Mumbo Jumbo (10 page)

The Hierophant smiles. Now you’re catching on. You’re grooving with the jive, H.

The Hierophant rises to shake Hinckle Von Vampton’s hand.

Of course you will work with our people there. They will provide you with all of the assistance you need. Their names are in this little black book.

The Hierophant hands Hinckle the little black book and for a moment Hinckle thumbs through it.

Warren Harding?

Yes, we had problems trying to get him nominated. It took 10 ballots. Some of the delegates at the convention called him a “He-Harlot” and a “Black Babylonian.” They called the convention “boss controlled” and said that his nomination was the result of a “Senate Cabal.” H. L. Mencken, the writer, termed him “a series of wet sponges,” but we groomed him from the beginning by surrounding him with a man who is now his Attorney General. It took an advertising agency named Lord & Thomas to sell him to the American people. The charges of the convention had to be somehow dealt with. If they only knew. Hard-headed, these descendants of indentured servants and criminals. 30,000 felons, I understand, were sent to Georgia alone. Bloody paradoxical place, that country. The J.G.C.s shipped there to harvest cotton and rice surrounded by the descendants of 2-bit hoods, loan sharks, and Atonists of the most fundamental variety. Ostensibly pragmatic, the place’s characteristic fiction is “dark romance.”

Center of industrialism but at the same time the home of the Fox sisters, the founders of Spiritualism…well anyway Harding is just a Mason so you may use him as you wish; there is another man, the 1st entry in the book under M, who you may call upon in an emergency but be careful he isn’t revealed because he is the most sensible contact we have.

I don’t think that I will be needing any additional help. I will use my old friend Hubert “Safecracker” Gould…

“The only man of his generation who didn’t go to jail?”

Yes, I need him at my side for this… this Crusade.

I think it’s going to work out fine, Hinckle. Perhaps if we had called upon you earlier we could have regained the Holy Land before 1917. We will destroy the Knights Templar’ trial records, the 36 feet of long scrolls decorated with those strange symbols your Order was so fond of. They will be burned tonight at the Vatican…And Hinckle, …Hinckle if your Order is successful we will put you in charge of the next Crusade, World War 2 a bigger extravaganza than 1. Beyond the dreams of Lubitsch and De Mille, which is being choreographed at this very moment.

Hinckle’s eyes shine…

What are you going to call the magazine, Hinckle?

The
Benign Monster.
Give it the Freudian angle.

Hinckle carrying the little black book and his orders begins to leave the room for the transportation that will convey him to this mysterious country’s harbor where awaits the World War 1 submarine he will use for his journey to the Templars’ private, secluded estate on Long Island.

I have 1 more request, Hierophant 1.

Yes Hinckle, anything, anything. You name it.

Summon your men, I wish to say our old Templars’ chant.

Not here Hinckle, before my men; they won’t understand after all the vilification they’ve heard against your Order.

SUMMON YOUR MEN!!!

Hierophant 1 presses the buttons and here they come. Marching. Hut Hut Hut Hut Hut. Hut. Hut. Hut Hut Hut. Soon the men are all gathered about the famous horseshoe-like desk where the Hierophant stands. They raise their mugs and begin to shout Beascauh after the name of the Templars’ 1st piebald horse.

*
The New Negro—
Alain Locke, editor.

A
TALENTED GRAVE-ROBBER AND
2nd-story man, Hinckle Von Vampton arrives for his assignment 1 moonlit night in an old rusty World War 1 surplus submarine, part of an arsenal the Wallflower Order keeps on hand in case its underlings kick up; mostly presidents the likes of the twangy New Englander Calvin Coolidge, kings with brain disease, 44-year-old Eagle Scouts with set jaws, maharajahs who have heart attacks while playing polo, unemployed actors who married the brain surgeon’s daughter, African presidents who are out of the country a great deal. So as Fats Waller once remarked, “One never knows, do one.”

On the shore his new household awaits him as the craft surfaces from a large pool of oil slick. It resembles a posh ad for whiskey. A few of the maids, their black skirts and white aprons and their hair blowing in the breeze, hold cocktails on trays. Hinckle Von Vampton arises from the sub and is rowed onto the beach. He steps out of the boat. He inspects the cooks, chauffeurs and the maids and the gardeners and grooms.

That night he dines with his staff at the head of a long table beneath a ceiling which has a mural commemorating the ceremony of the Knights Templar’ immunity from excommunication (the Hierophant had it painted as a surprise). Hinckle lays down the rules of the house.

The next morning Hinckle Von Vampton calls his old comrade-in-arms Hubert “Safecracker” Gould, 1-time carpetbagger, now “radical education expert” who lives in a penthouse high above the streets of New York purchased from the proceeds he has received from the scribblings of little colored waifs and the income from a downtown cabaret on East 3rd Street—a sweatshop for Black musicians—of which he is silent partner.

Hubert?

Yes, who is it? The voice at the other end belongs to Hubert “Safecracker” Gould, standing holding his cigarette holder between his fingers.

O Hinckle, hi sport, I am told you successfully carried through the plan to embarrass the Wallflower Order. I saw the headline. Calls came in from our little band distributed all over the world.

That’s not all…I was interviewed by the Wallflower Order and we made a deal. We’re exonerated. The Order. They burned the evidence from the trial and we’re in charge of the epidemic.

How were you able to swing that?

Let me explain that later. I used the headline and the Book.

That worked?

Yes, of course it did.

If there’s a deal what are we to do?

They gave us a staff. Their North American contacts have been buzzed that the power has passed from the Teutonics to us again. Listen, here is the plan…

G
UESS WHO’S OUTSIDE THE
reporter cries excitedly, rushing into the city room of the Atonist sheet the New York
Sun.
Hinckle Von Vampton, dressed like a banker or tycoon with a chauffeur outside. All the brass is down there…and they’re coming this way…

Does the old man know?

No, he…

The 2 reporters resume their seats and return to clattering away at their typewriters as the managing editor returns from his 2-minute coffee break. A little less gabbin’ and a little more tabbin’, you guys, he says.

The door leading to the city room opens and the party starts through on their way to the executive offices of the New York
Sun.
Well when the managing editor sees Hinckle Von Vampton he nearly drops dead.

You! But before he can say anything the editor-in-chief and the chairman of the board of the
Sun
begin to pass by his desk.

Of course, you know the managing editor, don’t you, the executive pauses, turning to Hinckle.

O yes of course I do, Mr. Elm. Please put him on the agenda of topics we will be discussing over sherry and cake upstairs.

The editor-in-chief extends his hand to Hinckle’s elbow, leading him through the city room and out. The managing editor sits down. He makes a gesture associated with the comic Leon Errol, gradually rubbing his open palm down over his red face. The reporters exchange grins.

That night the managing editor resigns. Apparently the decision occurred in a meeting at the top which Hinckle Von Vampton had held to “get acquainted” with his contacts.

D
YPSOMANIACS, THOSE WHO TAKE
it from behind by german shepherds, those delighted by pin pricks at the bottom of the feet, whippersnappers, vibrators, Free Love advocates, ex-I.W.W. intellectuals, an art director who likes Aubrey Beardsley, a flagpole sitter whose record is 10 days, 10 hours, 10 minutes, and 10 seconds, people whose feet fall asleep, 3 or 4 inside dopes, and muckrakers of Tammany Hall. The staff of the
Benign Monster.

The cover is splendid. Some kind of head in the mush. No…A Fat Lady atop a Whooping Crane…No…A Cow? It’s very hard to make out the cover. It’s in the avant-garde style. Adolf Hitler has an article on the future of Germany. He’s the young lad who killed 14 at a Protestant Bible Study camp. His tousle-haired lawyer was seeking to free him by appealing to German Psychology. Wotanian seizure is the diagnosis underneath this “Christlike” looking young man. A nude flapper 1 page, deathwhite skin with black circles around her eyes. Another page carries a picture of a lynching. Bulging eyes. Entrails. Delighted sheriffs licking chocolate-covered ice cream sticks. There is a hot story about a woman who used to go down to meet the trains. “The Drawers of Wa-Wa.” They expect this feature to get the magazine across.

The phone rings. Hinckle Von Vampton and Hubert “Safecracker” rush into the office. Hinckle Von Vampton picks up the phone and the fixed tight-lipped expression on his face widens into a grin.

We’ve been banned in Boston! We’ve made it. (As a journalist in the 1932 movie
Doctor X
said, “Sensationalism? Why the sons of guns love it.”)

While the staff celebrate, Hinckle Von Vampton contemplates his next move. He glances at the poll he devised as a feature for the newspaper. The Jazz Poll. Bix Beiderbeck wins the Trumpet category. Paul Whiteman the Big Band. Something is missing. Something colored. It will take time to get the Talking Android. In the meantime they need a Negro Viewpoint.

A
CROSS TOWN THE CITY
room of the New York
Tribune
is in stitches. The reporters, rewrite men and managing editor are on the floor convulsed with laughter. Woodrow Wilson Jefferson stands in the middle of the room barefoot, his bags dropping chicken feathers, his cuffs the length of what are called “high waters.” He is bewildered at the response he is receiving.

The cherubic-faced balding man sitting at the desk prods Jefferson. Tell us again who you want to meet?

Why…why Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

Another round of laughter. But when the editor-in-chief walks into the room they stop.

What’s going on here? Don’t you know we got an edition to get out. You. C’mere.

Jefferson points to himself.

Yeah, you. C’mere.

Jefferson walks up to the man.

Now, what’s on your mind, Mac?

I want to meet Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

Well they don’t work here no more, they were promoted. Now get outta here.

The city room breaks up. Woodrow Wilson Jefferson slowly walks out, undaunted. He is an ambitious man. If he wasn’t going to find these men here, he was going to return to the room he rents above Frimbo’s Funeral Home and look them up in the phone book. He is walking down University Street in Greenwich Village when he comes upon the sign in the window.

NEGRO VIEWPOINT WANTED

As soon as Woodrow Wilson enters the office of the
Benign Monster
holding the sign, Hinckle Von Vampton starts licking his chops.

Yes young man, what can I do for you?

I came about the Negro Viewpoint job.

Yes, what is your experience?

I have read all the 487 articles written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and know them by heart.

The perfect candidate, Hinckle Von Vampton decides. He doesn’t mind the shape of the idol: sexuality, economics, whatever, as long as it is limited to 1.

You’re hired.

But don’t you want to hear about my contributions to the County Seed packages, my descriptions of the bulbs and the germs?

That’s enough. You’ve convinced me.

Hinckle Von Vampton informs Woodrow Wilson Jefferson of his salary and the other terms of the position as Negro Viewpoint.

We’ve an office for you in the rear of Spiraling Agony, my estate, and you will also be required to perform certain chores in addition to your responsibility as a columnist. We are doubling-up due to our very limited resources.

Well what will my double-up be? Woodrow Wilson asks, overjoyed at having found a job the 2nd day in New York.

Ask the cook when you reach Spiraling Agony.

Hinckle Von Vampton summons 1 of his drivers to take Woodrow Wilson to a rented room above Frimbo’s Funeral Home in Harlem to gather his things and then go on to Long Island.

1 thing, Mr. Von Vampton?

Yes, what is that Woodrow?

Can you introduce me to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels?

…Hinckle thinks
he would have to really mold this 1 but it would give him good practice for when he discovered the Android.
Come into my office just 1 moment, Woodrow. I’ll explain.

S.R.: IN HAITI IT WAS PAPA LOA, IN NEW ORLEANS IT WAS PAPA LABAS, IN CHICAGO IT WAS PAPA JOE. THE LOCATION MAY SHIFT BUT THE FUNCTION REMAINS THE SAME. CREOLE BANDS CONCEAL JES GREW FROM CHICAGO’S PSYCHIC DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH. ERZULIE WITH HER FAST SELF IS SHELTERED IN A “VOCALISING” TRUMPET WHICH SINGS FROM MUTE TO GROWL. LEGBA TAKES REQUESTS FROM BEHIND THE DERBY-COVERED BELL OF A “TALKING” SLIDE-TROMBONE.
(He is a loa who has always worked for his keep.
—I.R.)