“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“You must be Robert.” A big smile. I nodded. “I’m Seth. I am speaking through Fred Conyers, who flew all the way here from Denver just to see you and Jane. I have here the Christ Book, as well as another Seth book, The Rules of Love: A Seth Book. If I can just talk to you and Jane in your house for a few minutes. I know I can convince you of everything....”

“You walked?” I was incredulous. That would be fifteen miles or so. In this weather, without a coat? I wasn’t thinking too clearly yet, but that would be feat par excellence for anyone—let alone lugging two bags along. From the attaché case Fred took the handwritten manuscript of The Rules of Love. “Please. I am Seth. Show this book to Jane and have her read it while I wait here, then you tell me, Robert, what she thinks of it....” This, after Fred comprehended that I had no intention of letting him in the house. Jane could not deal with him, I thought, although he showed no signs of violence. “Please, Fred is getting cold.... If you won’t take the whole manuscript, take just this one chapter—Fifteen—and show that to her. Let her read it. Then you come out and tell Fred what Jane thinks of it. I can help her. She’s going to die soon.”

“If you don’t let me in your house I’ll just die,” Fred said. By now he’d taken two hardcover books from a bag, and given them to me. One by Jerszy Kosinski and one by Somerset Maugham. The latter was an expensive anthology. In one he’d written a note on a blank page to Jane, and to me in the other. Check their phrasing for a close approximation of the way he talked. Fred also handed me a thick, neatly tied package of brown paper and yellow string—The Christ Book, he said, which was for Jane and me, and for Prentice-Hall. I didn’t open it, and still haven’t. When I asked him where he was really from, he said Denver, and that his address was inside the package. It wasn’t on the other manuscript. Nor was I quick-witted enough to ask if he had a family, if anyone knew where he was, or what he did for a living—if he worked, or could—or how he found our house in the first place. I wondered if he was schizophrenic. He appeared to be harmless enough.

“We’ll take him to the Salvation Army,” the young officer said, after joking with Fred about what a long walk it was from the airport. In retrospect, I still don’t know—the next day—whether Fred had visited the police station in West Elmira to ask directions to the hill house. He’d certainly not led me to believe that when we first met. Nor did the officer I met say so, although he may just not have been told that by the dispatcher on duty. But their reaction was quick enough once I explained the situation to them.

We hope not. We’ll probably call the police to ask for news, eventually. I may ask them not to refer people here, if they’re not legally bound to. Upon scanning the one manuscript, I found several references to Fred writing on it in a series of restaurants in Pennsylvania—which means of course that he didn’t take a direct flight here from Denver. There may be no such connection. Maybe he landed in Pittsburgh. Maybe he’ comes from Pennsylvania. The manuscript of The Rule Book of Love: A Seth Book, is written on the back of heavy white stationery from Howard Johnson’s motor lodge in Coraopolis, PA, which may be near Philadelphia. I’m not sure. That is, Chapter 16 and a few other pages are. The rest is plain white paper, from who knows where? I definitely ended up feeling sorry for Fred, and I think Jane does too. Too bad she missed him, for as I told her, he’d make beautiful subject matter for a chapter, by inference. So would his manuscript (not a bad title, that), although we couldn’t quote it. It’s a very coherent production in its own way. I know it’s easy to feel bad about what appears to be someone else’s dilemma, but at the same time they live in the reality they’ve created and have their own kinds of protection. Their set of rules of the game are just as strict as ours are—at least that’s the way it seems to be in Fred’s case. All of his behavior was consistent with his beliefs, I’d say. At no time did I feel fear, but at the same time I didn’t want him in the house, where problems might develop getting him out....