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M ' s Secret Cure

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SHOW BUSINESS WORLD TAINTED BY OCCULT
[From The ---- Monthly, November]

... These occult cures, which have become a kind of craze among members of the
entertainment world, are spread primarily by word of mouth, but in some cases they bear the
mark of certain secret organizations.
Take, for example, "M": 33, debuted ten years ago as supporting actress in a television
dramatic series, well received, leading roles ever since in TV and films, six years ago married
"boy wonder" real estate developer, no problems in first two years of marriage. His business
did well, and she recorded some fine performances on film. But then the sideline dinner club
and boutique he opened in her name ran into trouble and he started bouncing checks, for
which she became liable. Never eager to go into business to begin with, M had more or less
had her arm twisted by her husband, who wanted to expand. One view has it that the husband
was taken in by a kind of scam. In addition, there had always been a serious rift between M
and her in-laws.
Soon the gossip spread about the trouble M was having with her husband, and before long
the two were living separately. They concluded formal divorce proceedings two years ago
after an arbitrator helped them settle their debts, but after that M started showing signs of
depression, and the need for therapy put her into virtual retirement. According to one source
at the studio she worked for, M was regularly plagued by serious delusions after the divorce.
She ruined her health with antidepressants, and it got to the point where people were saying,
"She's had it as an actress." Our source observed, "She had lost the powers of concentration
you need to act, and it was shocking what happened to her looks. It didn't help, either, that
she was basically a serious person who would dwell on things to the point where it would
affect her mentally. At least her financial settlement had left her in pretty good shape, so she
could make it for a while without working."
One distant relative of M's was the wife of a famous politician and former cabinet
minister. M was practically a daughter to this person, who introduced her to a woman who
practiced a form of spiritual healing for a very limited, upper-class clientele. M went to her
for a year on a regular basis for treatment of her depression, but exactly what this treatment
consisted of, no one knows. M herself kept it absolutely secret. Whatever it was, it seems to
have worked. It wasn't long before M was able to stop taking anti-depressants, as a result of
which she lost the strange puffiness the medicine had caused, her hair regained its fullness,
and her beauty returned. She recovered mentally, as well, and gradually began acting again.


At that point, she stopped the treatments.
In October of this year, however, just as the memory of her nightmare was beginning to
fade, M had one episode during which, for no apparent reason, her symptoms flared up again.
The timing couldn't have been worse: she had a major acting job just a few days ahead of her,
something she could not have carried off in her present state. M contacted the woman and re-
quested the usual treatment, but the woman told her that she was no longer in practice. "I'm
sorry," she said, "but I can't do anything for you. I'm not qualified anymore. I've lost my
powers. There is someone I can introduce you to, but you'll have to swear absolute secrecy. If
you say one word about it to anyone, you'll be sorry. Is that clear?"
M was supposedly instructed to go to a certain place, where she was brought into the
presence of a man with a bluish mark on his face. The man,,around thirty, never spoke while
she was there, but his treatment was "incredibly effective." M refused to divulge what she
paid for the session, but we can imagine that the "consultation fee" was quite substantial.
This is what we know about the mysterious treatment, as told by M to a trusted "very
close" friend. She first had to go to "a certain downtown hotel," where she met a young man
whose job it was to guide her to the healer. They left from a special underground VIP parking
lot in "a big black car" and went to the place where the treatment was performed. As far as the
treatment itself is concerned, however, we have been able to learn nothing. M is said to have
told her friend, "Those people have awesome powers. Something terrible could happen to me
if I broke my promise."
M paid only one visit to the place, and she has not since suffered any seizures. We tried
approaching M directly for more information on the treatment and the mysterious woman, but
as expected, she refused to see us. According to one well-informed source, this "organization"
generally avoids contacts with the entertainment world and concentrates on the more secretive
worlds of politics and finance. Our contacts in the performing arts have, so far, yielded no
more information....