And then my poor old friend sat down and tried to put me through the whole business, and tell me what a great and mysterious thing it was, and what a splendid scheme it would be to get into the two-hundred and ninety-seventh state or the thirtieth dilution or the thirty-third degree, or something, for when you got there you were nothing, don’t you know?
I was short on Vishnu and I didn’t know beans about Buddha, and for a long time, I am afraid, I gave dear old Billings a great deal of grief. But finally I began to get a new light, and Billings convinced me that there was something in it, and we had some more champagne.
That evening Mitch came for us with a carryall, and said he was going to drive us twenty miles inland to a “dancing-in-the-barn” function on somebody’s plantation. I proved to him then and there that he was not. Billings nearly melted into a puddle while the operation was going on. He could scarcely believe his eyes when he saw Big Mitch drive off alone, and I think he had a slight chill. At any rate, he had the champagne brought to the library, and there he told me that he had not believed such a thing to be possible; that he looked upon me in a new light, and that he thought my Ghoollah must be stronger than Mitch’s Ghoollah. I told him that I should be ashamed of myself if it wasn’t; and then I asked him what a Ghoollah was. Please do not ask me if I have spelled that word right. I am spelling it by ear, and if my ear for Hindoo is as bad as my ear for music, I have probably got it wrong. It sounded something like the noise that pigeons make, and that is as near as I can get to it. According to Billings, it was Hindoo for my vital essence and my will power and my conscience and my immortal soul and pretty nearly every other spiritual property that I carried around in my clothes. Everyone, it appeared, had a Ghoollah. If your Ghoollah was stronger than the other man’s Ghoollah, you bossed the other man. If you had a good and happy Ghoollah, you were good and happy. If you had a bad Ghoollah, you were bilious. If my Theosophy is wrong, please do not correct it. I prefer it wrong. I told him that I did not see that having a Ghoollah was anything more than being yourself, but he said it was; that folks could swap Ghoollahs, or lend them out on call loans.
Then it all came out. That was the reason that he was driving deeper and deeper into Theosophy. He had got so sick of Mitch that, feeling it impossible to shake off his burden, he had seized upon this Ghoollah idea as offering a ray of hope. He was now trying to learn how to get into spiritual communication with somebody—anybody—else, who would swap Ghoollahs with him after business hours, so that they could ride-and-tie, as it were, and give his own weary Ghoollah a rest.
“Look here, Billings,” I said, “this is all rubbish. Now, I’m not dealing in Ghoollahs, but I’ll tell you what I’ll do. You can find some sort of a job here for a decent young fellow, and I’ll send one down who’ll be grateful for the place and who will be a companion to you. It’s Arthur Penrhyn, Dr. Penrhyn’s boy; a nice, pleasant young fellow—just what his father used to be, you remember? He was to have graduated at Union this year, but he broke down from over-study. That’s the kind of Ghoollah you want, and he’ll do you no end of good.”
* * *
This happened in June. I had never expected to see Billings’s mud-heap again, but I saw it before the end of July. I went there because Billings had written me that if I cared for him and our life-long friendship, and for poor Penrhyn’s boy I must come at once. He could not explain by letter what the matter was.
It added to my natural concern when, on my arrival, Billings hurried me into the library and I found it as theosophic as ever. I had hoped that that nonsense was ended. But worse was to come.