MASQUES OF SATAN (28 page)

I drew Aunt Dora to a couple of chairs as far from Fand’s carver as we could make it. The idea of ectoplasm did not appeal to me. Presently Fand entered, rubbing his hands together, nodding and smiling to the assembled company.

I saw him rally his devotees with little teasing jokes that elicited fawning, laughing responses from them. He was progressing around the room so that he would reach my Aunt last, thus, I suppose, honouring us. When he arrived in front of us he sandwiched Aunt Dora’s hand between both of his and said, rather unctuously, that he was so glad she could come. He looked rather less favourably on me.

‘Good afternoon, Mr Philosopher,’ he said. ‘Have you come to learn or to scoff?’ I replied rather lamely that I had an open mind. He nodded and patted me on the shoulder, clearly not deceived. Whatever else he was Fand was sharp-eyed, and he had detected my hostility at once.

He went and sat down in his carver while the rest of us also settled. Carl stood by the door using a dimmer switch to lower the lights gradually, as if the place were a cinema. Once the room was almost completely dark, he himself took a seat a little outside the circle to the left of, and slightly behind, Fand, in order to operate the tape recorder. This he switched on to record after urging us to fill our minds with ‘goodwill towards the Spirit world and Norman’s work in it.’

You will know I am sure that the vast majority of séances, whether genuine or not (whatever that may mean), are very dull, and this was no exception. All the same, it was of interest to me because it was a new kind of dullness. We all want to know what life is like beyond the grave; unfortunately, it would appear, the deceased, though voluble, are not very illuminating on the subject. However because something happened at the end of the séance which was significant I must give an outline of what went before.

At first we heard nothing but heavy breathing from Fand. As my eyes became accustomed to the darkness I could see him slumped in his chair, head slightly to one side. His eyes appeared to be open but sightless. Presently a small dribble of some greyish substance began to form, pulsating slightly, on his lips. It looked to me as if he were gradually extruding a dirty linen handkerchief from his mouth. At the same time an odour was wafted across to me, sweetish and sulphurous, like that of decaying fish. It was not overpowering, but it was sufficient to induce disgust and unease. Then the voices began.

I have to admit that, probably by some ventriloquial feat, it did appear that the voices were coming not from Fand himself but from somewhere outside him, perhaps even from the dirty handkerchief which Carl had called his ‘etheric voice-box’. The timbre of the voices varied, certainly, but the variation was no greater than that which could be produced by an experienced actor or a good television impressionist. As each voice came, murmurs from the assembled company told me who they were supposed to be.

The first voice was that of Fand’s ‘Spirit Guide’ I was told, a ten year old boy called Ricky who had perished in a Zeppelin raid on London in 1917. He was greeted by the ‘old hands’ in the group with friendly familiarity, and chirruped away in a cockney falsetto.

‘Ricky’s the name. There’ll never be another. Boys will be boys, eh? Lucky for you girls, or you’d get no fun. I’m a cheeky chappie, I am.’

The old hands laughed at these antics, indulged them up to a point, but they did not quite conceal their impatience to hear the main event. Ricky, for his part, acted as a kind of master of ceremonies, introducing the other voices with more than a touch of resentment that he was not the principal attraction.

The first speaker was a Major Macorquodale. When he was announced I detected a slight restlessness among the old hands, despite outward expressions of interest and respect. I soon understood the reason. He was a sermonising bore, and his news from the other world, though couched in the most optimistic terms, was curiously dispiriting: ‘Here is complete unity and harmony and love. Here is truly brotherhood. Here is the wisdom of all time expressed in all manner of ways, by all manner of peoples, irrespective of any earthly ideas of class, or creed, or colour. Truly this is a spiritual world, but not as man has depicted it. Indeed it is so, so different, and so tremendously alive, so vital, so far removed from man’s conception of things, that it cannot be adequately described. One can only feel it and know it and sense it — it is so vast and so beautiful.’ He talked colourlessly of colour and lifelessly of life. It filled me with misery because I knew that somewhere, lurking beneath the high-sounding platitudes, was a lie.

There was a short pause after the Major had said ‘farewell’ and promised to return. Ricky said: ‘You liked that, didn’t you? Didn’t you, eh?’ Everyone agreed that they had, but without conviction. ‘I’ll bring him on again, then, shall I?’ said Ricky.

‘We would like to know if there are any other messages from the other side, Ricky dear,’ said Mrs Bowles, an ‘old hand’ and self-appointed leader of the group. But Ricky was not through with his teasing.

‘Oh, yes! Oh, yes! I know what you’re after. You just want a bit of sensation, a bit of how’s your father, that’s what you want. You want a bit of a knees-up, don’t you?’

Mrs Bowles and the others were trying to sound amused, but then an odd thing happened. It was as if the line went dead for a moment; there was an odd choking and clicking sound, then we heard the sound of singing:

‘Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar

Where are you now? Who lies beneath your spell?

Whom do you lead on Rapture’s roadway, far,

Before you agonise them in farewell?’

The voice was not good, a braying amateur attempt at a tenor voice, and it sounded like an imitation of an old recording. Aunt Dora suddenly gripped my arm. A murmur rippled round the room.

‘Is that you, Rudi?’ said Mrs Bowles.

‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,’ said a throaty voice with a slight foreign accent. ‘Yes, it is I, Rudolph Valentino. I am still practising my singing.’

‘Oh, it’s wonderful, Rudi,’ said Mrs Bowles, backed by sounds of insincere agreement from the rest.

‘Dear lady, you are too kind. In the next world we continue to practice the arts because art is a means of expressing beauty, and beauty is that which elevates us to higher planes of spiritual advancement . . .’ And so on. Rudolph was as dull as his predecessor, Major Macorquodale. The slight interest he sustained was because of the few pale shreds of egoism that remained to clothe the faceless shade. ‘If I can use the small reputation that I gained on earth to communicate through you the message of universal love and peace to the world, then I feel that my efforts in this mediumship have not been entirely wasted.’

Aunt Dora’s grip, which had tightened during the singing of the song, relaxed. I was beginning to long for the event to be over, but once again there seemed to be an interruption in the flow of verbiage, a slight choking sound. The voice that resumed was still Valentino’s, but less monotonously relaxed.

‘I wish to say,’ said Rudolph, ‘that there is someone on this side who wishes to communicate with someone present among you. He cannot use his own voice because it takes some time on this plane to accustom oneself to this instrument if I may so term what is——’

He was clearly lapsing into verbiage, but Mrs Bowles had the courage to interrupt him.

‘Who is the message from, please, Rudi?’

‘His name is Anton.’

‘We have heard his name before,’ said Mrs Bowles. ‘Does anyone here know Anton? Can the person here who knows Anton please speak this time?’ Aunt Dora gripped my hand again and said ‘yes’ in the faintest possible voice.

‘Is that you, Mrs Gibson?’ said Mrs Bowles, like a schoolmistress addressing a hesitant pupil.

‘Yes.’

‘Has Anton a message for Mrs Gibson?’ said Mrs Bowles.

There was another long pause before the voice of Valentino said: ‘Anton wishes to say only this. He says “Hetty is here.”’ I felt rather than heard my Aunt let out a half-suppressed gasp of pain.

‘Hetty. Does Hetty mean anything to you, Mrs Gibson?’ said the indefatigable Mrs Bowles. At this moment, however, everyone’s attention was disturbed by the fact that Fand was rousing himself from his trance, asking what had happened, and remarking querulously that he often couldn’t remember what his voices had said. Carl slowly brought up the lights. I wondered what had happened to the ectoplasm which we had seen seeping from Fand’s mouth. There was no trace of it, no damp patch on his shoulder, nothing.

We saw Mrs Bowles eying us in preparation no doubt for a searching interview about Anton’s curious message. ‘Come along,’ said Aunt Dora briskly, ‘we must go,’ and pausing only to put a twenty pound note into the basket in the hall, we were out of the house and into the summer sunshine of Larch Avenue.

As I closed Fand’s front door behind us I noticed a woman standing on the other side of the road directly opposite Fand’s house, looking straight at us at us. She was in her thirties, tall and dark haired. I vaguely registered a slightly uncomfortable presence and kept her in my peripheral vision while we took the short walk up Larch Avenue towards Aunt Dora’s house. Suddenly the woman was crossing the road and making straight for us. ‘Oh, dear,’ muttered Aunt Dora, as she approached, ‘I’m rather afraid that young woman is going to be the most fearful nuisance.’ Difficult people had a habit of attaching themselves to my Aunt Dora, attracted partly by her fame, such as it was, partly by her natural serenity, which was more fragile than they supposed. (If they considered my Aunt’s peace of mind at all, which is doubtful.)

The next moment she was on the path, barring Aunt Dora’s way home. She could have been handsome if there had not been dark circles under her eyes, had she paid some attention to her damp, lank hair, had her dress sense been more coherent. I knew that Aunt Dora, who had strong views about young women ‘looking after themselves’, as she termed it, would not approve.

‘Excuse me. You’ve just been at Norman Fand’s, haven’t you?’ she said. ‘I’m Midge Black.’

‘Can we help you?’ said Aunt Dora in a gentle, tepid tone of voice. Midge Black was staring at her.

‘Aren’t you Dora Gibson, the writer?’ My Aunt nodded and sighed almost imperceptibly. ‘Then you’ll understand. Can I have a word with you? It is rather important.’

‘I’m afraid my Aunt is very tired,’ I began. ‘Perhaps some other time——’

‘That’s quite all right, Geoffrey. It’s very solicitous of you, I know, but I think we can manage. I live just up the road. Won’t you come in, Midge, and have a cup of tea?’

I realised that my Aunt’s implacable sense of duty had taken over, and that nothing now would dissuade her from adopting Midge Black as one of her protégées. I made the tea while Midge and Aunt Dora settled down to talk. When I came into the drawing room with a tray of tea they seemed to be on intimate terms.

Aunt Dora said: ‘Oh, thank you so much, Geoffrey dear, I’ve been longing for a cup. Why Carl and Mr Fand can’t offer us at least some sort of refreshment, I don’t know. After all one does put a generous tip into that rather blatant basket of theirs. Now sit down while I pour the tea. Midge has just been telling me that she’s a ghost.’

Aunt Dora’s sense of humour — her preferred means of tackling most of life’s difficulties — had obviously asserted itself while I had been in the kitchen. It was true after a fashion: Midge was, or had been, a ghost. She was a freelance journalist who, having ghosted a couple of autobiographies by minor celebrities, had been approached by a publisher to do the same for Norman Fand. She had done much preliminary work, sorting out dates, family histories, press cuttings, and the like, but had not been as vigilant as she should have been over the contractual arrangements. When Fand decided to dispense with her services, she had been dismissed with an
ex gratia
payment of no more than five hundred pounds. On reading the book
Me and My Voices
when it was published — ‘not my title,’ Midge remarked, ‘I would have called it
Me and My Vices’
— she found that Fand had made extensive and unacknowledged use of her research, even of her own writing in parts. In short, she wanted Aunt Dora to lobby Fand for a share of the royalties. She had no money to pay for a court case whose outcome would be, to say the very least, uncertain.