The Angel of the West Window Read online

  I wait – – – wait – – – wait – –.

  Time for me has become like a woman in labour who cannot give birth and who pleads for relief in an unending scream. My meat is hope, but it is a food which tears at my body; my drink is assurance, and I am parched. When shall I say: it is finished?! – – –

  Now we spent all our time with the preparation of the tincture of gold and scarcely a sitting passes but that the Green Angel assures us that on the next day or at the next suitable conjunction of the stars it will reveal to us the secret of the Stone and the formula that will crown all our labours. And each time there is a new condition, a new preparation, one more last call on skill and wealth, one new sacrifice, one more plunge into the black abyss of hope and trust.

  The wildest rumours are circulating amongst the local people at what is supposed to be going on in Mortlake, so that it seems best to let them – whether they wish us well or ill – know what is the purpose of my studies and experiments. Better, at least, than to allow calumny a free rein and suddenly find myself one day unexpectedly exposed to the fury, the enmity and blood-lust of the mob. It is for that reason that yesterday I gave way to the request from Lord Leicester, who still seems well-disposed toward me for old time’s sake, and have invited him, together with several of the gentlemen of the court who are curious to see our marvels, to visit me at Mortlake.

  And now Lord Leicester and his entourage, together with the Polish prince, Albert Lasky, are at the castle, filling every corner of house and yard with their noise, not to mention the costs of lodging and a well-supplied table. It has cost us another good pinch from St. Deniol’s salt-cellar, but Kelley just laughed his mocking laugh and mumbled into his beard something about there being plenty of birds to pluck. I clenched my teeth in fury, for I knew what he was about. I have been spared nothing in my restless search for truth. How much filth, baseness, iniquity and evil has this travelling quack not brought into my life.

  In my notebooks I have recorded what happened at the sittings the gentlemen from London organised at Mortlake. Both my house and my soul grow daily more confused. What is there for me to say of the recent change in the mystical exchanges between Kelley and the green spectral child? Their subject is no longer Immortality and “Greenland” and the Queen and the Crowning Glory of the person and all the celestial favours accorded the chosen ones; they no longer even talk of the preparation of the salt and the essence. With the worldly ambition and superficial chatter of the courtiers and the scheming little Polish chieftain, all meditation and self-examination have been turned into their opposites and the sittings echo with the questions of these people as to the prospects for all their little intrigues and personal aspirations, as if they were in the cave of the witch of Uxbridge, or listening to prophecies read from the dregs of their cups by fairground gypsies. But still Kelley is rapt in the same trance as when questions about the spiritual life were put to Aristotle, Plato and King Solomon – only now it is the flunkeys and bootlickers of the Royal Bedchamber that speak through his mouth. – – –

  Loathsome, utterly loathsome! – And yet I do not even know what it is that disgusts me.

  After every sitting I arise sucked dry, my legs can scarce carry me from the chamber; but Kelley, after each sitting, has an increase of robust strength, triumphant confidence and self-assurance. He is no longer the guest in my house, my pupil and assistant, it is I who am here on sufferance, the servant of his miraculous powers, the slave of his ever-growing appetites.

  And that no jot of my shame shall go unrecorded: sometimes it is now Kelley who pays the household expenses from what he receives from my guests, in particular Prince Lasky, who seems to have fabulous wealth at his disposal, for the information he gives them in the name of the Green Angel. Now I and my family depend for our daily bread on the scraps from a charlatan’s table! For I well know that Kelley does not refrain from deception and trickery at these sittings: he disguises his voice and pronounces what his foolish hearers in their insatiable pride want to hear and tells them things that flatter their boundless ambition. With insolent words and a cynical laugh he confessed as much to me and told me to pawn the blankets off the beds if I would rather feed my illustrious guests in that way. But there is another question that wounds me even deeper than the humiliation of being the accomplice of a cutpurse, so to speak: how can Providence suffer such fraud to be perpetrated in the presence – and the name! – of divine messengers such as the Green Angel and the spectral child at the west window?! For they do appear when it is taking place, in physical form, tangible and visible to all; I have seen it myself a dozen times. All this has overwhelmed me, as sudden as a desert storm, and I can see the gaping maw of fate ready at any moment to devour me. If Kelley is unmasked, then I fall with him, for I am linked to him – and who will believe I am innocent when even in my own eyes I am not? The invitations to go to the Queen in London become ever more pressing; the inflated reports of the Pole, Lasky, have aroused her curiosity and she will surely not let me keep from her the newly discovered marvel of the open door to the world beyond. If that should happen, then it is a matter of life or death. But I will never permit Kelley to practise his deceit on her! – Here thou must make thy stand, John Dee, here is the limit of thy errors and betrayal of the secret of the Baphomet! – –

  Would that I had never written down my dreams! – How true is the wisdom of the old adepts: do not tell your dreams, even to paper, or they will become reality. Has he not become a reality, the man that I dreamed of with his ears cut off? Now he is revealed to me in all his filthy nakedness – my house guest and companion in fortune, Edward Kelley. And again and again I find myself thinking of Bartlett Greene and Mascee, both robbers of the dead and desecrators of graves and both instruments from beyond of the vengeance of St. Dunstan. I am the victim of a strange trick of fate that sent me the ivory spheres that they should be transformed into iron balls, chained to my ankles like those a criminal has to drag after him. – – –

  Now the Pole, Lasky, with a fair note from the Queen, has sent for myself and Kelley to come to the court and conjure up the Green Angel in a solemn sitting – because the Polish princeling has had an attack of the gout and we are to conjure up the immortal spirit to find a remedy for his over-indulgence in port wine!

  Oh, everything is taking the course I foresaw: doubt and confusion! Deprivation and want! Dishonour and destruction!

  The order of the Queen makes refusal impossible and we must hasten to London. – – – Our reception at court was most welcoming, but at what cost to my soul!

  Elizabeth insisted that we hold a sitting immediately; no visible apparitions came, but two spirits spoke through the mouth of Kelley, calling themselves Jubandalace and Galbah, and they promised the Pole that he would not only soon recover his health but would also become King of the Turks. Elizabeth could hardly repress a laugh, and I could see how she was tempted to start the old game of cat and mouse with me and what fiendish pleasure it gave her to see me teetering on the brink of shame and ridicule.

  What is it that drives her to such acts? – How unfathomable are the ways of Providence! – Is this the fulfilment of the mystic, spiritual union that was pledged between us? – Is this the end of my road to Baphomet, who bears the crown and the eternal radiance of the crystal? – –

  The only means by which I managed put a stop to this was by beseeching my old friend Leicester to use his influence to have the sessions in London stopped. Otherwise, I am sure, the spirits would have ended up promising Lasky the crown of this island and dominion over the whole world. Then I was fortunate to find a way to tear the Queen away from her devilish pleasure in my discomfiture. At a private audience I pleaded with her to curb her impatience to consult Kelley’s spirits until I was sure of their nature. I represented to her that the world beyond might harbour diverse beings, including dissembling fiends who could take on the form of angels, so that Her Majesty’s virgin reputation would be at the mercy of such mocking dem
ons. At this the Queen thought long and then asked me if I thought my future invocations of the spirits would bring me more than my earlier plans for the conquest of Greenland?

  I answered with a firm “Yes!” She fixed me with a seaching look as I continued, “Whatever way I choose to spend my life in, I am on a journey of discovery to the land of fulfilment, and shall continue it for as long as these eyes can see the sun. And wherever I strike land, I will raise the flag of my last love and take possession of my Green Land, just as Duke William of Normandy did when he swept across the sea and conquered England.”

  The Queen did not answer. I did not challenge her silence, but I could see her pride was provoked, and I could understand why she resorted to scorn to defend herself:

  “Be that as it may, good Master Dee, it nevertheless gives Us great satisfaction to hear that thy commerce with the world above has not been without its earthly rewards. We hear that these unworldly beings have revealed to thee the philosopher’s stone and the secret of the preparation of the tincture for making gold.”

  I was no little astonished at this revelation, for I had kept my alchymical experiments hidden from everyone and could not understand how the Queen had come to hear of them. Nothing daunted, however, I answered frankly, for I suddenly saw the opportunity of solving all my difficulties. I told Her Majesty, therefore, that so far all my efforts to transmute metals had been vain and that my sole earthly reward had been the loss of my fortune.

  At that Elizabeth seemed to respond as if her heart, usually so cold, had been touched by human feeling, and she asked me if I needed help from her privy purse.

  I did not want to appear before her as a beggar, and so I answered with the last remnants of my pride that I would not abuse my Mistress’ favour, but that I would remember her words should my need become greater. – – –

  Now we have finally escaped the bustle of the city and are back in the peace and quiet of Mortlake where I can resume my alchymical experiments.

  I did not have to wait long for further misfortune: during one of the experiments the whole laboratorium exploded. It was a miracle that I myself was unharmed, but there are wide cracks in the castle walls and it has so aroused the superstitious hate of the peasants that I hourly expect some kind of attack, for they have sent word that they will no longer suffer the Devil to remain in their midst. – My time here is almost over.

  The Green Angel heaps promise upon promise, each one more definite, more confident than the other: all approaches its final fulfilment, it says. But we all know that help is too late; our ruin is imminent.

  We had a final discussion of the situation with Kelley and came to the conclusion that we should not use any more of the red powder to make gold to pay for our needs, but should leave the country as quickly as possible and head for Bohemia where we could take up our work again under the protection of the Emperor Rudolf, himself a famous adept of the royal art, as were many of his noble friends; we had all the more prospect of success as we would be able to give the suspicious Habsburg a demonstration of the transmutation of metals before his very eyes, thanks to the remaining few grains in St. Deniol’s ivory spheres. There in Prague we would have to make one final effort to discover from the book how to prepare the Stone, which would put an end to all our misery and open up the path to glory and fortune. There is no doubt at all that a successful alchymist enjoys much more favourable conditions in Prague than in England with its ungrateful Queen.

  With my wife Jane I spent a long time weighing up the advantages and disadvantages of the step, for it was a wrench for me near to my sixtieth year to have to flee my native land once more; but the Green Angel had given the order to leave England for the Emperor Rudolf’s court in such promising terms that I resolved to hesitate no longer. As if heaven itself wanted to give me a sign that I had made the right choice, yesterday I received a letter from Prince Lasky in Poland in which he invited me in the most flattering terms to stay with my wife, and Kelley as his guest on his estates for as long as it should please us. He would of course bear the cost of the journey, and beyond that he offered me a generous salary. My pleasure in the letter was short-lived: the very next morning there were notes threatening to set fire to the castle and murder us all nailed to the door. That is too much; I cannot endanger the lives of my loved ones. Should I call on the magistrates for help? There would be no point, they would leave me in the lurch. I sense only too clearly that behind the peasants’ uprising powerful enemies are concealed who wish me evil and seek my ruin. I must take the initiative myself! – – – No money has come from Lasky,and the situation has worsened, so that I have had to approach Elizabeth for help through Leicester’s mediation. What more do I care! I have no pride left to lose. I will not be responsible for the murder of my wife and child! – – –

  A messenger came from Elizabeth today and brought me forty gold nobles and a note wherein she answers my complaint that both our house and our lives are insufficiently protected: her power, she says, is no more than that of the appointed magistrates. Moreover she is surprised that the apparition, in whom I place so much trust, is not a better Guardian Angel than herself, a mere earthly ruler – – – and more such cold mockery.

  Now therefore all has been settled and the arrangements have gone ahead in secret; we have kept our baggage to the minimum so that the journey may be done as cheaply as possible. Everything that I leave behind here in Mortlake, as well as the unknown future that lies ahead of us, I commit into the hands of the all-merciful power of heaven. – – –

  Today, the 21 September, 1583, the day of departure has arrived. A carriage has been ordered so that we can leave the house quietly before sunrise and we hope to reach Gravesend before dark. – – –

  Last night a mob of peasants and vagrants were rioting outside the castle walls and a burning torch was thrown into the closed courtyard, but my old servant stamped it out. During our flight we managed with great difficulty to evade another rabble of troublemakers in the early morning mist. – – –

  O my God, it is as I have described it here in my diary: flight! Behind me lies everything that was mine and that linked our family name with England: Mortlake is abandoned to the attacks of the mob, perhaps will fall even before I have left the inhospitable shores of my native land. – – –

  My eyes, dim with age, have seen the burning of Mortlake! Black clouds hang on the horizon over the place where the castle lies hidden behind the hills. Black clouds of billowing smoke – the inhabitation of demons puffed up with their own venom! – swirl in a witches’ sabbath around the former abode of peace. The evil spirits of the past have descended like vultures – let them eat their fill. May they gorge themselves with the sacrifice and forget me in their orgy of desecration! – There is only one thing for which I deeply grieve: my beautiful library, my books which were so dear to my heart. The avenging demons will spare them just as little as the rabble in its ignorance. There were amongst those books many that were unique, the last of their kind on earth. A burnt offering of profound wisdom! True instruction going up in smoke! Dissolve back into the fire whence you came: noble words are wasted on beasts. Better to burn with an eternal flame and be borne up home to the source of the everlasting fire!

  For a whole hour I have been sitting at my desk with the last page of John Dee’s Private Diary in my hand. I have seen the castle in Mortlake burn as if I were standing there outside it myself. It was more alive than anything you see in your mind whilst reading.

  Several times, on a sudden impulse, I have stretched my hand out to the drawer where the papers from my cousin’s legacy are kept, but each time I do so my arm seems to go limp and I cannot bring myself to take out another document that might provide more details. More details? What on earth for? To stir up more clouds of mouldy dust? To dig up the past? When everything has taken on an immediacy so brilliant it is almost dazzling? It would be much better if I could make use of the intense peacefulness that cocoons me at this moment. Sitting here in m
y study, I feel as if I am cut off from the world and yet not alone – as if I were somewhere in empty space, outside human time. –

  I am no longer in any doubt at all: John Dee, my ancestor, lives! He is present, he is here, here in this room, here by my chair, by me – perhaps within me! – I will put it down in plain, unambiguous words: it is probable that – that I am John Dee ... perhaps always have been ... have been from the very beginning, without knowing it! What do I care how that can be?! Is it not sufficient that I feel it with indescribable clarity and precision? There are, anyway, many theories and examples from all sorts of areas of modern science which back up, explain, categorise what I have experienced and give it a learned name-tag: there is schizophrenia, split personality, dual consciousness, not to mention various parapsychological phenomena. What is ridiculous is that it is the lunatic doctors who concentrate on such matters – and in their ignorance they label anything as mad which doesn’t fit into their neat little pigeon-holes.

  I have examined myself and declare that I am completely sound of mind. But enough of such protestations: I do not need them and the psychiatrists, those know-all moles of the human psyche, can go to hell, for all I care!

  So: John Dee is not dead; he is a – let’s call it a transcendental personality, which expresses and tries to realise itself through clear desires and goals. It may well be that this life force has been transmitted through the secret channels of the blood, but that is a minor matter. If we imagine the immortal part of John Dee as pulsing through these channels like an electric current through a wire, then I am at the end of the wire and the electrical impulse that is John Dee is building up within me with all his awareness of the world beyond. But that is of no interest! A thousand explanations are possible, but none can replace the terrible intensity of the experience. Mine is the mission; mine is the goal and the crown and Baphomet realised! If ... if I am worthy! If I am steadfast! If I am prepared. Eternal triumph or disaster – it all depends on me, the last of the line!