“Do you feel better in the air?” I asked anxiously, yet somewhat vexed and feeling a sort of lassitude and half regret at the reality of life and not of the dreams.

It seemed as if he could restrain himself no longer.  He burst out into a hearty laugh.  “I was just watching the look of disgust on your face,” he said as he opened his hand and showed me three or four of the gum lozenges that he had palmed instead of swallowing.  “Ha, ha!  I wonder what the Swami thinks of his earnest effort to expound the Karmic law.”

It was beyond me.  With the Swami’s concoction still shooting thoughts like sky rockets through my brain I gave it up and allowed Kennedy to engineer our next excursion into the occult.

One more seer remained to be visited.  This one professed to “hold your life mirror” and by his “magnetic monochrome,” whatever that might be, he would “impart to you an attractive personality, mastery of being, for creation and control of life conditions.”

He described himself as the “Guru,” and, among other things, he professed to be a sun-worshipper.  At any rate, the room into which we were admitted was decorated with the four-spoked wheel, or wheel and cross, the winged circle, and the winged orb.  The Guru himself was a swarthy individual with a purple turban wound around his head.  In his inner room were many statuettes, photographs of other Gurus of the faith, and on each of the four walls were mysterious symbols in plaster representing a snake curved in a circle, swallowing his tail, a five-pointed star, and in the centre another winged sphere.

Craig asked the Guru to explain the symbols, to which he replied with a smile:  “The snake represents eternity, the star involution and evolution of the soul, while the winged sphere—­eh, well, that represents something else.  Do you come to learn of the faith?”

At this gentle hint Craig replied that he did, and the utmost amicability was restored by the purchase of the Green Book of the Guru, which seemed to deal with everything under the sun, and particularly the revival of ancient Asiatic fire-worship with many forms and ceremonies, together with posturing and breathing that rivalled the “turkey trot,” the “bunny hug,” and the “grizzly bear.”  The book, as we turned over its pages, gave directions for preparing everything from food to love-philtres and the elixir of life.  One very interesting chapter was devoted to “electric marriage,” which seemed to come to those only who, after searching patiently, at last found perfect mates.  Another of the Guru’s tenets seemed to be purification by eliminating all false modesty, bathing in the sun, and while bathing engaging in any occupation which kept the mind agreeably occupied.  On the first page was the satisfying legend, “There is nothing in the world that a disciple can give to pay the debt to the Guru who has taught him one truth.”

As we talked, it seemed quite possible to me that the Guru might exert a very powerful hypnotic influence over his disciples or those who came to seek his advice.  Besides this indefinable hypnotic influence, I also noted the more material lock on the door to the inner sanctuary.