Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2006 16:57:39 +0100
From: Julian Obedient <julian.obedient@gmail.com>
Subject: The World Is a Trance We Enter Together Part 3

The World Is a Trance We Enter Together

III

    There fell a very fine clear rain
    With no admixture of frost or snow;
    And this was, and no other thing,
    The very sign of the start of spring;
    Not the longing for a lover
    Nor the sentiment of starting over,
    But this pure and refreshing rain,
    Falling sweetly without haste or strain.

Paul Goodman, "Rain in Spring"

1

Alan Diamond leaned forward and looked at Geoffrey Martin quietly as
he sat slumped, across from him, in the brown leather club chair just
like the one he was sitting in facing him. Martin's soul had moved to
the edges of his body and was being drawn to him across the space
between them. Even in his sleep, in this trance, he felt Alan
Diamond's power as the surge of his own energy rushing out of him.

He could feel it. The emptiness.

Can you hear me, Geoff?

Yes.

You are very relaxed, very relaxed and sinking deeper and deeper into
the chair. You feel how heavy your body is. It is like a balloon that
has been deflated. I have let out all the air. Your body is sinking
deeper and deeper into the chair. It is so deep in the chair that it
is becoming part of the chair. There is no difference between the body
and the chair. You cannot feel the difference between the body and the
chair. You feel nothing. You are a chair. You are a cushion of air.
You are empty. You are emptiness. You are empty. You are empty space.

For nearly a year, since his breakdown, Martin had been seeing Alan
Diamond once a week, and through these regular sessions of hypnosis he
had become stronger, easier, more confident.

He had learned to put himself into a trance and often at times when he
felt an inexplicable tension or the surge of panic about to reach over
him in a dreadful arch, like a threatening wave rushing to engulf him,
he transcended the illusion and entered a trance, from which it might
be hours later he always emerged steady, sturdy, and easy.

Steady. Sturdy. Easy. Diamond chanted slowly, and slowly Martin woke
in the chair, looked at Diamond and smiled.

At times like these he felt a childlike affection for his master, for
to himself he had begun to refer to Alan as his master and he wanted
to tell him that but did not have the courage to. As each session
ended Martin's affection was so strong that he wanted to kiss Diamond,
but he was in awe of him and never would have presumed to do anything
like that. He allowed himself to feel his desire as gratefulness,
devotion, and tribute.

How do you feel? Alan asked him as he emerged from the trance.

Steady, Martin said, sturdy, easy. Empty. And he nodded his head, as
if, after giving it a moment's thought, he could definitely affirm
what he had just said. Empty.

2

When the Securities and Exchange Commission began its investigation of
overvaluation of certain stocks at Pinchon and Broadfells, Mathew
learned about it from the story in The New York Times, which he read
with the same anxiety a hypochondriac reads the obituaries, checking
to make sure he hasn't died without being aware of it. He knew he was
still alive because of the icy chill of anxiety that began like a
tremor in his belly and a sense of sexual arousal.

Later that morning, Old Pinchon leaned forward on the mahogany table
in the boardroom with both elbows, cigar in his right hand, inches
from his mouth, inches from the microphones, always at the ready. The
board of directors were assembled around the table to his left and
right, and the room was crowded with reporters and television cameras.
Klieg lights gave a white intensity to the otherwise subdued
mustard-colored grandeur of the room, which was lined with a burnished
wainscoting and furnished with dark leather sofas, red plush chairs,
several crystal chandeliers and a red carpet bordered by a band of
gold fleurs-de-lys.

If there was an act of malfeasance, Pinchon said slowly and quietly,
it is obvious that the malefactor will have to take the
responsibility. Our company itself has too great a tradition as an
upstanding corporate citizen to countenance such things and can only
regret the misjudgments in personnel which have allowed someone whose
ethical standards do not conform to the high standards of Pinchon and
Broadfells to penetrate the radar, as it were, and gain a position of
influence and of responsibility, from which position he was able to
profit himself -- or herself -- and besmirch P&B.

He promised an immediate audit and an investigation, but refused to
answer reporters' questions and was ushered out the side door by
uniformed Pinchon and Broadfells security officers.

Three days later, Pinchon himself was on the phone with the financial
editor of The New York Times detailing the investigation and informing
him that the overvaluation had been traced to reports authored by one
of the men they had trusted implicitly, a Princeton graduate, that
they were shocked and profoundly disappointed, and that they had
terminated Matt Parker that morning and were cooperating fully with
the Securities and Exchange Commission, the New York State's Attorney
General's Office, and the independent prosecutor, and that one of the
firm's senior vice presidents, Morgan Howard by name, would be
testifying before the grand jury impaneled to investigate the matter.

3

He ought to understand, Myra Daley, P&B's lawyer, drawing on a
cigarette through a black and silver holder, told Mathew, that things
would go much better for him if he cooperated with the independent
prosecutor.

He had tried to argue. He was acting inside a corporate culture. He
had been given the figures to work with. He didn't make them up.
Depending upon how a sum was entered it might be interpreted as an
asset or a liability. He had done nothing dishonest. He had made
models and projections based on hypotheses. His work had been clean.
The way it was used had been faulty.

But it was useless. The top tier at P&B was good. They were very good.
They had played him for a sucker. They had cast him in a role which he
couldn't get out of. It felt eerily familiar. If he accepted the role
he had been assigned rather than resist it, he's get off easy. Daley
assured him of that. Her steely demeanor momentarily gave way to a
smile that was surprisingly warm and reassuring.

He was over a barrel, yes, she explained, but, again, if he made the
best of it, it would be over in less than a year and no real harm
would be done. After a few months on a prison farm, he'd be ready to
make a comeback. With a financial mind like his, he'd never go hungry,
certainly not if^Åwell he knew.

But if he insisted on trying to make things complicated, to be
vengeful, then^Åwell, it would be foolish. He could be sure no one, or
at least no one who mattered, would credit anything he had to say,
especially -- and here she took some glossies out of a leather
portfolio and surprised Mathew -- especially after pictures like these
with him handcuffed, naked, to a bed in the company of, well, on
television and in the newspapers they would call him a male escort had
been published.

How did you get those? Mathew said almost without a voice. Granger,
was he working for you?

Don't be paranoid, Mathew. This is the information age. Your friend
Granger doesn't know anything about this and will be as surprised as
you are. Perhaps you'd enjoy that -- humiliating the man who
humiliated you.

No, Mathew said, wistfully, for he loved him.

I thought so, Daley said. That's just the reason why I think we can
count on you, too, can't we?

Mathew only nodded submissively.

You're a good soul, Mathew, Myra Daley said and caressed his cheek.

He did not know why, but suddenly, unaccountably, he wanted her to
embrace him. The tears welled up in his eyes.

4

It was raining and dark at three in the afternoon on a Tuesday in May
as Granger came out through the revolving brass and glass door of the
court house at Foley Square. He stood battered by the rain, paralyzed
and fixated on the lowering sky, lost in his mind, wandering through
an empty maze.

Are you ok?

It was Martin at his side. They had glanced at each other several
times throughout the last week as they followed Mathew's trial, but
until now they had never spoken or even acknowledged each other's
glances.

What? Granger said, shaking himself out of a trance.

Are you ok? You're getting soaked.

Martin opened his umbrella and with his arm round Granger's shoulder,
he pulled him under it.

You need a coffee, or maybe a brandy.

A brandy, Granger said.

Come on, Martin said pointing to a tavern he spotted across the square.

They stood at the bar. Granger was lost somewhere deep inside himself
and Martin waited quietly for him to return. Finally, Granger lifted
his glass, saluted his companion with it, and took a deep swallow. The
burning essence of the brandy made fiery flames leap up inside him and
grate against his inner skin like stinging needles.

Three years, he said, with a chance for parole after eighteen months,
and his license permanently revoked.

Martin returned the salute with his glass, took a swallow of brandy,
let a shallow breath out slowly, and shook his head.

The poor bastard, Granger said in a whisper, almost inaudibly.

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