But that is the history, already lettered, of Henry and Henrietta Cook Burlingame V, called to their vocation by the letter and pocket-watch sent them in 1827 by “Ebenezer Burling of Richmond,” companion of young Edgar Poe. By then Andrée will have done what we have seen her do, and disappeared into the western fastness.

Thus the long chronicle of Andrew Cook IV trails off into the same marshy equivocation that engendered it. The fate of his Utopian “Louisiana Project,” as of his Indian Free State, is all too evident: the “militant” Indian nationalist movements of our time are to his and Tecumseh’s dream as was Napoleon III’s Second Empire — that grandiose, self-conscious paradigm of the Freudian “compulsion to repeat”—to the First: pitiable travesty.

Must we not conclude the same of the Second Cycle of Andrew’s life? Was not it, was not he, a failure? Has not our whole line been, Henry, from Ebenezer Cooke the first laureate of Maryland and his tutor Henry Burlingame down to you and me? For that is whom we are come to, having traversed, between Andrew’s prenatal and his posthumous letters, all the intervening Cooks and Burlingames: the genealogical bottom line. Am I not myself, in my courtship of Betsy Patterson’s descendant for the sake (I mean also for the sake) of our cause, become my namesake’s pallid parody, and in my own Second Cycle the impersonator of myself?

Before the untimely death of Andrew Cook VI — and the wedding of Jane Mack to Baron André Castine of Castines Hundred — you shall hear, upon these questions, from

Your loving father

C: Jerome Bray to Bea Golden. Inviting her to star in the first epic of Numerature.

Comalot, R.D. 2

Lily Dale, N.Y., U.S.A. 14752

8/5/69

Mrs. Bea Golden (a.k.a. “Bibi,” “Jeannine Mack,” etc.; t.b.k.a. Regina de Nominatrix)

Remobilization Farm

Fort Erie, Ontario, Canada

My dear Mrs. Golden,

Certainly a star of your magnitude must receive numbers of letters in each day’s post: solicitations to model as the heroine of somebody’s counterrevolutionary novel; to play the lead in somebody’s film derived from such a novel; et cetera. But a rising star reset should spurn such obsolescent media, soon to be superseded by coaxial television and laser holography, ultimately by a medium far more revolutionary, its essence the very key to and measure of the universe. This is to invite you to spray your past with dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane and take wing to your golden future, a future impatient to be RESET Mariner-7 takes 1st close-ups of Mars surface Miami blacked out Niagara Falls helicopter crashes Oil leak in Lake Erie.

Hum. Numerature!

Permit us to introduce our new self with apologies for our old. (Much better, LIL.) We are the former 10 2 2, a.k.a. Jerome B. Bray, of the former Lilyvac Farm, R.D. 2, Lily Dale, N.Y., U.S.A. 14752, born in the Backwater Wildlife Refuge and RESET Our ungallant pursuit of you; our apparent, even actual derangement since Passover and particularly since Independence Day use dash to indicate break in syntax and recommencement — these are owing to the overflow of my spirit’s vesicles as it were. Cf. W. Shakespeare’s seminal equation: lunatic = lover = poet; also the wreckage or frenzy of Greek mythic figures, in particular Io, after mating with gods and gadblanks. What indeed is inspiration if not the swelling that follows the Godflaw’s bite? The real star of the myth of Bellerophon is not RESET Who believes he can achieve mythic herohood by perfectly imitating the Heroic Pattern and who learns that by doing so what one becomes is a perfect imitation of a mythic hero no doubt a heroic mimicry in itself but not quite the same thing heh heh. It is not the triple beast Chimera nor is it the pinioned pony Pegasus (O LIL). It is the Gadflaw! And who was that poor mad fellow 10 2 2 a.k.a. RESET A lost chord on LILYVAC’s intromittent organ as it were, a stingee of the Godflew New paragraph.

M. Bernstein was but the mere anticipation of her ex-stepmother! LILYVAC will deal with her; in the meanwhile she deserves R. Prinz, who was never worth 1 grain of your pollen as it were. That’s a figure there heh semicolon a digit of speech RESET And Marsha Blank, number of our enemies, was but an unsuccessful tryout for your role, 1 of numerous understudies so to speak recruited and prepared during our Casting Season, which now approaches its culminating scenes: Rout of the Dromes, Fertilization of the Queen. No matter that in a kind of coma she let loose the goats and herself strayed from the fold; when the hour comes so shall she, plenty, see below, who 1st inspired our Gadblank Illuminations of 7/4 and later, playing at your destined role, gave LILYVAC’s domain its new and proper appellation see above. Final casting to be completed by 8/14, immediately whereafter, with the Fall Work Period, we commence “shooting” (a figure of RESET 1858 Cyrus Field completes 1st Atlantic cable and Queen Victoria exchanges greetings with President Buchanan. 1864 Union Admiral Farragut wins Battle of Mobile Bay. 1945 Hiroshima A-bombed. 1966 Giles Goat-Boy published, imperfect mimicry of a RESET Close parenthesis new ¶

Our proposal: Now that you are quit of your commitment to reactionary media and their representatives, we invite you to play a starring role in the 1st, revolutionary epic of Numerature! The details are too confidential for letters, but this much may be enumerated: (1) Its working title is 18 14 (formerly R.N.). (2) It requires a 1st-magnitude female to play Regina de Nominatrix (formerly Margana le Fay, a.k.a. y Fael), royal consort to Rex Numerator (formerly King Author, a.k.a. RESET To sit at his right hand at the Table of Multiplication, play Ordinate to his Abscissa, share the Pentagonal Bed, receive his innumerable seed, make royal jelly, and bring forth numerous golden heirs. To be the lock his key will fit, its cylinder and oiled tumblers, that together we may RESET No damn it that together they may reach the Treasure stop

Your instructions: (1) Give enclosed packet to M. Blank, your former rival, your present ally and understudy. She will share with you its coma-clearing contents and confirm the truth about yours truly, LILYVAC, and the role that awaits you in 18 14 (formerly NOVEL a.k.a. NOTES). (2) Come again to Comalot with her for 1 shining moment on Wednesday week 8/13 USS Essex captures Alert 1812 Berlin Wall 1961 to see for yourself and to make ready for Bellerophonic downfall of Author and Director by the stinging numbers of R(egina) D(enominatrix) II and her

R.N.

H: Jerome Bray to his parents. An ultimatum.

Comalot, R.D. 2

Lily Dale, N.Y., U.S.A. 14752

8/26/69

Mr. & Mrs. Gerald Bray a.k.a. Gadflay III & Betsy Bonaparte Bray

c/o Monsieur Casteene

Castines 100, Ontario, Canada, &/or lloodsworth I., Md., U.S.A.

Ma y Da (y M.C.²):

Having a wonderful RESET Wish you were Here is our (final) report of business finished et unfinished ha ha since ours to you of 6/17 when in despair over LILYVAC’s printout and Merope/Margana y Fael’s defection we appealed to you for clear programming through 8/15/69 midpoint of our life and Phi-point 6 1 8 etc. of our 5-Year Plan (i.e. Mating Season between Years T & E of NOTES a.k.a. NOVEL): i.e. How translate all those numbers into letters? And whom hump from 7/4-8/14/69 inclusive?

No reply! We begin to wonder! Où et who êtes vous etc.? Et why have you forsaken us? Vous whom all our Leben we’ve thought our allies & protectors; whom our lifework has been but une long letter to, and who we have believed responded s’il vous plaît e.g. via LILYVAC’s leafy anagram! Now Hear This is our final RESET Arabs use rockets on Israeli positions British capture Penobscot Bay ditto Castine Me stop