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During the break, I wandered about the several floors on which the different facets of the symposium were being held. For whatever reasons, the prospect of getting a snack didn't seem all that appealing, and although I had no errands to run, phone calls to make, or calls of nature to answer, I was feeling restless.

In somewhat of a preoccupied manner, I had been looking over a variety of exhibits, displays and introductory reading materials that were in an area that had been set aside for such purposes. I suppose part of the reason for my preoccupation and restlessness was connected with Rip the Botclofots' mysterious references to my meeting up with someone at the symposium who might be a help at some point in the future.

I didn't believe that I had come to Chicago to attend a mock trial involving origin-of-life issues ... at least, I didn't think this was the reason why I was here. Nor did I believe that the point of the Chicago exercise was to become involved in a discussion on Jung, Freud and the nature of the unconscious.

Should I be moving about more, and circulating in different venues of the symposium in an attempt to maximize my exposure to people, circumstances and events. Perhaps, but there was no guarantee any of the other sessions I might choose would advance my purpose any better than staying where I was might be able to accomplish.

As I thought back, trying to recall what Rip actually had said to me, some of the mists veiling the swamp of my mind begin to dissipate a little. He had told me I could do whatever, or go wherever, I pleased.

Events would overtake me. Moreover, the import of his words, as best I could recall, was that the person whom I would meet would be of help to me, not only in relation to the events which would overtake me, but also in some other way or ways later on, possibly in relation to Brian Idaho's situation.

This raised some other problems. How could Rip possibly know events would overtake me in Chicago and that someone would be involved with those events who would be of assistance to me in a variety of ways, including, perhaps, Brian Idaho?

Was he part of some vast conspiracy into which I had stumbled and with respect to which I was now but a pawn to be moved about and, if necessary, sacrificed. Brian knew of the Botclofots, and the Botclofots knew of Brian, but I didn't know how anyone knew whom or what they knew.

Had the Botclofots arranged Brian's escape? Was Brian a Botclofot?

Who were the Botclofots, exactly? Why didn't Beth, Brian's own sister, or Jennifer or Ken or Pam, all very intelligent and knowledgeable people, have even a passing acquaintance with the name?

Given what Rip had explained to me with respect to all of the meanings associated with being a member of the Bearers of the Cloth, and given all the charitable work that seemed to be going on at the Center, one wondered why the Botclofots were not a household name. Yet, they seemed to exist in obscurity and at the very margins of society.

On the first occasion I saw Rip, he sought a handout from me on the streets as I was on the way to my car following the movie. Later, he seemed to have an important role to play at the community center on St. Jude.

Among other things, he talked to me about people who are spiritually intoxicated and who are homeless. These are people whose impoverished condition requires them constantly to live beyond their means just to stay alive from day to day.

Next, he turned my world view upside down by suggesting that, to the spiritually intoxicated, most, if not all, of us, so-called, 'normal' people live lives, not of quiet desperation, but of insipid insanity. Maybe, part of what Rip was trying to convey to me was, in its own way, alluding to a rendering of the Biblical text which - perhaps, in connection with both worldly well-to-do, as well as worldly-poor but spiritually intoxicated, individuals - maintained that, respectively, the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.

Conceivably, Rip was suggesting that people who go after this world will be the poor and destitute of the world to come. Yet, those who seek the world to come often end up being among the poor and destitute of this world.

Another question left its signature trail in my mental cloud chamber. How did Rip seem to know about what had happened to Ken and Pam even before the authorities did?

He was the one who had broken up the abduction attempt. I was with him for most of the night, and he never left me alone, except when he talked with the person down in the kitchen at the center.

Somehow, I doubted he had taken that opportunity to order a hit on my friends. Moreover, intimating knowledge of the event really made no sense if he was involved in the matter.

Possibly, I was reading something into his words that didn't belong. His words were very general and could have meant almost anything.

Phony psychics, and other would-be portenders of the future, often used this technique of vagueness to induce their clients to fill in the ambiguities with the client's own life events. Whenever something, subsequently, seemed to fit in with what the psychic was foretelling, usually after conveniently forgetting about any inconsistencies, the amazing ability of the psychic would have been confirmed yet once again.

However, Rip didn't strike me as someone who was running some kind of a scam. Furthermore, I didn't believe he was part of a conspiracy involving the deaths of Pam and Ken.

Nonetheless, in my gut, I felt Rip somehow knew about Ken and Pam. If his further prognostications concerning Chicago turned out to be true, I would be confronted with some very disturbing questions about what could be known and how it could be known.

At this point in time, the only thing I knew is that for some inexplicable reason I trusted Rip. At the same time, I was uncomfortable with the idea that I could feel so confident and at peace with a piece of 'knowledge' which was so wrapped in uncertainty, ambiguity, confusion and mystery.

Oddly enough, I had the same kind of experience with Brian Idaho when I visited him at the prison. I was hoping these guys were not Ted Bundy clones - people who are charming, convincing, friendly and very, very deadly.

Maybe part of the training of Botclofots is to learn the art of instant hypnosis.

If so, large portions of my present feelings about, attitudes toward, and perceptions of Rip and Brian might be little more than post-hypnotic suggestions being manifested in the form of a positive regard for them, as well as in the form of a willingness to help them out.

Memories of the Star Wars trilogy came briefly to life. I remembered the capacity of Jedi warriors, including those who had been captured by the dark side of 'the Force', to fog and control the minds of those who opposed them.

That was fiction. This was ... I didn't know. Maybe Rasputin or Jim Jones were closer to the mark.

Here I was in Chicago, feeling restless about meeting a person whom I had come to meet at the suggestion of someone I really didn't know at all. The fact of the matter was that I was either in over my head, or I was in over my head. Which ever one it turned out to be, I definitely was swallowing water while trying to tread water in the deep end of the pool.

I checked my watch and decided to head back to the lounge area. Somehow, the questions and problems surrounding the unconscious or mythology, however difficult they might be in some respects, seemed a lot more tractable than some of the problems and questions upon which I just had been reflecting.

When we all the members of the group had reconvened and settled down, we began the session in the same way we had ended with the last session. There was silence for a short period of time.

Finally, Vince Ardello broke the quietude with: "I may be premature on this, but I believe we have reached a closure, of sorts, in the facet of our discussion concerning Jung. If my perceptions in this regard are correct, I'm wondering if we might get back to the topic of Joseph Campbell's approach to myths that, if you all will remember, we were beginning to explore before David barged in and distracted us with all this Jungian nonsense."

"Don't listen to him, David," advised Tammy Winthrop, "Vince is known far and wide for the rapidly deteriorating condition of his character due to the ravages of the acute, early-onset, manners-deficit- disorder with which he is afflicted from time to time."

Vince managed a rather convincing expression of wounded innocence in response to Tammy's words. His eyes seemed to beg for a sympathetic understanding of his troubled world.

Continuing on, Tammy suggested: "However, we all know that if we do not cater to Vince's wishes, there is bound to be all manner of unpleasantness that will create considerable embarrassment for everyone except him. I think we better indulge Vince on this, so, Andrea, as our ranking, amateur expert on Campbell, perhaps, you could get the ball rolling a little with your usual, insightful eloquence."

"I fear Tammy is promising far more than I can deliver," Andrea fretted, "but with an introduction like that I feel duty-bound to, at least, say something." She was about to speak when she checked herself, and turning to Vince, she inquired with feigned solicitousness: "Would this meet with your approval?"

Beaming with the contentedness of someone who is getting his way, Vince gave an imperious gesture of magnanimity with his hand. The royal assent had been bestowed.

"Given our previous discussion of Jung," Andrea indicated, "perhaps the best place to start taking a look at some of what Campbell believed is by addressing some of the ways in which he may have differed from Jung. I say: 'may have differed', because there are some people, as Tammy pointed out prior to asking David to speak about Jung, who consider Campbell to be sort of a neo-Jungian.

"I agree there seem to be a certain number of commonalities shared by the theoretical frameworks of both Campbell and Jung. Nevertheless, I believe Campbell - and you will have to decide for yourselves whether this is for the better or worse- had introduced his own, unique set of twists to the idea of myths that indicated his position was not merely a derivative of Jungian theory.

"Campbell himself indicated that although he held Jung in great esteem, nonetheless, Campbell did not consider himself to be a Jungian. He respected Jung without feeling compelled to defer to the latter's theoretical judgements.

"There are other considerations beside Campbell's disavowals, however, which tend to substantiate the Campbell's claim that he was not a Jungian. One of the factors lending support to Campbell's contention in this regard is the manner in which he, unlike Jung, maintained that myths had a metaphysical reality and significance, not merely a psychological reality and significance.

"For Campbell, myths spoke to the actual nature of reality. They were not just a function of therapeutic ventures into, or interpretations of, some aspect of psychological space.

"In fact, Campbell seemed to feel therapy, at least of the Jungian variety- and, maybe, other kinds as well- was sought out only by those who possessed no myth of their own. In a sense, I guess, one might even contend Campbell may have believed the absence of myth in a person's life had a causal role to play in the development of various kinds of emotional or psychological problems that created a need for therapeutic assistance of some sort.

"There is little doubt Campbell considered myth to be absolutely essential in the life of an individual. For him, myth was the key to understanding oneself and the nature of reality.

"By contrast, Jung believed that what was essential in one's contact with the realm of the unconscious was therapy, rather than myth. Myth was just one means, along with dreams, art and the active imagination, which could be used as a therapeutic vehicle for helping to transport one toward the realm of archetypes.

"In brief, consequently, the role of myths for Jung was an option or possibility that could be pursued if desirable, but was not essential, or even necessary, to the process of therapy. For Campbell, therapy was not only unnecessary but clear evidence pointing to the absence of myth in an individual's life, whereas myth was the sine qua non of the human journey toward fulfilment of the self.

"Unlike Jung, Campbell also was quite hostile to organized religion. Among other things, he felt that giving emphasis to the authority of the institution over the freedom of the individual placed entirely unnecessary obstacles in the way of those who were seeking to realize the purpose and function of myth in their lives.

"According to Campbell, the church, temple, synagogue or mosque did not lead to realization of the self. Myth alone made such self-fulfilment possible since in myth one found the only wisdom that really mattered to issues of self-realization and self-fulfilment.

"Furthermore, Campbell did not appear to believe any kind of mystical or spiritual practices - such as chanting, meditation, fasting, or the like - were required to be used in conjunction with myth in order for an individual to be able to pursue, or benefit from, the treasury of wisdom which was hidden beneath the surface of myth. If a myth was presented, or introduced, by the right kind of sage who helped one correctly interpret the meaning, significance, value and purpose of a given myth, the individual had everything he or she needed in order to gain access to, and unlock the nature of, the unconscious realms to which myth was calling one.

"As David informed us earlier, Jung tried to discourage people from getting too entangled with individual myths because of, in Jung's opinion, the inability of myths, when considered in isolation from a proper mythology, to help an individual bring to fruition, a complete, balanced personality. Campbell, on the other hand, encouraged individuals to give themselves - mind, heart and soul - over to, and completely identify with, a myth, because only myth had the capacity to open one to the unconscious self."