Mystical Paths

This was fine but he was only telling me what I already knew. What I really wanted him to tell me was how to muzzle the maxi-erection so that it only occurred with the right girl; or in other words, I wanted to know how I could stop being hooked on Tracy and start being hooked on Rosalind.

‘… and I need hardly point out to a young man of your intelligence,’ he was adding, ‘that fornication is worse than Russian roulette because a person other than yourself is also involved in this potentially suicidal gamble. Don’t risk it, Nicholas. Wait for marriage. It may be the toughest exercise in self-restraint that you’re ever called to make, but very often the most worthwhile things in life can only be achieved with considerable effort by people who have the strength and wisdom to act as mature human beings, not selfish children.’

I nearly tied my tongue in a knot in my haste to say: ‘Right. Actually I’m getting married. In fact I’m unofficially engaged.’

‘You are? But that’s wonderful – how very exciting!’ said the Bishop, sagging with relief. ‘Who is she? Do I know her?’

‘Rosalind Maitland.’

‘Oh, an excellent girl – what a splendid choice! And how pleased your father must be!’

‘Um.’

Wait a minute – you’re signalling there’s a fly in the ointment – ah yes! Now I see what you were driving at: you’re strongly tempted to try a spot of premarital sex.’

‘Well –’

‘No, hang on, I’m on the wrong track again, aren’t I? I’m talking too much – time for me to shut up and listen. Why don’t you tell me exactly what’s bothering you?’

This was the moment I had been dreading. ‘Well …’ But disclosure was now impossible. After his resounding approval of Rosalind I could hardly admit I wasn’t as enthusiastic as I should have been about marrying her. And I certainly couldn’t admit that it was not Rosalind Maitland of Starrington Magna whom I found sexually irresistible but Tracy Dodds of Langley Bottom. A long and desperate silence ensued.

‘I’ve got it!’ said the Bishop suddenly. ‘You’ve sown a few wild oats and your conscience is troubling you. Well, of course young men do sow wild oats, even young men who want to be ordained; we’re all liable to succumb to temptation, even the best of us. You’ll remember St Paul’s words, of course. “Let him who thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.”’

‘Yes, Uncle Charles.’

What you have to do now, Nicholas, if you repent – and I’m sure you do or you wouldn’t be here seeking my help – is to put the wild oats firmly behind you, set yourself a high standard of conduct for the future and ask God’s grace to enable you to be a first-class husband to Rosalind. Getting married to an excellent girl who loves you is without doubt the best possible course you can take.’

‘Yes, Uncle Charles.’

‘Meanwhile I do see you still have the problem of abstaining from sex, even though chastity does become easier when there’s a definite end to it in sight. Of course it would be easy for an old buffer like me to say to a young man like you: “The solution is to take cold showers and work hard.” It would be easy – but it would be wrong. It would imply a view of man based on the Pelagian heresy, the view that man can improve himself by his own efforts without God’s grace. But grace is all. And prayer is vital. I presume the Theological College has at least given you some useful teaching about prayer even if it hasn’t been busy lecturing about sex?’

I seized the chance to race away from the subject of my sex-life. ‘Well, to be honest, Uncle Charles, I’ve found the College’s teaching on prayer a dead loss. It doesn’t connect with anything I do at all.’

The Bishop, who had been so commendably open, now began to close up. He loved that College as a child loves a favourite toy. He had rescued it from the slough of sloth into which it had slumped during the years following my father’s retirement. He had nurtured it, poured his precious time into it, attended every governors’ meeting he could, redesigned its syllabus, basked in the glow of its rising reputation. To hear this cherished fiefdom repeatedly criticised by a mere ordinand was to experience the trial of his Christian patience to its limit. ‘And what, may I ask,’ he said dryly, ‘do you “do” when you pray?’

‘Flip a switch in my head and tune in.’

There was a pause. Then Uncle Charles said: ‘Have you discussed this with your father?’

‘Don’t need to.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’s one of the subjects we don’t have to talk about in words.’

‘I think most discussions are more profitable when conducted in words,’ said the Bishop, now speaking very dryly indeed, ‘and since your father’s such a distinguished spiritual director –’

‘He says he can’t be my spiritual director because he’s too emotionally involved.’

‘Ah well, yes, I’m sure that’s right, but nonetheless I’d have thought that on such an important subject as prayer he … well, never mind. Remind me: who’s your personal tutor at the College?’

‘Dr Hallet, but he’s hopeless.’

‘Dr Hallet is the most Christian man!’

‘Yeah, but he’s hopeless. Doesn’t dig the mystics.’

After another pause Dr Ashworth said: ‘Do you still see Father Peters at Starwater?’

‘Yes, but I wouldn’t discuss prayer with him.’

‘Why not?’

‘He’s too tied up in Anglican-Benedictine convention, sort of old-fashioned, you know, square. I did try talking in my code-language once, but –’

‘What code-language?’

‘The symbols I use for ultimate reality – for you know, kind of, God. But Father Peters just said what Dr Hallet said – warned me that I was talking like a Gnostic and ought to watch it. Well, so what if I do talk like a Gnostic if that’s the best way I can put my experiences into words – experiences which can’t actually be put into words anyway? Some of those Christian Gnostics in the old days were very good, holy men and I don’t see why we should write them off just because they didn’t quite conform to the Church’s idea of orthodoxy.’

‘The Gnostic heresy,’ said the Bishop, who had written a book on the subject, ‘Very nearly destroyed the Early Church.’

I felt like saying: ‘Too bad it didn’t succeed,’ but fortunately I resisted this temptation to take a swipe at that man-made idol THE CHURCH, and made a mighty effort to rein myself in before Uncle Charles had apoplexy. I knew what had happened. After the conversation about sex, when I had been obliged to remain buttoned up, I was now lashing out in an unbuttoned frenzy at the Theological College and the Church in order to let off steam. Normally I would never have divulged my sympathy with the Gnostics to anyone who wore a clerical collar.

‘Sorry, Uncle Charles, I know you must be thinking I’m a heretic, but –’

‘No, no – just a trifle unusual,’ said the Bishop courteously as he prepared to play the champion of orthodoxy and bring me to heel. ‘Of course,’ he remarked, ‘it’s an axiom of spiritual direction that each soul is different and that each soul must therefore pray in the method best suited to it, but I think you should always bear in mind, Nicholas –’ Here the full episcopal power was switched on ‘– that psychic gifts can be a danger to those following the spiritual way. For example, they tend to foster arrogance. Instead of writing off Dr Hallet as hopeless and Father Peters as old-fashioned, you should approach them with more humility and consider the possibility that they might well have something important to teach you. You should also remember that undisciplined contemplative prayer can be dangerous and should never be undertaken without the guidance of a spiritual director.’

‘Yes, Uncle Charles.’ Abandoning the incoherent patois of the under-thirties I adopted a crisp, formal tone.

Satisfied that his chilly reproof had had a sobering effect, the Bishop changed gears. The toothpaste smile flashed. Charm started to ooze again. No wonder he was such a success on television. ‘Well, so much for serious matters,’ he said lightly. ‘Now let’s turn back to the very pleasant subject of your engagement – you must bring your fiancée to dinner soon! I’ll ask my wife to get in touch with you about a date.’

‘Thanks – that would be very nice,’ I said, immaculately well-behaved, and parted from him in amity with all my problems quite unsolved.

The next day Marina Markhampton came to see me and the Christian Aysgarth affair began.

TWO

‘Mysticism in the proper sense is an intense realization of God within the self and the self embraced within God in vivid nearness. It is a phenomenon known in a number of religions, and in those religions very similar language is used in describing the experience … Now through the centuries Christian teaching has emphasised that the significant thing is not just the mystic experience but its place and its context within the whole life of a Christian.’

MICHAEL RAMSEY

Archbishop of Canterbury 1961–1074

Canterbury Pilgrim

I

I now come to the third path which led me to the crisis of 1968. Running parallel to my increasingly convoluted relationship with my father and my increasingly chaotic career as a psychic was my friendship with Marina Markhampton.

Since Marina was the fiancee of the Bishop’s younger son it was hardly surprising that I knew her; what was surprising was that I had become friends with her well before her engagement to Michael. She was a year my senior, one of those flashy debutantes who are forever having their photographs plastered all over the society magazines, and while still a teenager she had won herself the title of the biggest cock-tease in town. This was not the sort of woman who normally interested me and so there was no obvious reason why we should have continued to wander in and out of each other’s lives, but ever since Marina had decided I should be a member of her famous Coterie I had never quite managed to disentangle myself from her.

Since my mother had come from an old county family I had been automatically granted access to the debutantes’ social events in the diocese of Starbridge, but I had quickly fought my way out of this boring maelstrom and rejected all invitations to similar parties in London. This early antipathy of mine towards conventional socialising explains why I never met Marina until she turned up at my Cambridge College’s May ball in the summer of 1962, six years before my unprofitable interview with Bishop Ashworth and the onset of the Christian Aysgarth affair.

The May ball was one of those rare events which I condescended to attend; as everyone acquainted with Cambridge knows, the May balls are a very big deal indeed and not even an oddball loner dares to miss them. In 1962 I invited Rosalind to accompany me, but unfortunately she was struck down by appendicitis so I wound up going on my own. The ball marked the end of my first year up at Cambridge. I was nineteen. Apart from Rosalind – who in those days was no more than my former childhood playmate – I had no girlfriend of any kind. Naturally, since I was nineteen, I was obsessed with sex, but naturally, given my background, I hadn’t yet succeeded in working out what I could do about it. Alone and innocent I drifted along with mixed emotions (distaste ploughed under by an overpowering sexual curiosity) to the event which all my contemporaries considered to be the last word in undergraduate chic.

By the time I met Marina the evening was far advanced. I had been whiling away the hours by watching and listening and occasionally summoning the nerve to dance with girls who looked nice enough not to reject a very plain teenager who felt like a goldfish marooned a long way from his bowl. These girls all bored me very much. Eventually I confined myself to observing the sultry sirens and wishing I had the guts to whip them away from their preening partners. While all this was going on I drank much more than usual out of sheer absent-mindedness; I was fantasising so hard about the sirens that I forgot to notice what I was pouring down my throat. Finally, unable to stand the frustration any longer, I staggered outside to sample the moonlight, and as soon as I began to cross the lawn to the river I saw Marina lying semi-naked in a punt.

The sight stopped me dead in my tracks. Then it dawned on me that two would-be gondolieri were fighting on the jetty for the honour of wielding the pole which would propel the punt downstream.

Drunk but by no means dead drunk I said to myself: ‘He who dares wins,’ and circumventing the brawling gondolieri I said politely to Marina: ‘May I help you?’

‘My dear,’ she said, ‘I thought you’d never ask,’ and stepping into the punt I picked up the pole.

The gondolieri shouted: ‘I say, hang on!’ and ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ but Marina and I were already gliding away from the jetty. At that moment more opposition appeared: a small wiry figure raced down to the bank and began to bounce up and down in an ecstasy of disapproval. ‘Marina, nudity is not allowed – pull up your dress this instant!’ it thundered, and as I heard that familiar voice I realised this curious creature was none other than the Bishop’s son, not Michael but the older one, Charley. He was at a theological college in Cambridge, but as a graduate of Laud’s he would have had no trouble obtaining a ticket for the May ball.

‘Do you know this girl, Charley?’ I called with interest, sinking the pole much too deep in the mud. My lack of interest in the debutante world and my lack of acquaintance with glossy society magazines had ensured my failure to recognise her.

‘Of course I know her! She’s the grand-daughter of Lady Markhampton who lives in the Close at Starbridge. Marina, for God’s sake –’

Take not the name of the Lord thy God in vain!’ trilled Marina richly. ‘Remember your manners, Charley darling, and introduce me to this divine mystery-man!’

At that moment the divine mystery-man was trying to pull the pole out of the mud. For one agonising second I thought I was about to be dragged into the water, but the pole parted from the river-bed in the nick of time and I regained my balance. Meanwhile the gondolieri had stripped off their clothes and with cries of ‘Whoopee, Marina – we’re coming!’ they plunged into the river.

This is disgraceful!’ shouted Charley, outraged at the sight of more nudity. ‘Absolutely disgraceful!’

‘Oh, buzz off before I order them to drown you!’ exclaimed Marina crossly, and purred to the oncoming swimmers: ‘Darlings, you’re terribly sweet but you’ve missed – quite literally – the boat. Punt on, mystery-man.’

I shot the boat forward. Charley and the swimmers were left behind as I furiously propelled the punt towards the moonlit silhouette of Clare bridge.

‘Stop!’ commanded Marina as we sped beneath the arch. ‘I want to feast my eyes on King’s College Chapel.’

I braked as dexterously as I could and tried to concentrate on drawing alongside the bank without a bump, but I was distracted by the sight of Marina’s unsuccessful attempts to pull up her dress. Something had broken at the low neckline and her breasts kept falling out.

‘I can’t get my bosom to behave itself,’ she said, ‘but you don’t mind, do you?’

‘Not in the least.’

Introduce yourself. You fascinate me.’

‘Nick Darrow.’

‘What’s your connection with that ghastly prig Charley Ashworth?’

‘Our fathers are pals.’

‘Oh God, how awkward for you – I inevitably loathe all the offspring of my parents’ friends. Where do you come from?’

‘A village near Starbridge.’

‘Good heavens – in that case why haven’t we met? I thought I knew absolutely everyone in the Starbridge area as the result of my visits to Granny in the Cathedral Close. Darrow, Darrow, Darrow … No, I don’t know that name. Now extraordinary.’

‘Your grandmother knew my mother. My mother’s maiden name was Barton-Woods.’

‘Ah well, of course I’ve heard that name before – isn’t there a rather heavenly manor house at Starrington Magna? And – gosh, wait a minute! Is your father the holy man who lives on communion wafers in a wood?’

‘He’s a priest who lives quietly in retirement.’

‘Exactly! Granny’s told me all about him. Are you reading divinity in order to follow in his footsteps?’

‘Yep.’

‘How sad – another good man lost to the Church!’

‘Don’t knock the Church too hard,’ I said, trying to work out where I could park the pole so that I could have both hands free to grab her breasts. ‘It could be in your future.’

Instantly she was enthralled. ‘You sound as if you tell fortunes!’

‘Of course I tell fortunes!’ I said, and as I spoke a vision of how I could succeed with the sirens unfolded before my eyes. But still I couldn’t work out where to park the pole.

Meanwhile Marina was stretching out her right hand and demanding: ‘Read my palm!’ as her breasts appeared to float magically towards me in the moonlight.

‘I don’t go in for palmistry,’ I said. ‘I just tune into the vibrations.’ And still clutching the pole with one hand I grasped her proffered fingers with the other. By this time my erection was so uncomfortable that I thought I might have to jump into the river to get my genitals under control.

‘Go on – spill the beans!’ said Marina impatiently. ‘How’s the Church going to be in my future?’

I had no idea but I remembered the grandmother who lived in the Cathedral Close.

‘I see you living in the shadow of a great cathedral,’ I invented, taking care to speak in portentous tones.

‘Impossible! I never stay with Granny nowadays, there’s no time, I simply drop in occasionally.’

‘Nevertheless I see that long shadow cast by the cathedral – and I see a man in your life there.’

‘There are always men in my life everywhere!’ she said fractiously, and as she spoke I detected a touch of boredom with the male sex, perhaps even a trace of disappointment.

‘This’ll be a special man,’ I said, clued in by her tone of voice and deducing that the average panting male left her cold. Really, fortune-telling’s so easy that I can’t think why more people don’t do it. All you have to do is put up a mental aerial to receive the unspoken signals and then wait for the subject to give herself away.

‘The only special man I know,’ said Marina with a sigh, ‘is quite unobtainable.’ And as she disclosed this piece of information the alcoholic fog cleared in my psyche, my metaphorical aerial began to pick up strong signals and I understood that an unobtainable man was, in some mysterious way, exactly what she wanted. I was too young at the time to make the obvious deduction: that a desire for an unobtainable man coupled with a distaste for the men available hinted at a sexual hang-up. I just thought – and when I say ‘I thought’ I mean I knew, it was the special knowledge I called ‘gnosis’: she doesn’t do it. I’m wasting my time.

‘The funny thing is,’ Marina was musing, ‘this man does actually have a connection with the Cathedral Close at Starbridge. But I don’t see how I could ever wind up there living with him.’

‘I didn’t say you would. I said you’d be living – or perhaps just temporarily staying – in the shadow of a great cathedral, and this man would at last be significantly present in your life.’

‘Will I get anywhere with him?’

‘Yes, but not in the conventional sense,’ I said, inventing the answer I knew she wanted to hear, but then without warning I received the print-out that circumvents the ordinary processes of thought, the message that’s hammered directly into the brain from some unknown source and appears instantly on the screen of the psyche. Without stopping to think – because thinking had been by-passed – I said: ‘You’ll be very close to his wife. In fact she’s already a friend of yours.’

‘Glory!’ said Marina astounded. ‘You really are amazing! How could you possibly have known about my new friendship with Katie?’

And that was the moment when I elided the Cathedral Close connection with the wife called Katie and realised that the man we were talking about was Christian Aysgarth.

II

Since I had promised my father not to behave like a shady charlatan by performing psychic parlour-tricks, I felt guilty enough about the punt episode to try to avoid Marina afterwards, but she was like a child with a shrimping-net who had seen an exotic creature swimming in a rock-pool; she found herself compelled to kidnap me for her very own private aquarium.

I was netted, compulsorily enrolled in her Coterie and treated not as a fish but as a very expensive poodle. Marina called me the Coterie’s soothsayer-in-residence. I hated all this rubbishy behaviour but of course I was flattered to have been singled out by the dazzling Marina Markhampton. Having been unsure how much sex-appeal I had (if any), I liked the way Marina made me feel like Errol Flynn and Elvis Presley rolled into one. No wonder I retained a soft spot in my heart for her afterwards and could never quite bear to sever myself completely from her boring old Coterie.

Ironically, sex was no longer a serious ingredient in our friendship once I’d sobered up. Marina’s persistent pampering was based on the kind of attraction a smart woman feels towards a supremely original fashion accessory; it was covetousness, not lust, which lay at the root of her liking for me, and it was a flattered ego, not a libido in overdrive, which lay at the root of my liking for her. In fact once I was no longer drunk enough to feel like laying every woman in sight, I was surprised to discover how resistible I found her. The Venus de Milo type of torso has never been to my taste, and I happen to be one of those gentlemen who don’t prefer blondes. I like steamy brunettes with large breasts, slim hips and legs that go on for ever. Marina was supposed to be a flawless example of feminine beauty, but I thought she looked like an intelligent sheep, all light, blazing eyes and angular facial bones.

In the May of 1963, less than a year after our first meeting, she went to live temporarily in the Cathedral Close at Starbridge. (This reflects no credit on my fortune-telling skill, of course. My invented prophecy had merely given her an idea about how she could best further her friendship with Christian, and if I’d kept quiet in the punt it would never have occurred to her to offer to house-sit for her grandmother while Lady Markhampton was away in the south of France.)

Inevitably Marina threw a party and inevitably I was invited and inevitably I was afflicted by my usual ambivalence: I felt satisfaction that I should have been included, curiosity to see how the jeunesse dorée lived and annoyance that I was to be trotted out once more as Marina’s psychic poodle. My friend Venetia seemed to think that the Starbridge party was the first occasion that Marina had displayed me as a fashion accessory, but there had been previous occasions in London when to my disgust I had been unable to resist being exhibited.

I now made a new resolution to waste no more time in this idiotic fashion, so I turned down the invitation to Lady Markhampton’s house by saying I was too busy swotting for my second-year exams. Unfortunately Marina refused to take no for an answer. Discovering that I was planning to slip back to Starrington that weekend for my father’s birthday she bludgeoned me again with her invitation and almost before I could say ‘parlour-trick’ I found myself mutinously turning up at the party – the ‘orgy’ as Marina chose to call her parties in those days.

As a gesture of rebellion I arrived late and left early. In fact I behaved very badly, but then so did Marina, introducing me to her current gang as the Coterie’s soothsayer-in-residence and fawning over me until I wanted to puke. There were about sixteen people present; Marina either gave small parties where couples continually formed and re-formed as everyone tried out everyone else, or she gave big bashes where couples tended to stick together in order to survive. On this select occasion it just so happened that I knew few of the guests, but there was nothing particularly surprising about this. Marina had a vast circle of acquaintances and liked to shuffle them around her guest-lists to keep everyone wondering whom they were going to meet next. The privileged inner circle, which she insisted on calling her Coterie, also varied, depending on who was in favour, and the only people I knew that night were her two closest girlfriends (Emma-Louise and Holly), my friend Venetia and Michael Ashworth, the younger son of the Bishop and the brother of Charley-the-Prig.