The Illuminatus! Trilogy

"The male is Vagina, and the female is Penis," Hagbard said innocently, "but there's a metaphysic behind it. First, you have to ask yourself, which appeared earlier on this planet, life or death? Have you ever thought about that?"

'This guy is nuts," Galley told Eichmann.

"You've got to realize," Hagbard went on, "that life is a coming apart and death is a coming together. Does that help?"

("I never know whether Hagbard is talking profundity or asininity," George said dreamily, toking away.)

"Reincarnation works backward in time," Hagbard went on, as the narcs opened drawers and peered under chairs. "You always get reborn into an earlier historical period. Mussolini is a witch in the 14th century now, and catching hell from the Inquisitors for his bum karma in this age. People who 'remember' the past are all deluded. The only ones who really remember past incarnations remember the future, and they become science-fiction writers."

(A little old lady from Chicago walked into George's room with a collection can marked Mothers March Against Phimosis. He gave her a dime and she thanked him and left. After the door closed, George wondered if she had been a hallucination or just a woman who had fallen through a space-time warp and landed on the Leif Erikson.)

"What the hell are these?" Eichmann asked. He had been searching Hagbard's closet and found some red, white and blue bumper stickers. The top half of each letter was blue with white stars, and the bottom half was red-and-white stripes; they looked patriotic as all get-out. The slogan formed this way was

LEGALIZE ABORTION PREGNANCY IS A JEWISH PLOT!

Hagbard had been circulating these in neighborhoods like the Yorkville section of Manhattan, the western suburbs of Chicago, and other places where old-fashioned Father Coughlin-Joe McCarthy style Irish Catholic fascism was still strong. This was a trial run on the logogram-biogram double-bind tactic out of which the Dealy Lama later developed Operation Mindfuck.

"Patriotic stickers," Hagbard explained.

"Well, they look patriotic…" Eichmann conceded dubiously.

("Did a little woman from Chicago just walk through this room?" George asked.

"No," Harry Coin said, toking again. "I didn't see any woman from Chicago. But I know who the Martian is.")

"What the hell are these?" Galley asked. He had found some business-size cards saying RED in green letters and GREEN in red letters.

("When you're out of it all the way, on the mountain," George asked, "that's neither the biogram nor the logogram, right? What the hell is it, then?")

"An antigram," Hagbard explained, still helpful.

"The cards are an antigram?" Eichmann repeated, bewildered.

"I may have to place you under arrest and take you downtown," Hagbard warned. "You've both been very naughty boys. Breaking and entering. Pointing a gun at me- that's technically assault with a deadly weapon. Seizing my narcotics- that's theft. All sorts of invasion of privacy. Very, very naughty."

"You can't arrest us," Eichmann whined. "We're supposed to arrest you."

"Which is red and which is green?" Hagbard asked.

"Look again," They looked and RED was now really red and GREEN was really green. (Actually, the tints changed according to the angle at which Hagbard held the card, but he wasn't giving away his secrets to them.) "I can also change up and down," he added. "Worse yet, I clog zippers. Neither one of you can open your fly right now, for instance. My real gimmick, though, is reversing revolvers. Try to shoot me and the bullets will come out the back and you'll never use your good right hand again. Try it and see if I'm bluffing."

"Can't you go a little easy on us, officer?" Eichmann took out his wallet. "A cop's salary ain't the greatest in the world, eh?" He nudged Hagbard insinuatingly.

"Are you trying to bribe me?" Hagbard asked sternly.

"Why not?" Harry Coin whined. "You got nothing to gain by killing me. Take the money and put me off the sub at the first island you pass."

"Well," Hagbard said thoughtfully, counting the money.

"I can get more," Harry added. "I can send it to you."

"I'm sure." Hagbard put the money in his clam-shell ashtray and struck a match. There was a brief, merry blaze, and Hagbard asked calmly, "Do you have any other inducements to offer?"

"I'll tell you anything you want to know about the Illuminati!" Harry shrieked, really frightened now, realizing that he was in the hands of a madman to whom money meant nothing.

"I know more about the Illuminati than you do," Hagbard replied, looking bored. "Give me a philosophic reason, Harry. Is there any purpose in allowing a specimen like you to go on preying on the weak and innocent?"

"Honest, I'll go straight. I'll join your side. I'll work for you, kill anybody you want."