Talk about stupidity. I should have seen it coming; after all I had plenty of warnings from darn near every book I'd read on the subject. The first was, heck, maybe almost twenty years ago. Living with the guy who would become my first ex-husband, I couldn't sleep one night, and got into his paperbacks. Bloch, Lovecraft, Derleth--all full of warnings about messing around with this kind of stuff. You've heard the story about the guy working the love charm who needed three pubic hairs from his intended? He bribed the girl's brother to get them but the brother thought better of it and found a substitute . . . so for the next six months the would-be magician was followed everywhere by an adoring cow. But me, I always was a fool about everything practical. So I just wasn't prepared when my chance came.

What's your point, you're asking. Well, I was driving through Oklahoma some ten years later with the guy who's about to become my second ex-husband, and we were collecting rare books on our way back to Texas. That is, I was collecting rare books; he thought he was collecting books, but he was really just buying out the secondhand shops. I had a commission to write a series on mysticism in science fiction, and needed reference materials. Bob fancied himself a pagan Christian Satanist, (whatever the heck he thought that was. During the divorce I discovered he was just plain loony.) Anyway, there we were in the occult section of the Three B's bookstore, in one of those small towns off the secondary roads that parallel the interstate. And there it was.

One thing about Bob, not only was he crazy, but he was also stubbornly ignorant. He claimed interest in "magick," yet he didn't know about Mathers, Crowley, or any of the classical magicians like Paracelsus or Cagliostro. He'd never read anything on alchemy. He'd never even heard of Frazer or, for that matter, Dion Fortune. His bravery consisted of owning that stupid paperback fake of the Necronomicon and a Tarot pack. He bought more junk (he picked out LaVey's The Satanic Bible or some nonsense like that). It was just my luck that I (of course) had to go for the one actual real grimoire in the shop, which (of course) is the one thing he had no interest in. Maybe that's why he's still in Texas and I'm stuck here.

Anyway, I bought this grimoire--oddly free of dust for a book in Oklahoma--for $7.50. Bob made fun of me nearly all the way back to Mesquite, some two hundred miles, for blowing so much money on something that he wouldn't have given more than a dollar for. I was idly paging through our other acquisitions, so I didn't pay much attention to him for a while, but after almost three hours it was just too much. Looking through the grimoire, there were several appropriate spells, but the only one I could do in a car at 70 mph was the one for "Silence." It didn't require any fancy materials and I could recite the formula in a whisper. Did it work? Bob instantly got a toothache and I didn't hear anything but muffled groans for the next fifty miles. When we got back to Mesquite he had to go in for an emergency root canal and I had to give him $350 since the insurance wouldn't cover it and he was out of a job again.

One day about three weeks later my ex-boyfriend Dick asked me to lunch. He adored this Jewish girl, and she wouldn't give him the time of day. So he asked me if I knew any magic spell he could do to make her change her mind. I had the grimoire with me, so I said sure, I'd look. By the time we'd finished lunch I'd found the spell for "Turning the Heart of a Beloved Person." Put three drops of your heart's blood into her glass of wine on Good Friday, (you can do it while she goes to powder her nose) and recite this prayer over it, I told him. The next time we went to lunch I asked him if the charm had worked. I think so, he replied. She's still not talking to me but she converted to Catholicism last week.

The next time something came up, I just couldn't resist giving it one more try. A friend of mine wanted success in a stage production. Fair enough, in the book I found a spell for "Success in an Undertaking," so I told him what to do. Put a pinch of these chemicals in the ink used to print the programs, have them print this symbol in them, and success is guaranteed. Well, the show flopped but the print shop's publicly traded shares skyrocketed.

Bob and I finally separated, and I decided to get out of town and start a new life. I figured that Europe was just about far enough away, and found a spell in the grimoire "To Ensure Success in a Stay among Strangers." I'm successful in staying, all right. The shortest work contract I could get was for fifteen years, even though all my friends have nine-month contracts. They liked my impressive résumé. And if I break the contract I have to repay three years' salary.

Why are you telling me this now, you want to know. Earlier this year Bob and I finally agreed to a divorce. He started out nice about it, but when it came to the property settlement I discovered he wasn't really going to be nice at all. Wouldn't you know it, the only relevant spell in that grimoire is a curse? I try to put that book out of my mind but it comes into my thoughts at the oddest moments. I even locked the book up in my safety deposit box but it somehow got itself mailed back to me with my bank statements. Every time my lawyer calls the darn thing seems to end up next to the telephone. Against my will I find myself glancing at the page with the curse on it and starting to assemble the materials necessary. Last night I actually set up the stuff and took a breath to recite the formula before I caught myself.

My former neighbors tell me that Bob is already starting to act really strange. He's got a whole ton of dogs and cats out there, a decidedly unpleasant smell hangs about the place, and he doesn't leave the house much anymore. Not like I care that much but he has to sign the papers. I finally got so scared I might finish the formula, that I asked a friend to stay with me but he can't see the book at all, and doesn't notice when I start the preparations. He thinks I'm cooking.

Anyway, what's so bad about a curse, my friend asks. Me, I'm not sure I want to know.

Smith, Johnson, Johnson and Brown, Attorneys at Law
1315 E. Commerce Street
Dallas, TX 75202
USA

December 14, 1996

Dear Sir:

Your letter was forwarded to our office along with other mail addressed to Ms. Wunsch. It is with regret we (as her legal representative) must inform you that we are unable to locate Ms. Wunsch at this time. It appears that immediately after sending "The Foreseeable Future" to her publisher several months ago, Ms. Wunsch disappeared without trace. We are holding your letter unopened for delivery in the event that she or some other party contacts us or we manage to learn of her whereabouts. Upon written request we will return your letter to you, or follow your other instructions (without charge to you).

If perhaps you have any knowledge as to where we might find Ms. Wunsch, we would be very grateful if you would contact our office immediately.

If we can be of any other assistance to you please let us know.

Very Truly Yours,

Henry B. Johnson
HJ:rjl

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