Nutscracker
And what were their voices like?
UGLI 666
Humble and sincere.
Nutscracker
What did they say?
UGLI 666
I started telling you that, but you interrupted. They said that in the glorious times of the Holy Crusades, especially after the victory of Gottfried of Bouillon, pilgrims journeyed on foot to the grave of our Lord to repent. Later, when faith grew weaker and the human spirit no longer possessed the strength for such great effort, the site of pilgrimage was relocated to monasteries and abbeys, where people went to pay homage to the local saint. When people’s piety became too weak even for that, they were instructed to walk The League to do penance.
Nutscracker
The League?
UGLI 666
Yes. It’s the old name for the church labyrinth. That’s approximately how long it was. Although the one I was facing was a lot shorter. You were supposed to walk through these labyrinths on your knees. And for the time of ultimate decline that will come just before the end of the world, labyrinths on walls were prepared, really small ones that people go through by tracing the way with their finger. They are for those who are only willing to spend a very small amount of time on their souls. But there are labyrinths that are quite the opposite, endlessly long ones in which you can repent eternally. For instance in the Church of Sta. Maria-di-Trastavera in Rome. The first canon showed me a plan of it.
Monstradamus
He prepared well for the conversation.
UGLI 666
He didn’t prepare for it. The plans of the labyrinths were on the columns and walls of the cathedral. In fact, everything there was covered with them. The one that’s in Sta. Maria-di-Trastavera consists of a large number of circles set inside each other. It looks like a target for shooting practice. It’s the most mystical of all the labyrinths.
Monstradamus
The most mystical one is mine; please enter that in the minutes.
UGLI 666
The second canon explained that the meaning of these circles is that it’s no more possible for the soul to approach the Lord through its own desire than for the moon suddenly to decide to fly closer to the earth. The soul will remain eternally on the plane to which the Lord has sent it, and it will only be able to approach Him through His mercy, and not of its own will. And His mercy is expressed in the existence of the Church. It’s the Church that lends us those mathematical wings we were talking about. Without them we can only circle around Him like the planets. Sin is the centrifugal force that pulls us away from Him. But God’s love is like the force of gravity, because it draws us to Him. The soul dwells in this world below because these forces balance each other.
Nutscracker
So the Lord loves sinners more then?
UGLI 666
Why?
Nutscracker
They have more sins, so their centrifugal force is stronger. For them to stay in orbit, the force of God’s love has to increase to balance it.
UGLI 666
But it happens in families too, that the best-loved children are the naughtiest.
Nutscracker
Then that means, if you want the Lord to love you, pull as many dirty tricks as you can?
UGLI 666
Yes it does, according to logic. But I’m not really sure that’s what the Lord is actually guided by.
Nutscracker
Okay, we’ll check that one out. What happened next?
UGLI 666
Next? The second canon folded his arms and fell silent and withdrew humbly into the shadow. I began walking around the cathedral arm-in-arm with the first one, examining the plans of the various spiritual labyrinths, while the canon quietly explained their function and symbolic meaning to me. I thought the labyrinth from Poitiers Cathedral was particularly beautiful. It’s shaped like a tree with a spreading crown and arranged so that the same threshold serves as its entrance and its exit. It works out like that because the path only divides in two once, at the very centre, and its two halves twist and turn to form the right and left parts of the tree’s crown. The canon said it was the Tree of Life, and the meaning of the labyrinth was that we enter life and leave it through the same door, naked and taking nothing with us.
Nutscracker
And where’s that inscription with the secret message from, the one you asked us to translate?
UGLI 666
From an ancient basilica in Algeria.
Monstradamus
Does it have a labyrinth too?
UGLI 666
Yes. It surrounds a central square containing the holy inscription. The canon told me to copy it out and assured me there was a secret in the inscription. He said I would only be able to read it when I had the key. In exactly the same way, he said, I would not be able to understand the predestined purpose of people and things in this world until the moment when the wisdom that comes with true faith opened my eyes to the transcendental meaning of creation. And the key to that wisdom was the same as the key to the inscription. He also told me not to be seduced by the empty talk about Theseus, which he knows all about. In time, he said, I would see for myself that the true Theseus is the One whom he serves. And that’s all. Is Monstradamus still there?
Nutscracker
Later. Go on with your story.
UGLI 666
I’m not going to tell you any more until he translates for me.
Nutscracker
Monster, are you there? Translate for her, please.
Monstradamus
The whole point is in the way the letters are arranged. In French it’s called a jeu-de-lettres .
UGLI 666
But do you have the key to the inscription the canon was talking about?
Monstradamus
Of course.
UGLI 666
What is it?
Monstradamus
It’s a cross.
UGLI 666
My Lord! Thy will be done!
Monstradamus
Yes. You have to start from the very centre. Find the letter S there and trace a cross through it. If you read the text in any direction of the cross and then along any line from it at right angles, you get SANCTA ECLESIA, which means ‘the holy church’, with one mistake.
UGLI 666
Are you saying the inscription was made with a spelling mistake? Or does the inscription refer to a mistake made by the holy church?
Monstradamus
What I’m saying is there should be two C’s in the word for church – ecclesia. But in olden times they might have thought that was excessive.
Nutscracker
Then what happened, Ugly?
UGLI 666
Wait a moment. Let me see if it works with the letters. It really does. How profound! Now I understand what the canon was trying to say, Monstradamus. This world will remain a meaningless conglomeration of absurdities and riddles, where we continue to wander aimlessly about in the dark, until we accept the teachings of the Holy Church. But as soon as that happens, the holy cross will shine out at the centre of life’s labyrinth, and the fullness of the purpose concealed in all things will instantly be revealed! The world will be miraculously transformed, the harmonious scheme of things will emerge from the chaos and insanity, and whichever way we direct our gaze, we shall see Hosannah to the Lord on every side! Is that right, Monstradamus?
Monstradamus
But of course. And we shall hear the radiance of his glory.
Nutscracker
Amen. So what happened next?
UGLI 666
The canon led me over to the labyrinth laid out on the floor and said ‘My daughter, the One whom I serve wishes you to walk The League and repent.’ I went down on my knees and set off. The canon said that while walking through a labyrinth like that the correct thing to do is to meditate intensely on everything that you have done in your life. I didn’t have to try very hard. I only had to glance at the grid by the altar for pic
tures of my childhood to start floating past my inner eye like coloured balloons, magically transforming what I saw around me. With every new second I was immersed deeper and deeper into the past. The majestic columns soaring upwards to meet the distant vaults took on the appearance of the lime trees in the park in xxx where I spent the first few years of my life. It’s not surprising – in those distant days the trees were every bit as huge in relation to me as those columns are now. The images of the saints watching me from niches in the walls had the faces of grown-ups from my childhood. I sensed that some of them were strict and others were indulgent, but they all loved me equally, even though they knew absolutely everything about me. Then the path turned a corner and I began walking, or rather crawling, in a different direction; now I remembered the time of my youth. The stone boatman decorating the preacher’s pulpit came to life and sailed across the waters of my memory, transformed into the only friend of my life’s brief springtime. He looked exactly as he did on the lake in xxx, where we swore to love each other forever. A new turn, and sin had swept him into oblivion – I no longer knew him and did not wish to know him. Yet another turn and the time of maturity had arrived. My stockings were worn into holes, my knees were scratched, but I didn’t feel any pain – tears of repentance and hope were flowing down my cheeks. And the Lord sent me word, yes He did! A little miracle occurred – I don’t know how it happened that in my blindness I only realised it afterwards, when I came back to my cell. I mean my room. As I circled through the labyrinth, no matter which way I turned within it, I could always see the crucifixion with a ray of sunlight falling on it through a stained-glass window, suffusing it with ruby, emerald and sapphire light! And that unearthly radiance made my heart feel so happy, so bright and calm that I wanted to cry and sing, cry and sing …
Nutscracker
And?
UGLI 666
Cry and sing.
Nutscracker
And is that it?
UGLI 666
Yes, that’s more or less everything. When I’d crawled all the way through the labyrinth, the canons were no longer anywhere to be seen. I walked out of the cathedral and found myself in my room.
Nutscracker
And can you go back into the cathedral now?
UGLI 666
Its door is locked now.
Nutscracker
When did they find time to lock it?
UGLI 666
I don’t know.
Nutscracker
And are you sure you didn’t just dream it all, like Ariadne?
UGLI 666
Yes, I’m sure. The canon gave me a rosary and I’m holding it in my hand. I’m going to take a rest now.
Monstradamus
Yes, Ugly, take a rest. After all you’ve been through it will do you good.
Nutscracker
An interesting crossword puzzle. But from a mystical point of view, how do you explain that at the very centre of the labyrinth of life there lies the letter ‘S’?
Monstradamus
That ought to be clear enough to you of all people, Nutcracker.
Nut$cracker
Why?
Monstradamus
You have the same letter at your centre too. And just at the moment it’s looking really lovely.
Nutscracker
Where? Oh, that. That’s the moderators taking the piss again. If that’s what you had in mind, I can tell you the pay for my job is so low it’s an insult.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Isolde, are you back yet?
Monstradamus
Hi there, Romeo.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Are you IsoldA then?
Nutscracker
Cohiba’s in a bad mood today.
Monstradamus
I liked the phrase ‘With every new second I was immersed deeper and deeper into the past.’
Nutscracker
Yes, I noticed that too.
Monstradamus
Pure poetry. With every new day we slide deeper and deeper into the past. We disappear into it, like a diver sinking under the water in a slow-motion sequence. What is the difference between an old man and a young man if you put them side by side?
Nutscracker
One of them is old and one of them is young.
Monstradamus
Yes, but what does that mean? That there is only a tiny little piece of the old man left in our dimension – he is almost completely submerged in Lethe’s waters of oblivion. But the young man is still all here – he has just barely touched the surface of the water. Isn’t that it?
Nutscracker
I don’t know. The way things are these days, they could both go down together at any moment. And the size of the pieces would depend less on their age than the force of the blast.
Monstradamus
That’s also true.
Nutscracker
And, as for that phrase you liked, I think Ugly was thinking of the helmet of horror. The future is produced from the past, so the further we go into the future, the more past is required to produce it. You know, the closer you build to the stars, the deeper the pit you dig the soil out of …
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Isolde, are you there? Isolde!
Nutscracker
And, to complete the picture, you could say the bubbles of the past were bursting in a helmet that was running ‘Sticky Eye’ and ‘Sunny Kiss’ simultaneously.
UGLI 666
What?
Monstradamus
Are you still here, Ugly? Take no notice, he’s joking.
UGLI 666
I should never have told you.
Monstradamus
Don’t be offended, Ugly.
UGLI 666
I’m never going to tell you anything again.
Monstradamus
Say you’re sorry, Nutcracker.
Nutscracker
For what?
Monstradamus
Please, say you’re sorry.
Nutscracker
All right. I’m sorry, Ugly.
UGLI 666
God will forgive you.
IsoldA
Romeo, where are you? I’m back.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
I was starting to get worried. Tell me what happened.
IsoldA
You first.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
All right. I would have reached the pavilion quickly, because last time I marked which way to go at the forks in the path. But I met someone really terrifying on the way.
IsoldA
You too?
Romeo-y-Cohiba
What happened? Are you all right?
Isolde
Yes, everything’s fine. Go on.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
When I got past the bench where I can see the roof and the fountain, I suddenly sensed a movement behind me. And when I turned round I saw something absolutely incredible. Just imagine it, a long narrow corridor between the bushes. And coming towards me along it on roller skates was … I don’t even know if it was a man or not. He was immensely tall, wearing a sombrero hat and an ice-hockey goalkeeper’s mask made of white plastic. And there were two smaller figures on roller skates behind him. I could hardly see them, because he took up the entire passage. He was wearing a goalkeeper’s uniform too – an immense blue sweatshirt with the number ‘35’ and the words ‘chicago bulls’. Or at least, that’s what I thought at first. But when he got closer, I could see the number was actually totally weird: ‘–3.5%’, and the word ‘bulls’ was really ‘BEARS’. It was just that the minus sign and the percentage sign were the same colour as the sweatshirt and I hadn’t spotted them from the distance. And he was holding a double hockey-stick.
IsoldA
How do you mean?
Romeo-y-Cohiba
You’ve seen a goalkeeper’s stick, haven’t you? Now imagine it has two blades curving in opposite directions. Of course, you couldn’t possibly play with one like that.
; IsoldA
And what happened when he reached you?
Romeo-y-Cohiba
He didn’t get that far. When he was only ten feet away, he turned a corner and disappeared into a side passage. And the others darted in there after him as well.
IsoldA
Who was it following him?
Romeo-y-Cohiba
It was two dwarves. They were on roller skates too, and wearing sombreros. I couldn’t see their faces, they had their heads lowered so the wind wouldn’t blow their hats off. And they were holding up the hem at the back of his sweatshirt, like ladies in waiting.
IsoldA
Was that all?
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Fortunately, yes. Who did you meet?
IsoldA
It was at the corner of one of the alleys. I heard the sound of a guitar string behind me. When I turned round, about twenty metres away from me I saw an immensely tall man standing beside a fountain. He was dressed all in black and gold like an eighteenth-century gallant, and he was hiding his face behind a mask in the form of a golden sun that he was holding on a stick. There were two dwarves dressed up in red velvet standing beside him, holding old potbellied guitars. They strummed a few soft chords, then the giant turned his mask slightly and the sun glinted on it so brightly I was dazzled and I screwed up my eyes. And when I opened them again there was no one beside the fountain any more. I didn’t even have time to be scared and I thought I must have had a hallucination after everything I’d been hearing. But now I don’t know what to think. You go on.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Well, I decided that if the giant had wanted to kill me he would have done it already. So I carried on as though nothing had happened. I didn’t meet anyone else on the way. The door in the wall of the pavilion was open. And behind it there was a winding corridor. Naturally, there was no light. The floorboards squeaked horribly, as if every one of them had three mice sitting under it. It was absolutely terrifying. There were doors in the walls and more doors behind them. I began groping my way at random through the musty, squeaking darkness and became disorientated straightaway. I was overcome by apathy. I wanted to drop down on the floor, close my eyes and forget about absolutely everything. Probably that’s what I would have done, but then one of the doors led me out into a large room where there was a light on. It was deserted and dusty, with no windows and divided in half by a set of steel bars so thick they could have kept out an elephant. There was no furniture at all, if you didn’t count several pictures turned around so that the images faced the wall. I thought it was probably so they wouldn’t get dusty – clever and very simple, no need for any glass. Hanging on the door, which closed behind my back, was a plaque that said ‘Silence!’ And beyond the bars was a fresco with a portrait of the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. Right across the whole wall.
Helmet of Horror Page 7
