Somnium

by Steve Moore

  ‘Then please me best by being most yourself,’ he told her then. ‘And if you wish to show me palace reconstructed, then show it to me most the way you’d wish to have it. Show me where Diana lives, Diana sleeps, Diana loves. And everywhere Diana goes, I beg you let me kiss her.’

  ‘A bargain, then,’ she smiling said, and pouted for a kiss. And swift as payment was received, she hopped down from his knee. Her little hand it found his own; her toes they pattered on the floor; and so she led him to the theatre’s door.

  Sunday, 14th October 1803

  Last night the inn was packed out in a way I never thought to see. It was Saturday night, of course, and so the musicians gave a dance; but word of Cynthia’s lovelies had obviously spread far and wide besides. And more than this, I thought: with Jude Brown gone, and all his gang, and all the former tavern staff associated with him, it seemed as if The Bull had somehow shrugged off base material form and risen now above its hilltop ground, idealised, partaking of the celestial; while nymphs and angels served up gobletsful of nectar and ambrosia, and all around was Moonlight and cascades of lunar rainbows.

  Half the army seemed to have marched up all the way from Woolwich; a half a legion of civilians had come to join them from the local villages. And all of them they seemed intent on dancing all the night with Flora’s dearest flower-fairies (at least to dance to start with; I suspect their real intentions went considerably further). The lovely maidens being far too few; the soldiers and the locals eyeing each other with mutual disapprobation; an hour or two of ale and wine a-flowing: I frankly expected a riot at any minute, especially as dear Cynthia, who is so sweet, still refused to dance with anyone else than me.

  Yet Flora was magnificent. Her pistols were discharged but twice. Her first ball she put into the wall, to attract the attention of a brawling mob, no less a dozen strong. A drunken corporal, not quite understanding the message of that first shot, received the second. She warned him first precisely what she’d do, and then she shot away his earlobe.

  After that, there was no further trouble.

  It was gone two before we expelled the last-most reveller; I was quite drunk, and darling Cynthia had danced me to exhaustion. The takings from the tap-house alone were, I gather, quite enormous, the Assembly Room yet better, and the musicians were paid a bonus like they’d never seen before.

  I’d thought to stagger to my room, and write a while, then sleep. An innful of the loveliest girls had other ideas for me.

  It seemed that every one of lovely Flora’s blossoms had watched me dance at some point in the evening, and now I was surrounded by prospective partners, all of whom insisted that I drink with them and dance a step or two. They were so lovely, and they giggled so delightfully, and I knew that Cynthia was laughing near at hand and egging them on; for otherwise, I knew, they would not dare to strip down to their fair white petticoats to dance.

  I was not then quite sure what music played or whence it came; but each dance started with a glass of sack, and oh, those darling girls they all were so vivacious. We whirled and twirled and tripped and hugged; I kissed them every one. My dizzy head was full of floral scents, my arms were full of sweet young virgins. I danced with every single one, until I got to Flora, who was so energetic; by then I was so tired and so drunk, I tried to slow her down. I am no longer sure; I think my pawing hands tore even her chemise. I know I saw a pair of lovely breasts, but just as well they may have been my Cynthia’s. I know she took the final dance; I almost think she was quite naked. And yet by then I know that I could hardly see at all, and dancing had, for me, become a little more than being held up in a lovely woman’s arms; the music, I thought, was nothing more than lovely girlish giggles.

  They carried me off to bed; that much I do remember. Nothing more.

  I woke this morning to find they had undressed me.

  Even now, I blush to think of this.

  I dressed and took myself downstairs; it was still early, but all my dancing had left me with an appetite, and for a change I wanted to eat breakfast (surprisingly, my head it did not ache at all; yet I know I drank too much). Everywhere I went within the inn, those lovely girls were waiting there to kiss me fond good morning; and oh, those charming smiles. Every single one of them, I realised, has large brown eyes; though Cynthia’s and my Liz’s are the bigger. If Cynthia’s maids were made to please me quite, they could not have been the better.

  But Cynthia was in her nightdress once again, when at the last I’d kissed my way into the kitchen. I pulled her close and hugged her. She told me then that what I wanted was an omelette; a part of me agreed.

  Before I’d hugged enough, or she could start to cook, a small disturbance at the door distracted us. Dear Flora, she was being Flora once again, but this time even more so; and I never thought to see such a wondrous sight, not even in these modern times. The ‘reverend’ Kinnock, unfortunately now without his gout, arrived this morning to preach his nonsense to I know not who; and dearest Flora put a pistol-ball straight through his boot-heel and sent him hopping on his way, calling absurdly on his Christ, his God and, I’ve no doubt, in time upon his doctor. I laughed and laughed, and threw one arm around slim Flora’s waist, and round beloved Cynthia’s the other, and kissed them both in my delight. I decided then, I would not let them go, the pair of them, until I’d taken them both with me to the tap-house, and called on lovely Rose for claret, to toast in truth the overthrow of God, and of his damnable church; and to call on Goddesses everywhere, and their nymphs, and their priestesses, and the soft beloved sisters of all who worship them, to laugh and dance and kiss and sing for joy, and to say that here and now, upon this strange and Moonish hill, we damn all preachers straight to hell, and all their masculine religion with them, and gods themselves and sons of gods we roast them; and that I (most especially, because I would not ask any other to do what I would not do myself) and we (being those lovely young ladies embraced up in my arms, and more than this, that dearest sister Liz who is never, ever quite removed from out of my beating heart) cry out instead that we love Diana (as the Romans call her, one breast bare) and Selene (as the Greeks, all naked to the waist) and any other lovely Goddess who is of the Moon above, and of its beauty and its charm, and only in her arms is bliss, and that anything besides is nothing, and nothing, and that the world is empty without her, who is beauty, who is beyond description, who is, to any of the masculine sex, just everything.

  And Cynthia looked at me so strangely in my exultation, and smiled a smile that was, somehow, quite small about her lips but enormous in her eyes, and told dear Rose to leave the claret where it was. Instead, she led me then behind the taproom counter and showed me there an earthenware jar that lay upon its side; I thought it vaguely like an amphora, but told myself it could not be. She took a jug, then knocked the plug, and asked me if I would tilt up the jar; and when I did, a brownish ‘white’ wine came thickly pouring out. The jug filled up, the jar replugged, she arranged a dozen glasses on the counter-top, and began to pour. My expression must have been full of questions.

  ‘Falernian,’ she said so soft, and then I know my face was full of disbelief, for I knew full well that genuine Falernian was quite undrunk upon these shores (or anywhere else) for a millennium or more; I mean by this the ancient wine, laid down in jars for 20 years or more, and not the weakling imitation coming now from Italy. More staggering yet, I realised that just last night I’d noted out a section where Diana Regina gives Endimion Lee Falernian there in Somnium; on a page I’ve neither writ nor yet read out to Cynthia. All that apart, I simply knew this could not be old Falernian.

  Such a mischievous smile my dearest Cynthia she had then: spilling out a drop or two of wine as libation on the counter, and then applying to it a taper’s flame. The wine (for wine it was, not spirit; I know that from the drinking) it then caught fire.

  I know not how, but Cynthia Brown-eyes had Falernian, brewed, it must have been, when gilded, marbled Rome still stood and lorded half the world.


  And this, said Cynthia brightly, was the only wine for toasts and libations to Diana, and that if I meant what I had said in my excitement just a moment previous, and would say it now again in duly considered seriousness, then Falernian would be all I drank for ever more. I knew, of course, that drinking Falernian ever after was mere symbol of reward, and the look in her eyes it simply said: ‘renounce!’ Renounce your old god, your religion, your society, all the life that you’ve led heretofore. And fair Diana looked at me through Cynthia’s bright and sparkling eyes, and I know she said: ‘surrender… come to me and lay your head upon my naked breast and dream eternal in my arms, where anything is possible and everything can be done; and I will comfort you, and live with you, and we will love together and forever in the Moonlight, and by starlight, and the light of eternal bliss, even if the world goes mad and the sun turns black and there is nothing more in the eternal night than us.’

  I told her yes, and renounced the world, my body and my soul, and everything except Diana, who is Selene, who is Cynthia, and darling Liz, and all and any that I have ever loved or considered worthy of my love.

  And I drank the Falernian. And damned the rest. The unwashed world can waste in hell. Nineteen Christian centuries are too long; I pray there’ll never be a twentieth.

  And every single one of ‘Flora’s nymphs’ they entered the taproom then. I know not how they knew what had occurred, but suddenly they came and took their glasses, ready-poured, and laughing first for joy, they toasted my ‘conversion’, and then they raised a double toast, to Cynthia and myself, and Cynthia embraced me, and we kissed, and drank that ancient nectar from each other’s lips.

  And after that I simply passed out in sweet Cynthia’s arms, waking only at sunset, to find myself undressed (again, I have to assume by ladies) and put to bed in my normal room. Rising, I found the tavern once more its usual self, though just as packed with drinkers as on previous nights, and Violet at the harpsichord while Iris played the violin, and there was dancing, and revels, and laughing that I had not thought to see again in these tempestuous times.

  Dear Cynthia brought me claret (although I swear it tasted of Falernian) and asked me how I felt. I told her not to worry of my fainting fits; never had I tasted wine quite like that delicious Falernian and, besides, last night my most loved Cynthia and her darling girls had simply tired me out.

  We ate together. An hour later now, I cannot remember what at all, though Cynthia’s presence made it taste quite of ambrosia. I asked her then if she’d excuse me; another evening’s rumbustious entertainment probably would have been too much, and besides I felt I wanted to write. She smiled at me so sympathetic, said she’d see me later, and sent me back upstairs with such a charming kiss. And another bottle of claret.

  And so I’ve spent an hour or more just writing up this journal.

  I confess I’m still perplexed. The ruins down below the cellar simply cannot be, and neither can the Falernian; I do not quite believe dear Flora’s nymphlets either. Are all these like that full Moon night on top of Severndroog?

  Am I mad?

  Not going mad, but mad already.

  The Falernian it may or may not be; the charming girls, I hear their giggles down below. And Somnium’s ruins? I simply do not know. With Jude Brown’s capture and all that’s happened since, we’ve had no chance to return. Yet I think they must be there.

  I am bemused. I thought to make a fiction of the Moon-Goddess’s palace, high up on its sacred hill; which at the same time was Endymion’s cave. Now it seems it’s come to be, and I cannot tell what’s what. Is the cellar that old Latmian cave, and Somnium in The Bull? And who is Cynthia?

  And who am I?

  And why, O Goddess of the Moon above, have I not heard from my Liz?

  Monday, 15th October 1803

  I wrote a small amount of Somnium last night, but halfway through the evening lovely Cynthia came to see how I was getting on. We talked and drank, and then I read her what I’d written. She said the Moon was on my tongue; I said its light was shining in her eyes. She left me when the time came for the inn to close; and so I tried to write again.

  I write now with my door wide open, for no ugly men are left about the inn still to distract me; and charming girls I’ll stop for any time. And so they stop me far too much. All those lovely floral nymphs, they wander through the corridors in night attire, or flimsy robes, or less, a-giggle and adorable, and I can barely think. Especially when dear Cynthia, dressed no more than they, brings me wine and honeyed cakes, and tells me that I should think only of sweet and Moonlit things as I sit and write. And so I always do. But, oh those darling ladies…

  Not long after dawn this dismal rainy morning, they hanged Jude Brown between two other thieves, down there at the foot of the hill. I was so glad it was not up here where the Moon reigns on our sacred peak. The Fox, I’m told, was selling ale and beer before the sun was up, and all the crowd were drunk. They jeered the cart as the men arrived and shouted foul abuse as the nooses they were tightened, sang ribald songs that quite drowned out the priest, and cheered and tossed their hats up in the air as the bench was kicked away. They say Jude Brown abused them till the last. I was just glad I was not there to see it; I did not even like to hear about it later.

  The other two, I gather, when they had finished kicking, were transported back to London town and handed to the surgeons’ apprentices for the cutting. Brown (and I know not whether this is the more merciful or otherwise) now hangs in the Upper Gibbet Field, food for crows. They paraded him past his former home, without a thought at all regarding to his widow, with singing, shouts of exultation and bawdy jokes. We heard them, Cynthia and I, but refused to look; and the dear woman seemed so grim I almost wept for guilt that I had ever thought she might have been the one to betray him. I took her in my arms and sat there hating all the outside world. Indeed, some inhuman members of that rowdy mob that followed Jude Brown’s lifeless shell sought to burst into The Bull in search of further drinks to toast his taking off; only to find the handsome Flora standing there in boots and britches before the tavern’s locked front door, with pistols in her hands and venom in her eyes. She did not have to shoot them; I rather wish she had.

  The inn remained quite closed beyond the hour of dinner. We ate together, all subdued: myself, Cynthia, Flora and all her nymphs; and though none of us could find it in our hearts to say a good word about the late Jude Brown, we all agreed that that barbaric crowd deserved their thirst.

  Yet later in the afternoon, Eustatius Wellbeloved sent up his man to present me with a letter. I thought at first it must be from my Liz, yet when I looked upon the envelope, it was so passing strange.

  The address was as I might expect (my name, though, perhaps a little informal): Kit Morley, Esq., The Bull Tavern, Shooters Hill, Kent… and yet somehow it seemed to be printed on the envelope, not written with a pen. And in one corner, overstamped all blurred in black, a tiny coloured engraving of a woman’s head seemed glued.

  And when I opened it, many sheets of paper were within, and all of them were printed like a book. I simply could not understand it. The first sheet was a letter, and the more I read of this, the more I do confess my head span. I thought it best, then, until I’d tried to understand, to go back to my room; though Cynthia looked at me with questions in her eyes.

  The sender’s address was given as The Palace of Dreams, Shooters Hill, London SE18. I realised at last ‘The Palace of Dreams’ might perhaps have been a private joke in a letter whose recipient would know the writer’s address well enough. But to find that Shooters Hill was now in London, not in Kent, reminded me then of all my future visions. And then I saw the date.

  Friday, 7th November 2003.

  I read it twice or thrice, and looked away, and looked again. And still it said 2003.

  So after that, I had to read the letter.

  Hello Phoebe! it began. How’s my big-eyed girl? I was appalled. Such vulgar over-familiarity. I would not even write the
same to Liz.

  And yet… thinking how I write so much the less of English than Will Shakespeare did, two centuries gone before me, I had to wonder how they’d write two centuries after I was buried in the ground.

  But if I was confused by this, I also had to smile. Whoever he was who’d written the letter (and all my intuition told me that I knew exactly who it was), the Phoebe who he’d written to, she had a lunar name. And so, of course, I had to read the more.

  How’re things down there in Hastings? next the letter asked. Give yourself a hug and kiss from me, and I’ll see you in your dreams.

  I’m still writing, as much as I have the time to, and I thought I’d send you down another little story. Just finished it last night. Of course, you know I can’t write anything about the ghastly present day, so it’s set in late 19th century France. It’s complete in itself, and, naturally, it’s a bit of a distraction from my main work on Somnium—

  Here, of course, I had to stop. Rose, I noticed passing by then in the corridor, and asked if she’d be so kind to bring me up a brandy; but not to tell dear Cynthia. She looked at me so strange.

  By the time she brought the brandy, I’d long forgotten asking for it.

  Except for Liz and all the ladies of the inn, I’d told no one my story was called Somnium, yet here was this apparent ‘future-author’ writing a story called the same. Worse, I somehow had the feeling that the title wasn’t the only thing coincident… that somehow too (though Gods and Goddesses of the Moon and Stars above, I cannot quite tell how) the story too was likely-most the same as well. I had to lie down then, at full stretch on the bed, before I could read on till the end.

  … distraction from my main work on Somnium, though some of the ideas obviously overlap. The young man far from home, the silver castle, the library. I don’t know what I’ll do with this. I wrote it just for fun. But sometimes it occurs to me: I might insert it whole in Somnium. Now isn’t that a mad idea? Let me know what you think when you’ve read it, angel.