Babylon (25 page)

‘It is what we will that matters,’ he said, no longer amused. ‘What we will to
be.
And, of course, what we will
not
to be.’

He pointed at the map and its rash of tiny, model buildings. ‘Politics,’ he continued, ‘is only the means to an end. The true work of great statesmen and military leaders lies in the field of art.’

‘You want to remodel Babylon?’

‘My dear Madeleine, I want to remodel the
universe
.’ I leant over the table and inspected the model city more carefully. Narrowing my eyes to focus on the tiny, almost microscopic, detailing, I saw that a great tract of land had been cleared around the Citadel and that new buildings were being erected there. Not only the Shulamites, it seemed, were engaged in a grand, new architectural project.

Fortress-like, with domineering towers, the adjuncts to the Citadel were constructed of black and grey marble. They dwarfed what indigenous structures still stood.

‘The core of the new city is the north-south axis,’ he said. ‘What is now the Processional Way will become a
via triumphalis.’
I allowed my gaze to follow his finger as it described a line from a gigantic Arch of Triumph along a thoroughfare lined with monuments and mausoleums. ‘It terminates, here,’ he continued, ‘at the Meeting Hall, which, when completed, will accommodate as many as 180,000 of my soldiers. As such, it will be the largest structure in either Babylon or Earth Prime.’

‘And
all
this,’ I said, looking up at him over my shoulder, ‘will be completed when Babylon falls?’

He nodded. ‘It can
only
be completed when Babylon falls.’ He folded his arms across his chest. ‘If I were to assess my work, I would emphasize, first, that in the face of an uncomprehending world I succeeded in making the racial idea the basis of life, and second that I made culture the driving force in Aryan greatness.’ He lifted his chin and stared at me down his long, finely-chiselled nose. ‘Without racial purity, culture is without foundation.’

I straightened myself and stared at him.
Who are you
? I asked, but this time the question reverberated only through the confines of my own mind, as cold and empty as the great stone structures that would one day line the Processional Way.
Who are you
? The answer bore down on me, like a wolf rushing out of the glades of a midnight forest, in whose eyes you recognize a lover unaccountably transformed from man into beast.
Who am
I
? said a voice that only I could hear.
I am nothing. I have always been nothing.
There was a pause. It perforated the barrier—ghostly, yet hard as steel—that had so long separated me from that other world and self that lived beyond the looking glass. ‘
Oh, Madeleine, Madeleine, I have always been you.’

I had lived, it seemed, in a state of liminality, between dream and waking, the real and unreal, life and death. Lord Azrael was a phantom, as much a creation of my own desires as I was a creation of his. We were as contingent upon each other as upon Babylon.

‘You have seduced me,’ I said, quietly. ‘But you’ve been doing that all my life, haven’t you?’ I turned my back on him and walked the few steps to the window. Drawing aside the gossamer drape, I stared down at the empty courtyard and its ranks of closed, black doors. ‘Once, I called you Lord Barbarossa. And if you were my enemy, you were my friend, too. My only friend.’

I knew, now, that there was a love that had nothing to do with the usual relationships that existed between men and women. It was a love that was strange, treacherous, unholy, and yet it was love all the same.

The universe—Babylon—was as it was because of His will, I told myself; and, for me, it would remain as it was only by a submission to that will and the will of a dark, virile order of masculinity.

I had thought the Serpentessa mad. But perhaps she was the only one who had been sane. Babylon was mad. It had been built by Nebuchadnezzar, a mad king. Perhaps the history it had engendered was mad, too. No matter. I suspected ‘history’ did not exist. Time and space consisted of multiple histories. They overlapped and interacted with each other. And finally the only question that had to be resolved was: Which history was legitimate and which was to be excluded? I chose. I made my leap of faith.

For the new world was His world, the world of the Ripper. I yielded, determined to play my part to the end.

‘Shall we go?’ he said, so breathlessly as to be unable to convince anybody other than himself that he maintained a slippery grip on his
sangfroid.

‘Go?’ I said, turning around. A chill went through me, as if I had just awoken on a dew-covered lawn and couldn’t remember where I was, or where I’d been. ‘Go where?’ The nightdress had, by now, adhered itself to each and every one of my perspiration-slicked contours, mocking my redoubled efforts to withdraw deeper and deeper into its voluminous, cotton folds.

‘You must refresh yourself,’ he said, ‘at the reception centre, where Miss Lipski is waiting for you. There, you may bathe and be afforded a change of attire. And then, of course, you will be ready for St Persephone’s.’

‘St Persephone’s?’ I echoed, like the stupidest girl in class.

‘St Persephone’s is a basilica where we enact our most solemn ceremonies.’

I looked up at him through lowered lashes. ‘I will receive a trousseau?’ I swallowed, hard. ‘Just like you said?’

‘Of course. The reception centre is connected to the basilica by an underground walkway. Once you are suitably dressed, you may proceed. I shall be waiting for you.’ He took another few steps towards me, and then froze, his face utterly changed. ‘I shouldn’t have brought you here.’ He placed his palm against his forehead. ‘I shouldn’t have said so much. But you, Madeleine— you are special. I wanted you to understand.’ He took me by the arm, ready to escort me to my destiny. ‘I wanted you to know that I am not... a
barbarian
.’

If the basilica was infected with the same kind of giganticism that had found its way into the muscles, nerves, and sinews of the entire Citadel, then its cruel working of perspective— its spatial outrages—seemed to hint at a peculiarly virulent exacerbation of the disease. The nave, atrium, double colonnades, and semicircular apse were of stupendous proportions— so much so that they began to make my eyes ache. And I wondered what mad, criminally inclined school of architecture could possibly be responsible. A school whose habits of line, depth, and elevation had, perhaps, become so obsessive that they had sickened of themselves and devolved into a need, a titanic craving, to realize the physical Form of despondency and gloom. Or perhaps Nicholas Hawksmoor—the baroque master of gloom—whose Christ Church had allowed Lord Azrael to evade the police while pursuing his own, more nefarious, criminal career, was alone responsible, having chosen to build his true masterpiece off-world, in unfettered imitation of the Dionysiac architects who had built the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus and Diocletian’s palace at Spalato, and whose Aryan descendants would soon, perhaps, rebuild Babylon, London, and the known universe and realize the physical Form, not only of gloom, but of autarchy. Wherever the responsibility lay, the interior was a hateful sight—made more hateful by the simple fact that it was so denuded of ecclesiastical artefacts. Indeed, it was utterly barren, and seemed reserved for one sole purpose: to confine the erstwhile denizens of Temple Ereshkigal.

‘What d’ya fink they’re keeping us waiting for?’ said Cliticia. ‘We’ve got ourselves done up to the nines. Why leave us ’anging round kicking our ’eels?’

I had been inspecting the crowd, seeking out the faces of the temple-maidens I had met at Ereshkigal: Lipski senior, Miss Manning, perhaps, or even Tristesse, the Serpentessa’s nurse. But the crowd was huddled in a tightly packed group. And with each girl attired in the fabulous bridal weeds that had been laid out in the reception centre, it was difficult, almost impossible, to resolve that conglomeration of shimmering white satin into its individual constituents. I lowered my eyes, as exhausted by the glare as I was by the constant drone of apprehensive chatter, and once more fell to arranging the folds and pleats of my own wedding dress.

The gown was cream satin decorated with machine- embroidered net and artificial pearls. It was imported from Earth, of course, and according to the label, was made by Messrs Gladman and Womack. Its style was very contemporary, emphasizing a slender silhouette. The skirts—with their typical gathered draperies—were cut on the cross and held with inner tapes. They were pulled back over a generous bustle. The bodice was high on the neck, and elaborately adorned with lace. Underneath I wore stockings of white silk and matching garters with pink rosettes. And holding my veil in place was a wreath of white, white lilies.

There were a few cries, followed by a massed rustling of satin petticoats. I looked up. The temple-maidens, who had previously been glancing nervously towards the vestibule and its clock like a thousand brides left standing at the altar, now gazed towards the chancel.

A side door had opened. Through it came Lord Azrael. He walked briskly up to a rostrum—the single piece of furniture the basilica possessed. Mr Malachi followed.

I heard Cliticia gasp. She held a hand to her breast, and then turned to look up at me, her face illuminated by an inner light of pure devotion such as I knew I could never command. Mr bloody Malachi. I had never liked him. He seemed quite capable of taking the pennies off a dead man’s eyes. And what is more, he trifled with the affections of my darling.

Behind milord and his factotum came several men, some of whom I had seen patrolling the train during our journey to the Citadel. They seemed to constitute Lord Azrael’s personal guard.

The crowd fell silent.

‘This is it, then,’ said Cliticia in a whispered aside. ‘The big day. The moment of destiny, I suppose.’

‘The moment of truth,’ I said, almost to myself.

Without having to be told, a party of temple-maidens began to organize themselves into orderly lines. Soon, other girls followed suit. Cliticia and I joined them, pushing and shoving our way through the serried ranks until the crush became such that we were prevented from going any further.

Just five rows separated us from the rostrum. Shoulders pulled back, gloved hands folded across our skirt fronts, and gazing up through our diaphanous tulle veils at the man of destiny as he ascended his pulpit, the crowd waited, expectantly, each one of us nursing, I would suppose, her own little thrill of anticipation and dread.

Lord Azrael placed his hands upon the lectern. He studied us, his cold, blue eyes passing over the assembled ranks of white, virginal silk—a tremulous sea of foam that threatened, at any moment, to come to the boil. Mr Malachi stood a little to one side, his hands behind his back.

‘The human female,’ Lord Azrael began, ‘has neither a soul, nor a need for immortality. She may, however—as is so wonderfully demonstrated by this present, fair congregation— embody the spirit of her time. Bedecked in the lineaments of beauty and grace, in foibles, frills, furbelows and little fripperies, femininity, deadly, poisonous femininity, is the modern world incarnate. And the apotheosis of this femininity is the Shulamite. Others may worship at the altar of degeneration. But the Shulamite
is
her religion. Her femininity embodies the poisonous sex-cult of Ishtar, her fatal beauty the illusory veil we must tear away if we are to bring mankind to the light. She is mistress, leman, and courtesan to the Illuminati—the Illuminati, who drug us with their vain dreams of Democracy and Liberalism! The Shulamite is at the very
heart
of the conspiracy that we of the Black Order have dedicated ourselves to expose and destroy.

‘The conspiracy. Ah, yes. For two thousand years we have been ruled by an occult conspiracy. Until 1788 it had many names, many lodges—a series of interlocking élites comprising the Knights Templar, the Jesuits, the Masons, the Ancient and Mystical Order of the
Rosae Cruris,
the Vatican, the Brotherhood of the Serpent, and countless others. But all, all came under the umbrella of the power-crazed Internationalists who presently rule us: the
Illuminati
.’

He paused to take breath. I cast a glance at Cliticia and then at the girls who surrounded us. Their eyes glinted—less appalled, I think, than fascinated—and wayward bosoms leapt in little displays of surprise, recognition, and sympathy as each word struck a chord in the collective Babylonian soul.

‘Today at last it seems as if that foreign, hostile cabal of parasites is known and hated by all men of good will. For the first time in history instinct and knowledge attain clear consciousness. Earth Prime must see and understand the danger. Babylon gave birth to the Illuminati, and Babylon sustains and nourishes the Illuminati. And so I tell you: in the days to come, we shall point fearlessly to the Shulamite as the inspirer, originator, and profiteer of our present decadence.’

He drew himself up to his full height and extended an arm, an accusing finger stabbing at the assembled girls.

‘The Shulamite is the world’s enemy, the destroyer of civilizations, the universal leech, the daughter of chaos, the embodiment of evil, the ferment of decomposition and the scarlet demoness who is the eternal curse of mankind!

‘The Whores of Babylon stand at the very cusp of history, waiting to fall into the abyss. After that, there will be no place for Shulamites in Europe, America, or anywhere else on Earth Prime! And to those that voice astonishment I say it should have been obvious from the very beginning that the destruction of the Shulamites would be the single most important objective of our struggle! Without it the final victory cannot be complete. Today, in the middle of the collapse of a whole world, a new era begins, a fundamental rejection in all fields of ideas inherited from the past. The people of the North emerge from the claws of the Babylonian world-entanglement to a mighty rebirth! And the spirits of the underworld are banished to their appointed place in the dark!’

Lord Azrael’s speech was not quite what I had expected. Yet the Ereshkigal temple-maidens showed all the signs of submitting, just as I had done, Oh, a lifetime ago now, when, seeing his lordship ascend the steps of Christ Church, I had known that love is madness, and madness, love.

‘It is only by—’ His oration came to an abrupt stop. Beads of sweat had broken out on his forehead. He seemed in conflict, at pains to resolve the murky desires he harboured within his breast with their political rationalization. ‘Evolution must be helped along,’ he began again, his voice gaining in strength until it almost became a bark. ‘Bacteria, vermin, and pests cannot be tolerated. For reasons of cleanliness and hygiene we must make them harmless by
killing them off.
Listen well: the Shulamite race must cease to exist! Does not one of their own sacred texts say that “The women of Moab and Midian shall die and their blood shall mingle with the dust ” ?’ By now he was almost screaming. ‘Man must free himself from the feminine, that is, from the chthonic realm, the debilitating chaos that emanates from the Dark Mother, in order to forge an ego, a self.’ He threw back his head, baying at the great domed vault. ‘All Shulamites by virtue of their birth and race belong to an international conspiracy against Thule, Hyperborea, and our adopted homeland, Earth! They are of no social value! And individuals of no social value must be culled! Only thus may we cleanse the human bloodline of all that is corrupt and worthless!’ His hand sawed through the air; a lank of wet, blond hair fell over his left eye. His fist crashed down on the lectern. Several girls flinched, and there were a few, stifled screams. ‘Babylon is responsible for the worldwide plague of usurers, miscegenators, and parasites. Babylon is responsible for the Illuminati! Only by exterminating—without exception—the Babylonian whore, will we cure ourselves of nympholepsy and be free!’

He swung about and quickly descended the rostrum. Then Mr Malachi walked forward. I heard Cliticia sigh. How could she entertain a
grande passion
for such a man? And then I sighed, too, for I knew that it was to be the last time I would ask myself that weary question. In a moment of strange, almost blasphemous, inner peace that was the counterpart to the light that illuminated my friend’s beautiful, transfigured countenance, I understood just how fitting it was that we should have become sisters. I too loved a mask, a cipher, a nothingness. I too loved a man who was no man at all, but only a correlative of my own fears, desires, and ravings.

Mr Malachi surveyed us very slowly as Lord Azrael and his retinue left the basilica by way of the same door by which they had entered.

‘
Untermädchen
,’ he said, almost spitting the word at us. Then his lips parted in a thin smile as he too withdrew, descended the stairs, and left the basilica. The door closed, sending a deep reverberation through the nave and into the atrium.

‘What the bleeding ’ell was
that
all about?’ said Cliticia.

The girls to either side of us were looking up at the vault. I followed their gaze. A line of equidistantly placed chandeliers hung from the projecting lip of the clerestory. They seemed to be exuding a powdery mist, filling the air with clouds of some odd, pink sherbet.

The mist thickened and began to fall.

We broke ranks. Some girls ran towards the apse, in a vain attempt to open the door by which the Men had left; some ran in circles. And some tore at their veils and hair.

‘What ’ave you done, you silly little cow?’ said a voice to my right.

I hadn’t seen her in the steam-filled baths of the reception centre. I hadn’t seen her when, pink, soft, and fluffy, we had shuffled from the thermae into the vast dressing rooms where our veils, dresses, and paint boxes had awaited. And even though I was certain that she too had been captured and brought to the Citadel, I had somehow convinced myself that I would never see her again.

It was Gabrielle.

‘Don’t get in a two-an’-eight,’ said Cliticia, who seemed otherwise unperturbed by her sister’s sudden reappearance.

‘It’s the pink mist!’ said Gabrielle, too agitated, I suppose, to consider admitting to a solecism. ‘The pink gas! ’aven’t you ’eard the fucking
stories
?’ And then she too ran towards the apse, where about a hundred girls had already massed, banging on the chancel door and scratching at its steel panels with those long, fanatically cultured fingernails that I so admired and which preclude the possibility of useful labour. It could have been my imagination— I was feeling a little dizzy, and perhaps the pink mist was already having an effect—but I thought I saw a judas slide back. An eye appeared—the judas was big; it could, I suppose, have accommodated a multitude of eyes—and stared out at the panicked throng to view the spectacle that was to follow.

The swirling clouds of powder gradually filled the whole basilica, so that we stood as if under a hail of pink rice thrown by a party of wedding guests. The confetti had begun to scintillate, like dust-motes in a beam of light, and settled on my dress, stippling it with thousands of pink dots, like the corpses of tiny, crushed insects; and then, getting under my veil, it stuck to my face and neck. I shivered; the confetti began to melt, soaking through dress, chemise, and stays, until I felt it make frigid contact with my bosom.

Cliticia lifted her veil and closed her eyes, her upturned face covered in pink blotches, like a little girl’s who has been gorging herself on sweets. Indeed, the whole basilica had begun to smell like a sweetshop. ‘It’s pretty,’ she said, as she held out her arms and let the confetti fall onto her open palms. The other girls had disappeared, lost within the thickening mist, like travellers who have strayed from the path on a moor, to wander into a strange land of Faerie—a chocolate-box, Christmassy world of pink stars, pink skies, and pink moonlight. ‘They never really meant to make us their slaves, did they?’ she added, sadly. ‘We’re stupid, that’s what we are, Maddy. Plain stupid.’ She tipped her chin to the vault, the confetti spattering her eyelids, her lips, cheeks, and
retroussé
nose. She began to laugh, the laughter gentle, like the tinkling of a pink, fairy bell. ‘We’re fools. Bloody fools for love.’ The laughter froze on her lips and became a smile. It was a lovely smile, totally bereft of remorse or bitterness. ‘I thought I loved ’im. I thought ’e was the one.’ She took a deep breath and then exhaled with histrionic languor, like someone who, poring over old love-letters and feeling the keen edge of sadness pressed against her cheek, took refuge in self-mockery. ‘I thought ’e was Prince Cherrypop.’ Her face, like her dress, was by now saturated. She was a girl who had been dipped into a vat of candyfloss. She was an Arcimboldo made of candied peel, glacé cherry, bonbons, and all kinds of crystallized fruit, primped, preened, prinked and ready to be put on show in a confectioner’s shop window.