The Complete Simon Iff by Aleister Crowley Page A

Under this torture Fraser wrote the telegram which was later handed in by Clara; then he was set to telephone to you, Macpherson, with the implement of torture ready in case he should make a mistake. Yet he kicked; they had to ring off, and have a second orgie of devilment before he would give the answer you required. It was useless for him to give a false answer; his best chance of help (as they probably showed him) was to convince you that it was he.
    “Directly this is over, Fraser is murdered. It would really have been safer to wait till the last moment ——”
    “Of course it would. You don’t know all, though you must be the devil to know what you do. But Fraser had aortic regurgitation; he died while still speaking to you. We had meant him to say a great deal more. That was where our plan broke down.”
    “Still, it was a good plan,” returned Simon Iff cordially. “And the rest is simple. The car is left on a lonely road, with Fraser in it, an evident suicide. And the doctor was to drive past; he was in waiting, after firing the shot into Fraser’s abdomen, for the lights of the patrol or whoever should come up; and he was to certify that the shot had caused death. Why should anyone suspect anything else? Perhaps the doctor would offer to take it away in his car, and lose time in various ways, until the hour of death was no longer certain. Now, Fisher, why didn’t he do as arranged?”
    “Clara was full of morphia up to the neck. She did it all, plan and execution, on morphine and hysteria. Oh, you don’t know her! But she broke down at that moment. She was in the car with Leslie; she had a fit of tearing off her clothes and screaming, and he had to struggle with her for an hour. When she came to, it was too late and too dangerous to do anything. When I heard it, an hour later, I knew the game was up. I knew that Fate was hunting us, even as we had thought we were hunting Fate! The two accidents — Fraser’s death and her insanity — were the ruin of all! God help me!”
    “So she took morphia!” cried Macpherson. “Then was that what you meant about the Chinaman?”
    “Good, Macpherson! You’re beginning to bring your Shakespeare into the bank!”
    “But you — how did you know about it?”
    “I was ten years in China. I’ve smoked opium as hard as anybody. I recognized the drama from the first as a mixture of opium-visions and sex-hysteria.”
    “But I still don’t see why they should play this mad and dangerous game, when it would have been so simple just to steal the money and get away.”
    “Well, first, there was the love of the thing. Secondly, it was exceedingly shrewd. The important point was to cover the one uncoverable thing, the theft of the money. Left alone, your business routine would have worked with its usual efficiency. You would have traced the Paris package minute by minute. Instead of that, you never gave it one thought. You were out on a wild goose chase after Fraser. She took you out of the world you know into the world she knows, where you are a mere baby. I could follow her mad mind, because I have smoked opium. You might try that, too, by the way, Macpherson, if the Russian Ballet doesn’t appeal to you!
    “And now, Mr. Fisher, I wish you to answer my second question. I have reasons for inclining to acquit you, in part; for giving you a chance. The man I mean to hang is Dr. Leslie. He is one of a common type, the ambitious money-loving Scotsman, clever and handsome, who comes to London to make his way. They become women’s doctors; they seduce their patients; they make them drug-fiends; they perform abortions; and to the extortionate charges for their crimes they add a tenfold profit by blackmail. These men are the curse of London.”
    “It’s true; I think he ruined Clara with morphine. I feel sure she was a good girl once.”
    “Tell us of your relations with her.”
    “I met her a year ago. Her fascination conquered me at once. Oh, you don’t know her! She