Part 6

“I saw an ordinary man. I heard a sermon which was interesting, although I might be less impressed if I read it to myself....” Deliberately I tried to throw it all away, that instant of belief, that paralysis of will, that sense of mysteries revealed in a dazzle of light. But as I talked, I realized that I was not really dismissing it, that I could not alter the experience even though I might dismiss the man and mock the text: something _had_ happened and I told her what I thought it was.

“It is not truth, Iris, but hypnosis.”

She nodded. “I’ve often thought that. Especially at first when I was conscious of his mannerisms, when I could see, as only a woman can perhaps, that this was just a man; yet something _does_ happen when you listen to him, when you get to know him. You must find that out for yourself; and you will. It may not prove to be anything which has to do with him. There’s something in oneself which stirs and comes alive at his touch, through his agency.” She spoke quickly, excitedly.

I felt the passion with which she was charged. But suddenly it was too much for me. I was bewildered and annoyed; I wanted to get away.

“Don’t you want to meet him?”

I shook my head. “Another time maybe, but not now. Shall I take you back?”

“No. I’ll get a ride in to Santa Monica. I may even stay over for the night. He’ll be here a week.”

I wondered again if she might have a personal interest in Cave: though I doubted it, anything was possible.

She walked me back to the car, past the lighted chapel, over the summery lawn, down the dark street whose solid prosaicness helped to dispel somewhat the madness of the hour before.

We made a date to meet later on in the week. She would tell Cave about me and I would meet him. I interrupted her then. “What _did_ he say, Iris? What did he say tonight?”

Her answer was as direct and as plain as my question. “That it is good to die.”

FOUR

1

This morning I reread the last section, trying to see it objectively, to match what I have put down with the memory I still bear of that first encounter with John Cave. I have not, I fear, got it. But this is as close as I can come to recalling long-vanished emotions and events.

I was impressed by the man and I was shaken by his purpose. My first impression was, I think, correct: he was a born hypnotist and the text of that extraordinary message was, in the early days at least, thin, illogical and depressing if one had not heard it spoken. Later of course I, among others, composed the words which bear his name and we gave them, I fancy, a polish and an authority which, with his limited education and disregard for the works of the past, he could not have accomplished on his own, even had he wanted to.

I spent the intervening days between my first and second encounters with this strange man in a state of extreme tension and irritability. Clarissa called me several times but I refused to see her, excusing myself from proposed entertainments and hinted tête-à-têtes, with an abruptness which anyone but the iron-cast Clarissa would have found appallingly rude. She said she understood, however, and she let me off without explaining what it was she understood, or thought she did. I avoided a number of parties and all acquaintances, keeping to my hotel room where I contemplated a quick return to the Hudson and to the darkening autumn.

Iris telephoned me twice and, when she fixed a day at last for me to meet John Cave, I accepted her invitation, a little to my own surprise.

We met in the late afternoon at her house. Only the three of us were present on that occasion. In the set of dialogues which I composed and published in later years I took considerable liberties with our actual conversations, especially this first one: in fact, as hostile critics were quick to suggest, the dialogues were created by me with very little of Cave in them and a good deal of Plato, rearranged to fit the occasion. In time, though, my version was accepted implicitly, if only because there were no longer any hostile critics.

Iris served us tea in the patio. She spoke seldom and, when she did, her voice was low and curiously diffident as she asked Cave some question or instructed me.

Cave himself was relaxed, quite different from my first view of him. In fact, I might not even have recognized his face had I seen him in a group.

He rose promptly when I came out onto the patio; he shook my hand vigorously but briefly and sat down again, indicating that I sit next to him while Iris went for tea. He was smaller and more compact than I’d thought measuring him against myself as one does, unconsciously, with an interesting stranger. He wore a plain brown suit and a white shirt open at the collar, a modified Lord Byron collar which became him. The eyes, which at first I did not dare look at, were, I soon noticed, sheathed ... an odd word which was always to occur to me when I saw him at his ease, his eyes half-shut, ordinary, not in the least unusual. Except for a restless folding and unfolding of his hands (suggesting a recently reformed cigarette smoker) he was without physical idiosyncrasy.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you” were the first words, I fear, John Cave ever spoke to me; so unlike the dialogue on the spirit which I later composed to celebrate this initial encounter between master and disciple-to-be. “Iris has told me a lot about you.” His voice was light, without resonance now. He sat far back in his deck chair. Inside the house I could hear Iris moving plates. The late afternoon sun had just that moment gone behind trees and the remaining light was warmly gold.

“And I have followed your ... career with interest too,” I said, knowing that “career” was precisely the word he would not care to hear used but, at that moment, neither of us had got the range of the other. We fired at random.

“Iris told me you write history.”

I shook my head. “No, I only read it. I think it’s all been written anyway.” I was allowed to develop this novel conceit for some moments, attended by a respectful silence from my companion who finally dispatched my faintly hysterical proposition with a vague “Maybe so”; and then we got to him.

“I haven’t been East you know,” he frowned at the palm trees. “I was born up in Washington state and I’ve spent all my life in the Northwest, until last year.” He paused as though he expected me to ask him about _that_ year. I did not. I waited for him to do it in his own way. He suddenly turned about in his chair and faced me; those disconcerting eyes suddenly trained upon my own. “You were there the other night, weren’t you?”

“Why, yes.”

“Did you feel it too? Am I right?”

The quick passion with which he said this, exploding all at once the afternoon’s serenity, took me off guard. I stammered, “I don’t think I know what you mean. I ...”

“You know exactly what I mean, what I meant.” He leaned closer to me and I wondered insanely if his deck chair might not collapse under him. It teetered dangerously. My mind went blank, absorbed by the image of deck chair and prophet together collapsing at my feet. Then, as suddenly, satisfied perhaps with my confusion, he settled back, resumed his earlier ease, exactly as if I had answered him, as though we had come to a crisis and together fashioned an agreement: it was most alarming.

“I want to see New York especially. I’ve always thought it must look like a cemetery with all those tall gray buildings you see in photographs.” He sighed conventionally: “So many interesting places in the world. Do you like the West?”

Nervously, I said that I did. I still feared a possible repetition of that brief outburst.

“I like the openness,” said Cave, as though he had thought long about this problem. “I don’t think I’d like confinement I couldn’t live in Seattle because of those fogs they used to have; San Francisco’s the same. I don’t like too many walls, too much fog.” If he’d intended to speak allegorically he could not have found a better audience for I was, even at this early stage, completely receptive to the most obscure histrionics but, in conversation, Cave was perfectly literal. Except when he spoke before a large group, he was quite simple and prosaic and, though conscious always of his dignity and singular destiny, not in the least portentous.

I probably did not put him at his ease for I stammered a good deal and made no sense, but he was gracious, supporting me with his own poise and equanimity.

He talked mostly of places until Iris came back with tea. Then, as the sky became florid with evening and the teacups gradually grew cold, he talked of his work and I listened intently.

“I can talk to you straight,” he said. “This just happened to me. I didn’t start out to do this. No sir, I never would have believed ten years ago that I’d be traveling about, talking to people like one of those crackpot fanatics you’ve got so many in California.” I took a sip of the black, fast-cooling tea, hoping he was not sufficiently intuitive to guess that I had originally put him down, provisionally of course, as precisely that.

“I don’t know how much Iris may have told you or how much you might have heard but it’s pretty easy to pass the whole thing off as another joke: a guy coming out of the backwoods with a message.” He cracked his knuckles hard and I winced at the sound. “Well, I didn’t quite come out of the woods. I had a year back at State University and I had a pretty good job in my field with the best firm of funeral directors in Washington state. Then I started on this. I just _knew_ one day and so I began to talk to people and they knew too and I quit my job and started talking to bigger and bigger crowds all along the coast. There wasn’t any of this revelation stuff. I just knew one day, that was all; and when I told other people _what_ I knew they seemed to get it. And that’s the strange part. Everybody gets ideas about things which he thinks are wonderful but usually nothing happens to the people he tries to tell them to. With me, it’s been different from the beginning. People have all listened, and agreed: what I know _they_ know. Isn’t that a funny thing? Though most of them probably would never have thought it out until they heard me and it was all clear.” His eyes dropped to his hands; he added softly: “So since it’s been like this, I’ve gone on. I’ve made this my life. This is it. I shall come to the people.”

There was silence. The sentence had been spoken which I was later to construct the first dialogue upon: “I shall come to the people,” the six words which were to change our lives were spoken softly over tea.

Iris looked at me challengingly over Cave’s bowed head.

I remember little else about that evening. We dined, I think, in the house and Cave was most agreeable, most undemanding. There was no more talk of the mission. He asked me many questions about New York, about Harvard where I had gone to school, about Roman history. He appeared to be interested in paganism and my own somewhat ambiguous approach to Julian. I was to learn later that though he seldom read he had a startling memory for any fact which seemed relevant. I am neither immodest nor inaccurate when I say that he listened to me attentively for some years and many of his later views were a result of our conversations.

I should mention, though, one significant omission in his conversation during those first crucial years: he never discussed ethical questions; that was to come much later. At the beginning he had but one vision and it was, in its terrible truth, quite inhuman and anarchic: man dies, consciousness dies with him: it is good to die, good not to be. On this the Cavite system was constructed and what came after in the moral and ethical spheres was largely the work of others in his name. Much of this I anticipated in that first conversation with him, so unlike, actually, the dialogue which I composed ending, I still think complacently despite the irony with which time has tarnished all those bright toys for me, with the essential line: “Death is neither hard nor bad; only the dying hurts.” With that firmly postulated the rest was inevitable.

Cave talked that evening about California and Oregon and Washington (geography, places were always to fascinate and engage him while people, especially after the early years, ceased to be remarkable to him; he tended to get confused those myriad faces which passed before him like successive ripples in a huge sea). He talked of the cities he had visited on the seaboard, new cities to him, all of them. He compared their climates and various attractions like a truly devoted tourist, eager to get the best of each place, to encounter the _genius loci_ and possess it.

“But I don’t like staying in any place long.” He looked at me then and again I felt that sense of a power being focused on me ... it was not unlike what one experiences during an X-ray treatment when the humming noise indicates that potent rays are penetrating one’s tissue and, though there is actually no sensation, _something_ is experienced, power is felt. And so it invariably was that, right until the end, Cave, whenever he chose, could turn those wide bleak eyes upon me and I would experience his force anew.

“I want to keep moving, new places, that’s what I like. You get a kind or charge traveling. At least I do. I always thought I’d travel but I never figured it would be like this; but then of course I never thought of all this until just awhile ago.

“Can you remember when it was? how it was exactly you got ... started?” I wanted a sign obviously: Constantine’s _labarum_ occurred to me: _in hoc signo vinces_. Already ambition was stirring, and the little beast fed ravenously on every scrap that came its way for I was, in that patio, experiencing my own revelation, the compass needle no longer spinning wildly but coming to settle at last, with many hesitancies and demurs, upon a direction, drawn to a far pole’s attraction.

He smiled for the first time. I suppose, if I wanted, I could recall each occasion over the years when, in my presence at least, John Cave smiled. His usual expression was one of calm resolve, of that authority which feels secure in itself, a fortunate expression which lent dignity even to his casual conversation: the fact that this serene mask hid a nearly total intellectual vacuity, I suspected as early in my dealings with him as this first meeting; yet I did not mind for I had experienced his unique magic and already I saw the possibilities of channeling that power, of using that force, or turning it like a flame here, there, creating and destroying, shaping and shattering ... so much for the spontaneous nature of my ambition at its least responsible, and at its most exquisite! I could have set the one-half world aflame for the sheer splendor and glory of the deed. For this my expiation has been long and my once exuberant pride is now only an ashen phoenix consumed by flames but not yet tumbled to dust, not yet recreated in the millennial egg ... only a gray shadow in the heart which the touch of a finger of windy fear will turn to air and dust.

Yet the creature was aborning that day: one seed had touched another and a monster began to live.

“The first day? The first time?” The smile faded. “Sure, I remember it. I’d just finished painting the face of a big dead fellow killed in an automobile accident. I didn’t usually do make-up but I like to help out and I used to do odd jobs when somebody had too much to do and asked me to help; the painting isn’t hard either and I always like it, though the faces are cold like ... like....” He thought of no simile; he went on: “Anyway I looked at this guy’s face and I remembered I’d seen him play basketball in high school. He was in a class or two behind me. Big athlete. Ringer, we called them ... full of life ... and here he was, with me powdering his face and combing his eyebrows. Usually you don’t think much about the stiff (that’s our professional word) one way or the other: it’s just a job. But I thought about this one suddenly. I started to feel sorry for him, dead like that, so sudden, so young, so good-looking with all sorts of prospects; then I felt it.” The voice grew low and precise. Iris and I listened intently, even the sun froze in the wild sky above the sea; the young night stumbled in the darkening east.

His eyes on the sun, he described his sudden knowledge that it was the dead man who was right, who was a part of the whole, that the living were the sufferers from whom, temporarily, the beautiful darkness and nonbeing had been withdrawn and, in his crude way, Cave struck chord after chord of meaning and, though the notes were not in themselves new, the effect was all its own ... and not entirely because of the voice, the cogency of this magician. No, the effect was achieved only in part through his ability to make one experience with him an occasion of light, of absolute knowing.

“And I knew it was the dying which was the better part,” he finished. The sun, released, drowned in the Pacific.

In the darkness I asked, “But you, you still live?”

“Not because I want to,” came the voice, soft as the night “I must tell the others first. There’ll be time for myself.”

I shuddered in the warmth of the patio. My companions were only dim presences in the failing light. “Who told you to tell this to everyone?”

The answer came back, strong and unexpected: “I told myself. The responsibility is mine.”

That was the sign for me. He had broken with his predecessors. He was on his own. He knew ... and so did we.

2

I have lingered over that first meeting for, in it, was finally all that there was to come. Later details were the work of others, the exotic periphery to a simple but powerful center. Not until late that night did I leave the house near the beach. When I left, Cave stayed on and I wondered again, idly, if perhaps he was living there with Iris, if perhaps her interest in him might not be more complex than I had suspected.

We parted casually and Iris walked me to the door while Cave remained inside, gazing in his intent way at nothing at all: daydreaming, doubtless, of what was to come.

“You’ll help?” Iris stood by the car’s open door, her features indistinct in the moonless night.

“I think so. I’m not sure, though, about the scale.”

“What do you mean?”

“Must _everyone_ know? Can’t it just be kept to ourselves? for the few who do know him?”

“No. We must let them all hear him. Everyone.” And her voice assumed that zealous tone which I was to hear so often again and again upon her lips and on those of others.

I made my first and last objection: “I don’t see that quantity has much to do with it. If this thing spreads it will become organized. If it becomes organized, secondary considerations will obscure the point. The truth is no truer because only a few have experienced it.”

“You’re wrong. Even for purely selfish reasons, ruling out all altruistic considerations, there’s an excellent reason for allowing this to spread: a society which knows what we know, which believes in Cave and what he says, will be a pleasanter place in which to live, less anxious, more tolerant.” And she spoke of the new Jerusalem in our sallow land and I was nearly convinced.

The next day I went to Hastings’ house for lunch. He was there alone; his wife apparently had a life of her own which required his company only occasionally. Clarissa, sensible in tweed and dark glasses, was the only other guest. We lunched on an iron-wrought table beside the gloomy pool in which, among the occasional leaves, I saw, quite clearly, a cigarette butt delicately unfolding like an ocean flower.

“Good to, ah, have you, Eugene. Just a bit of potluck. Clarissa’s going back to civilization today and wanted to see you ... I did too, of course. The bride’s gone out. Told me to convey her....”

Clarissa turned her bright eyes on me and, without acknowledging the presence of our host, said right off: “You’ve met him at last.”

I nodded. The plot was finally clear to me: the main design at least. “We had dinner together last night.”

“I know. Iris told me. You’re going to help out of course.”

“I’d like to but I don’t know what there is I might do. I don’t think I’d be much use with a tambourine on street corners, preaching the word.”

“Don’t be silly!” Clarissa chuckled. “We’re going to handle this quite, _quite_ differently.”

“We?”

“Oh, I’ve been involved for over a year now. It’s going to be the greatest fun ... you wait and see.”

“But....”

“_I_ was the one who got Iris herself involved. I thought she looked a little peaked, a little bored. I had no idea of course she’d get in so deep, but it will probably turn out all right I think she’s in love with him.”

“Don’t be such a gossip,” said Hastings sharply. “You always reduce everything to ... to biology. Cave isn’t that sort of man.”

“You know him too?” How fast it was growing, I thought.

“Certainly. Biggest thing I’ve done since....”

“Since you married that brassy blonde,” said Clarissa with her irrepressible rudeness. “Anyway, my dear, Iris took to the whole thing like a born proselyte, if that’s the word I mean ... the other’s a little boy, isn’t it? and it seems, from what she’s told me, that you have too.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” I was a little put out at both Iris and Clarissa taking me so much for granted.

“Say anything you like. It’s still the best thing that’s ever happened to you. Oh God, _not_ avocado again!” The offending salad was waved away while Hastings muttered apologies. “Nasty, pointless things, all texture and no taste.” She made a face. “But I suppose that we must live off the fruits of the country and this is the only thing which will grow in California.” She moved without pause from Western flora to the problem of John Cave. “As for your own contribution, Eugene, it will depend largely upon what you choose to do. As I said, I never suspected that Iris would get in so deep and you may prove to be quite as surprising. This is the ground floor of course ... wonderful expression, isn’t it? the spirit of America: the slogan which broke the plains ... in any case, the way is clear. Cave liked you. You can write things for them, rather solid articles based on your inimitable misreadings of history. You can educate Cave, though this might be unwise since so much of his force derives from his eloquent ignorance; or you might become a part of the organization which is getting under way. I suppose Iris will explain that to you: it’s rather her department at the moment. All those years in the Junior League gave her a touching faith in the power of committees, which is just as well when handling Americans. As for the tambourines and cries of 'Come and Be Saved’ you are some twenty years behind the times. We ... or to be exact I ought to say 'they’ ... have more up-to-date plans.”

“Committees? What committees?”

Clarissa unfolded her mushroom omelet with a secret smile. “You’ll meet our number-one committee member after lunch. He’s coming, isn’t he?” She looked at Hastings as though suspecting him of a treacherous ineptitude.

“Certainly, certainly, at least he _said_ he was.” Hastings motioned for the serving-woman to clean away the luncheon dishes and we moved to other chairs beside the pool for coffee.

Clarissa was in fine form, aggressive, positive, serenely indifferent to the effect she was having on Hastings and me. “Of course I’m just meddling,” she said in answer to an inquiry of mine. “I don’t really give two cents for Mr Cave and his message.”

“Clarissa!” Hastings was genuinely shocked.

“I mean it. Not that I don’t find him fascinating and of course the whole situation is delicious ... what we shall do! or _you_ shall do!” she looked at me maliciously. “I can foresee no limits to this.”