The Open Circle.

This story has never been published and isn’t likely to be, since it breaks the rules of short story writing by changing both tone and direction as it proceeds. Nevertheless, I’m very fond of it because it represents a little piece of my history.

All the characters and settings existed and are faithfully described, and much of it actually happened – including Barbara’s shameless grass skirt ploy!

Approximate reading time: 30 minutes.

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Graham Betts and his friend Anthony Tyler fastened their winter coats as they stood up and prepared to leave the bus. It slowed and came to a halt at a stop close to the end of Sackville Terrace.

It was the last day of November, and Graham had just celebrated his seventeenth birthday. Anthony was six months younger. It was also the last year of the nineteen sixties, a decade that had promised much but had failed to deliver. The new dawn that had seemed so hopeful only two years earlier had largely been snuffed out, crushed under the rifle butts of part time soldiers, the self-serving interests of a financially elitist system, and the reactionary nature of a population conditioned to conformity. The Summer of Love seemed a distant memory and the western world had turned noticeably colder and more cynical.

The night was cold too, with a clammy mist filling the frosty air. Dense as it was, it failed to cloak the ice that had formed on numerous puddles, and it refused to be dispersed by the biting breeze which nipped at the boys’ exposed ears. It was a Sunday evening and they were on their way to a premises known simply as “Mrs Baker’s.”

They had both been spiritualists for a couple of years, ever since the sublime scents of 1967 had persuaded Graham finally to cast off the claustrophobic and irrational dogma of the established Church. It would actually be truer to say that Graham was a spiritualist. Anthony just liked anything mysterious and tagged along for the ride. The “Mrs Baker’s” they were heading for was a crumbling Edwardian town house about a hundred yards from the bus stop.

The eponymous lady was a local medium of some renown. She was ninety-one years of age and remembered the good old days when tables rapped, candles flickered in the still air, and ectoplasm was commoner than sliced bread. She bemoaned what she saw as the modern taste for blind rationalism. She asked what use there was in people going to the moon whilst ignoring the far more important journey into the afterlife. In the hope of keeping a more profound tradition alive, she made one of the back rooms in her house available to a group of twelve to fifteen people who liked to attend an open circle there once a week.

Graham and Anthony walked briskly to their destination, their hands thrust deep into the pockets of their overcoats. The street was silent and very few of the houses had lights showing. Most people, it seemed, lived in the rear of their properties these days. The dark air was punctuated every so often by the misty glow of a feeble streetlight, and one of them stood outside Mrs Baker’s front gate. Her windows were dark too.

Anthony was walking on the inside of the pavement and pushed open the creaky, wrought iron appendage. Graham followed and closed it behind him. They made their way up the tiled steps, lit well enough from the street to allow safe passage on the broken and uneven surface. The entry that ran between Mrs Baker’s house and the one next door could boast no such advantage. That was as dark as a deep coal mine, and the boys walked slowly and carefully to ensure that they trod on nothing untoward.

They emerged at the back of the house and turned into a near-derelict yard. They were heartened to see a welcoming light shining out of a dilapidated window frame, and Graham knocked quietly. One of the group, a pretty but rather pasty girl called Sandra, opened it and beckoned them in.

The door gave access to a rear annexe that was kept exclusively for the use of the dear departed spirits. There they could find a place of communion in which they would be welcome, and where they could whisper their messages of hope and reassurance to those loved ones still bound to the earthly plane.

The smell was like nothing to be found elsewhere, comprising a heady mixture of damp plasterwork, old wooden furniture and the petroleum-scented fumes coming off a paraffin heater standing against the middle of one wall. Maybe it was the smell that gave the room its vital aura of mystery, a fitting repository for any oracle that might want to rest there briefly and bestow the grace of its pronouncements on the living.

In one corner of the room stood an old standard lamp fitted with a meagre, forty-watt bulb. Various items of furniture rested against the walls, their pedigree impossible to estimate in the dim light. In the centre of the room a ring of simple wooden chairs stood in the middle of a threadbare carpet, and about ten of them were occupied by simple, reverential souls quietly awaiting the start of proceedings. At least it was warm in there. Graham and Anthony removed their coats and took two of the vacant seats.

Graham looked across at one of the long-time regulars sitting on the opposite side of the circle. Her name was Barbara. She smiled at him and said “Hello.” Graham reciprocated politely. He wasn’t sure that he liked Barbara very much.

She was in her mid forties and unmarried. The fact that she always came to Mrs Baker’s alone suggested that she didn’t have a boyfriend either; and her general appearance and demeanour further suggested, unfairly perhaps, that she’d never had one. She was more than a little short of what most people would consider attractive.

It wasn’t so much her physical appearance that put Graham off: her over-fed, unnaturally corpulent form, her plainer than average face, the innocuous beige cardigan that she wore over an equally innocuous brown skirt, and the strange, slightly unwholesome smell that he assumed must have something to do with hormones. It was her manner. Or rather, it was the manner that she seemed to reserve exclusively for him.

He found her friendliness forced and intrusive, as though she were expecting some reaction from him that he felt no inclination to return. In simple parlance, she seemed to fancy him. To a seventeen-year-old boy, familiar with the attentions of pretty, sprightly, sweet-smelling young women in mini skirts, such attention seemed both amusing and repellent in equal measure.

Graham averted his eyes from Barbara’s obsequious gaze and made some casual remark to Anthony. A grandfather clock, standing somewhere among the dim recesses of the room, struck seven.

Had Mrs Baker been a few years younger she would probably have stood up. Instead, she clapped her hands firmly and called out with a sureness of tone remarkable in one of her advanced years. Her extended modulations were, however, perfectly in keeping with a Victorian, middle class upbringing.

“I thought you might wish to know,” she began, sweeping the circle from left to right with practised ease, “that I have been speaking with His Majesty, King George V today. He extended his greetings to you all, and said that we should have a very successful circle tonight.”

Several pairs of eyes were turned momentarily downwards, but no one sniggered. As dotty as old Mrs Baker was, she did have a way of commanding the respect of an assembly. Having been the daughter of one imperial army officer and the wife of another, she was no doubt born to the task and naturally versed in the method.

“If you are ready,” she continued, “we shall begin. Would someone take charge of the lights please.”

The ever-obliging Sandra rose and walked over to the ageing light switch by the inner door. She pressed it and a naked red bulb connected to the ceiling fitment stuttered into unassuming life. She proceeded to the opposite corner and switched off the standard lamp.

The air of mystery deepened. Graham looked around the room at his fellow aficionados. Some were sitting prim and upright, whilst others were leaning forward in relaxed expectation. Sandra sat with her hands folded on her lap, her head bowed and her eyes closed. She exuded an air of innocent intensity. He decided there was something of the reformed hippy about Sandra. Barbara, on the other hand, was staring at him again.

At least, that was how it appeared. Objective observation was, however, difficult to exercise in the unnatural light of a single, dim, red bulb hanging centrally over the circle. Faces were transformed as lurid foreheads and cheekbones contrasted sharply with deep black eye sockets. Arms and legs seemed to dissolve into dull, hazy facsimiles, and the areas beyond the circle became even more impenetrable. Sometimes the indeterminate, dark shapes standing against the walls seemed to move. Graham knew that it was just an optical illusion, but the effect was powerful nevertheless. Mrs Baker spoke again.

“Those of us assembled here extend greetings to any dear friends and loved ones who have passed over. Any communication you would like to impart will be gratefully received.”

The old lady bowed her head and silence held sway for several minutes.

“I have to come to you, my dear,” she said suddenly, pointing to one of a pair of middle-aged sisters who had only recently joined the group. “I have a lady with me whose name begins with the letter ‘M.’ Mildred, I think she’s giving me. Do you know a Mildred?”

The chosen recipient looked anxious and thoughtful. Eventually she shook her head. He tone was apologetic as she replied

“I can’t think of anyone. Sorry.”

“Never mind, my dear; Mildred passed over some time ago. She says she was connected to your mother’s side – a great aunt, perhaps. She’s showing me a beautiful white dog with long hair. Ask your mother if she knows of her, would you? I’m sure you’ll identify her eventually.”

“I will, yes. Thank you.”

“She tells me you’ve been having a few headaches lately. Is that correct?”

“I did have a bit of a headache yesterday, yes,” answered the woman enthusiastically.

“Mildred wants me to tell you that there’s nothing to be concerned about. She says that you are worrying too much over a family issue. If you learn to relax, the headaches will go. Will you do that?”

“I will, yes. Thank you.”

For the next fifteen minutes or so Mrs Baker continued to pick out members of the circle and impart messages from beyond the great divide. Some were instructive, some comforting, some cautionary, and some amounted to nothing more than idle pleasantries.

Graham shuffled in his seat. So far, Mrs Baker had passed him over. He knew he couldn’t blame her for that – she was, after all, only the medium. She had no control over which spirits chose to come and communicate. He was disappointed, nevertheless; and the tedious nature of the messages had instilled the beginnings of a sense of boredom. He stifled a yawn.

Mrs Baker was silent for several minutes, and then announced that she felt no more presences and that it was time to begin the open circle. This was the reason why most of them were there. An open circle allowed everyone to develop and exercise their own powers of mediumship.

The technique required that the practitioner establish a blank state of mind, impervious to both external and conscious stimuli but still aware. If that could be achieved, it would become sensitised to influences from the other dimension that is the state beyond the physical. Graham had been practising it for some time and felt he was getting close.

The room became silent again, save for the hardly audible ticking of the grandfather clock that had earlier set the proceedings in train. Graham closed his eyes and relaxed, concentrating gently on a picture of a black void behind his eyelids. He mentally closed the door to all extraneous thoughts and breathed slowly.

He began to feel light-headed, but instinctively shut out any conscious reaction to it. He saw a name float onto the blank canvas. “Albert Thacker,” it said. His conscious mind eased back into the picture and silently asked the question “Who is Albert Thacker?” Graham knew no one of that name.

This was his big test. He had faced it before and had always backed off. How could he know that the name presenting itself so plainly before him was coming from some otherworldly source and not from his own imagination? If he was wrong it would be embarrassing.

He judged that this manifestation was different than previous ones. It felt different. He felt different. Backing his own judgment, however, still took courage. He summoned as much as was required and spoke out, breaking the pregnant silence that filled the dingy room.

“Does anybody know an Albert Thacker?”

“I did.”

Graham looked to his right. The speaker was an elderly man whom he knew only as Arnold. He was aware that Arnold was retired, but knew nothing else about him. Graham felt a slight ripple of shock strike his midriff, and then the picture of the name was replaced by an image of collapsed pit props.

“Did he die in a mining accident?”

“He did, yes. He was a mate of mine; we worked together.”

The picture changed again. The number 58 flashed on and off, like a neon sign in the darkness.

“Why am I getting fifty eight?” he asked.

“That was his lamp number,” said Arnold, clearly impressed.

Graham saw no more pictures.

“Seems he wants you to know he’s OK,” he said.

“Yes, right, thanks,” said Arnold. “Thanks.”

Graham felt elated. This was his first success, and it was somewhat more dramatic than anything Mrs Baker had managed. He settled his mind again, closed the necessary doors and stared into the void. Several more minutes passed, and then he heard Barbara’s voice break the silence.

“I have to come to you now, Graham.”

Graham opened his eyes and looked at her. She had risen to her feet and was standing in front of her chair looking at him. Her hands were clasped in front of her chest. Her face, being closer to the red light, had highlights that were even more lurid than before. The shadows were as deep as ever though, and the overall effect was of a grotesque mask. Graham was not generally given to unkind judgments, but the sight of Barbara’s contorted features resting on top of her unpleasantly bloated body was repulsive.

“Your spirit guide is standing behind you,” she began. “You’re very lucky, you know. Your guide is a woman. That’s very rare – for a man to have a female guide. She’s a princess from the South Sea Islands – Hawaii, I think. She’s dressed only in a grass skirt and says she’s very pleased with your progress. At each stage of your development, she says she’s going to remove a strand of grass to mark it.”

Graham felt a heavy note of suspicion add itself to the slight feeling of loathing that was already there. He would have been happy enough had she merely told him that his guide was a woman. Maybe it was rare; it certainly made an refreshing change from the usual Red Indian chiefs. But the reference to the grass skirt sounded heavily contrived. There was more to come as Barbara delivered the epilogue.

“And she wants me to come over and embrace you, to let you know how fond of you she is.”

Graham’s sense of disgust intensified. A feeling of threat and mild panic came with it. He looked hurriedly around at the others, wondering what they would make of this shameful display of Barbara’s. What he saw – or thought he saw – shocked him.

Immediately to his left, Anthony was sitting upright and rigid with his eyes closed. All the others, with one exception, were leaning forward and watching proceedings with evident interest. But they looked so different, so frighteningly different that even the polarising effect of the red light fell far short of explaining the changes.

Some heads looked elongated, whilst others seemed swollen, as though they were about to burst. Bodies were contorted into unnatural positions, and thin, bony hands were being flexed and unflexed. He thought he saw a tongue flick quickly out of a mouth here and there, tasting the air it seemed.

Old Mrs Baker looked the most hideous of all. Her open mouth revealed two enlarged canines in her bottom jaw, separated by a large gap. Her lined and leathery face displayed an ugly, lascivious leer, and he was sure that he saw saliva running over of her thin, anaemic lip and dripping onto her skirt.

But the major difference was in the eyes. Where they had previously been hidden in the darkness of the shadowy sockets, now they gleamed out of them menacingly. And every shining, white ellipse seemed to turn up slightly at the edges, with narrow black slits for pupils.

The only person whose appearance was unchanged, and who was clearly aware of the situation, was Sandra. She was gripping the bottom of her seat and staring at him with a look of surprise and concern.

Graham felt a sense of confusion overlaying his increasing nervousness as Barbara approached him slowly from the far side of the circle. As he looked up at her fat face and mocking mouth, he saw that the red light had started to swing with a circular motion. He glanced at the room where the shadows were moving too, swaying back and forth slowly and deliberately, as though following the strains of some devilish waltz. And a frightful sound broke the silence of the decrepit old room. It seemed that every one of the mouths around the circle was uttering something like a low groan or growl.

He felt the need to get up, to escape and replace this unnerving, inexplicable tableau with some semblance of sense and reason. Before he could do so, Barbara had straddled her legs and placed her formidable weight high on his lap.

He recoiled as far as he was able when she leaned her copious bosom towards him and enfolded the back of his neck with her arms. He looked into her narrow-slitted eyes which now burned with evident depravity. They examined every inch of his face as her oversized head moved slowly closer.

He caught his breath as an acrid stench hit his nostrils. It seemed to combine the sharpness of hot metal with the gut-wrenching odour of putrefaction. But he was in no mood to engage in analysis. He felt only a sense of violation and a manic desire to flee.

He tried to push Barbara away, but her bulk and her dominant position made her immovable. He tried to press his feet downwards in an attempt to topple the chair backwards, hoping it might break her hold on him. The result was the same. He felt weak, trapped and totally at the mercy of something he didn’t even understand. Whatever it was, it was certainly more than just the physical reality of Barbara’s oversize form. It was reaching into places where no other being had a right to encroach.

His head began to swim and a feverish heat assailed every part of his body. Nausea rose from his stomach and blind terror threatened to erupt screaming from his lips. And then he heard a succession of strange words rise above the groaning.

They sounded like an incantation, delivered in a woman’s voice, and the language was a strange one. Graham was familiar with the sounds of the common West European languages, and had heard enough Slavic to rule that out too.

Barbara’s eyes looked sideways briefly, and then she moved away. She took her arms from Graham’s shoulders and stood up. Sandra was standing behind her, uttering the words with firmness and clarity. She gently took Barbara’s arm and led her back to her seat. Graham was slumped in his own chair, breathing heavily and seized with a heaving mixture of horror and confusion.

He glanced around at the members of the circle. Every one of them looked normal again. Some were watching Barbara, some were sitting impassively, others had their eyes closed and seemed to be concentrating on the reason for which they were there.

He heard a snigger to his left and looked to see Anthony grinning a knowing, boyish grin. Finally he looked across at Sandra, now sitting next to the settled figure of Barbara and smiling back at him. Her smile was comforting, and he felt protected by it.

And so he sat out the remaining minutes of silence until Mrs Baker declared the circle over for the night and ordered the saying of the Lord’s Prayer. She was a Christian as well as a spiritualist, and always insisted on ending that way.

At the conclusion, Sandra stood up and took charge of the lights again. As inadequate as the standard lamp was, the room seemed bathed in wholesome light when compared with the shadowed sanguinity provided by the red bulb. What had seemed sordid and mysterious now looked merely tawdry again.

A friend of Mrs Baker’s had left the room before the saying of the prayer and soon returned with tea and biscuits. Graham stayed put in his seat, watching as the various members of the circle waited in turn to be served with their refreshments. They were such an inoffensive bunch of people – mostly aging, many of them lonely no doubt. They projected a composite air of mundanity and insipid inadequacy.

Graham felt bewildered. What was he to make of the night’s proceedings? Had it all been a figment of his fevered imagination? Was he mentally ill? Had it been an optical illusion caused by the dim red light? Anthony spoke chirpily.

“Shall I get you a cup of tea? Bloody impressive, that thing about the miner.”

Graham looked up at the lanky figure of his friend, standing with his hands in his pockets. He replied incredulously.

“Didn’t you see anything?”

“Like what?”

Graham frowned, shook his head and said nothing. Anthony continued.

“Well, I saw beefy Barbara setting her stall out. You could be in there, you know. Lucky old you, eh?”

Anthony thought again and wrinkled his nose.

“Nah, you wouldn’t want to though, would you? Not exactly Twiggy, is she? More like Nellie the Elephant, really. Oh well... Do you want a cup of tea?”

Before Graham had time to answer, Sandra was standing in front of them with two cups.

“There you go - two teas. Give me a second while I get one for myself. I need to talk to you.”

The last remark was addressed to Graham. He felt a thrill of anticipation, hoping that Sandra was going to explain everything. He watched her slight frame skip athletically across the room and noticed, for the first time, how her ash-blonde hair, trimmed neatly in a pageboy style, caught the light as it swung. She returned a minute or so later and took the seat next to him.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Confused. A bit nauseous. Did you see what I saw?”

“Yes, of course I did.”

“Thank God for that. I thought I was going off my head. What the hell was going on? And what was that stuff you were coming out with? What language was it?”

“Hebrew.”

“You speak Hebrew?”

“No. I learned that incantation phonetically a couple of years ago – from an old Jewish woman I used to know. I’m not even sure what it means. I just know it works.”

“Works for what?”

“Excuse me.” Anthony’s voice interrupted the conversation. “What are you two talking about? I never heard anybody speaking Jewish – Hebrew, or whatever it was.”

“No, that’s the strange thing about it,” replied Sandra. “It seems that only people who are affected hear it.”

“Affected by what?” asked Anthony loudly, clearly feeling his own sense of bemusement.

The two middle-aged sisters looked over at him. Sandra saw them and said

“Keep your voice down. Look, what time’s your bus home?”

“Half past eight,” said Graham.

“Right, that’s plenty of time. Let’s leave early. I’ll walk along with you and explain on the way. Finish your tea and we’ll be off.”

Graham was anxious to do as Sandra directed. Anthony shrugged his shoulders and concurred. The three of them finished their tea quickly, and then Sandra and Graham made some apology to cover their early exit. The half hour after the end of the session was normally a time for trivial chitchat. Anthony, as usual, merely tagged along for the ride.

Graham looked briefly at Barbara as they opened the outer door to leave. She looked displeased. He and Sandra didn’t usually leave the building together. There was a look of malevolence in her eyes that made Graham shiver prematurely.

Once they were out in the ramshackle back yard he shivered even more strongly. The mist seemed both denser and colder than when they had arrived. Sandra locked her arm firmly into his as they made their way through the impenetrable darkness of the alleyway. As soon as they were beyond the gate and walking along the deserted street, Graham asked the direct question.

“So, do you know what was going on in there tonight?”

“Yes and no. It was familiar, that’s all I can say. It happened a few times when I was with the commune a year or two ago. The changes that came over people, the lascivious behaviour, the sense of menace. We used to put it down to the effects of the acid, some form of group hallucination, a shared neurosis of some sort.

“But there was this old Jewish woman who used to hang out with us sometimes. Rebecca, her name was – don’t remember her second name. She was well versed in the Cabbala and knew a lot of esoteric stuff. It’s a lot more complicated than just this world and the afterlife, you know.

“She told me that the LSD was only partly responsible. It freed people’s minds to influences that wouldn’t normally get through. It causes hallucinations, yes. But they’re personal to the individual. The group experience was something different.

“Her explanation was that it was the dark side of the individuals’ psyches coming through and effecting physical changes by messing with the vibes. Mostly it was harmless enough. The whole thing usually faded away before any real damage was done. The victims were sometimes frightened witless during the event, but the next day they just put it down to a bad trip and laughed it off.

“On one occasion though, things were getting out of hand and some poor soul was about to suffer a pretty nasty fate. Fortunately, Rebecca was there that night. I saw her get up and speak that incantation. It was like putting a heavy blanket on a small fire. Everything calmed down immediately; but then something strange happened. Everybody was so tired that they all dossed down in the room where we were sitting.

“When I tried to talk to them about it the next day, nobody remembered anything. They hadn’t a clue what I was talking about. It seemed that whatever had been occupying them had taken the memory away with it when it had been banished by Rebecca’s words.

“So I went to see her and asked her about it. She told me that the incantation had been taught to her by her grandmother who was also a Cabbalist. Apparently, it had been passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. She also said that some people, including her – and me, apparently – seemed to have some sort of inner strength that kept us from being affected by this possession or whatever it was. I think you must be one of us too, because the only people I didn’t see change were you and Anthony.”

“Oh, good,” Anthony interjected. “Does that mean I have inner strength as well?”

“’Fraid not, sunshine,” said Sandra, smiling at him. “The reason you weren’t affected was because you’re just not tuned in. That’s why you didn’t even see anything, and why you didn’t hear the incantation. How that works, I’ve no idea. Weird, eh?”

Graham ignored Anthony’s indignant tutting and interjected.

“So I suppose that’s why Rebecca taught it to you – because you’re one of the chosen few who doesn’t get possessed.”

“That’s about it. She decided I was worthy and that it might come in useful now and again. It did, too. Something similar happened to the riot police on a demo I went to last year. It’s also why I think I should teach it to you. We could start tonight if you like. You could come back to my place now.”

Graham looked questioningly at his friend. Anthony looked pointedly at Sandra’s arm, still locked tightly around Graham’s.

“Oh bloody hell, Gra’. You’re going to abandon me, aren’t you? Just because you’re ‘tuned in.’ Why do you always have to be the bloody chosen one?”

They were approaching the bus stop where their ways would have to part. Graham shook his head and smiled. He turned to Sandra.

“How would tomorrow night suit, after I finish work?”

“OK. I’ll make you a meal if you like. I reckon I could teach you quite a lot in the course of one night.”

The heavy mist failed in yet another respect. The glint in Sandra’s eyes was unmistakeable. Anthony tutted again.

Sandra gave Graham her address and then crossed to the bus stop on the other side of the road. The two of them exchanged a wave when her transport arrived first.

Anthony looked long into the face of his friend when they were safely settled in their own.

“What?” asked Graham.

“Sandra must be at least twenty-two.”

“So?”

“She’s old enough to be your mother.”

“Hardly!”

“You fancy her, don’t you?”

Graham shrugged.

“She’s OK. Pretty enough.”

“Hmm...”

Inwardly, Graham was smitten. “Pasty” wasn’t a problem – nothing the spring sunshine wouldn’t cure. He kept his appointment the following day and did, indeed, learn an awful lot that night and over the ensuing months. Looking back, he always said that age seventeen was a very special year. He began it a boy and ended it a man – in more ways than one.

He maintained his close friendship with Anthony too, but the three of them never went to Mrs Baker’s again. They confined their spiritualist activities to attending the public circles at the official CSU church in the city centre.

And Sandra did teach him the Cabbalistic incantation as promised. He only ever used it once - in an opulent, upstairs room above a Soho restaurant, nearly thirty years later. Katy, an actress friend who had taken him there, later thanked him for saving her from a fate worse than corpsing.

But that’s part of an altogether different story.