Hypnogoria: Hypnogoria Halloween Advent Calendar - Door 28

25th October 2023 continued

Got into work slightly late today to my shame. Considered calling in sick, but to be honest I thought I would need access to the library’s full resources, if I am to make any kind of sense of what is happening to me. What I hope at least is just happening to me.

And besides, I wanted to retrieve Fells’ book. When I went down to the vault, I must confess I was half-expecting to find that it had vanished once more. However, thankfully it was still there, although whether you could say it was “safe and sound” is very much open to question. And I wonder how thankful I will actually be that it hasn't gone wandering again.

It was probably my imagination but it felt like there was a little crackle when I pulled it from the secure shelves, like a little ripple of static electricity. Probably imagination. But I certainly did shudder when I gazed upon the monstrosity on the cover. However there was no time to go to pieces. I also retrieved the monographs Fell had published too for good measure. So many questions, and so much to cover.

Most of the morning I busied myself discharging the day’s duties as quickly as possible, and prayed there would be no visitor enquiries to field. However luck, or something else, was seemingly smiling on me, for the library was unusually quiet. The gloomy weather seems to have kept folks away. The only real interruption was a small informal discussion when Caitlin and a few of the others had noticed that one of our frequent visitors had been absent for nearly a week now. An old fellow who lives up on Barrow Lane, and usually bobs in every couple of days to change his books. Quite the devotee of vintage crime. Apparently he had ordered some titles which arrived, but so far he had not been in to collect them. As he is an elderly gentleman who lives alone, Caitlin quite rightly raised the issue with us, wondering whether we should get someone to check on him.

I said I would handle it, and I called up Inspector Caldecote personally and passed on our concerns. Someone will make sure he is ok. Must admit that did make me feel a little better.

After lunch I had done enough to devote some time to my other concerns. Now I realise that my subconscious had picked up the image of that owl-headed nightmare from the book cover. And likewise, I could theorise that the business of the undiscovered inscription on the square monument was down to my subconscious having noticed those markings on the sepia photograph a long time ago.

But why highlight that now? My dreams are normally humdrum and frequently and easily forgotten. But now it seems like they are trying to speak with me. Certainly when I have tried to repress them, they just come back in increasing power, so vivid I cannot help but remember them. Perhaps the best policy is to unravel what they are trying to communicate, or rather, what I am trying to tell myself perhaps?

So let’s work through what I managed to glean this afternoon. Firstly the boy in the dream was of course a dead ringer for the missing lad. Even down to the red coat and bag - what he was wearing in the last sighting. And was last seen near Chapel Hill too. Again details I wasn’t conscious I knew, but had been mentioned in various reports in the papers and online.

Next then, Fell’s book. The cover is actually an etching from Dictionnaire Infernal first published in 1818 and written by Jacques Collin de Plancy. Apparently de Plancy started writing as a sceptic but rewrote the book through the course of several editions as his views changed, and by the last version printed in 1863, he was a firm believer in demons and spirits. It was this final edition of Dictionnaire Infernal that featured a series of plates depicting various demons by Louis Le Breton, a French artist better known for his maritime paintings.

The particular drawing Fell borrowed for the cover of his tome is le Breton’s depiction of a demon prince, Amon, sometimes called Aamon or Nahum. According to de Plancy, he - it maybe is -

“A great and powerful marquis of the infernal empire. He has the form of a wolf, with a serpent’s tail; he vomits flames; when he takes human form, he has only the body of a man; his head resembles that of an owl and his beaks shows very slim canine teeth. This is the most solid of the princes of the demons. He knows the past and future, and reconciles, when he wishes, friends who have fallen out. He commands forty legions”

From a quick skim of the text of Fell’s book, I am unsure whether he had adopted Amon as his patron or was engaged in some sort of occult wrangling with it. However I am on uncertain ground here, I’m not sure what Fell was doing. Is this all some metaphor or code? I seem to recall hearing that many old grimoires and books on alchemy were written in symbolic terms. Or was he a believer? A devil worshipper? I will need to do some more background digging before delving any deeper.

I am also struck by the fact that for some reason I have never investigated the particulars of this publication properly. A troubling oversight on my part - it should have been done in order to place a value on the book so it can be insured accordingly. And yet, for some reason I did not do the usual checks. And what’s more, failed to do them again, when deciding to put the book on public display. For example, I have no idea what the print run was or how rare it is.

The more I think about it, the more troubled I am. And there are basic questions I should have asked too. For example, why was this tome not published by the local printer Fell used for his monographs? I need to find out more about this Sublunary Temple that handled the publication.

I recalled they were connected with a notorious occultist, Karswell, and soon I found a good deal of material on him which I will go through tonight. Apparently the Sublunary Temple is no more, but I did find a historian at Lufford University, Dr Neil MacGinnis, who has made a study of the sect and its founder Julian Karswell. I fired off an email to him to establish contact, and I hope, if he’s amenable, to quiz him further. I’m hoping he has a history of the publishing side of the operation.

So then diary, that is all for now… Possibly will update again later before bedtime, or may leave it to the morrow.

LATER

I have spent the evening reading or rather wrestling with Fell’s book. It is a very perverse tome in many regards, aside from the subject matter, the text lapses into several different languages and makes all manner of esoteric references that I had to search out. However my big initial takeaway is that while it is set out as a kind of manual for ceremonial magic, much of the time Fell is talking about his own work, and I have the horrid impression that it is some kind of confession effectively. There are references to his medical practice, his frustration with the limits of medicine and treatments, a frustration that led him to investigate other avenues of exploration. Then later he becomes increasingly concerned with his own advancing years and mortality.

The book was published in October 1920 and maybe my knowledge of what the next two years would bring is colouring my reading, but it seems like Fell senses that the end was near. Indeed the running theme of these magical workings is the conquest of death. Fell seems to have believed there wasn’t an afterlife, at least not in the conventional sense. Rather horribly, he mentions deliberately taking lives in order to try and capture escaping souls. His experiments were not successful apparently and he had to discard what astral forms he did ensnare.

Hence after a certain point he becomes convinced that his most important work as a magician was to create his own, I don’t know, resting place, afterlife, escape plan, to ensure that his consciousness survived the death of the physical body.

It is disturbing and difficult work and after several hours I could bear no more. I returned the book to my satchel and I will take it upstairs to bed with me, for safekeeping.

26th October 2023

I decided to lay off the sleeping tablets last night. I felt it does not pay to stifle the dreams, perhaps it is better to let sleep bring whatever it will. And as it was, I did sleep relatively peacefully. And although I did dream again, thankfully they were of a more subdued nature.

Once again I was in that misty cemetery, and yet again every path I took seemed to lead back to that white mausoleum. However, just as it was beginning to feel like a loop of nightmares, the scene changed and I was walking foggy streets again, following a click-clacking ahead of me. I could not see my guide, but I followed the sound, which I suspect might not be a cane at all, and I was led all around the town. I passed a vast sprawling version of Provost School, and then down a majestic tree lined driveway that led to the Mains Museum, perhaps this is how it was laid out years ago maybe, when it was still Mordyke House? After this, I was led back into the heart of the village centre, through the market square, and passed the big old Town Hall, and finally as we approached the library, now a huge towering cathedral rearing out the fog, I awoke.

I am unsure what it all signifies. But I have noted it down and will check on each of the locations in due course and see if there is a connection. The history of that mausoleum I already know, but I wonder if I am missing something. It did belong to the Goodwins but they went out of business in the late 19th century. Something else to check.

So many threads. I feel I am being led in multiple directions, getting different bits of a puzzle. And while I am attempting not to concern myself with how and why this is happening, at the same time I cannot help but feel that time to solve it is running out. And I am not certain I have that much time to waste. I procured a dictaphone this morning so I can quickly record key passages and excerpts to transcribe later on.

Work was quiet again, another day of poor weather, rain and mists creeping in. However it gave me time to sort and clarify various leads I’ve been chasing. Firstly the clear cut stuff. Julian Karswell - a minor figure in occult history. Apparently he wanted to be taken seriously as a historian but his books were profoundly trashed by critics and the academic establishment. The newspapers of the day attempted to make him another Crowley - running somewhat lurid stories alleging he was a black magician and had invented his own religion. In 1909 Karswell died suddenly - killed by a stone that fell from a church while visiting Abbeville in France.

Apparently though he has had a sort of renaissance in more recent times, and hence I easily got hold of pdfs of his major works. His last book published just before his death, The Truth of Alchemy doesn’t seem to have anything of relevance, but interestingly he is now lauded for considering alchemical texts to be about psychological transformations several years before Jung did.

His 1889 book The History of Witchcraft has likewise been reappraised too - he rightly rejected the then nascent idea that witchcraft was the survival of ancient pagan cults, an idea historians are only recently cutting ties with now. Furthermore, he does have a section on the Witch of Redvale, Marianne Agnes, also known as Old Hemdyke. He draws heavily from Dr Fell’s monograph which he lauds as the most complete historical account. I must confess, while personally it seems Karswell was a very petty and mean man, I do find his writing very engaging and he makes some very solid historical insights.

I heard back from Dr MacGinnis today who was delighted to speak to me. He is very excited that we have found a copy of a book published by Karswell’s printing house that he has never seen. I am very thankful that we had already scanned a good many of the pages so that I could send them to him, and will gladly do the rest when time allows. I could delegate the task of course, but I don’t want to let the book out of my sight. Or indeed let anyone else have it in their hands. The book stays in my satchel and my satchel stays with me.

LATER

Had a productive exchange of emails with Dr MacGinnis, or rather Martin. He was able to guide me through the basics of occult history, and acquaint me with the differences between witchcraft, modern paganism and ritual or ceremonial magic. We talked a lot about Karswell, and I understand the fascination he has with this rather odd man who was both brilliant but also childish and cruel. I was surprised to learn that apparently with his quest for magical power, fame and riches, plus his frequent posing as a clergyman, Karswell was the inspiration for Masefield’s villain Abner Brown in The Midnight Folk and The Box of Delights.

Also I had a call from Mike at the station, and he was asking about why some places are haunted. I gave an off the top of my head answer, but on reflection I fear I might have said a bit too much.

Worked more on Fell’s peculiar text - there is far more buried in here than I anticipated. He tends to drift into a variety of dead languages, suddenly jumping into Hebrew or mediaeval Latin at certain points. Consequently much of the evening has been spent working on translations again.

However I have noted that these instances tend enclose the more revealing passages, more personal information. For example, early on, there is a section where he talks of the dead, and outlines his belief that cemeteries are infested with a species of vile beings that feed on corpses, and that they can cross breed with us humans. Horrible! However in a later passage, written in Aramaic, he mentions his own experiments in this area, injecting several of his own patients, mothers to be, with some concoction I am glad he does not specify, in order to - in his own words - “create a viable hybrid”. The results nearly all died at birth thankfully, although he mentioned that one survived, but the child was completely feral and it had to be kept chained up. Absolutely appalling.

It does not help that one of the ghastly woodcuts shows one of these beings attacking a passerby. That is disquieting enough, but what bothers me is that the background to this scene is clearly Chapel Hill.

27th October 2023

Again I did not take any of the pills and again slept better and with milder dreams. I feel as if I have reached some sort of accord with… Myself. Something else? I do not know. It is a mystery to fathom later. I have more pressing matters to deal with. Or rather my instincts, which I am learning to trust, tell me are more pressing.

In other news, a somewhat gloomy day. I heard back from Caldecott, no sign of the old boy. Neighbours say he does go off from time to time, and he usually tells them where. Although he has taken an impromptu holiday away before and has not informed them. But it is troubling all the same. Another missing person will cause a panic. As it is, people are just settling down a bit, and there is a little excited buzz about the various Hallowe’en festivities. A lot of people are hooked on the ghostly section Radio Redvale has been running. Mike has been knocking it out of the park it seems.

I heard back from Dr MacGinnis too. Basically after Karswell’s death his group continued for a while but soon dissolved with the lack of a leader. But they continued in a fashion for a couple of decades, slowly morphing into a small press dedicated to keeping Karwell’s books in print, and also publishing other works from various self-styled mystics and occultists. They funded these endeavours by operating a vanity press, printing small runs of books by amateurs for their family and friends, frequently lavishly volumes made with gold leaf, fine leather, and vellum. As Martin notes as occultists they were a bit three-rate by now, but brilliant bookbinders!

Fell’s book appears to be notable for two reasons. Firstly it was the last book the Sublunary Temple published. Apparently a fire at their headquarters of Brocket Hall soon after finished the group off for good. Secondly, there were only five copies of it printed, with Fell also paying for them to be shipped to their intended owners.

I have the addresses of where all five copies of the books were sent. One to Ashlington University, one to Provost School, another to Blackwood Academy, and one to the library. Only one went out of the local area, a copy was sent to Brichester University in the Severn Valley. Curiously there was never a copy for Fell himself. Perhaps he had a galley print, or having the original manuscript felt no need for a copy for himself. I am not sure. Again something seems very off here.

Why these locations? Fell got his first degree at Aisling College, which is now Ashlington University, and I know he had been a pupil at Provost School. Likewise he studied for a second degree in philosophy at Brichester. I was not familiar with Blackwood Academy, but a quick check revealed it was a short-lived prep school that had its premises in what is now offices for the Town Hall. Fell did not study there. However he was one of its most important benefactors and occasionally taught there. Finally, a search of the catalogues and even rooting through the old card index we have in storage, revealed no trace of the library ever having Fell’s Book. Although there are several catalogue numbers with no listing giving. A clerical error perhaps, or something else.

I wonder then which one ended up in the hands of our tireless collector, the late Mr Nesbit. Perhaps the books are numbered in some way. I wonder what happened to the other copies of The Remembrances of Amon by Thaddeus Fell. I am unduly concerned that other copies might be out there. I am taking extra care of my copy.

LATER

Just a quick last note for today. Have been reading Fell’s book all tonight and had to have the laptop to hand to continually look up obscure references and translate as best I can various passages in a variety of dead languages. Discovered a good deal on the Witch of Redvale who Fell at first seems to have been in awe of, and then later much more dismissive - apparently she squandered her knowledge in his opinion. He seems to consider himself to be one of a few who have discovered a great secret, who include some ancient monk, Marianne Agnes and most mysteriously “a hog-brained Victorian idiot”.

This great secret which Fell has stumbled on is a way of escaping what he calls “the great disc of Time turned by mighty Amon”. It is very confusing but from what I can glean, one may cheat death - and he implies one’s enemies if necessary - by transitioning into “the Gardens of Remembrance”. Although this is hazardous, for there is a mighty guardian, who will let you enter if you are deemed worthy, but there is always a catch. “The wonder and terror of it all is that while one may enter, only another can call you out”. Even a magical afterlife granted only to a few was not enough for him apparently. Clearly Fell was quite insane.

However it was because I was logged into my library account - which gives me access to a variety of academic and university sites not available to the general public - I noticed a message from MacGinnis. Very curious that he should message so late I thought. And it was marked urgent.

It simply read -

Michael, knowing a fair amount about the technicalities of ceremonial magic and the Goetia, there is something very wrong with this book. I make no judgments, but I would strongly advise that no one should attempt the rituals in this book. Several operations are flawed to the point of being hazardous, and I suspect several are deliberately so. I appreciate that you may not set much store in this sort of thing but please heed a warning nonetheless. Please be very careful who is allowed access to this book.

I must confess, I was not expecting that. And yet, somewhere deep down, I have felt protective of the book for what I think are similar reasons, but ones that I could not articulate at the time. I doubt I shall sleep well tonight and I am worried I have already made a very grave error. One whose consequences I am now experiencing…

28th October 2023

A great bell was ringing, but the chimes were far from pleasant, horrible, cracked and discordant. I was wandering in the dark, somewhere deep underground, and was blindly stumbling through wet mosses and ancient cobwebs, trying to find some way out of a warren of crumbling tunnels. However I was not alone, voices whispered, from people, or things, hiding in the dark of the many twists and turns of this subterranean maze. “His shadow shall rise to another place” said one croaking voice as I stumbled on. “He has gone too far,” said another. “He must be forgotten” hissed a third. I ran on and on, and was greatly relieved to find a slimy ladder in the dark. It led up into further darkness, but I reasoned that upwards was better than downwards and began to climb. The chimes sounded louder and I reached to the top and found myself in a lightless room, tracing out its limits with my hands. A place of smooth stone walls and naught else it seemed.

I heard a scraping sound and the dark splintered into a line of widening light. I rushed towards and the light burst all around me and stumbled, tumbled out into fresh air and fell in a heap, into mud and dead leaves. I rolled out and saw the door of the white mausoleum swinging closed, pulled shut by a strange figure with blue skin and the head of an owl.

Someone spoke behind me, a female voice, young but full of authority - “Those who aided him, even unknowingly, will face the wrath of Nahum too. Stop him if thou can!”

I clambered up to see who addressed me. But the dream was dissolving like the figure in a long coat walking away into a blood red sunset…

Very shaken. And I was glad it was Saturday and I had put in for the day off. But my other work awaited. I have been busy trying to make sense of everything I have discovered and fill in some gaps.

There seems to be no one to contact or even trace in connection with Blackwood Academy. I have been unable to pinpoint when it closed down, but records indicate that it did not reopen for a new academic year in September 1923. An inquiry to the college library at Ashlington was more productive. Apparently a collector, who wished to remain anonymous, offered a very large sum to purchase their copy of Fell’s book in January 1923.

Brichester University were swift and prompt in their response too, apparently their copy was stolen in the late 1960s and has never been recovered. However, Provost School was somewhat more cagey, and only after a lot of back and forth was I put in touch with a now retired member of staff, who told me that after Fell’s arrest in October 1922, it was decided that the book should be burned.

Understandable I guess. It is even possible the library copy met a similar fiery fate. Certainly its removal from even the card index and catalogues would suggest it was decided to erase all traces of Dr Fell’s works. The closure of Blackwoods smacks of the same impulse at work. It would seem that by the end of 1923 four copies were in one way or another lost. I strongly suspect that it was someone local who was the mystery collector who procured the Ashlington copy for a very high price. It is too early to have been George Nesbit, and to my knowledge, despite being one of the old families of the town alongside the Rolts, Bowens and Hainings, he didn’t have that kind of money. It’s very telling that the one that survived longest in the wild was the outlier sent to Brichester, although it seems that eventually someone tracked it down to there. One wonders just how committed to collecting pieces of Haggleton history old George was.

I had a long conversation with Martin this afternoon. I think he was relieved to know I am going to keep the book under lock and key. He was also stunned to learn about the life and many crimes of Dr Fell. As he remarked it is incredible, a case involving so many and so full of macabre details is virtually completely unknown. I think again about how quickly all copies of Fell's book disappeared months after his death. On reflection Martin thinks some of the rituals in the book are in fact traps. He points out one in particular - it is noticeable even to a layman like myself that this is the easiest spell, if that is the word, to perform. A grave, some candles, a simple sigil drawn in blue wax, a quick chant. It’s labelled “a charm for success”. According to Martin, it isn’t. It’s a summoning. Of what he doesn’t know, but, and this is why it is dangerous, there is no banishing ritual given. So you call up something and you can’t ever send it back…

I have so many ideas whirling around my head. I have been pouring over various texts, Karswell, town chronicles, and of course Fell’s damn books. I have been recording what I feel are key passages on the dictaphone which I will need to sit down and transcribe later on tonight. I think I need to get everything down on separate cards and literally piece it all together. Things are clicking together bit by bit but I can’t quite see the full picture yet…

No, that is not true. I don’t have the luxury of time to lie to myself. I think I can see the picture. At least well enough to know that I made a colossal mistake in displaying The Remembrances of Amon. The public should have never been let anywhere near Fell’s book. If I had sat down and read it more thoroughly when we first discovered it in the Nesbit archive, I should have thought twice about being so careless.

I have been careless too in other regards. I finally checked out something that my dreams have been highlighting for days - the white mausoleum. I should not have been so complacent, so certain of my knowledge. Foolish. Foolish. And the true answer was in my grasp all along, up in the box of papers I put together when researching the book on the Fell case. In there I have various legal documents and local records. One document I should have recalled and checked days ago. A bill of sale for Mordyke House, now the Mains Museums. In this document the Goodwin’s’ solicitor lists all the property and chattels included in the sale when they closed their funeral business in 1853. The list includes many effects - furniture, equipment, supplies for making coffins and gravestones even. And ownership of the White Mausoleum on Chapel Hill. The buyer was, of course, Dr Fell…

Stupid, Stupid. Everyone knows that was where he had his practice. Mordyke house. The Old Morgue. Where the police broke down the doors and discovered the grisly horrors within at the close of October 1922.

And of course, he never had a listed grave because he already owned a tomb. Is he in there now? Was he ever in there? In my dream, the mausoleum was empty…

It is late now, and, I fear, in more ways than one.