“The man says they’re subversive. They’re trying to overthrow Fremont.”
I nodded. That is true,” I said.
“I wish them luck,” Leon said. “I might even be willing to run off some mimeographed flyers for them.” Speaking in a hoarse, confidential voice, he muttered in my ear, “I got some of my flyers hidden away in my backyard, where I lived. Under a big rhododendron plant, in a coffee can. I espoused justice, truth, and freedom.” He eyed me. “You interested?”
“Very much,” I said.
“Of course,” Leon said, “we got to get out of here first. That’s the hard part. But I’m working on that. I’ll figure it out. You think Aramchek would take me?”
I said to him, “Yes. I think they have already.”
“Because,” Leon said, “I really can’t get anywhere alone. I need help. You say you think they’ve taken me already? But I never heard any voice.”
“Your own voice,” I said, “is that voice. Which they have heard through the ages. And are waiting to hear again.”
“Well,” Leon said, pleased. “How about that. Nobody ever said that to me before. Thank you.”
We ate together in silence for a time.
“Did believing that, about a heavenly father, get them anywhere?” Leon asked presently.
“Not in this world, maybe,” I said.
“Then I’m going to tell you something you maybe don’t want to hear. If your Aramchek friends were here I’d tell them too. It’s not worth it, Phil. It has to be in this world.” Leon nodded firmly, his lined face hard. Hard with experience.
“They gained immortality,” I said. “It was conferred on them, for what they did or even for what they tried to do and failed to do. They exist now, my friends do. They always will.”
“Even though you can’t see them.”
“Yes,” I said. “Right.”
Leon said, “There has to be something here first, Phil. The other world is not enough.”
I could think of nothing to say; I felt broken and feeble, my arguments used up during all that had happened to me. I was unable to answer.
“Because,” Leon continued, “this is where the suffering is. This is where the injustice and imprisonment is. Like us, the two of us. We need it here. Now.”
I had no answer.
“It may be fine for them,” Leon said, “but what about us?”
“I -” I began. He was right and I knew it.
“I’m sorry,” Leon said. “I can see you loved your two friends and you miss them, and maybe they’re flying around somewhere in the sky, zipping here and there and being spirits and happy. But you and I and three billion other people are not, and until it changes here it won’t be enough, Phil; not enough. Despite the supreme heavenly father. He has to do something for us here, and that’s the truth. If you believe in the truth – well, Phil, that’s the truth. The harsh, unpleasant truth.”
I sat staring down mutely. –
“What’s this,” Leon said, “about the Aramchek people having something resembling a beautiful silver egg placed with care very secretly in each of them? I can even tell you how it enters – along the optic conduit to the pineal body. By means of radiation, beamed down during the time of the vernal equinox.” He chuckled. “The person feels as if he’s pregnant, even if it’s a man.”
Surprised that he knew this, I said, “The egg hatches when they die. It opens and becomes a living plasmatic entity in the atmosphere that never -”
“I know all that,” Leon broke in. “And I know it’s not really an egg; that’s a metaphor. I know more about Aramchek than I admitted. See, Phil, I used to be a preacher.”
“Oh,” I said..
“That about the beautiful silver egg that’s put into each of them that grows and hatches and guarantees immortality – that’s in the Bible, Phil. Jesus speaks about it several times in different ways. See, the Master was talking so as to bewilder the multitude; it was only supposed to make sense to his disciples. Or rather, it made sense to everyone, but the real meaning was known only to his disciples. They guarded the secret carefully because of the Romans. The Master himself feared and hated the Romans. Despite their efforts the Romans killed them all anyhow, and the real meaning was lost. In fact, they killed the Master . . . but you know that, I guess. The secret was lost for almost two thousand years. But now it’s coming back. The young men now, see, are having visions, and the old men, Phil, are dreaming dreams.”
“There’s nothing about silver eggs in the New Testament,” I said.
„The pearl,” Leon said emphatically, “of great price. And the treasure which is buried in the field. The man sells everything he has to buy the field. Pearl, treasure, egg, the yeast that leavens the mass all through – code words for what happened to your two friends. And the mustard seed that’s so tiny but it grows to become a great tree that birds land on – birds, Phil, in the sky. And in Matthew, the parable about the sower going out to sow . . . some seeds fell on the edge of the path, some fell on patches of rock, some on thorns, but listen to this: Some fell in rich soil and produced their crop. In every case the Master says that’s how the kingdom is, the kingdom which is not of this world.”
I was interested. Tell me more, preacher Leon,* I said, half kiddingly, half in fascination.
“I’m not a preacher any longer,” Leon said, ‘since it isn’t worth anything. I’ll tell you one further instance, though, where Jesus talks about it. Your friends that died, they are now a single creature together instead of separate. Did they tell you that before they died?”
“Yes,” I said. “Nicholas had told me about their future merging into a composite life form, all of them in Aram-chek. The corporate existence that would come.”
“That’s from John, chapter twelve, verse twenty-four. It goes „Unless a wheat grain falls on the ground and dies, it remains only a single grain“ – for ‘single“ read „solitary“ – „but if it dies, it yields up a rich harvest“ -read „corporate life“ for „rich harvest.“ And – „Anyone who loves his life loses it; anyone who hates his life in this world will keep it for the eternal life.“ See? In each case something small – a treasure, a mustard seed which is the smallest seed of all, the sower sowing seeds in rich soil, a grain of wheat – something is placed in the ground, which is a secret symbol of the early Christians for the human head, the brain, the mind, and it grows there until it hatches, or sprouts, or is dug up, or it leavens the whole mass, and then it brings eternal life – the kingdom which no one can see. It’s what your Aramchek friends were talking about, probably without knowing it, that happened to them, before they died and caused their condition now, after they have died.”
“All the parables of Christ have to be decoded, then?” I asked.
“Yes,” preacher Leon said. “The Master says he’s speaking cryptically so the outsiders won’t understand. Matthew thirteen – twelve.”
“And you know what he said is true.”
“Yes.”
Amazed, not understanding, I said, “And yet you still -”
“Still I say,” Leon said, “that hating this world and forgetting this world is not enough. The work must be done here. Let me ask you this.” He gazed at me intently with ancient but clear eyes. “Where did the Master teach? Where did he do his work?”
“Here in this world?” I said.
“You see, then,” Leon said, and returned to his bologna sandwich. These sandwiches get staler every day,” he muttered. “We ought to complain. Those red-white-and-blue ladies shouldn’t get away with so much; they’re getting lazy.”
Having finished eating, I got out my sole cigarette and carefully lit up.
“Can I have half of that?” Leon asked.
I tore the cigarette in half and gave one part to my friend. To the only friend I had, now that the others were to the old ex-preacher who had shown me, so c Tipellingly, that all that we had done, Nicholas and I and Sadassa Silvia, was worthless. The man who, as if speaking for Valis himself, had brought me the truth.
“What kind of stuff did you write?” Leon asked me.
“I’m still writing it,” I said jokingly. The government forgeries of my work were already beginning to appear. They made it a point – probably Vivian made it a point -to send me a copy of each one.
“How do you do that?”
“It’s easy when you know how,” I said.
Leon leaned over and nudged me. “Look,” he said. “Kids watching us.” Sure enough, beyond the rusty cyclone fence inside which we worked, a group of schoolchildren were staring at us with a mixture of fascination and fear. “Hey, kids!” Leon yelled to them. “Don’t you ever wind up like this. Do everything you’re told, you hear?”