Authors: Robert Irwin
Satan Wants Me (45 page)
But we lost. The old bankers, generals, policemen and professors prevailed. And I am they. They, the men in suits, who every morning walk across Waterloo Bridge, heading for the City are no better than war criminals. The Juggernaut rolls on. First we lost the battle and then our souls. Sally was the only one I ever knew who remained true to herself and I am the only one who seems to care for what was lost. ‘First girl I loved … ’ We were young and mad as hares.
Maud was buried in Hampstead cemetery this afternoon. In the coffin she was clutching the crucifix I had given her all those years ago. The Master (it is Granville these days) and Laura were among the mourners. There was no reception afterwards, as I had no desire to spend more time than I had to with Lodge members. Having dismissed my chauffeur, I was setting out to walk back to our, now my house, when I was accosted by two strange creatures. One was cowled and one was shaven-headed and they were dressed in orange and red robes – somewhat like the pusher who sold me those drugs in Abdullah’s Paradise Garden all those years ago. There was a whiff of oriental incense about them and at first I thought that they must be Hare Krishna people. These days one occasionally sees a Hare Krishna procession snaking its way down Oxford Street, banging toms-toms and jingling little bells, but they used to be around a lot more at the end of the sixties. I make a point of stopping to watch these people, orange-robed and shaven-headed, because I want to try and figure out why they always look so bloody miserable. But that is by the way. These two turned out not to be Hare Krishna devotees.
‘Let the dead bury their dead,’ said the cowled figure lurking at the gates of the cemetery. He thrust a leaflet into my hands.
‘JESUS SAVES! DON’T BE LONELY! JOIN HIS FAMILY AND HAVE A BALL, SECURE IN THE LOVE OF GOD’S FAMILY.’ Beneath the big print was some comic-strip story about the sufferings of a soul in Hell, but, with the lengthening sight I have these days, I had trouble in focusing on the little print in the speech balloons.
‘You are blind and do not see,’ said the cowled figure. ‘But you stand on the brink of a sea of fire. Once you are launched upon that sea, there will be no instant in which you will be free from pain. Your bones will be pulled out from your flesh. Your eyeballs will be squeezed from your skull. Your scrotum will be pierced by blades much sharper than those of a razor. Then, in a cauldron of boiling spittle, you will be reconstituted to suffer it all over again, but this time and the next and the next you will anticipate the pain. Your sweat will burn through metal. After a million years of this have passed, it will be as if you have yet to begin to truly suffer. Now consider how in this life how angry you are with yourself when you forget to post a letter and
then
consider how angry you will be with yourself when you find that you have neglected to take advantage of the offer of eternal salvation! Turn then to the love of your Lord Jesus and be saved.’
‘We love you,’ said the shaven-headed figure and, it was only when she spoke that I realised that she was a young woman. ‘I love you and I want to bring you to Jesus. Cos’ for you it’s Jesus or the eternal torments of Hell.’
She pressed herself up against me so that I could feel her pointy breasts and she ran her fingers up and down my black tie.
‘I want you to come to Jesus. I want you to come for Jesus. I can give you a really great time.’
‘What about him?’ I said, gesturing at her companion.
‘Jesus doesn’t mind,’ she whispered. ‘He knows that it’s all in a good cause and that I’m a Hooker for Christ. He knows that, because I love you, I want to save you from the flames of Hell. Jesus has taught me that I must be ready to die for others. How much more then should I be prepared to have sex for others, in order to save their souls? Come on, it’s a good deal we are offering here – some great sex, plus eternal salvation. Don’t worry about anything. He likes to watch.’
Then, and in retrospect I can hardly believe it, she knelt to fumble at my flies.
‘Get away from me woman! I have just come from burying my wife. If, in the circumstances, you think I am going to get a hard-on as a result of the ministrations of a bald religious fanatic in fancy dress, you are very much mistaken.’
She looked up smiling sweetly,
‘Let’s suck it and see, shall we?’
‘Oh go fuck yourself!’ and, zipping up my trousers, I turned and hurried away from them.
It was outrageous, really so outrageous and tasteless for these freaks to have intruded on the funeral of my wife in this way. Hours later, I am still quite upset. I have heard about this sort of sexual evangelising. I believe that it is called ‘lovebombing’ or ‘flirty-fishing’. Coincidentally, I now recall that Robin Williamson in that Incredible String Band song, ‘First Girl I Loved’, sings about how he has heard that his old girlfriend has since joined the Church of Jesus. Probably a lot of the old hippy riff-raff have actually ended up in evangelical Christianity.
The encounter at the cemetery gates was, as they say, ‘a blast from the past’. The old Peter, the 1967 version of Peter, would have played with the idea that he had just encountered some sort of astral manifestation of Sally come down to earth in a final attempt to rescue him from the clutches of Maud and the jaws of Hell. Or perhaps the shaven-headed little freak might be one of those Tibetan visions which prepare one for the afterlife, Verukas, or whatever it was that Sally used to call them. But such notions, as the actress said to the bishop, are just a load of cock. The girl at the cemetery was not Sally, there was no tattoo on her head and the dead do not live again. What I saw was what there was – a pair of crackpot Christian evangelists. However, be that as it may, it got me thinking, in a way I have not done before, about the sixties and about how sixties ways of talking and behaving still linger on at the edges of our society. There is, I think, a metaphorical sense in which those two Christian freaks were indeed ghosts from another world.
Now, thirty years on, when I came back to an empty house after Maud’s funeral, I have fetched these diaries out. Of course, I am wistful. I was thin then and I had limitless energy, but, even so, I find that I have no desire to travel back through time. Youth is rarely a happy stage in life. I was then so ignorant, Maud was so gauche and both of us were terrified by the real world. Since then, we found our place in that world and we have been happily married for thirty years.
It was painful for Maud to shed her human form and surrender to the cancer.
Her last words to me were, ‘I will come back for you.’
Soon, I hope.
Published in the UK by Dedalus Limited,
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ISBN printed book 978 1 903517 58 1
ISBN e-book
978 1 909232 08 2
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Publishing History
First published by Dedalus in the UK in 1999
First Bloomsbury paperback edition in the UK in 2000
First Dedalus paperback edition in 2007
First published in the USA in 2007
First ebook edition in 2012
Copyright © Robert Irwin 1999
The right of Robert Irwin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
Printed in Finland by Bookwell
Typeset by RefineCatch Ltd
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
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