THE SPIRITUALIST

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The Spiritualist.

By Robert Davidson ©

One Sunday evening Alec Sutherland entered an office building in Swanston Street and went up in a rapidly rising elevator to the fifth floor.

He walked quickly down the long corridor lined with heavy oak doors. At the far end, a sign outside a half open door announced Mrs Findlater’s ‘Temple of Light’.

Mrs Findlater, a Psychic Medium, was at the moment preparing for the evening séance. She was arranging flowers on a table.

Alec being the first to arrive was warmly greeted by the older woman who flashed him a big smile.

‘You’re a bit early,’ the woman said brightly, ‘but do sit down.’ His eyes roved her body and saw she was top-heavy with a large bust in a bright multi-coloured floral dress.

Alec found himself looking into her eyes. For a long moment he had the strongest feeling that he knew her but couldn’t imagine where he could have met her.

She’s old but beautiful in an unstated way, he thought to himself. Large dark chestnut hair with streaks of grey. The delicate features of her face were flawless with a kind of pristine purity: her make-up was lightly applied with pink lipstick and pink rouge on her cheeks. Perfectly made up, just the faintest hint of perfume. Her blue eyes held a mischievous sparkle.

It was a smile as if she knew him, had recognised him, had known him for years. Her eyes felt to Alec as if they were going right through him. They were the most outstanding thing about her. Alec was mesmerised. He chanced her another glance. He looked again into her large, luminous eyes, they were such a deep blue, they were almost violet. A flash of blue that stirred something deep within him.

Alec stood immobilised, still looking at her. For a long moment his mind just refused to work.

She watched him eyeing her. She did not say anything, did not turn away. Then the woman appeared to turn her eyes off. It was as if she had thrown a switch. It was an unnerving experience.

Alec sat down in the back row of about twenty wooden chairs which were arranged to face a platform with a table of some dark reddish wood.

The table was spread with masses of flowers of many different kinds and about a dozen candles in pretty glass holders.

The woman was now lighting the candles. Alec watched her movements around the table, which served as a kind of altar.

She turned to face him. Her lips trembled slightly as she spoke. ‘We’ll be starting soon.’ Her voice was cultured and charismatic, her lips were soft and full, Alec observed. Sensual lips, ripe and insolent. He could see a pulse beating in her throat. Her eyes flicked up at him, and then down. Alec was spellbound! Hypnosis? Mind control? he wondered.

A heavyset man wearing a headband of some kind stepped through the doorway and stood behind Mrs Findlater.

Alec could hear voices in the passage outside as five elderly women entered the room. The Spiritualist greeted them warmly as they took their seats.

Another older woman then came into the room and went up to a middle-aged lady in the front row. The two women kissed one another passionately mouth to mouth before sitting down.

Mrss Findlater then stood behind the table and said a few words of welcome and gave a short explanation of what to expect.

Alec was eager to absorb her words and the truth within them. He had been told this woman had a remarkable ability to communicate with people who had passed over to the Other Side.

She was now handing out brown paper bags to everyone present. ‘I want you each to take a bag, come to the table, select a flower, hold the flower in both hands for a moment, then place it in your bag.’ Alec chose a bright blue delphinium, caressed it and put it in his bag before returning to his seat.

‘When everybody is seated,’ the woman was saying, ‘I will go into a light trance. I want you all to be very quiet during this time as I must have full concentration. I will come to you one at a time. I will then give you a reading from your flower.’

While she was saying this one of the other women was closing the heavy curtain at the window and switching off the lights.

And so the meeting went on by candlelight. And as Mrs Findlater went to each person, took their flower out if their bag and then asked if they had an Yvette or a Margery in the Spirit World, several of the women and the one other man present exclaimed, ‘Yes. Yes. She was my daughter,’ or ‘My mother’s maiden name was Thompson, as you said.’

When Mrs Findlater took the delphinium out of Alec’s bag, he was astonished when she told him that his mother had been deserted by her boyfriend when she told him she was pregnant with Alec. She then went on to say that a young girl named Victoria Gay was in the Spirit World and that she sends Alec her love. Alec was instantly overcome with the deepest sorrow as he recognised the bright vivacious girl.

The Spiritualist lady was saying that Alec was to stop mourning this girl and move on. Alec was stunned, his mind strangely blank. For eight years Alec has obsessively mourned Vicky and has suffered a full-fledged depression. He was broken-hearted when she died.

Vicky had been his first girlfriend when he was seventeen. She had been instantly killed in a hit and run accident on the Nepean Highway in Cheltenham when she was sixteen. This was eight years ago. Alec had never forgotten her.

Mrs Findlater, now coming out of her trance, brought the meeting to a close, saying, ‘There’s tea and coffee available for a small charge. There’s no need to rush off.’

Eventually people drifted over to a table by the door where an urn was boiling. They were each immersed in excited conversation telling one another about their readings. ‘She’s amazing,’ said a small grey-haired lady. ‘Beatrice gets it right every time, even down to the finest details.’

‘She gave an excellent description of my grandmother again today,’ said the only other man present. A heavy-set man with a large bandana. ‘Old Julie has come through three times this year.’

‘It might have been a trick of the light. Maybe hypnosis. But I’m sure my father was in the room,’ another woman said.

One of the younger women was telling everybody that Beatrice had once told her that a bald-headed man would be of major significance in her life. ‘A week later I met Joe. We’re now engaged.’

The heavy-set balding man put out a meaty hand and introduced himself to Alec as Bill Faye. Bill was an actor who had recently played the Ghost of Hamlet’s father in an amateur production. His fleshy nose was red with open pores. A whisky nose, Alec surmised. ‘Ye-es,’ Bill was saying, masticating the last crumbs of an Arnott’s biscuit. ‘Beatrice is spot on. Well, waddyaknow?’

Bill’s wife Persephone was proudly telling everybody how Bill as a member of the Spiritualist Union had been sent to investigate a poltergeist that has been annoying and frightening a family in Oakleigh. This family had recently moved into a house that had been empty for several years. There had been all sorts of strange knocking noises during the night and something that sounded like a huge chain being dragged across the dining-room floor. And how the Channel Seven News team had made quite a feature of this story and Bill had his moment of celebrity when he was called upon to explain what was going on to the viewers.

‘Did you receive a good reading?’ Mrs Findlater was asking Alec.

She stared into him sharply and again Alec had the feeling of her seeing through him, as though peering into his skin.

‘Yes, I did,’ Alec replied. ‘How did you know about my mother?’ And about my girl, Vicky?’

‘I don’t know anything about them. They just came through to me while I was in my trance. I don’t remember now what they said. All I hope is that their message had meaning for you.’

There was a great sadness in Alec’s eyes, she saw, and despite her unease, Beatrice felt for him, for whatever private devils he was struggling with.

‘Yes. It certainly was. But what I also wanted was some sort of contact with my Uncle Fred. He was my mother’s brother and was like a good step-father to me.’

‘I’m afraid I can’t just conjure him up like a genie out of a bottle. All you can do is be patient, and hope or pray he will make contact with you. Just relax your mind and open yourself to the Other Side.’ Her words hung in the air for some moments.

She was about three times his age. Yet he was attracted to her. He looked her straight in the eye, capturing her complete attention, but not knowing exactly what was going on in her mind. Not a word passed between them. Not a word needed to pass. It was as though it were happening in an isolated pocket of time. Alec looked deep into her face and saw the sincerity there. She then closed her eyes and seemed to be lost in meditation.

People now began to make their way out of the room, their footsteps echoing down the hallway to the elevator. Alec followed behind.

Once outside in the street, Alec made his way up Flinders Lane to where his car was parked.

2.

The following Sunday Alec was just entering the elevator as Mrs Findlater, coming in from the street, called out to him from the lobby, to hold the door open for her. She had rushed in from the florist shop next door and arrived breathless, her large bosom heaving. She was carrying two big baskets of flowers, one on each arm.

She shook her head when Alec offered to carry one basket.

His gaze was fixated on her. He had a smouldering look as if he was sizing her up, checking her out. Imagining what she could look like underneath her clothes.

He tried to act cool and avert his gaze.

Their eyes met and she hastily looked away. She knew what he was thinking.

She was being appraised and she knew it. She could tell by the feel of his eyes on her. In the privacy of Alec’s mind Beatrice was being undressed. Her breasts were inspected, then her legs. Her clothes were again removed and her legs spread. His eyes roved her body.

She intended to give as good as she got, and closely examined him. She was so lost in her own thoughts. She took in his dark hair and scruffy beard. He had the most intense brown eyes she had ever seen.

She saw that his hands were strong and sturdy. He was obviously a man who knew how to use tools.

Beatrice still couldn’t keep her eyes off him. Why was she looking at him like that? He had the impression she was also checking him out. He could certainly be just fooling himself though thinking that she was coming on to him.

Alec’s hands were tanned and masculine. She could feel those hands exploring her body.

Beatrice felt genuinely connected to Alec and she was fully aware of how symbiotic such a bond is capable of becoming. Her face was as red as a schoolgirl’s blush.

Again her eyes searched into him. Her smile filtering through her thoughts.

She looked into his face hoping to catch emotion but at first found none. But as she looked deeper into him, something about the sadness in his eyes made her desperate to comfort him.

‘Sir!’ The single word hung between them. ‘You were here last week, weren’t you?’ Alec nodded.

She rather shyly introduced herself in her slightly Irish accent as Beatrice.

He also told her his name, Alec Sutherland.

Even with the age gap between them he was attracted to her. Almost conspicuously not looking at her cleavage.

She then asked how long he had been interested in Spiritualism.

‘Not long,’ he answered briefly.

They exited the elevator and walked to the room that Beatrice called her Temple.

She moved over to a table by the window and unloaded the bunches of flowers from her baskets. She studied Alec from this distance.

Alec had never expected to connect with a much older woman in this way. Last week she had looked up and caught him staring at her, and she seemed to hold his eyes a lot longer than necessary. There might have been a slight smile on her lips or he might have imagined it.

She had immediately recognised him as an Affinity, a Soul-Mate, and that he had at some time gone through a big emotional crisis in his life.

She had to have loved Alec once, she thought, most likely in a previous life. Only that could explain it. Why else would his body seem so familiar to her?

She couldn’t keep her eyes off him. She looked at him, looked right through him into the hidden parts of his mind. And she had known. That he like her had had significant tragedy in his past. She had been where he was now.

She knew it would be too great a shock to discover there was someone who could read your thoughts, so she switched off her probing of the inside of Alec’s mind, but she was very aware of how Alec kept catching himself glancing at her chest, clearly outlined underneath her dress. She saw how he was holding his breath to control his wild thoughts.

At first Alec felt that he had to get away from her too knowing gaze, then he realised he couldn’t leave as she was his one and only contact with Vicki.

At the moment Alec was unable to see beyond his own pain. And Beatrice’s look of pure empathy had unnerved him, even though he was desperate for someone or something to fill the void within him.

She had looked into him and had seen the love and pain, the loneliness and passion.

‘Have you got a girlfriend at the moment?’ she asked, sitting down next to him.

‘No.’

‘I assume you’re not married?’

‘No. I’ve had to concentrate on my studies.’

‘Do you work during the day?’ she asked trying to keep the conversation going.

‘I’m in an insurance office. The claims department for motor vehicle accidents.’

‘You will have no trouble finding a nice girl. You’re attractive and eligible.’

‘I’m falling into a monotonous routine,’ he replied. ‘Just going through the motions. It’s just life, I suppose.’

She knew that he was still obsessed over his girl’s death and that it kept going round and round in his mind.

‘You need to move on,’ Beatrice said.

He wondered how she had guessed his thoughts. ‘I don’t know if I can move on.’

‘You can ... and you will. Just give it time.’

The feeling of emptiness, she knew, it seems like it will never go away, but it will. ‘Give it time.’

She took in the haunted look in his dark eyes. The distant look on his face. The bloodless cheeks. Her eyes were transfixed on him. She felt she would need to touch him to comfort him.

‘I know what it’s like to lose someone,’ she was saying. ‘Sometimes all it takes is for someone to tell you that the world hasn’t ended.’ Her voice was almost breaking with a weak sob. How fragile and fleeting life is, she thought.

She came to Alec.

At that moment a large woman came into the room and sat on the other side of Alec. Beatrice introduced her as Madame Renee Loftus.

Madame Loftus, a French woman who had a bad cold. She moved restlessly on her chair and turned to Alec and started talking at him. ‘I have eighty-eight years,’ the woman sniffed, holding a damp handkerchief to her inflamed nose and looking at him through thick glasses.

‘Beatrice is to me like my own daughter. Ma fille. But she is not my daughter. I love her. She is so young-looking. And pretty. My real daughter was killed crossing Punt Road in South Yarra eleven year ago.’ Her thick lips were munching on the words. ‘If an accident has been arranged there’s nothing you can do about it.’

‘I’m afraid that’s too fatalistic for me, ’ said Alec. ‘I don’t think car accidents are arranged.’

They sat looking at each other a while. She looking at Alec over moon-shaped glasses and lowering beige eyelids.

Alec took in her full, white goitrous throat above the grey jumper of her twin-set. Madame said after a pause, ‘Beatrice often bring Yvette to me in séance. I am devoted to Beatrice.’

Beatrice had stopped thinking of men sexually many years ago. Sexual thoughts were now coming at her with a vengeance. It was like a cancer that had been in remission for a long time and had now come back in a fury.

She felt that strange feeling again, a tightness in her stomach and breasts, and a looseness between her legs. She couldn’t get Alec off her mind all day. Something about him was different.

Her eyes fell on Alec’s hands, strong and clean, capable. She has always been attracted to a man’s hands, and he had beautiful, masculine hands. And she again wondered how those hands would feel caressing her body.

She felt her nipples tighten, and for a moment she was ashamed of her lewd thoughts. She pulled her eyes away from the young man.

Alec continued to attend the séances each Sunday evening for the next few weeks. He got on well with the people there and listened carefully to the various people tell of the readings they got from the clairvoyant.

3.

The following week when Alec entered the Temple, he saw Bill Faye hovering over an elderly lady sitting on a solitary chair at the far end of the room.

Bill had his hands above the woman’s head and was moving them in small circles. He then lowered his hands to just above her shoulders and did the same circular motions.

‘Bill’s giving Miss Virgo spiritual healing,’ Persephone Faye, Bill’s wife was explaining to Alec. ‘You’re not allowed to touch the person but just to direct your hands around and about them. Miss Virgoe says she’s had relief from her asthma, her liver and her gout, due to Bill’s ministrations.’

Alec could again feel Beatrice’s eyes on him and that she was watching him intently.

‘Hello Alec,’ Beatrice said, pointing to a chair for him to sit. ‘How are you tonight?’

‘Well enough, Mrs Findlater.’

‘Call me Beatrice.’

‘Beatrice,’ he corrected.

Her smile was disarming as well as her forthrightness. Alec found her blue eyes sparkling at him even more. He was very conscious of her eyes.

‘You’ve met Lydia Jeffries, Kitty Virgoe, Bill and Persephone Faye, Madame Loftus, haven’t you?’ she asked pointing to the other persons present.

Alec acknowledged Persephone Faye and noted her milky marble eyes. And her matching polka dot dress.

Bill Faye smiled and held out his hand and Alec had no choice but to take it. Bill was a distinguished looking man. His voice was rich and velvety.

Kitty Virgoe was a pigeon-coloured woman with a seamed, yellow face. She had screwed up her mouth and the thin lips tended to disappear.

Alec looked right at Beatrice in a way that completely unsettled her. Her brain realised she was being watched.

‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

‘I like looking at you,’ he told her.

Beatrice was being appraised, she knew it. She could tell by the feel of his eyes on her. It felt as if he was not only assessing her body, but her soul, her very being.

4.

A week later there was a train and tram strike in Melbourne. It had been going on for seven days and there was no sign that it would end.

After the séance had finished Alec was standing just inside the lobby door of the building, next to the florist’s shop. He stood looking out at the traffic streaming past in Swanston Street. It was raining heavily.

Beatrice joined him in the lobby.

‘Looks a bit wet, doesn’t it?’ he said lamely.

Her blue eyes bored into him. ‘It seems we’re stuck here.’

We? He thought. ‘How are you getting home?

‘I’m looking out for a taxi,’ she said.

‘I don’t think you’ll get a taxi easily today. It’s a football final night and there’s no trains or trams.’

‘Well, I’ll just have to wait, I suppose.’

‘No you won’t. Where do you live?’

‘Hawthorn. But ...’

I’ll drive you home. My car’s just round in Flinders Lane. We’ve both got umbrellas and the rain’s eased off a bit.’

‘It’s very kind of you, Alec. But I can’t impose on you.’

‘Yes you can. Let’s walk to the corner. Where did you say you lived?’

‘In Hawthorn, near the station.’

Alec was glad of this opportunity to get the woman alone as she was his only link with Vicky.

He regarded Beatrice for a moment. There was just something about her, maybe her eyes. Again he felt the need to break away from her laser-like gaze.

He couldn’t quite place it. Something about her just hit him. He found himself off kilter. It was weird. He had to snap out of it. There was more to the woman than met the eye. There was a depth to her he couldn’t access.

As they made their way up Flinders Lane, the rain was once more sleeting down in torrents.

‘We’ll get soaked in this downpour,’ Beatrice said.’

‘Bad luck if we do. My car’s just over Russell Street. Walk with me now.’ He touched her arm. ‘Come on. Follow me.’

Beatrice was cold, wet, soaked and miserable. She felt she had no choice but to follow the determined young man across the street to where his car was parked.

‘Here we are,’ Alec said, opening the passenger door.

‘But I’m all wet,’ she protested.

‘I’m all wet too, and we’ll get a lot wetter if we stand here arguing. Put your coat on the back seat and give me your brolly. I’ll put it with mine in the trunk.’

Beatrice quickly followed Alec’s instructions, took off her coat and stumbled onto the front seat. Then Alec joined her.’

He was about to start the car when he turned to her. ‘You haven’t told me exactly where you live yet. You said Hawthorn. So I’ll be heading east. But you could help me out with some further directions. I ... uh ... I kind of need your address, if you don’t mind.’

‘Oh, of course,’ Beatrice said with a smile, ‘I suppose that would help.’

She gave it to him and Alec added it into his phone.

‘Is there any possibility I could get your phone number while I’m about it?’

She provided that, too, then asked, ‘What sort of car is this?’ she enquired as he pulled out into the one-way street, before turning left into Russell Street.

‘As I said, I live near Hawthorn station. Just go down Wellington Street, Bridge Road, and then onto Burwood Road.’

A little while later she said, ‘I hope I’m not taking you too far out of your way.’ They were crossing the bridge over the river.

‘I live in the opposite direction, in Moonee Ponds. But it’s no problem.’

They were heading towards Power Street.

‘I spoke to Vicki again last night and she sends her love to you. She’s told me a lot about you, about how you’re very talented with your hands and love fixing things and you do French Polishing as part time work and how you love working on cars.’

‘Is that all she said.’

‘More or less. What sort of car is this? It’s been kept in beautiful condition.’

‘It’s a 1954 Humber Hawk Sedan.

‘1954? That’s the year I was born. Your car is a vintage model like me.’

They came to a red light at the intersection and Beatrice looked at him before he entered Burwood Road.

‘Just keep on for a bit and I’ll tell you when to turn,’ Beatrice said. Then after a few minutes. ‘Turn left at the next corner and then right into Lennox Street. I live near the park.’ Alec soon found himself parking outside a single-fronted cottage.

‘Would you like to come in for coffee, or are you in a hurry to get home?’

‘Well, I don’t want to put you out or anything. I’ve got plenty of time. Thank you.’ He followed her to the door. And waited while she dug through her purse for the key.

He pushed open the door and let her go in first.

Alec found himself entering a large living-room, which had chintz furnishings, a large sofa and a simple dining table laden with candles and flowers. There was an open fireplace and several bookcases over-loaded with books. There was a large Persian carpet on the polished floor.

‘Your house is very compact,’ Alex said glancing round. ‘And very comfortable looking. Everything seems to be in such perfect order.’

The fireplace was already set up with kindling wood and a large log.

Beatrice told him to sit down while she took some matches from the shelf above the fireplace and lit the fire. She also lit a candle on the table.

Alec’s eyes were fixated on the flames in her fireplace. Beatrice went into the kitchen to prepare coffee while Alec looked at the book shelves. There were many books on the Occult, Reincarnation, Parapsychology, Hypnotism, Mind Control, Astral Travel, Out of Body Experiences. Apart from that there were other books on philosophy, history and literature. Beatrice was obviously a great reader.

‘Would you like a glass of port or whisky with your coffee?’ Beatrice asked as she returned with two steaming mugs and set them down on a table between the couch and the fireplace.

‘Yes, whisky please,’ Alex was only too pleased to accept. He sat down at one end of couch and waited until Beatrice came back with two glasses and a bottle of Johnny Walker.

She sat at the other end of the couch and was stiffly distant from Alec. But she never broke eye contact with him. Her scent was – perfume du jour.

She was telling him that he was her Affinity, her Soul-mate. ‘We are the same you and I.’

Alec felt that she was inhabiting a twilight world of ghosts and shadows, as a psychic medium dealing with the paranormal.

There was a slight awkward silence between them. But it was as if they were sending psychic signals to one another and he knew they were both thinking the same thing.

She kept up a steady chatter, just small talk really, but he was content just to hear her voice.

Her fingers touched his as she poured a refill into his glass before he could stop her.

They talked some more as they sipped their drinks, he about his work in the insurance company, she told about her late husband Gordon.

‘It was his time,’ she said, putting the loss of her husband in perspective. ‘I can feel his presence most of the time.’

She then went on to say that Alec ought not go on looking back. She remarked on the coincidence that Gordon and Alec’s girlfriend Vicky were both killed in similar car accidents.

‘It seems to me the coincidences are piling up around here.’ Alec said, after a pause.

‘Life is chock-full of odd coincidences. That’s because we’re living parallel lives.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘We’ve both experienced personal tragedies in our lives when we were young due to car accidents. I lost my Gordon thirty-three years ago. He was hit by a stolen car driven by a teenage boy being chased by the police on the Upper Heidelberg Road. And you lost your girlfriend Vicki in a similar accident many years later. We both have to live with loss. It’s a process we go through. I’ve been there. So I know you’re hurting bad. It hurts, but eventually it hurts less and less and then life goes on.’

‘I didn’t realise I was in therapy,’ Alec said.

Her eyes seemed to bore into his soul. And then it hit him. It was her eyes that resembled Vicky’s eyes. But they weren’t exactly the same. Vicky’s eyes were a light sea-green merging into a grey-blue, whereas Beatrice’s eyes were a grey-blue merging into a deep royal blue. It was the ability to change the colour shade that was similar. It was this about Beatrice that reminded him so much of Vicky.

He had never fully recovered from his loss of Vicky, and had suffered periodic bouts of acute depression.

He realised that Beatrice had been where he was now.

Her eyes seemed to see into his soul and she was holding his hand.

Alec was caressing the back of her hand with his thumb as they talked.

‘Vicky contacted me again last night. She was enveloped in a beautiful blue aura.’

‘Did she say anything?’

Beatrice hesitates and says yes. She asked me to give you a kiss from her.’

Beatrice is obviously embarrassed by this request. Her cheeks were a brilliant pink.

But Alec is unperturbed. A little while later he said, ‘I’m still waiting for that kiss.’

Beatrice and Alec looked at each other and neither said anything for what seemed an eternity.

‘I’m not sure I can do this,’ she said.

‘Oh, I’m sure you can.’

Beatrice leaned toward Alec and kissed him timidly on the cheek.

He felt himself move towards her, moved by a force beyond his control.

Alec then grabbed hold of both her shoulders and gave Beatrice a full mouth on mouth kiss, taking a blatant possession of her. He then bent down once more and found her mouth again. Their tongues found each other. Beatrice’s eyes were closed and her breath was coming in short little gasps.

He kissed her again. And Beatrice got a flash of déjà vu as if they had done this before, in some other place, in some other time.

Alec found her nipple through her blouse and pinched it, and that seemed to set her off even more.

Beatrice gave a slight moan.

Alec pulled away, saying, ‘I’m sorry. I guess I got carried away.’

‘It’s all right. I guess I’ll survive.’ He felt so familiar to her, Beatrice wanted more of him.

‘I’m afraid I’ve offended you.’

‘Not at all. I’m really quite flattered.’

Beatrice has a feeling of exhilaration knowing that she – a late middle-aged woman, had sexually aroused another human being. It made her feel ... well ... wanted. Something that had been increasingly missing from her personal life. And that the other human being happened to be a very young man.

She knew that she had been out of circulation for a long time. Her loneliness. She had come to terms with herself many years ago.

Yet now she was assessing Alec in ways she knew she shouldn’t. She found herself undressing him in her mind. She would have to get hold of herself. And try and stop these thoughts bouncing around in her head. Her skin was flushed, and her eyes were dilated.

After a moment’s pause while she collected herself, Beatrice said, ‘I also spoke to Gordon, this morning.’

‘How do you mean?

‘Although Gordon’s been on the Other Side for many years, we still talk to one another almost every day. Sometimes I have an Out of Body Experience and I see him face to face although I can’t touch him. I’ve told him about you.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I told him about the red aura that I’ve seen about you several times since you first came to my meetings.’

‘What exactly is an aura?’

‘An aura is the flow of psychic energy around your body. Not everybody can see it. Different people have different coloured auras. Yours is generally a dark red. A red aura means you are robust in health, that you are adventurous in most things you do, that you are a ‘I’ll try anything once’ kind of man. In other words you will rush in where angels fear to tread. You’re most likely to enter into unconventional relationships with unusual people, including women.’

‘What colour is your aura, Beatrice?’

‘Pink, of course. People with pink auras have strong psychic abilities and are very sensitive to others. That’s why I do spiritual work.’

‘And what else did you say to Gordon?’

‘I told him about Vicki.’

‘And what did he say?’

‘He asked me to tell him all about you?’

‘And did you?’

‘Yes. I said I didn’t know that much, except that you were still grieving over Vicky’s death.’

Alec found himself breaking up. He was close to tears.

‘I’ve got to go.’ He gasped ...

‘Don’t go, Alec.’

Alec was now lost in his own thoughts. Vicky. His girl!

‘Alec!’ Beatrice repeated, startling him back to attention. His senses came into sharp focus. ‘I know what it’s like to lose someone. It’s important that you move on.’

He looked back at her, a vacant look on his face. His eyes widened in panic.

‘I don’t know if I can move on.’

‘You can. And you will. Just give it some time.’

The sad, helpless look on his face. Hollow cheeks. That haunted expression in his brown eyes. His eyes were transfixed on a spot on the wall.

‘The feeling of emptiness. I know it seems like it will never go away, but it will. Give it time.’

Beatrice stared at him to make sure the crisis was over.’

Alec never felt so connected to a woman as he did at that moment.

It was almost ten thirty when he realised how long they had been talking.

‘Well, I’ve probably taken up enough of your evening. I should probably get going, don’t you think?’ he said.

‘No. Not at all. Please don’t rush off.’

‘I have to leave.’

‘I’m sorry. You have to leave? Alec, are you shy?’

‘Oh God!’ he stammered. ‘This is ...’

‘Crazy.’ Beatrice said, finishing his sentence.

‘I might have been out of line tonight.’

I’ve really got it bad for her, he thought.

‘I’ve got to go.’

Picking up the last of the whisky, Alec swallowed it all in a single gulp, and felt the burn as it went down his throat.

‘I’ve got to go.’ He gasped.

Alec thanked Beatrice for the coffee and whisky.

She was telling him he was very welcome. ‘I never thought I’d meet such a kindred spirit.’

‘You see, there’s another coincidence.’

‘You’re going to make me blush.’

Outside the rain had eased to a slight drizzle.

As Alec made his way to his car he could still feel her presence in his mind. Her gaze as though sizing him up.

5.

The following Sunday Alec was again driving Beatrice home and he suddenly realised that since he kissed Beatrice the week before he had not thought obsessively about Vicki. And his chronic depression had completely disappeared. He felt such a relief. Vicki was still somewhere in his mind but not at the forefront.

‘Gordon says you’re in need of sexual healing, Alec,’ Beatrice said as they sat in the car outside her house.

‘Is there such a thing as sexual healing? Persephone Faye said you must not touch the person during a spiritual healing session.’

‘That’s true enough as far as spiritual healing goes. But you can’t do much sexually without touching someone, even if it’s only yourself. Sexual healing can’t cure you of anything but it can help you to move on.’

‘So how does it work?’

‘Firstly, there has to be both passion and compassion operating at the same time. Physical passion coupled with a feeling of empathy with the other person.’

‘How then do you develop empathy?’

‘By discovering an Affinity with the person that eventually develops into an Empathy whereby you can feel the other person’s pain as much as they can. Sometimes more than they can. In your case, you’re experiencing much psychological pain with the loss of your girl Vicky. With Empathy your pain becomes lodged in my mind or heart or whatever, and I feel your pain as my pain. And thus I develop compassion for you. Don’t get me wrong, compassion is not sympathy, a feeling which can become patronising in the sense of ‘I feel sorry for you.’ Sympathy doesn’t really dissolve boundaries between people in the same way that Empathy can and does.’

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