Babylon

by Richard Calder

  ‘Ain’t that your ol’ mate?’ said Cliticia, glancing across the road. It was Lizzie. An omnibus passed by, and when I looked again, Lizzie had disappeared. ‘Wot an Elephant and Castle,’ she added. ‘Wot a complete Berkshire Hunt.’ The jingle of an unseen organ broke out and a gruff, hoarse voice began to sing a few snatches of ‘Duck-legged Dick’. The commotion drowned out any further slanders.

  We continued westwards. Within minutes we had reached the big Goddess temple that gave the surrounding district its name. It had been built around one of London’s main interdimensional Gates, and a pair of magnificent stone lions guarded its doors. Then we turned into Osborn Street and Brick Lane.

  This was Spitalfields, an area familiarly known as ‘Little Babylon’. It was a place Mum and Dad always told me to avoid, despite the fact that perfectly respectable people patronized its shops. It had its dangers, of course. A significant proportion of the white population still survived by begging, thievery, or by doing piece work for Bryant and May, and consequently lived in the very worst of slums: a network of cheap lodging houses branching off from the main thoroughfare where whole families lived in one room and a single standpipe serviced entire neighbourhoods. But Little Babylon wasn’t like the rookeries you’d find in Old Nichol or Rosemary Lane. After the Black Order had assassinated Tsar Alexander II, Russia had closed its interdimensional Gates, and in the waves of mass emigration that followed thousands of Shulamites had crowded into the two square miles hereabouts. An army of dressmakers, milliners, and fancy-good merchants had followed. These days, despite the surrounding poverty, Spitalfields was a focal point of the rag trade, a little Empire of Fashion.

  I almost came to a halt, so tempted was I to press my nose against the window of an exotic corsetiere’s. But I was ashamed. Ashamed of my ulster, linsey frock, pinafore and black, ribbed-wool hosiery. I could surely never achieve the kind of abdominal extenuation Cliticia possessed. Oh, how jealous I was of her! She was a Spitalfields girl. Pretty as a bird in her canary yellow dress, silk stockings, and button boots. And trim as the proverbial hourglass! How I so wanted to be her friend.

  We crossed the road and walked into Church Street, where Cliticia said her family had rooms. Windows were draped with union flags; lampposts were festooned with crepe; and above my head multicoloured twists of bunting extended across the road from one rooftop to another. It was all, of course, in preparation for tomorrow’s public holiday.

  ‘It looks lovely,’ I said.

  Cliticia grunted. ‘Don’t know why they make all the fuss.’

  ‘But it’s the centenary! A hundred years ago Adam Weishaupt revealed the existence of Modern Babylon!’

  ‘Seems a bloody silly thing to have gone and done, considering all the trouble we’ve ’ad from the Black Order.’

  ‘Well,’ I sighed. ‘We didn’t really have the problem of the Black Order in those days, did we?’ No sooner were the words out of my mouth than I found myself filled with self-doubt. No one really seemed to know too much about the Men, least of all me. ‘Our cult had survived for nearly two thousand years,’ I continued. ‘How could Weishaupt have predicted that things would work out the way they have?’

  ‘Dunno,’ she said. ‘But it sort of sounds like one of those bleedin’ fings the Duenna might ask us to write about, Gawd ’elp us.’ She took a little running kick at another bottle that lay in her path. It ricocheted off the kerb and into the gutter. ‘Don’t get the idea I’m completely stupid.’ She waved her hand through the air, and somewhat regally, too, I thought, like one whose accomplishments are far too numerous to mention, but who is prepared to do so for reasons of noblesse oblige. ‘I know, like, that after the old Babylon fell and the Shulamites retreated off-world, other, secret Gates were opened up—the same ones we use today.’ She cocked her head to one side and looked up at me through the corner of her eyes, expecting, perhaps, some sign of approval.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘That’s very true, of course.’

  ‘I know that Babylon, the new Babylon,’ she continued, more eagerly now, ‘became the centre of an underground religion. Fings were safer in those days, too. I know that’

  ‘Yes,’ I sighed. ‘I suppose they were safer.’

  ‘And, like, in those days—’

  ‘But that was a long time ago,’ I interrupted.

  ‘In those days,’ she continued, ‘you ’ad, like, to be a posh judy to go off-world.’

  ‘Babylon took care to recruit its temple-maidens from the families of kings, courtiers, intellectuals, artists, and financiers.’

  ‘So the Babylonians could ’obnob with the quality.’

  ‘Yes. So the cult could command their allegiance. By the twelfth century, Europe had been infiltrated. Those who wielded influence in Church and State engaged in clandestine Goddess worship.’

  ‘Good for us,’ said Cliticia, in a sarcastic attempt to imitate my accent. ‘Jolly right too. Pip-pip!’

  ‘It remained a secret cult, of course,’ I said. ‘Ishtar helped shape world history, but Her influence was covert.’

  ‘And it was ol’ man Weishaupt ’oo changed all that, yeh?’ It was nice to hear her natural dialect again. Her voice was beautiful. It was hard to believe that she had arrived in London when she was eight. She hadn’t a trace of a Slavic accent. Her cockney vowels combined with a naturally soft, childlike lisp that was perfectly in consonance with her face—a face that, however vulgarly painted, was the face of an angel. I had to restrain myself from bending over and kissing her.

  ‘Yeh,’ I said, imitating Cliticia’s locution. ‘Weishaupt was tired of the ol’ Babylonian strategy of slowly, quietly accumulating power. In the late eighteenth century, when the ancien régime came under increasing pressure from radical forces in France, ’e and others who represented the political axis between Babylon and Earth—the men who were to become known as the Illuminati—revealed Modern Babylon’s existence. And from that juncture in world ’istory, a New Order came into being: the Age of the Third Sargon.’

  I gazed up, enjoying the sight of the multicoloured streamers as we continued to walk along the street.

  ‘Bleedin’ marvellous, ain’t it?’ I said.

  ‘Stop it,’ said Cliticia, giggling.

  I smiled, happy that she was happy. ‘Of course,’ I mused, thinking it unwise to tease her any more and reverting to my own voice, ‘Weishaupt has had his critics.’

  ‘Critics like the Black Order, you mean?’ said Cliticia. ‘Like the Minotaurs?’ The laughter died on her lips and a look expressive of pettishness took its place. ‘Black Order, Minotaurs—I mean, they’re the same fing, ain’t they?’

  Discomfited, I gave a cursory nod. It was W.T. Stead, of course, who had first called the members of the Black Order ‘Minotaurs’. His purpose had been to draw parallels between the contemporary slaughter of the world’s sacred prostitutes and the Greek myth of the Labyrinth at Knossos, where the Minotaur—the monster half man, half bull—devoured an annual tribute of beautiful virgins. Before the publication of his sensationalistic newspaper reports that had deplored the government’s willingness to continue sending young women off-world, the Black Order’s recruits were simply referred to as regicides, revolutionaries, incendiaries or pétroleuses.

  ‘I’m not sure if we should really be talking about them,’ I said, stuffily, and blushing a little.

  ‘Shouldn’t we indeed,’ said Cliticia, with a twinkle in her eye. ‘If that’s the case, I don’t fink we should be talking about the Illuminati, either.’ She raised her voice. ‘Too much talk ain’t wise. Curtsey to ’em, yeh. Throw ’em a party, like we will on Friday. But never rabbit on about ’em.’ Raising her voice still more, she added: ‘Particularly if you’re the kind of girl who ’appens to think about Minotaurs all the time.’ Her gaze darted from door to door. ‘There’re spies everywhere,’ she shouted, in a stentorian, if comic, show of defiance.

  ‘But I don’t think about—’ I bit my tongue. ‘Sorry,’ I said, rather pathe
tically. I couldn’t stand the thought of us falling out, not now we were at last together.

  Cliticia giggled. ‘You’re mad you are, really mad.’

  We stopped outside number seventeen. Like the other houses in the street it had three floors, a basement, and a garret, and its brick façade was blackened with soot. It stood not more than twenty or thirty yards from The Ten Bells public house on the corner. Towering over us on the opposite side of the road was Christ Church, whose steeple had haunted my dreams.

  There was a small crowd of people outside the church, perhaps to witness a baptism or wedding. Amongst their number, I recognized Salome Jones. Her black straw bonnet was trimmed with beads and yellow velvet. Salome was in the standard below, and was a descendant of Shulamites who had been living in Spitalfields, Whitechapel, and Bethnal Green since the Middle Ages, when all about was countryside.

  Then, looking across the busy thoroughfare of Commercial Street, I spied Dorset Street, where the last outrage had occurred in Miller’s Court.

  ‘That poor girl,’ I whispered.

  ‘Wot? Salome Jones?’

  ‘No, I mean—’

  ‘Oh, that one,’ said Cliticia, whose gaze had followed my own.

  ‘Mary Jane Kelly,’ I said.

  ‘Marie Jeanette,’ said Cliticia, correcting me. She flicked a stray ringlet out of her eye. ‘Yeh. She was born ’ere, like the Nichols woman. She was only twenty-five—just been pensioned off. Disgusting, innit? But that weren’t no Minotaur that did ’er,’ she added, with sudden passion. ‘Anybody who says so is a bloody liar. Minotaurs don’t do that sort o’ fing.’

  She swung about, took a key from her pocket, unlocked the door to number seventeen, and pushed it open.

  We entered.

  In the hallway were five dirty-faced little girls. ‘My sisters,’ said Cliticia. They were clustered around a pile of crinkled playing cards, interrupted, perhaps, in a game of snap. ‘No gambling, now,’ said Cliticia. The children scowled. I had the feeling that no one in this house was accustomed to being admonished.

  We ascended the stairs. ‘I’ve got an older sister, too,’ she continued, looking down at me from over her shoulder. ‘She’s in Babylon, at Temple Ereshkigal. That’s one of the oldest temples there is. It’s swanky—really top-drawer. She’ll be ’ome on leave soon. You can meet ’er if you like. She has lots of stories to tell. Real educational they are as well, right up your street.’ A day or two ago, I would have thought she was making fun of me. But today—strange as it might seem—Cliticia seemed to be trying to impress. ‘She’s a laugh as well, of course, and no mistake. A real bleedin’ caution is our Gabrielle.’

  As we reached the landing I glanced back at the children. They still sat in a circle on the tiled floor. And, more than ever, they resembled a shop-window display of rag dolls. One moppet, dressed in a torn, crinolined party frock, returned my gaze, looking up at me through fantastically long, dirt-caked lashes. She would go to Babylon, too, of course, in time. They all would. And better that than nights out at the penny gaff, I thought. Better that than a life of desperate tedium.

  ‘Mum does all right,’ said Cliticia, as she reprised her attempt to show me that she could be as ‘respectable’ as a girl from Wilmot Street. ‘She works at the Eagle, in City Road. None of it interferes with her pension, of course. Just as well. With seven girls, ’er pension amounts to a tidy ol’ sum.’ But then Shulamite pride asserted itself, and respectability went out the window. ‘Yeh. There’s brass in girl-babies all right, specially these days, what with the need to repopulate Babylon and keep the temples up to the knocker. And that’s where a job like Mum’s comes in real ’andy—absolutely tons of stage-door Johnnies!’ In time, when she had got to know me better, and would understand that I didn’t mean to condescend, I would tell her how she had no need to try to impress me, and that, on the contrary, it was always me who had wanted to impress her. ‘She’s a dancer. A good one, too. She’s worked with Marie Lloyd.’ She tut-tutted. ‘Marie Lloyd: y’know, she was earning an ’undred quid a week when she was our age.’

  But my thoughts were all upon her sisters. ‘Is it true then?’ I asked. I immediately cursed myself.

  ‘Is what true?’

  ‘Nothing, I mean—’ I could hardly retract. ‘Shulamites only ever seem to have sisters. And people say that—’

  ‘Infanticide?’ said Cliticia, incredulously. ‘Wot, killing off the boy babies ’cause they don’t bring in any dosh? That’s a wicked fing to say, Maddy, it really is, and I don’t care if you ’ave ’eard it from others.’ She simmered a little, and then quickly cooled down, to finally give a brief, nervous laugh. ‘I told you before: don’t believe all what you read in the papers. Shulamites never ’ave boys. Or ’ardly ever. Don’t know why, but that’s the way it is. The way it’s been for thousands of years.’ She shook out her curls. ‘You might say it’s in our blood,’ she concluded, rather self- importantly. ‘Our black... poisonous... blood.’

  She pulled another key from her pocket, unlocked the door to her rooms, and stepped inside. I followed her. ‘Anyway, that’s ’ow we got to afford this place.’ And how nice it was, how different from the tawdry lodgings of so many families in Spitalfields. ‘It’s true, I never knew who me Dad was. That’s a problem most of us Shulamites ’ave.’ She threw up her hands. ‘But that’s life. When a temple-maiden retires she gets paid to ’ave baby girls, not to get soddin’ well married,.'

  I followed her into a room the Lipskis evidently used as a parlour, and then into Cliticia’s bedroom.

  ‘I ’ave to share it with the three youngest, of course—Bibi, Blaise, and Babiche. Gabrielle—’er off-world—is the only one who’s ever ’ad a room to ’erself. But it’s all right.’ She turned to me and smiled. ‘We’ll all ’ave our own rooms when we get to Babylon, won’t we? Big, posh rooms, too.’

  ‘I know,’ I said, smiling back. ‘We’ll live like a couple of swells.’ A huge oak wardrobe stood against one wall.

  ‘I bet you have lots of nice things,’ I said. I inspected myself, running a hand down my linsey bodice. ‘You’re a bit of a swell already. But me?’ My bodice was dowdy, but my hair was even worse. Cliticia, on the other hand, sported one of the latest Piccadilly bangs; her chignon was adorned with lace and tiny artificial flowers; and the puffs, ringlets, and coils that fell over her ears must have taken hours of application with curling tong and comb. I sat down on the edge of the bed and took off my bonnet. ‘I’ve always wanted a French twist,’ I said.

  She placed her hands on her hips and gave me a long, appraising look. ‘Why don’t you tight-lace?’ she said, frowning a little. She walked to the wardrobe and, after throwing open the doors, took a corset from its hanger. ‘Try it on.’ She saw me hesitate. ‘Go on, don’t be shy.’

  ‘I couldn’t. Really.’

  ‘Look,’ she said. ‘You’re a Shulamite, ain’t you? A born one?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, a little confused. ‘I told you I was. I mean—’

  ‘Then act like one,’ she said, not unkindly. She placed the corset next to me on the bed, and then fell to unhooking her dress. 'Look, I’ll go first.’ The dress slipped off her shoulders, and she stood revealed in corset, chemise, stockings, and drawers. ‘What kind of stays are you wearing at the moment?’

  Reluctantly, I rose, took off my ulster, laid it on the bed, and then unhooked my own dress. Soon, I was as near naked as Cliticia.

  ‘You’re wearing jumps,’ said Cliticia, her jaw visibly dropping. 'You don’t want to wear jumps, darling.’ Her incredulity disappeared in an explosion of laughter. ‘A Shulamite wearing jumps! Gawd bless us!’

  ‘Mum made it for me,’ I said, flushing. The loathsome thing was khaki. It had good whalebone in it, but it was otherwise constructed of buckram with stay-silk from the local haberdashers. I’d begged Mum to let me have decent stays. There were some really nice pieces of juvenile corsetry available after all and I’d had my eye on something by Symington called ‘The
Pretty Housemaid’. But people didn’t like to see girls my age tight-laced. Sometimes they didn’t like to see any girl tight-laced. They called it ‘vicious dressing’.

  The corset on the bed was a Shulamite corset. It was satin and shimmered pale blue in the oblique rays of light that shone through the casement window.

  ‘It’s French,’ said Cliticia. ‘Look at the label.’ I looked. It said ‘La Petite Salope.’

  Cliticia walked over to me. She ran a finger down my stay laces. ‘Come on. Take it off.’ She bent over, retrieved the corset that lay on the bed, and held it up, encouragingly. ‘And try this on. You won’t be sorry.’

  I removed the jumps and wrapped the silky, Shulamite corset around my waist. ‘Lace me,’ I said, turning my back to her and feeling her take the strain. She tugged and I gasped as the steel busk dug into my abdomen. And then the whalebone pinched, squeezed, compressed and finally began to crush my viscera. The blood rushed to my face in a flood of tingly excitement.

  ‘It’s an S-line corset,’ said Cliticia, as she continued her task of cincturing my waist into a skinny little isthmus that joined the great landmasses of my bosom and hips. ‘It gives you an S-shaped spine.’

  When she had finished, I was encased in a gin of whalebone and steel, a farrago of ribs and metal catches.

  ‘What an ’andsome tournureit gives you,’ said Cliticia. She gave my bottom a little pat. ‘That’s the real fing. The real cul de Paris.’

  I stood before the mirrors set in the wardrobe doors. The corset had changed my posture quite dramatically. With my spine distorted into the radical ‘S’ shape that Cliticia had spoken of, I was a glorious perversion of female form, all thrusting bosom and wildly projecting hindquarters. And yet the corset made me seem childlike, too. My twenty-two inch waist had been reduced to eighteen inches. Any smaller, and it would have resembled Dulcie’s, whose diminutive body was confined in lead-lined and altogether more morbid corsetry deep beneath the earth. Unlike her, of course, I could breathe, if only using the upper portion of my chest. I looked at myself the more. And the more I looked the more my breathing became laboured. It was as if I were sickening of my own beauty, a beauty that, perhaps, would only be complete when, like Dulcie, I breathed no more.