Mystical Paths. Susan Howatch
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but the word ‘escape’ in Christian’s last sentence was now reverberating compellingly in my mind. I heard myself say: ‘I wouldn’t mind getting away for a while. But my father would worry about me if I went off into the blue on my own, and I’d worry if I knew he was worrying.’
‘Obviously in that case the travel would need to be structured in some way which would win his approval and enable him to relax. How about doing voluntary work overseas for a Christian organisation? You’d be in the company of responsible people, and he’d recognise the work as useful experience for someone who planned to be a clergyman.’
This struck me as such a brilliant suggestion that for a moment I was speechless with excitement. A vision of change blazed through my psyche. No more living with the Community and enduring their prim piety. No more feeling tethered to Starrington Manor. I could take two years off, just as if I were doing National Service, and work for a Christian organisation in … The word ‘Africa’ floated across my mind. Exotic, exciting Africa which I had longed to visit ever since I had seen Stewart Granger in King Solomon’s Mines. Distant Africa, where no one would have heard of Jonathan Darrow, the famous spiritual director, and Martin Darrow, the famous actor. Africa, Africa, Africa … I could almost hear the drums beating to lure me on my way.
‘That’s cool,’ I said to Christian. ‘A great suggestion. Thanks.’
He finished stirring the new batch of sea-green poison and smiled at me. Then he said idly: ‘Beware of getting too tied up with that father of yours. Are you sure you really want to be a clergyman?’
Instantly the Dark began to creep into the room. It appeared stealthily, eerily, billowing around Christian so that he became a shadowed figure, sinister and subversive, a skeleton cloaked in black, a nightmare from some medieval vision in which ‘The Dark’ appeared not as a poisonous cloud but as a horned creature bent on destruction. I saw no horned creature but I felt that poisonous cloud, and as soon as I felt it I knew what it was, I just knew, I experienced ‘gnosis’, the knowledge that was special.
I stood facing Christian across the kitchen table while the party roared above us, and as the moment of ‘gnosis’ hit me I knew there was something very wrong with him, I knew that his psyche was far out of alignment, utterly dislocated, and that the Dark was streaming into him through every fissure of his personality. Yet never had Christian seemed kinder to the man so many years his junior, and never had his words seemed more charming and benign.
The Dark was now a huge pressure on my psyche and I knew I had to blast myself free. ‘Yes, I do want to be a priest,’ I said. ‘I want to serve Jesus Christ –’ Instantly the pressure eased as I opened up the scene to the Light ‘– and nothing on this earth is going to stop me.’
‘Well done!’ said Christian at once without a trace of condescension. Moving away from me with the jug of poison in his hands, he began to mount the stairs. ‘In that case I can only wish you the best of luck and every success in the Church.’
In silence I followed him upstairs, the glass of lime juice still clutched in my sweating palm.
V
‘I’m not at all sure you’ve got this right,’ said my father when I returned home and confided in him. Any manifestation of the Dark was always so horrifying, reeking as it did of death and disintegration, that my strongest instinct was still to seek sanctuary in his cottage, and as usual in such circumstances my father moved to reassure me by speaking very calmly. ‘I’m not at all sure you’ve got this right …’ He often said that, but now I found the words not soothing but irritating. I didn’t want my judgement queried. I knew what had happened. Having recognised that the Devil was infiltrating Christian I wanted to know how to deal with this knowledge. How could I get Christian to an exorcist? How could I dare to face him in future? How could I be sure that the Devil wouldn’t send a demon to infest me as the result of the scene in the kitchen when I’d defied him by declaiming the name – and thus invoking the power – of Christ? (I should perhaps apologise at this point for using old-fashioned picture-language, but some realities are almost impossible to express verbally without the liberal use of symbols.) All these questions seemed to me to be very urgent, yet as far as I could see my father was far from brimming over with the desire to answer them.
‘Father, it’s no use you saying: “I’m not at all sure you’ve got this right.” I know I’ve got it right, I know I have –’
‘You “know” no such thing! You’ve just jumped to a conclusion. Do please try not to be so arrogant, Nicholas!’
‘I’m not being arrogant!’
The generation gap began to yawn between us again.
‘Can we both make an effort to keep calm?’ said my father. ‘If we start upsetting each other we’ll get nowhere. Now let’s review your story carefully. You say that the Devil was infiltrating Christian – or perhaps you would be using the traditional language more accurately if you said that Christian was being attacked by demons who were paving the way for their master to take possession of his soul. Very well. But this is a big claim to make and it would be wise to proceed with considerable caution before reaching such a diagnosis. Remember that the gift for recognising the presence of either God or the Devil – the charism of the discernment of spirits – is seldom granted to someone of limited spiritual experience.’
Obstinate old fogey. I tried to be patient. ‘But I can pick up the vibes in my psyche and then I know, it’s “gnosis”.’
My father began to get upset again. ‘That’s a delusion. That’s the Gnostic heresy in its most insidious form – the belief that you’re one of an elite which has special access to God and special knowledge of spiritual mysteries. You’re confusing psychic power with spiritual power, Nicholas, but it’s quite possible to be psychically strong yet spiritually weak. Psychic powers must always be the servant of the personality, never the master, and all such powers should be offered with humility to God, not flaunted to boost one’s self-esteem.’
‘I know all that, Father –’
‘You’re not behaving as if you know. You’re being very proud and wilful, Nicholas.’
Wilful! Another of those awful Victorian adjectives. I wanted to bang my head against the wall in exasperation. ‘Okay, okay, okay!’ Mustn’t upset the old boy. He might die. Taking a deep breath I grasped my knees so tightly that my knuckles ached and said in my most soothing voice: ‘You tell me what really happened during that scene with Christian.’
My father sulked for a moment but then said evenly enough: ‘First of all I would survey the background, and the first fact I notice is that he’s taking an interest in you. Why? Possibly it’s because as an Oxford don he deals with many young men of your age and he’s intrigued because you’re unusual. This is the most obvious explanation, although one could be more cynical and theorise that he wanted to see me and realised that cultivating you was the best way of getting what he wanted. Perhaps originally both explanations were true. Now, this second reason for his interest might be classified as self-centred, even ruthless, but I certainly wouldn’t call it demonic, and since he’s still willing to be friendly to you even though I’ve refused to see him, his interest at present would appear to be wholly benign.’
‘Yes, but –’
‘Wait. Let’s take this one step at a time. The next thing I notice is that he makes a most interesting suggestion: he proposes that you should do the Christian equivalent of National Service before you proceed to theological college. If you did want to do this, I must tell you that I certainly shouldn’t oppose it. I firmly believe that the more experience young priests have of the world the better, and I often think, looking back, that I was ordained too young. Of course I should miss you dreadfully if you were away for a long time, but that’s irrelevant. It would be very wrong indeed if I selfishly kept you hanging around here with the result that your growth to maturity was impeded. You’re got your own life to live. You must live it.