The Illuminatus! Trilogy

They were in an elegant apartment, high above Lake Shore Drive-"We always meet here," Simon had explained, "because of the acrostic significance of the street name"-and the sounds of the automobile traffic far below mingled strangely with the preparations for what Joe already guessed was a black Mass.

"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law," the priest chanted.

"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law," Joe repeated with the rest of the congregation.

The priest- who was the only one who had not removed his clothes before the beginning of the ceremony- was a slightly red-faced middle-aged man in a Roman collar, and part of Joe's discomfort derived from the fact that he looked so much like every Catholic priest he had known in his childhood, It had not helped matters that he had given his name, when Simon introduced Joe to him, as "Padre Pederastia"-which he pronounced with a very campy inflection, looking flirtatiously directly in Joe's eyes.

The congregation divided, in Joe's mind, into two easily distinguishable groups: poor full-time hippies, from the Old Town area, and rich part-time hippies, from Lake Shore Drive itself and, no doubt, also from the local advertising agencies on Michigan Avenue. There were only eleven of them, however, including Joe, and Padre Pederastia made twelve- where was the traditional thirteenth?

"Prepare the pentad," Padre Pederastia commanded.

Simon and a rather good-looking young female, both quite unselfconscious in their nakedness, arose and left the group, walking toward the door which Joe had assumed led to the bedroom area. They stopped to take some chalk from a table on which hashish and sandal-wood incense were burning in a goats-head taper, then squatted to draw a large pentagon on the blood-red rug. A triangle was then added to each side of the pentagon, forming a star- the special kind of star, Joe knew, which was known as pentagram, symbol of werewolves and also of demons. He found himself remembering the corny old poem from the Lon Chancy, Jr., movies, but it suddenly didn't sound like kitsch anymore:

Even a man who is pure of heart

And says his prayers by night

Can turn to a wolf when the wolf bane blooms

And the autumn moon is bright

"I-O," the priest chanted raptly.

"I-O," the chorus came.

"I-O, E-O, Evoe," the chant rose weirdly.

"I-O, E-O, Evoe," the rhythmic reply came in cadence.

Joe felt a strange, ashy, acrid taste gathering in his mouth, and a coldness creeping into his toes and fingers. The air, too, seemed suddenly greasy and unpleasantly, mucidly moist.

"I-O, E-O, Evoe, HE!" the priest screamed, in fear or in ecstasy.

"I-O, E-O, Evoe, HEr Joe heard himself joining the others. Was it imagination, or were all their voices subtly changing, in a bestial and pongoid fashion?

"Ol sonuf vaoresaji," the priest said, more softly.'

"Ol sonuf vaoresaji," they chorused.

"It is accomplished," the priest said. "We may pass the Guardian."

The congregation arose and moved toward the door. Each person, Joe noticed, was careful to step into the pentagram and pause there a moment gathering strength before actually approaching the door. When it was his turn, he discovered why. The carving on the door, which had seemed merely obscene and ghoulish from across the room, was more disturbing when you were closer to it. It was not easy- to convince yourself that those eyes were just a trick of trompe I'oeil. The mind insisted on feeling that they very definitely looked at you, not affectionately, as you passed.

This-thing-was the Guardian which had to be pacified before they could enter the next room.

Joe's fingers and toes were definitely freezing, and auto-suggestion didn't seem a very plausible explanation. He seriously wondered about the possibility of frostbite. But then he stepped into the pentagram and the cold suddenly decreased, the eyes of the Guardian were less menacing, and a feeling of renewed energy flowed through his body, such as he had experienced in a sensitivity-training session after he had been cajoled by the leader into unleashing a great deal of pent-up anxiety and rage by kicking, screaming, weeping, and cursing.

He passed the Guardian easily and entered the room where the real action would occur.

It was as if he had left the twentieth century. The furnishings and the very architecture were Hebraic, Arabic, and medieval European, all mixed together in a most disorienting way, and entirely unrelieved by any trace of the modern or functional.

A black-draped altar stood in the center, and upon it lay the thirteenth member of the coven. She was a woman with red hair and green eyes- the traits which Satan supposedly relished most in mortal females. (There had been a time, Joe remembered, when any woman having those features was automatically suspected of witchcraft.) She was, of course, naked, and her body would be the medium through which this strange sacrament would be attempted.