W IS FOR WYRD

At our table, the ghost of Mark Twain muttered, "Weird."

I spun around, for when the three Norns merged they became the Entity, Wyrd --- not Something you wanted to see in Meilori's.

But only the three Norns cackled beyond our table not Wyrd.

Then, slowly, like a waterfall of flowing icy mists, they did merge becoming the towering, eerie Wyrd. I swallowed hard, for she flowed right up to our table.

"Fairly, Freud, did thee earn the contempt of The Twain."

Freud started to sputter but suddenly his lips disappeared.

"Hush! Thou forced thy sister-in-law to sleep behind thee and thy wife's bed with but a thin cloth between she and thee."

Even without lips, Freud muffled, "She had no income of her own. Space was limited in Vienna!"

"Bah! In the summer of 1898, thou, then a robust 42, took a trip to Switzerland with thy sister-in-law, Minna Bernays, who was then 33. "

Her glacier blue eyes fixed on me, and I felt pinned to my seat like a butterfly upon a display. 

"The couple stayed at a popular hotel in the Swiss Alps -- the second most costly in all the land --

and, remarkably, the hotel log from that time is still there. Not only had they stayed in a double room, but Freud had registered them as "Dr. Freud and frau!"

"Not only is The Twain too Victorian in his nature to shame you in front of Roland, but so was Jung."

Wyrd trilled, "Freud disciple, Carl Jung, visited the Freud home and Minna confessed the affair to him in great detail and how it weighed heavily upon her conscience."

Freud groaned, and Mark shook his head sadly at the ghost. 

"Men's minds are too ready to excuse guilt in themselves."

"Then, there is the matter of Minna's abortion ...."

Freud sobbed without lips. and Mark softly said, "Please, Wyrd, no more."

She turned majestically to me. "Now, thou knowest why Freud is condemned never to leave Meilori's."

She became the 3 Norns again which was hardly an improvement. 

Mark forced a smile, "And here I thought it was my sparkling personality that kept him here."