Episode 12: Subject 53
Excerpts from the psychical research notebooks of Dr Henry Lock, Consultant Neurologist, St Bartholomew's Hospital, London.
Thursday, 16th June 1881.
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The subject is a woman of around thirty years, though she is uncertain of her precise birth date. Her appearance is that of an older woman, caused, no doubt, by a life of suffering and privation. Her hair is light brown, thin and lank, already greying at the temples, and her face is puffy and blotchy, with red watery eyes. All front teeth are missing. She is unmarried, but has had two pregnancies in recent years. In both cases, the children were stillborn. This, she says, was a relief as she has no means of providing for children. She says she lives from hand to mouth, earning what she can as a charwoman, and it is clear from her appearance that much of her income is spent on drink.
Family background is the lowest level of society. Father and mother are both dead. Two sisters, whereabouts unknown. The subject does not know if any other family members possessed psychic abilities.
The subject first became aware of her abilities at eight years, when sitting in the workhouse schoolroom and not attending to the lesson, she became drowsy as she listened to the loud ticking of the wall clock. She entered a trance state and eventually spoke out in a voice that was unlike her own, in that it was high-pitched and had better enunciation than her usual voice. In this voice, she warned the schoolmistress that her mother was very ill and that she must go and care for her.
This sudden utterance caused enough uproar in the classroom to end the trance state, and the subject emerged from it with no memory of the preceding ten minutes. The schoolmistress dismissed the matter as a practical joke and ordered the subject to stand on a chair in the corner of the room. Later that day, the schoolmistress received a telegram stating that her mother was ill and requesting her urgent attendance at her bedside. Despite this apparent corroboration, the schoolmistress maintained that the subject had carried out some kind of trickery and refused to accept any other explanation.
After this first experience, the subject entered trance states regularly, always instigated by some visual or auditory regularity, such as the turning of a wheel or the ticking of a clock. The subject endured considerable ridicule, suspicion, and bullying as a result, but the ‘spirit messages’, as the subject came to call them, were often accurate and or possessed some kernel of truth, often in an oblique form. The subject provided the following examples […]
The general opinion in the workhouse was that these occurrences were trickery prompted by attention seeking, and that the subject had gleaned the information by means such as overhearing conversations, guesswork, or spying.
When the subject entered domestic service at fourteen, further incidents occurred, such as […]
The subject believes the messages come from a ‘spirit guide’, a term she picked up from a professional medium. She would have liked to become a professional herself, as she understands the money is very good, but has realized she lacks the decent appearance, social skills, and premises necessary. In her daily life, she tries to avoid any situations in which the guide might visit her, for fear of ridicule and hostility, and her occupation, with its hard physical work, enables that.
The subject saw the advertisement in the Evening News and applied to take part in the research on the understanding that I would pay her for her time. I confirmed this was the case, and the subject said she would take part for as long as is required.
Dr Reece and I agreed we would induce a trance state in the subject, and record the outcome, if any […]
Reece swung his pocket watch like a pendulum in front of the subject while I sat ready to take notes […]
After a few minutes, the subject’s seated posture became more upright, though not rigid. Her eyes remained open all the while. After some shaking of the head and indistinct mumbling, the subject spoke in a voice quite unlike the one we had heard hitherto. Though it was indeed higher-pitched, Reece and I were mainly struck by how remarkably refined and sensitive it seemed in comparison.
I recorded the exchanges and reproduce them here, verbatim:
Subject: Dr Lock and Dr Reece, how pleasant to meet you at last. I’ve been looking forward to it. I have a great interest in your researches. People must understand, they must understand.
Reece: What must they understand?
Subject: That there is a world unseen, a world beneath or outside… oh, these spatial terms are so misleading… and it’s plural, in a sense, but think of it all as one world, with several dimensions woven together, like a tapestry… but that’s misleading too.
Reece: And you are in this other world?
Subject: Yes.
Reece: Are you — (Reece uses the subject’s name, which I have redacted for reasons of privacy).
Subject: No.
Reece: Then who are you?
Subject: You can call me Gerda.
Reece: Can you describe this other world?
Gerda: Only by using misleading metaphors. But think of a great ocean, but a waterless ocean, so you can go off in any direction, endless, endless… there are streets and buildings but not like yours… oh, it’s so hard… but the point is to know it’s there. And then the two worlds can begin to understand one another. There is much we don’t know about you and ourselves and the worlds…
Reece: Do you inhabit both worlds?
Subject: Yes, I can. If I want. Like now.
Reece: But you’re not present physically?
Subject: No.
Reece: Why are so few people able to sense and communicate with this unseen world?
Subject: More than you think, Dr Reece. But everything is a work in progress. Everything is changing all the time: humanity, nature, knowledge. Sometimes randomly, sometimes with a goal in mind. We humans are co-creators with the Divine Being […]
Up to this point, the subject’s demeanour had been relaxed and open, with a faint smile on the lips. Then suddenly she seized Reece’s hand and leaned forward, fixing her eyes on his.
Subject: You will have to choose soon, Dr Reece. Which path will you take? You are already beginning to wonder, aren’t you? But Dr Lock knows nothing of your secret thoughts — how could he?
Reece: I really have no idea what you are getting at.
Subject: The choice will be yours, Dr Reece. But choose wisely. Choose wisely […]