Bartlett Greene could hardly wait for me to awake to myself! Not long ago he was here, standing behind my desk, in the belief that the mystical union between myself and his prey, John Dee, was already consummated. That was foolish, Bartlett Greene. You sought evil and worked for good, just as you devils of the left hand always do. You only speeded up my awakening, Bartlett Greene, you opened my eyes and sharpened them to the wiles of your ancient mistress from Scotland and to the abyss of the black cosmos. I welcome you, Lady of the Cat, always the same in your many guises! – Black Isaïs, Sissy, Princess Assja Shotokalungin. I know you. I have followed your way through timelessness from the moment you became a succubus feeding off my unfortunate ancestor until the day you sat here and demanded the spearhead of me. Behind her demand was a magic suggestion which I did not understand because it remained hidden from me. She cannot destroy the woman still sleeping within me, the royal “Elizabeth”, because the magic future cannot be harmed as long as it has not become present, but she desires to take possession of the active male principle in me, and so to foil the coming “Chymical Marriage”! There will come a final reckoning between us!
Friend Lipotin offered his services before I could understand him. He called himself a descendant of the “Tutor to the Czar”. He called himself, if only implicitly, Mascee. So be it; for the meantime I will believe him.
And what of my drowned friend Gärtner? I will ask the green glass, Lipotin’s present here in front of me, and I know that Theodor Gärtner will step out from the mirror with a smile on his face, light himself a cigar, lean back comfortably in his chair and say, “Don’t you know me any more, John, old friend? Me, your friend Gardner, your assistant? Who warned you? Who unfortunately warned you in vain? But we know each other now, don’t we, and this time you will listen to my advice?!”
The only one missing is Edward Kelley, the charlatan with the cut off ears, the seducer, the medium: the man from John Dee’s age who in our century has become a cancer that has multiplied a thousand times and grows and grows, even though it has no self any more. The medium! The bridge to the beyond and to Black Isaïs!
I am curious to see when this Kelley will bow his way into my life so that I can tear the mask of time from his face! – I am ready for anything, Kelley, whether you appear as a ghost in true spiritualist manner or as a vagrant prophet preaching in the street outside.
And that leaves: Elizabeth. – – –
I must admit that I am seized with a fit of trembling which makes it impossible for me to write down the thoughts beginning to surface in my mind. My brain is in turmoil. However hard I try, all my thoughts, all my ideas disappear into a swirl of mist when my mind turns to “Elizabeth”. – –
That was the point I had reached in my reflections – reflections part confident, part despairing – when I was surprised by the sound of a violent altercation, which started out by the front door and grew louder as it approached my room.
Then I recognised the two competing voices: the brusque and imperious exclamations of Princess Shotokalungin, falling like whip-cracks, and the gentler but no less obstinate tones of my housekeeper, Frau Fromm, who was conscientiously obeying my orders.
I leapt up: the Princess in my apartment! The Princess who only recently had sent a message through Lipotin that she was expecting me to return her visit. ‘Princess Shotokalungin’! – what am I saying? No: the demon of the gruesome rite of ‘Taghairm’, the enemy from the very beginning, the ‘Lady Sissy’ of my cousin, John Roger, the woman of the waning moon; she is coming back onto the attack.
A wild joy surged through my veins, setting each nerve-end alight: welcome, welcome, you come to the ignominy of defeat, ghost-woman! – I am in the mood – I am ready! -
And with a few quick steps I was at the door; I pulled it open and called out, making the reproach in my voice as mild and friendly as possible:
“It’s all right, Frau Fromm! You can let the lady enter. I’ve changed my mind. I’m quite happy to receive her. – Do come in!”
Frau Fromm shrank back as the Princess swished past her towards me, breathing deeply and audibly as she turned her irritation into a gently mocking greeting:
“I am quite astonished, my dear friend, to find you living in such strict retirement! But penitent or saint, I still think you can make an exception for a friend who has been longing to see you. Don’t you agree?”
Frau Fromm was still leaning against the wall, glassy eyed and scarcely breathing – some inner chill sent repeated tremors through her body; I signalled to her that all was well and with a wave of the hand invited the Princess into my study. Just as I was closing the door behind me I saw Frau Fromm raise her hands towards me with a sudden movement. I nodded to her again, with a smile that said she was not to worry.
Then I was sitting opposite Princess Shotokalungin.
She bubbled with charming reproaches: I must have misunderstood her determination the last time we had met and avoided her for that reason and that
