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Page 1 of 71922 · PDF PAGE 88
74 The Diary of a Drug Fiend bathed in an ocean of exceeding calm. My mind was very active, but only so within peculiar limits. I did not seem to be directing the current of my thoughts. In an ordinary way that fact would have annoyed me intensely. But now it merely made me curious. I tried, as an experiment, to fix my mind on something definite. I was technically able to do so, but at the same time I was aware that I considered the effort not worth making. I noticed, too, that my thoughts were uniformly pleasant. Curiosity impelled me to fix m…
1922 · PDF PAGE 30
16 The Diary of a Drug Fiend unreasonable, equally repugnant to the better regulated type of mid-Victorian mind, the best thing you can do is to sleep with your forefathers. So that’s that. Good-night. I told you that Lou was “ quite an ordinary and not a particularly attractive girl.” Remember that this was the first thought of my “ carnal mind” which, as St. Paul says, is ‘‘ enmity against God.” My real first impression had been the tremendous psychological experience for which all words are inadequate. Seated by her side, at leisure to look …
1922 · PDF PAGE 181
… makes something happen. One can’t get away from the cage, but the complexity makes me... there, I can’t think what I started to say. My mind stops suddenly. It’s like dropping a vanity bag. You stop to pick it up and the things are all over the place and it always seems as if something were missing. One can never remember what it is, but the feeling of annoyance is acute. It’s mixed up with a vague fear. I’ve often forgotten things before—every one does all the time, but it doesn’t bother one. But now, every time that I remember that I’ve forg…
1922 · PDF PAGE 178
… in her face. It was because he was angry at her attitude. She rather shut up. Either she thinks we're police spies or she’s made up her mind to rob us. The sight of the cash knocked her out of time! It destroyed her sense of proportion. It put all her ideas of straight dealing out of her mind. Her manner changed. She went off. Pete told me to go and see the dope girl myself. It’s the first time he ever spoke to me like that. All sexual feeling is dead between us. We've tried to work up the old passion. It was artificial, horrible, repulsive ; …
1922 · PDF PAGE 150
…the Caligula and hop so riture at the earliest possibile opportunity. Courier till attend to busines details.”’ It suddenly dawned on my mind that there was one scrap of fact imbedded in this fantastic farrago. The courier had attended to business details with an efficiency worthy of the best traditions of the profession. The thing seemed to sink into Lou’s mind like a person seeing his way through a chess problem. Her face was absolutely white with cold and concentrated rage. ‘He must have watched us in Paris,’ she said. “He must have known th…
1922 · PDF PAGE 25
…not perhaps looked a little rudely at what his common sense assured him was quite an ordinary and not a particularly attractive girl. My mind was immediately troubled. I went hastily back to my table. And then it seemed to me as if it were hours while the waiters were persuading the earl to his feet. I sipped my drink automatically. When I looked up the girl had disappeared. It is a trivial observation enough which I am going to make. I hope at least it will help to clear any one’s mind of any idea that I may be an abnormal man. As a matter of …
1922 · PDF PAGE 356
…grossed in abstruse calculations, loosely knit together, it is true, but very intense, with regard to an idea which - had not entered my mind for months. I was working out in my mind a plan for constructing a helicopter, the invention of which had occupied me deeply when I was out of a job. It had been driven completely out of my mind by my becoming heir to Uncle Mortimer’s estate. As I regained full wakefulness, I found myself extremely puzzled by my surroundings. In fact, I could not remember who I was. The question seemed in some extraordina…
1922 · PDF PAGE 192
…ering stupidity—or is he a devil in- carnate, as Gretel told us he was? Does he gloat? I loathe the beast—and I thought—once—well, never mind! Peter took the letter. Anything, anything to distract the mind from its boredom! Yet we haven't the energy to do anything: we take whatever comes to us, and clutch at it feebly. “ It’s true,’’ said Cockie, to my amazement, “ and we've got to be able to ¢ell him we've won.”’ There was a long quarrel—as there is over every incident of any sort. That is natural, with this eternal insomnia and sleeping at th…
1922 · PDF PAGE 205
…t. But I trust you to make a note of the exact time when you decide on a sniff, and I trust you to tell me the truth. Get it out of your mind once for all that I disapprove of your taking it. It’s entirely your business, not mine. But it’s every one’s business to be true to himself; and you must regard me as a mere convenience, an old hand at the game whose experience may be of use to you in training for the fight.” I hurried home a different woman. I didn’t want to save myself. I felt myself as a suit of armour made for the purpose of protecti…
1922 · PDF PAGE 288
…aking it openly together. We wanted to pretend that we were taking less than we were. The use of drugs develops every morbid kink in the mind. Meanwhile, Maisie was singing in her rich contralto voice an English translation of one of Verlaine’s most exquisite lyrics: ‘‘ With muted strings.” “Calm in the twilight of the lofty boughs Pierce we our love with silence as we drowse; Melt we our souls, hearts, senses in this shrine, Vague languor of arbutus and of pine!” “ Half-close your eyes, your arms upon your breast ; Banish for ever every intere…
1922 · PDF PAGE 234
CHAPTER VI COLD TURKEY | September 23 I pon’tT remember what happened. -I know why. Basil told me long ago. that the mind only kept count of material things. So these spiritual events are recorded in a higher kind of mind of which we are not conscious until we get accustomed to spiritual life. So all I can put down is that we Ahad a complete success. The Devil, of course, needs a human interpreter if he is to communicate with this world, and so he took possession of Peter. He has been preparing Peter to represent him. He will make Peter pope, a…
1922 · PDF PAGE 243
… When a man will dig his nails In his breast, and drink the blood Already that clots. and. stales Ere his tongue can tip its flood.” His mind had gone back to infancy. He thought that I was his mother, and came to me to be nursed. But when he came near, he recognised me and crawled away again, hurriedly, like a wounded animal trying to escape from the hunter... . Most of the time, when we have energy to talk at all, we discuss how to get more H. and C. The C. has been fmished long ago. It’s no good without the H. We could go to Germany and get …
1922 · PDF PAGE 193
… a doctor won't attend his own family, and I can see coldly and clearly like a drowning man that when- ever the idea of H. comes into my mind, I begin to think hysterically and come to the most idiotic con- clusions; and heroin has twined itself about my life so closely that everything is connected with it one way or another. My mind is obsessed by the thought of the drug. Sometimes it’s a weird ecstasy, sometimes a dreadful misgiving. “Not thirst in the brain black-bitten In the soul more sorely smitten ! One dare not think of the worst! Beyon…
1922 · PDF PAGE 274
260 The Diary of a Drug Fiend The fantastic appointments of the studio were pro- jections in terms of material substances of his mind interpreted through her consciousness. I had an uncanny feeling that if it vwere not for her, King Lamus would be invisible. In his mind, there was no) difference between any two things, but through her mediation he was able to pretend that there was. The studio was divided into several parts by arrange- ments of curtains. There was a perpetual soft noise of laughter, singing, and dancing; interrupted only by per…
1922 · PDF PAGE 304
290 The Diary of a Drug Fiend mind—it was like one of those transparent golden sunsets after a thunderstorm in the Mediterranean. I revelled in the ingenuity of Mr. Platt’s proceedings. I gloated with devilish intensity upon the jest of carrying out so magnificent a scheme beneath so complete a camouflage. It was the vision of Satan disguised as an angel of light. ‘* Yes, indeed, the whole affair is eminently gratifying from every point of view,” answered Platt. ‘“‘ Never in all my life have I been permitted to see with such luminous ‘clarity t…
1922 · PDF PAGE 350
…take a small dose now rather than put it off till later; because if I do so, it will disturb my sleep. 10. It is really very bad for the mind to be constantly preoccupied with the question of the drug. It is better to take a small dose to rid myself of the obsession. 11. I am worried about the drug because of my not having any. If I were to take some, my mind would clear up immediately, and I should be able to think out good plans for stopping it. 12. The gods may be leading me to some new ex- perience through taking it. 13. It is quite certain…
1922 · PDF PAGE 56
…s get the first train to London.” There are no incidents to record. We were both completely anzsthetised. Nothing bothered us. We didn’t mind the waiting on the platform, or the way the old train lumbered up to London. Everything was part of the plan. Everything was perfect pleasure. We were living above ourselves, living at a tremendous pace. The speed of the ‘plane became merely a symbol, a physical projection of our spiritual sublimity. The next two days passed like pantomime. We were married in a dirty little office by a dirty little man. W…
1922 · PDF PAGE 145
…ch-chain nervously. I had sunk into a chair—I noticed they hadn't offered us chairs when we came in—and the whole scene vanished from my mind. I was aware of nothing but a passionate craving for drugs. I wanted them physically as I had never wanted anything in my life before. I wanted them mentally, too. They, and they only, would clear my mind of its confusion, and show me a way out of this rotten mess. I wanted them most of all morally. I lacked the spirit to stand up under this sudden burst of drum fire. But Lou stuck to it gamely. She was o…
1922 · PDF PAGE 148
…p what he was saying for a moment, but there was no mistaking the import of his final phrase. “I’m so delighted that you've changed your mind, Sir Peter, but I felt sure you could never bear to leave Capri so soon. Our beautiful Capri! ’’ What the deuce was the fellow talking about? Change my mind? What I wanted to do was to change my clothes|! The consul’s clerk made a few rapid: explanations in Italian, and it almost hit me in the eye to watch the manager’s face as he lifted his eyes and saw the two obvious detectives in the doorway. ‘“‘T don…
1922 · PDF PAGE 359
…ink I’m rude. I’m very grateful for all you’ve done for me.” Strangely enough, the memory of the last few months had just returned to my mind. Yet it was merely the background of the burning flame of thought that filled my consciousness. Basil did not answer, and as we walked down the hill together I began to explain my ideas about the new helicopter. Almost without knowing it, we had reached the door of the large house which the Abbey used for a refectory, and we sat down on the stone seats which lined its north-eastern wall, and gazed over th…