evidence for Atkinson as the book's sole author. Dilemma: music or the mysteries Case reported a meeting on the streets of Chicago, in 1909 or 1910, that was to change the course of his life. "Dr. Fludd", a Chicago physician, approached the young Case and greeting him by name, saying he had a message from a "master of wisdom who is my teacher as well as yours." The stranger said that Case was being offered a choice. He could continue with his successful musical career and live comfortably, or he could dedicate himself to "serve humanity" and thereby play a role in the coming age. From that time on, Case began to study and formulate the lessons that served as the core curricula of the "Builders of the Adytum", the school of tarot study and Qabalah that Case founded and that continues today. In 1916 Case published a series of articles on the Tarot Keys, titled The Secret Doctrine of the Tarot, in the popular occult magazine The Word. The articles attracted wide notice in the occult community for organizing and clarifying what had previously been confusing and scattered occult doctrines about the meaning of the tarot cards. Whitty and Alpha et Omega In 1918, Case met Michael James Whitty (died December 27, 1920, in Los Angeles, California), who was the editor of Azoth magazine and would become a close friend. Whitty was serving as the 'cancellarius' (treasurer/office manager) for the Thoth-Hermes Lodge in Chicago, which was one of the lodges of the Alpha et Omega (A.O.). Alpha et Omega was the successor organization to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, founded in 1906 by S. L. MacGregor Mathers, after the demise of the Golden Dawn in 1903. Whitty invited Case to join Thoth-Hermes, which was the direct American lodge under the A.O. mother lodge in Paris. Case joined, and quickly moved up initiations in the Rosicrucian grades (True and Invisible Rosicrucian Order). Case's aspiration name in A.O. was Perseverantia (which means 'perseverance'). Whitty republished Case's attribution of the Tarot keys (with corrections) in Azoth magazine. That same year, Case became the 'sub-praemonstrator' (assistant chief instructor) at the Thoth-Hermes Lodge. Also during that year he finished a set of articles on the Mystical Rosicrucian Origins of Faust and published by Whitty. The following year, he began to correspond with Dr. John William Brodie-Innes (Fr. Sub Spe). Between 1919 and