The Wunderkabinett project had been carried out by independent researchers for many years, openly or in hidden or occult ways.
For each one in their own time found others who were also exploring the same territories, and they formed clubs and associations, often under the auspices of a grand patron or wealthy fool who imagined the such an association would bring him merit. Wealthy dowagers, creatively successful people of the theatre, renegade scientists, splinter religious groups, all took on the task of aggregating the wonders of the world in miniature form to indicate, in object, metaphor meanings and powers. A remarkable antler, a shining jewelled collar, five jars of rare cremator healing, star maps placed on staves, divination coins from the East, a shrunken head from Borneo, a Venetian mask.
It is an odd way to display wealth, intrigue, and interest in the extraordinary. Most who kept these cabinets had very little understanding of their capacity or their magical properties. Remaining on the surface, they opened the doors, and took out objects to caress, books to devour, items to collect, souvenirs of exotic travel, obscure talismans of forgotten meaning. A private museum, each cabinet held collections to pique the idiosyncratic interest of the collector. There were even collectors of cabinets themselves, and warehouses of these were discovered during WWII, emptied of their contents but still remarkable pieces of worked wood, inlaid with rare veneers and other materials like gold and copper. Door handles of horn or crystal. Smooth running drawers with metalwork handles. Fancy, meaning fanciful, some with glass doors, stained glass or leaded glass, tall front piece crowning the top with relief carvings. Lines of them in the protective cave looked like terracotta warriors.
Our organization began here, rescued the cabinets and set out restore them with their contents. But why were we all sworn to secrecy? Because one in a thousand cabinets were used specifically for sorcery, and couldn’t be exposed. The arrangements made at the time of the retrieval of the cabinets was that this work would reman hidden until 2045, or until the majority of the cabinets were restored.
We were never shown the whole picture or told how this deal was done or how the arrangement was to play out. There was a lot of money involved and our HQ has several locations dispersed around the world, with small groups working on only one or two cabinets for decades. It is very like the university system.
There is a connection between the cabinets and power, but I haven’t been able to discover exactly how that works. My account never touched on that aspect of it, and i wasn’t privy to the meetings on higher levels. Simply a researcher with a specific area of expertise, I worked in a defined area with an understanding that my contribution to the whole would become clear as time went on.
Well, it hasn’t yet, but I’m so involved and enmeshed in this role that I will no doubt continue on until I’m in the grave. I imagine that as I lay on my deathbed, a vision of the completed cabinet, filled with innumerable other cabinets will show itself like the grail in white samite, and twinkle away into the void as I close my eyes. This melodramatic idea strangely comforts me as I go through the daily work of searching, finding, sorting, notating, including or excluding, assessing, and so forth.
In the slush pile are many objects not included in my current active process but that may become valuable in the future, or useful to others. None are ever destroyed. We researchers rummage through one another’s slush piles all the time in search of treasures. Such treasures have become so because of context, because of our attention, and their specific role in time, place, history. In position and juxtaposition with others they fit perfectly in such a way as to shine or display qualities that had been hidden. Those qualities are not latent in the object itself. They are merely open to becoming cabinet-worthy. A prime minister of a country such as Canada will choose his inner circle, his cabinet, his ministers with certain portfolios and responsibilities. These persons are endowed with power once they are appointed. The power is in the position, not the individual. Together, they make up the cabinet, a trusted group that keeps secrets and gives advice.
The courier who brought me the dossier revealing my assignment to emerge from deep cover, was not outsourced but was a specific employee of our association. Documents were almost always given directly by hand, not sent through other means, and I was instructed to open such an envelope at a time when I’d be alone and not likely to be interrupted.
The courier herself was quick, light, bright eyed, and her freckled complexion made her look much younger than her years. fun and lively, a newbie I imagined. The glance she shot me through her blue eyes as I took the package and signed for it, was unnerving. I pretended it hadn’t happened. And so curious about the envelope, stunned in fact, I closed the door and ran inside room to open it.
Oh yes, there was the traditional stamp of authority. The arms of the group with the motto below. It seemed to shimmer. I knew the pages had been treated with invisible micro-content that beamed back to HQ my image as I read the page, scanned the maps, and looked at the instructions. All my retinal activity registered back in the HQ system. The booklet, map, paper, and passport were all familiar to me from early training days. But I was taken aback to see the collection of photographs – of myself. Who had taken them? I’d never seen them before. I glimpsed myself in some future time returning as a soul on the Day of the Dead, homing into one of these photos to give a loving thank you zap to the relatives or friends gathered there to remember me. I followed the impression a bit further and saw the room clearly but the people there were all a foggy blur.
Interesting, I thought, that was my first clue from the dossier, so I began to notate, using that flash of thought as my first entry. It may be a dead end, but there could be a house at the end of this road. I recalled visiting n artist who lived at just such a location – a dead end with a sign on a tree strangely placed almost in front of her door. Her studio at the back was dedicated to Mary in all her forms, and her cat had the same name as a daughter I knew. Dancing fairyland beings had obsessed her and pressed eagerly toward us to expand their influence. They had got her to make homes for them in her paintings so they could propagate in that way, and press outward to everyone viewing the work. I felt the influence but my training had kept me free from their grasp. I suppose I didn’t need them now that I’m older and not looking for more excitement.
The dossier with my instructions was quite poetic, in keeping with HQ’s codes and approach. (odes are codes!) They weren’t always like that. At the time of the SRF they commanded and worked through a profoundly bureaucratic language, taking it to absurd limits until it had to break apart. I am aware that these instructions are variable and it is the reader (i.e. me) who brings them to light in my own way. I receive and translate them in the manner in which I can understand.
To me now, HQ is no longer a bureaucracy or a castle in the sky or alien beings, but a poetic oracular voice of united souls in concert. I don’t know yet what is being asked of me in my participation in the wunderkabinett project, so am alert to clues and messages beyond the dossier’s overt contents. I decide to study the dossier daily and notate all my reactions, thoughts, queries, and observations. From this I will be in a position to see what my role is to be in this project.