distracting. Real — nice.’
‘Aha! Turns you on? Like this?’
‘Not so wild. More regular. Like a truth table. Say if left was true and right was false — like this.’ He took her eyebrow pencil and wrote on the kitchen table:
She tried it again, and Roderick began to relax and enjoy relaxing. ‘Maybe a longer sequence,’ he murmured. Just then the sun was eclipsed by a tall building, the Kratwel Tower.
‘I knew it! I knew it was no good!’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Ida. ‘We can use an electric light — no? Okay then maybe a sunlamp?’
‘No! No, just forget about it, forget—’
‘Wait. There’s one place in town where the sun will be up for at least an hour, the big hill in Beauregard Park. Come on, I’ll finish fixing my face in the taxi.’
The taxi dropped them at the foot of the hill, and they hurried up it, Ida carrying her shoes to keep them nice. When they reached the top they were facing a sheet of burning gold.
‘Look at that sky, Rod! Just look!’
‘Yeah, yeah.’ Roderick grabbed her purse and pawed through it looking for her compact. Powder spilled as he fumbled it out and thrust it into her hand. ‘Come on, come on.’
They sat on the warm grass and Ida, following the truth tables he’d scribbled in the taxi, gave him:
‘Just let yourself go,’ she said soothingly. ‘Go on, go on.’
‘I’m… afraid I’ll drain my battery…’
‘Don’t worry about anything, just let it all go, lover. Let it all go. Let go.’
Roderick had never felt anything like this strange, pleasant numbness that was engulfing him. His mind seemed to be thrusting and thrusting at some barrier, then pushing deeper into warm darkness, layer after deep layer until it reached the golden fire explosion.
He drowsed, then, only half-aware of Ida’s leaving for her evening at the Escorial. When he awoke it was getting dark. There was a kleenex beside him with a note in eyebrow pencil: ‘Told you so! Love, I.’
Christ, what had he done? Used her, that’s what, used Ida like a kleenex or a mirror, to rub his own disgusting mind against the world and take crude pleasure from the friction. His first friend, his first real friend. Now he knew he could never face her again. Hadn’t even told her how nice she looked. Hadn’t even stopped a second to look at the sky, her sky, pure gold like Ida herself. No, he was just a — an animal automaton, a cheap clockwork gimmick to wind up and run down. He was despicable.
Roderick flung away the tissue and started walking down the hill. Halfway down, the path was blocked by a man carrying a sign:
There seemed to be no way around the man, so Roderick stopped.
‘Brother.
‘Okay. Mind if I get past?’
‘Brother, a moment. Stop and reflect. Stop and reflect. Have you read my sign?’
‘Yes but—’
‘Notice anything unusual about it?’
‘No. Except that it’s written backwards. Now can I—’
‘In
Something about the man’s emphasis made Roderick shudder. He looked into the wild eyes. ‘You, uh, saw me up on the hill?’
‘With the lady, yes. Playing with a mirror. Ah, how little ye know, for ye stood on the path to paradise, and took not a step.’
It seemed certain that the man knew his terrible secret, but Roderick had to be sure. ‘Can you explain that?’
‘Come to our meeting tomorrow night.’ The man pressed a tract into his hand. ‘The address is on the back. Come all ye faithful!’
Was the man mocking him? He stood aside, and as Roderick passed, said, ‘All will be made clear. St Paul said, “We see as in a glass, darkly,
Roderick managed to murmur thanks and take the tract home. There he found he could only read it by holding it up to a mirror.
Have you looked at yourself in a mirror lately?
Oh, not just to comb your hair, but to
yourself. Look now. Do you like what you see?
The decay of the flesh, the marks of age, even
the ravages of sin?
Roderick saw the ravages of sin, and read on. The tract explained that all Nature was made symmetrical by God, and for a hidden purpose: Mirrors contained the whole of the world outside, showing (if darkly) the truth. No one can hide the truth from his mirror, any more than the mirror can hide his lies from him.
Have you ever thought, that when you look at your
reflection in mirror,
‘God sees dog,’ Roderick joked, and almost at once wondered whether his reflection would find this so funny. What if this mirror stuff was true? He read on:
The eyes are the mirrors of the soul, the tract explained. St Paul speaks of mirror-seeing. Reflection is highly prized in all religions. The God of the ancient Hebrews was YAWAY, a name readable in a mirror. Didn’t all this add up to something? Surely the incredible symmetry of all Nature was no accident, but part of a plan, a manifestation of God. The left side of every creature was
It did, said the tract. God wanted us to preach his gospel not only among ourselves, but to those of His creatures trapped on the Other Side — to the people within mirrors. Incredible as this might at first sound, there was evidence of this DIVINE PLAN everywhere: in Nature, in the Bible, and especially within ourselves. Only if the gospel were carried into looking-glass land, could we be sure of turning the message of the world (‘EVIL’) into the message of the mirror (‘LIVE!’)
This tract was printed by the Church of Christ Symmetrical. All strangers, and their reflections, were welcome.
‘We should be honoured, he decided to pay us a visit. Welcome!’ Mr Danton grabbed Roderick’s ear and
