m all right,’ he said.

The girl got it at once. ‘The back seat’s full of junk anyway,’ she said. She stepped up the speed of the car, and turned on the headlights, smiling at me guiltily, realizing only then that turning on the headlights made the whole thing obvious.

‘This is very nice of you,’ I said.

‘Not at all. Where can I drop you?’

‘At the drug store, if you don’t mind we’re going to pick up a taxi…’ I said, looking at her, not full in the face, but along the line of her chin. She was peering straight ahead through the windshield, but she knew that I was looking at her. She was still hatless and coatless. ‘This is some car you got here,’ I said.

‘I like it.…’

‘Fast, too, I’ll bet.’

‘I suppose so. I’ve never had it open.…’

‘What’s the fastest you’ve ever done with it?’

‘Oh, eighty… eighty-five.’

‘It’ll do better than that. Don’t you think so, Joseph?’

‘I think so,’ Jinx said.

‘Sure it will,’ I said. ‘Don’t you ever wear a coat?’ I asked the girl.

‘Sometimes. When it rains.’ She laughed. ‘I haven’t had the top up in months.’

I looked at Jinx. He stared at me grimly. As far as he was concerned, she was bug-house too.