Masks of the Illuminati (3 page)

Q: How long had James Joyce and Nora Barnacle been lovers?

A: Ten years and ten days.

Q: How many times had James Joyce suspected Nora Barnacle of infidelity?

A: Three thouand six hundred sixty times.

Q: With what regularity did these suspicions occur?

A: Usually at about midnight; occasionally earlier in the evening if Mr. Joyce had started drinking in the afternoon.

Q: What actions usually resulted from these suspicions?

A: None.

Q: Were there any exceptions to this otherwise consistent pattern of inaction?

A: Yes. In 1909, Joyce had expressed the suspicions with all the eloquence and fury of a great master of English prose. When persuaded that he was wrong on that occasion, he subsided once more into his pattern of silent distrust.

Q: Explain the motivations of this passivity.

A: Desire for peace and quiet in which to pursue literary work; morbid self-insight into the probably phantasmal origin of said suspicions; devout and baffled love for the object of both his concupiscence and his paranoia; democratic sense of belonging to the largest fraternal order in Europe, the cuckolds.

    The debate between Albert Einstein
(Prof. Physik)
and James Joyce
(Div. Scep.)
in the charming old Lorelei Rathskeller on that memorable evening as the
Föhn
wind began to blow across Zürich covered diverse and most marvelous topics in epistemology, ontology, eschatology, semiotic, neurology, psychology, physiology, relativity, quantum theory, political science, sociology, anthropology, epidemiology and (due to Mr. Joyce’s unfortunate tendency to dwell upon the unwholesome) more-than-liberal scatology. In epistemology, Joyce stood foursquare behind Aristotle, the Master Of Those Who Know, but Einstein betrayed a greater allegiance to David Hume, the Master Of Those Who Don’t Know; while in ontology, Einstein leaned dangerously close to the ultra-skepticism
which he was later to denounce when it was propounded more boldly by Dr. Niels Bohr as the Copenhagen Interpretation
(viz:
the universe known to us is the product of our brains and instruments and thus one remove from the actual universe), but Joyce, with cavalier disregard for both consistency and common sense, went even beyond the Copenhagen Interpretation to ultimate agnosticism, attempting to combine the Aristotelian position that A is A with the non-Aristotelian criticism that A is only A so long as you don’t look close enough to see it turning into B. In eschatology, Einstein held stubbornly to the humanist position that science and reason were making the world significantly better for the greater part of the species
Homo Sap
., whilst Joyce mordantly suggested that all work in progress was always followed by work in regress. The great ideas of Bruno and Huxley, Zeno and Bacon, Plato and Spinoza, Machiavelli and Mach bounced back and forth across the table like ideological Ping-Pong balls as each became increasingly impressed by the verbal backhand of the other, recognized a mind of distinctly superior quality, and realized that ultimate agreement between two such divergent temperaments was as unlikely as the immanentization of the Gnostic eschaton next Tuesday after lunch. The workers who overheard bits of this ontological guerrilla warfare decided that both men were awfully smart guys, but the Russian gent from the train, had he been there, would have pronounced them both contemptible examples of
petite-bourgeoisie
subjectivism, decadent Imperialistic idealism and pre-dialectical empirio-criticism.

    
Dass kommst mir nicht aus dem Sinn
…

The voices of the workers invoked in Joyce his image of
Lorelei:
eboneyed, fish-tailed, barnacled. Like old Homer’s Sirens. She combs her pale yellow hair, demure and virginal above the waist: below, the sulphurous pit. They sail toward the rocks, songseduced, musicmaddened. A crash, a slopping sluchkluchk, screams: then nothing. A whirlpool turning, turning: emptiness. A gull flipflapping in a compassionless sky.

And the Serpents head rising from the Loch: Eat and ye shall be as gods.

Considering each step, dim eyes aided by the walking-stick, Joyce with dignity approached the bar, signaling for another beer. Gravely he beheld, in the mirror, himself; above it, a bronze eagle.

Almost got it now. From deep neath the crypt of St. Giles/Came a shriek that re-echoed for miles. And something and something said Brother Ignatius. Oh, hell. Wait.

Windows rattling:
Föhn
wind starting to blow.

When will Einstein get back from the water closet? Bladder: a complicated funnel. If the medical student lives on in me, so does the priest and the musician. St. James of Dublin, patron of chalices, catheters and cantatas. Why, my prose always comes out musical, liturgical and clinical at once.

Ah: Einstein’s green sweater.

“Well, Jeem,” Einstein said, not re-seating himself, “I believe I’ve had enough for one evening.”

“One more beer?” Joyce prompted hopefully.
“Ein stein
, Einstein?”

Einstein shook his head sadly. “Classes in the morning,” he murmured.

“I hope we will meet again,” Joyce said, rising formally if unsteadily. “I will always remember you for giving me the concept of quantum language. It may be the key to this impossible novel I’m trying to get started …”

“I don’t understand how quantum physics can be applied to language,” Einstein said, “but if I’ve helped you, I’m glad. This has been a stimulating conversation both ways.”

An explosion of energy cast awry the slow-swinging street door, and Joyce stepped back nimbly to avoid collision. Silt.

The figure that staggered into the shadow-dark Rathskeller was that of a handsome but wretched youth whose pallid skin and demented eyes revealed at once a hideous history of some cosmic and monstrous horror that the feeble mind of man could scarce endure. All were instantaneously frozen with terror and copious chills ran abundantly up and down every spine, whilst many admitted later that their hairs stood on end, their flesh crept and their souls within them trembled. The stranger, although dressed in the best clothing of the English upper class, carried a meager straw traveling case, which might contain deadly poison, venomous cobras or human heads to judge by the eldritch laugh which broke from his lips as he fought—visibly to all—to restrain an outright collapse into hysteria. An aura of almost visible fright had subtly entered the previously happy booze emporium, and the one-eyed accordionist ceased to play, the instrument lying as dead in his hands.
What can such an intrusion forebode?
was the thought in every mind; and the dreadful answer came unbidden to each: Only the madman is absolutely sure. Unhallowed and timeless secrets of forbidden aeons
and the dark backward abyss of blasphemous necromancy seemed to move stealthily in every stark shadow haunting the dank and ancient Rathskeller, and still the door tossed in the wind like a spirit in torment: sllt sllt sllt. Inchoate noise rustled imperceptibly.

Bond Street look: an Englishman.

Joyce watched with wide blue eyes as the haggard girl-faced figure stumbled toward the bar. Dorian Gray at the end of his rope. True fear.

“Whiskey,” the young Englishman said in his own language, absently adding,
“bitte
…”

This his eyes went all out of focus, amoeboid, and he seemed to be floating almost as he sank in a dead faint to crash loudly, shaking the room as he hit the floor.

The night I fell drunk on Tyrone Street and Hunter helped: the same anew.

Joyce set his walkingstick by the bar and knelt, ear to the Englishman’s heart. Medical school: not entirely wasted. Counting, listening: the heart not too fast. Pulse: fast also, not abnormal, though. A blue funk.

Wait: coming around.

The Englishman’s wild tormented eyes looked up into Joyce’s.

“Mein herr,”
he gasped.
“Ich
, um …”

“Just rest,” Joyce said quickly. “I speak English.”

Einstein’s boots clumped thump on wood heavy as ox hooves: Joyce turned. “What is it with this one?” Einstein asked. “Serious?”

“Just a bad fright,” Joyce said.

The Englishman trembled. “All the way from Loch Ness,” he said hoarsely. “All across Europe to this very door.”

“Just rest,” Joyce urged again. Loch Ness. Coincidence?

“It has pursued me to this very door,” the Englishman went on. “It is outside … waiting …”

“You’ve had a fright,” Joyce said judiciously. “Your wits are muddled. Rest another minute, sir.”

“You don’t understand,” the Englishman said wildly. “Right around the corner … by the railroad tracks …”

“What’s right outside this bar?” Joyce asked, remembering Gogarty’s medical manner: soothing, reasonable, unfrightened.

The Englishman trembled. “You’re Irish,” he said. “Another Englishman would say I’m mad. Perhaps you have the imagination to know better.”

Celtic twilight:
merde
.

“Yes,” Joyce said patiently. “Tell me.”

“There is a demon from Hell right outside that door, on Bahnhofstrasse.”

The one-eyed accordionist knelt beside them. “Can I help?” he asked in German.

“Yes,” said Joyce. “Help him to a chair now. He can sit up. I’m going outside.”

“Was he attacked by ruffians?” the worker asked. “Two or three of us could go with you….”

“No,” Joyce said. “I believe he was attacked by his own imagination. But my friend and I shall go outside and have a look.”

Bahnhofstrasse, in the feeble yellow glow of gas jets, was nearly deserted at that hour. A half-block away: a horseless carriage:
automobile
, the Italians call them. Italian model, indeed: FIAT:
Fabrica Italiana Automobile Torino
. The Latin love of codes and acronyms. MAFIA:
Morte Aile Franconia Italia Anela
. And INRI: mystery of mysteries.

The
Föhn
was blowing more heavily now: hot, nasty, clammy wind like a ghoul’s kiss. Joyce scanned Bahnhofstrasse with weak eyes. On one side the great Gothic-faced banks: rulers of the paper that rules continents. World capital of usury, Tucker would say. On the other side, the railroad tracks that gave the street its name: parallel lines meeting by the trick of perspective in theoretical infinity. Joyce peered, squinting, in both directions, then jumped, involuntarily, as thunder crashed.
A scrubbed, empty street. Clean as the Swiss temperament, devoid of answers. The Englishman’s demon was of the mind only.

But wait: by the arc light
. Joyce stepped forward, knelt again, and picked up the slightly fluorescent object. It was a plastic mask, for a theatrical production or a masquerade ball: the face of Satan, red-horned, bearded, goatish.

“A nasty joke …?” Einstein asked.

The Englishman stood in the Rathskeller door, still pale but fighting for control.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, “you have found nothing, I presume, and consider me mad.”

Joyce smiled. “On the contrary,” he said. “We have found something, and I do not consider you mad at all.” He held out the mask. “You have been the victim, I fear, of a rather cruel practical joke.”

The Englishman came forward, looking with no sign of relief at the grinning inhuman mask.

“It is a nastier joke than you can imagine,” he said in a giddy tone. “Three people have died ghastly deaths in the course of this business. Do you think that is humorous, sir?”

Eternal tempter: reaching out of the Loch, serpentine power crossing Europe to challenge me here.

Where did I read that? Not Blake, certainly. An Olde Ballad? But listen: he speaks.

“Three dead already,” the Englishman repeated. “And now I am convinced that I must be the fourth.”

Home Rule for Ireland voted down again by the Lords last March after the Commons passed it in January. The
only possibility now is revolution: gunfire in the streets, womanscreams: dead children. Bloody War. The nightmare from which I am seeking a wakening. Yes: and Father’s words long ago: “Three things you should never trust, Sunny Jim, my lad: the hoof of a horse; the horn of a bull; the smile of a Saxon.” Another net I must fly over. This man needs help. Inwit’s agenbite’s cure: compassion.

The
Föhn
, the wind of witchcraft, blew unhealthy stagnant air foully in their faces as they stood. “Come,” Joyce said, “let me help you.”

Went down from Jerusalem to Jericho: and fell among thieves. Take him to the inn. I may even have the two pence.

“Yes,” Einstein said, “let us help you.”

THE RADIO ANNOUNCER
: And now a dramatic, fast-breaking story from Zürich, Switzerland. A reliable source has informed Reuters News Service that Mr. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce has actually been seen performing an act of charity. Although no details are available yet, it is claimed that Joyce performed the kindly act entirely gratuitously, with no attempt to gain publicity or popularity and even without thought of attempting to establish merit in Heaven. Mr. Joyce, an alleged writer and the most notorious cuckold in all Europe, was expelled from his hometown of Dublin, Ireland, nearly a decade ago for countless Sins of Pride, for more Sins of Lust than are recorded in the decadent works of Sade and Masoch, for the Sin of Intemperance, for the Sin against the Holy Ghost, and for looking at churches cross-eyed from behind. He has since then amply and fulsomely earned the reputation of being the most arrogant and self-centered scoundrel of our century and has fathered two bastard children on a peasant wench. News of Joyce’s sudden indication of grace is said to have the Vatican rocking and His Holiness The Pope is reported to have exclaimed, on hearing of the nearly
miraculous deed, “Maybe there is hope, after all!” In Heaven, God the Father could not be reached for comment, but the Holy Ghost told our celestial correspondent, “It just goes to show that inside every Sinner there’s a Saint fighting to get out.” And now a word from our Heavenly Sponsor …