Mason makes quick Head-Turns, to Left and Right, and lowers his Voice. “Whilst you’ve been out rollicking with your Malays and Pygmies, what have you heard of the various sorts of Magick, that they are said to possess?”
Dixon has in fact heard, from an assortment of Companions native to the Dutch Indies. Tales of Sorcery, invisible Beings, daily efforts to secure Shelter against Demonic Infestation.
“They are not as happy, nor as childlike, as they seem,” he tells Mason. “It may content us, as unhappy grown Englishmen, to think that somewhere in the World, Innocence may yet abide,— yet ’tis not among these people. All is struggle,— and all but occasionally in vain.”
Mason cocks his head, trying to suppress a certain Quiver that also gives him away when at Cards,— a bodily Desire to risk all upon a single Trick. “Would you happen to enjoy Entree to this world of Sorcery? I
am anxious as to Protection.”
“A Spell…?” Dixon suggests.
“Emphatickally not a Love-Potion, you understand, no, no, quite the contrary indeed.”
Dixon, to spare himself what might else prove to be Evenings-ful of Complaint, says, “I’ve met people who are said to possess a special Power,— the Balinese Word is Sakti. It has not, however, always been successful against Dutchmen. Would this be a Hate potion, then, that tha require?”
“Well, certainly not Hate. Inconvenient as Love, in its own way,— no, more of an Indifference-Draught, ‘s more what I had in mind. ‘Twould have to be without odor or Taste, and require but a few Drops,—”
“I could have a look about, tho’ ’tis more common here to accept what they happen to offer…?”
From Thomas Pynchon’s novel Mason & Dixon.
Biblioklept 