Aleksandar Blazevic Lorfels
THE SECT OF THE LAZY ONES

I met N.M. on one foggy morning in Beograd (Belgrade), when she was trying for ten minutes, unsuccessfully, to enter the National Museum. Both entrances, from Vasina street and behind Konj ("the Horse", the monument to a leader on horseback) were locked, because on that day was some or other Yugoslav holiday, so that the Museum did not work. I felt an obligation to entertain that young woman; we decided to sit down (so she could calm down a little) in the "Izlog" ("the shop-window") cafe, for a coffee; there we exchanged addresses, and she invited me, as if we had known each other for many years, into her temporary place of residence in the city of Beograd.

***

When she went back to her own country, she insisted long and hard on my travelling over there to visit her. Under such pressure, I agreed to come, at a time when professional obligations allowed her some additional free time. So, in the Spring of 1994, I happened to arrive into that land, the name of which, as you may have noticed, I cannot (for good reasons) give away.
    M.N. already had a reputation of a brilliant newsreporter, with a fantastic feel for bizarre and deeply concealed things. She had the intuition to "accidentally" run into personalities who are only on the surface ordinary, average, middle-class people. She was a very good friend of the leader of the controversial order OTO, she knew half the leadership of Maltese knights, she had dinner with the founder of ORT. This was her talent, something akin with a very penetrative sixth sense; I became convinced that her ability was, in fact, clairvoyance, well concealed. She never explained her talent to me, but on one occasion she told me: "I recognize them by the pupil of their eye, in our eyes' pupils is written out the biography of each one of us. You know my weakness for odd men, I can't stand everyday professions, I love the creators, the lonely types, the hidden people, those who are striving to reach the essence of transcendence." She herself was such, one of the women who seem, but only seem, to remain in the background, passive. I do not believe that she attracted much attention of men; not until she spoke.
    The house in which she lived was a reflection of her: half-empty, filled in fact only by her presence. As for furniture, she had in her bedroom a double bed as a memento to a short-lived marriage; a sofa, an armchair, and a set of little tables in the living room; and in the dining room, a small table and four chairs.
    From the day when I arrived in her native country, M.N. used every moment to introduce me to its values, particularly to things that would be new to me, things that Serbia (in her arbitrary opinion) did not have. These ranged from historical monuments and sights, to banalities such as oysters and lobsters a la this and a la that. Except for two museums and one free Rosenkreuzer temple, where I listened to a lecturer who claimed that the "axis of atoms" in human body was "bent" because of sinfulness, nothing in that country impressed me particularly. When N.M. was away, I spent time in a nearby antiquarian bookshop. There was plenty of everything there, from worthless books, to those that I should not mention their titles: they would only confuse the non-experts, and the cost went way above the capacities of wallets even thicker than mine. I did buy one book for two hundred dollars, but I hid it at the bottom of my travelling bag, because N.M. would have torn my head off if she had seen how little I value money.
    One morning, while I was dragging myself, still dozy, through her not-so-small house, in the direction of the dining-room table, she spoke to me in an important tone; I already knew her well enough to guess, from the tone alone, that she was about to inform me of something that she considered important.
    "You are leaving in two days, I think I would never forgive myself if I did not show you one really unusual place. I know your obsession for everything odd. I would have pangs of conscience if I kept silent about it. But there is one condition: you must never tell anyone; but, if your eager-to-know spirit, and your desire to leave written traces, should ever prevail, then I beg you to not mention any of the names of places, neither of the city and country; nothing that could be used as a lead to that oasis." She stressed the word oasis especially, syllable by syllable, o-a-sis, to make me realize the importance of it.
    I gave my word. I spoke the words "I promise", words long ago worn out with billions of insincere repetitions; I forgot, entirely, that the ethical contents of those two words had long ago evaporated, lost all meaning.
    Sitting comfortably, actually leaning back, in the seat of her Pontiac, I quickly forgot this oath of not-telling, spoken half an hour ago in her villa, an oath that was supposed to last a lifetime.
    The sun was melting the land; the highway stretched ahead of us like an endless carpet made of asphalt. It was so straight and symmetrical that it caused in me a feeling of disgust at a thing so artificial, so not-nature that it loses any form of power and existence. As if she knew that I had forgotten the solemn oath already, N.M. suddenly, while we were going 150 kliks, pressed the brakes. The safety belt, which saved me from flying head-forward through the windshield, caused pain, not strong, but unexpected; this returned me to the waking state. She leaned close to my face (her perfume coming in waves over me) and said with her full lips: "You haven't forgotten your promise? Am I right?"
    "How could you even think of such a thing", I blurted reflexively.
    "I know", said she warmly, not yet moving away from me. "You are the only man in the world whom I trust totally."
    She pressed the accelerator, switching me back into that state of mind when I do not catch the difference between reality and dreaming. I think I fell asleep. This I think because, when I again became aware of my surroundings, we were at a standstill, in front of a vast gate. A shiny metal miracle, maybe six meters tall, stood there and opened slowly, looking like vast jaws. So dazzling was the reflection at first, that I could not see anything else. I shaded my eyes with the palm of my hand, while the angle of the gates with the sunshine altered, so I could then see the calligraphically shaped letters in the poured-metal surface. The letters were gold-covered. On the left wing of the gate, the words were "The Sect of the" and on the right wing, "Lazy Ones". Yes, I read it well: The Sect of the Lazy Ones.
    Where are we, I asked myself, and I must admit that, despite all my desire to see the oddities of this world, I then wished for my darling N.M. to shift the car in reverse and take us back, out of that gate through which we had just passed. The very word sect always provokes in me a feeling of being limited. While our Pontiac glided forward along a path, in front of us I saw a poster, similar to those displayed in communist China, but of exactly the opposite content. It was a large, rectangular slab of marble, and on it, in gold-embellished angular letters, was written: "What you can do today, leave for tomorrow." Now M.N. drove slowly along a path paved by flat stones. The path wound uphill towards a large white building, which shone dazzlingly in the still sleepy sunshine of the springtime morning. The space between the gate and the building was planted with large trees, as if for hiding the building from prying eyes; but immediately in front of the building there was a lawn, or rather a park, planted with much younger and smaller trees, and at greater intervals. There were further slabs of marble; the sentences on them kept surprising me. One said: "One day you work and complete all your duties, and six days relax and rest." Another: "Take no risks, work kills."
    At the entrance of the building, a man was waiting for N.M. He was of middle age, dressed in a white tunic that hung to the ground, like Arabian ones; he extended his hand to N.M., but slowly, languidly. His eyelids were drooping; he looked through her, and seemed to be asleep. He did not say anything to me. Then N.M. explained to me that they are so lazy here, that they open their mouth only if they absolutely have to. "Some members of the sect spend more than half the day with their eyelids down", said she. Everything brought to mind an excellent afternoon rest. We climbed the broad staircase of black marble, and entered a large hall with pillars. The man got lost somewhere. I was taken by N. M. to one huge, darkened window; the glass was so stained that I could not see anything through it. She pressed a button on the wall, and the dark glass began to slide, one half to the left, the other half to the right. The blue glare of the sky shone into my eyes... and the vista made me hold my breath. From here, we could see all the way to the horizon; in a shallow valley, there were maybe hundred and twenty hectares of the most luxurious park, sculpted by some real master of landscape architecture; and in this park there were about thirty -- the word villa is not adequate for such glorious buildings -- thirty royal palaces, the most majestic that can be imagined, or rather that cannot be imagined, because not even the most fertile human imagination could depict such monumental places. I gazed at them, and similar to Bahayan temples they were, only incomparably richer. Beverly Hills villas are the grimiest ghetto in comparison with this beauty and wealth. The buildings shone in the glory of sunlight, while the golden cupolas cast that light up like gigantic reflectors. "Gold, pure gold", said N.M. to me. If there is anywhere in reality a fairytale territory, thought I, this strange settlement must be it. All the paths in that park were paved with mosaics, showing a vast diversity of images. I could not get enough of looking. With a mild smile on her face, N.M. took me by the hand, pushed open a door (which I did not notice until then) and announced: "Central hall." This time my breath really stopped, and I was so paralyzed and weak that I almost collapsed. The walls were of height beyond sight, covered with mosaics which were mostly turquoise with golden horses, similar to the Gate of Ishtar. I wanted to express my admiration out loud, but my throat was so cramped that I could not have uttered a single sound even if my life had depended on it. While gazing around, weak almost to the point of paralysis, I noticed a book that stood upright on an eight-cornered table of cedar wood. It was a large-format book, and on it was written, in letters of rubies inlaid in the cover: "The Doctrine of the Lazy Ones". I took the book in my hands, more from curiosity than from any real interest in its contents.
    The first part of that book is of purely philosophical contents. According to that teaching, man is created to enjoy, without work, the blessings of Heaven and nature. Further pages are a serious discussion about work: work is the punishment that Man received because of his sin. Man transgressed, and was sentenced to work. The religion of the Lazy Ones further claims that it is possible, through strict practice of absolute non-work every day, to regain the original blessing, to return Nature to the path of serving Man, and to prove that laziness is the only road to Paradise, the only means for getting back into it.
    The second part contains the brief biography of a certain L., the founder and obviously the prophet of the Lazy Ones, and his teachings. No date of birth or death is given, except that he lived in the twentieth century. It is claimed that L. was a top-class businessman, and that he comprehended, while there was still time, the meaninglessness of labor. "Life is short", they quote L., "even if it lasts a hundred years; for this reason, I deem absurd every form of work or trying hard."
    According to his teaching, work is invented by the Devil, to occupy Man as much as possible, thus turning him down the earthly paths, away from God. Work, says L., is the cause of all evils in the world: the race for money makes people ruthless, so that they lose morality and make enemies; enemies harm each other; the more work -- the more enemies, concludes L. Then he describes in great psychological detail the envious types of people, who will attempt, sooner or later, to bring down the successful person. He further describes the bloodshed among inheritors, adds a list of all people involved in such inheritance-oriented bloodshed over the last one hundred years, with their names and other data; and elaborately describes the tragedy of a civilization created by progress which, in fact, is nothing but a consequence of work. Another consequence of work, says L. in a separate paragraph, is the production of devices which can kill masses of people. A chapter is devoted to illnesses, with their Latin names, caused directly by the technological revolution; there L. pays attention to various forms of pollution, radiation, all sorts of machine-derived accidents; and these things are all produced by work. And all this system, this entire entangled net, was designed by the Dishonorable One, the Devil. After this, L. remarks that he actually admires such good camouflage, such deceiving of Man. The best way to oppose the Devil, says L., is direct fight: absolute determination to laze about, without any work whatsoever. By being lazy, claims L. further, we return into the original state of Creation, into pure essence, union with Paradise. "Because Adam, too, was created not for drudgery, but for enjoyment", thus goes yet another quote of L. in this book.
    I remained silent. I did not feel like having any conversation. Something seemed dark to me in all this whiteness and glitter, as dark as if I were standing at the bottom of a deep, unknown hole. Questions began to flow and slosh into my head, questions that I could not yet discern and define. The first that crossed my mind was egotistical: what will be with me when I finish my sightseeing tour of this fairytaleish location. In her customary mind-reading manner, N.M. took me by the hand and led me slowly towards the exit. While we were silently walking to her Pontiac, I noticed one being, the only one, which was moving. A man in white, broom in hand, pushing a white trashcan on wheels ahead of him. He moved with measured strides, and from time to time removed a peace of rubbish from the grass. "He is the only person who works every day in this entire place, but, he did the same work in the outside world; so what? A street cleaner remains street cleaner in every system," said N.M. to me in a melancholy voice.
    As we were approaching the car, N.M. raised a hand and, without turning, waved goodbye to someone behind her. I turned. Who was it, who was there to see us off? There was nobody behind us, only an unreal silence; but I remain convinced that N.M. waved to someone specific, someone who was observing us from some point.

***
    The metal jaws were opening one more time for our passage. I did not turn to look again, probably for the last time, at that wondrous place.
    When we went through, I sensed a weight melting away from me, something heavy streaming down off me and into asphalt. But I would lie if I said that I had not, for a moment, felt sorry that we hadn't stayed longer in the strange oasis, especially when I remembered our crushing crowds in the city busses and trams, our long lines in front of counters in the banks. Then a memory came to me: a long time ago I had read in newspapers about some such place, some society of that sort, in America. My N.M. raised her eyebrows and glared right into my eyes. "I am surprised by your naivete", said she, "you place yourself at a level equal to those gullible readers who, in the 'yellow press', follow a serial about Freemasons, written by some author who never even walked by one, and then retell such 'information' to others, believing that they know something. Well, information about that organization, and similar ones, is not to be found in newps, in mags, nor in the books which are sold in any ordinary bookshop. That is a smokescreen, carefully designed by their, crudely speaking, counterintelligence agents; and the masses find satisfaction even in such crumbs. Yahhh... the naivete of the ordinary guy is necessary for the maintenance of the world."
    I had to ask, I had to know one more thing. So I uttered: "Please tell me how the Sect is financed, who pays for all this luxury?"
    Without a blink, she answered me, with these very words: "I do not know for sure, but I think there is a bank, somewhere in the south-east of Europe, which promises to give, every month, twenty three percent of interest; the Sect is, I believe, either the owner or co-owner of that weird bank, and most of the money from such fantastic interest rates ends up in the Sect of the Lazy Ones."

(Translated to English by: Alexander B. Nedelkovich)

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