woman apparently making love on the floor. In the

  gloom I had not seen them there. I staggered as I tried to keep my balance, uttering an apology, steadying myself

  by pressing a hand against the wall.

  I moved on, away from the couple, but the alcove was

  a dead end. I felt around in the dim light, trying to find some sign of a door, but the only way in or out was

  through the archway.

  The couple on the floor continued what they were do-

  ing, their naked bodies pumping rhythmically and ener-

  getically against each other.

  I tried to step over them but I was unbalanced by the

  lack of room in which to stand and I kicked against them

  again. I murmured another embarrassed apology, but to

  my surprise the woman extricated herself quickly from

  beneath the man and stood up in an agile, untroubled

  movement. Her long hair was falling across her face and

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  C H R I S T O P H E R P R I E S T

  she tossed her head to sweep it back from her eyes. Per-

  spiration rolled from her face, dripping down on her

  chest. The man rolled briefly over. Because of his naked-

  ness I was able to see, with surprise, that he was not at all sexually aroused. Their act of physical love had been a

  simulation.

  The woman said to me, ‘Wait! I’ll come with you in-

  stead.’

  She laid a warm hand on mine and smiled invitingly.

  She was breathing excitedly. A sheen of sweat lay over

  her breasts; her nipples pointed erectly. I felt a new erotic charge from the light touch of her fingers, but also a surge of guilt. The man lay there passively at my feet, staring up at me. I was confused by everything I was seeing.

  I backed away from them, through the archway, back

  to the long, unlit corridor. The naked whore followed

  quickly behind me, seizing hold of my upper arm as I

  blundered along. At the far end of this corridor, past the door which I knew led back into Ste-Augustinia’s boudoir, I had noticed yet another door, leading somewhere. I

  reached it, put my weight against it and forced it open. It moved stiffly. Inside the room that was beyond, the endless throbbing beat of the synthesized music was louder

  but it appeared to be empty of all people. The musky per-

  fume was intense. I felt sensual, aroused, eager to do the bidding of the young woman who had attached herself to

  me—but even so I was frightened, disorientated, over-

  come by the rush of sensations and thoughts coursing

  through me.

  The young woman had followed me in, still holding

  my arm. The door closed firmly behind us, causing a de-

  compression sensation in one of my ears. I swallowed to

  clear it. I turned to speak to this whore but as I did so two 1 7 6

  T H E D I S C H A R G E

  other young women appeared as if from nowhere, step-

  ping out of the deeper shadows on the side of the room

  away from the door.

  I was alone with them. All three were naked. They

  were looking at me with what I took to be great eager-

  ness. I was in a state of acute sexual readiness.

  Even so, I stepped back from them, still nervous be-

  cause of my inexperience, but by this time in such a state of excitement that I wondered how much longer I might

  contain it. I felt the edge of something soft pressing

  against the back of my lower leg. When I glanced behind

  me I saw in the pale light that a large bed was there, a

  bare mattress of some kind, an expanse of yielding mate-

  rial ready for use.

  The three naked women were beside me now, their

  lustful scents rising around me. With gentle pressure of

  their hands they indicated I should lower myself to the

  bed. I sat down, but then one of them pushed lightly on

  my shoulders and I leaned back compliantly. The mat-

  tress, the palliasse, whatever was there, was soft beneath my weight. One of the women bent down and lifted my

  legs around so that I might lie flat.

  When I was prone they began to unbutton and re-

  move my uniform, working deftly and quickly, letting me

  feel the light tattoo of their fingertips. Nothing happened by accident: they were deliberately provoking and teas-ing my physical response. I was straining with the effort of controlling myself, so close was I to letting go. The

  girl closest to my head was staring down into my eyes as

  her fingers worked to slide my shirt from my chest and

  down my arms. Whenever she leaned across me, or

  stretched to free my hand from the cuff of a sleeve, she

  did so in such a way that she lowered one of her bare

  1 7 7

  C H R I S T O P H E R P R I E S T

  breasts towards me and brushed the hard little nipple

  lightly against my lips.

  I was naked in a few seconds, in a state of full and ag-

  onizing arousal, yearning for release. The women slid my

  clothes out from underneath me, piled them up on the fur-

  ther side of the mattress. The one beside my face rested

  her soft fingertips on my chest. She leaned closer to me.

  ‘You choose?’ she said, whispering into my ear.

  ‘Choose what?’

  ‘You like me? You like my friends?’

  ‘All of you!’ I said without thinking. ‘I want you all!’

  Nothing more was said or, as far as I could see, sig-

  nalled between them. They moved into position smoothly

  and as if in a formation they had rehearsed many times.

  I was made to remain lying on my back but one of

  them lifted my knee that was closest to the edge of the

  mattress, making a small triangular aperture. She lay

  down on her back across the mattress so that her shoul-

  ders rested on my horizontal leg, while her head went be-

  neath my raised knee. She turned her face towards the

  space between my legs. I could feel her breath on my

  naked buttocks. She took hold of my erect penis with her

  hand, holding it perpendicular to my body.

  In the same moment the second woman was astride

  me with a knee on each side of my chest, her legs wide

  apart, lowering herself so that her sex touched lightly

  against, but did not enfold, the tip of my member, which

  was being held in position by the other woman.

  The third one also straddled me but placed herself

  above my face, lowering herself towards, but not actually against, my eager lips.

  Breathing the woman’s delicious bodily scents, I re-

  membered Acizzone.

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  T H E D I S C H A R G E

  I thought about the most explicit of his paintings hid-

  den away in the gallery cellar. It was called (another title, remembered how?): The Swain of Lethen in Godly Pleasures. This one was painted in bold pigment on a stiff wooden board.

  All that could be seen of The Swain in reproduction, or from a distance, was what appeared to be a smooth

  field of uniform crimson paint, intriguingly plain and

  minimalist. One touch of a hand or a finger, though, or

  even (as I knew I had tried) the light press of a forehead, would induce a vivid mental image of sexual activity. For everyone it was supposed to be different. I myself saw,

  felt, experienced, a scene of multiple sexual activity, a young man naked on a bed, three beautiful naked women

  pleasuring him, one straddling his face, one his penis, the third reaching beneath his body to press her face against his buttocks. All was bathed, in this intense imagining, in a lubricious crimson light.

  Now I had become the swain himself, in godly pleas-

  ures.

  I was surrendering to the imminent passions the

  women aroused in me. A lust for physical release was

  rushing through me even as the extent of the enigma

  about Acizzone surrounded me. I felt myself hastening to

  the moment of completion.

  Then it ended. As swiftly and deftly as they had

  taken up their position, the women lifted themselves

  away from me, deserted me. I tried to call out to them,

  but my laboured breathing emitted only a series of ex-

  cited gasps. They stepped quickly down from the bed,

  slipped away—the door opened and closed, leaving me

  alone.

  I discharged my excitement at last, miserable and

  1 7 9

  C H R I S T O P H E R P R I E S T

  abandoned. I could still in one sense feel them, could detect the traces they had left behind of their exquisite and exciting perfumes, but I was alone in that dim-lit, sound-throbbing cell and I expelled my passion as a man alone.

  I lay still to try to calm myself, all my senses tingling, my muscles twitching and straining. I sat up slowly, lowered my feet to the floor. My legs were trembling.

  When I could I dressed quickly and carefully, attempt-

  ing to make myself look as if nothing had just happened

  so that I could depart with at least an appearance of

  calmness.

  As I tucked in my shirt I felt the residue of my dis-

  charge, cold and sticky on the skin of my belly.

  I found my way out of the room, along the corridor,

  into a large sub-floor area, filled with music and the

  sound of overhead footsteps. I saw a glint of bright-red

  neon lighting, limned against ill-fitting doors. I struggled with iron handles, pulled the doors open, found a cobbled alley between two massive buildings under the trop-

  ical night, sensed the smells of cooking, perspiration,

  spices, grease, gasoline, night-scented flowers. Finally I emerged into the clamorous street by the waterfront. I

  saw none of the black-caps, none of the whores, none of

  my shipmates.

  I was thankful the club was so close to the quay. I was

  soon able to reboard the troopship, check myself in with

  the marshals, then plunge into the lower decks and lose

  myself in the anonymous press of the other men who

  were there. I sought no one’s company during my first

  hours back in the crowded decks. I lay on my bunk and

  pretended to sleep.

  The next morning the ship sailed from Muriseay Town

  and once again we headed south towards the war.

  1 8 0

  T H E D I S C H A R G E

  *

  *

  *

  After Muriseay, my view of the islands was different. The superficial allure of them had diminished. From my short

  visit ashore in that crowded town I felt myself to have

  become island-experienced, had briefly breathed the air

  and the scents, heard the sounds and seen some of the

  muddle. At the same time, though, the experience had

  deepened the intrigue of the islands. They still had me in their thrall, but I was careful now not to dwell on it. I felt I had grown up a little.

  The whole pace of life on the ship was changing, with

  the army’s demands on us increasing every day. For sev-

  eral more days we continued to cruise our zigzag course

  between the tropical islands, but as we moved further

  south the weather grew gradually more temperate and for

  three long and uncomfortable days the ship was buffeted

  by stiff southerly gales and rocked by mountainous

  waves. When the storm finally receded we were in more

  barren latitudes. Many of the islands here, in the south-

  ern part of the Midway Sea, were craggy and treeless,

  some of them only barely rising above the level of the

  sea. They stood further apart from each other than they

  had done near the equator.

  I still yearned for the islands, but not for these. I

  craved the insane heat of the tropics. With every day that the islands of the warmer climes slipped further behind

  me I knew that I had to put them out of my thoughts. I

  stayed away from the exposed upper decks, with their

  silent, distant views of fragmented land.

  Towards the end of the voyage we were evacuated

  without warning from our messdecks and while we

  crowded together on the assembly deck every recruit’s kit was searched. The map I had been using was discovered

  1 8 1

  C H R I S T O P H E R P R I E S T

  where I had left it in my duffel bag. For two more days

  nothing happened. Then I was summoned to the adju-

  tant’s cabin where I was told the map had been confis-

  cated and destroyed. I was docked seven days’ pay as

  punishment and my record was marked. I was officially

  warned that the black-cap escouades would be alerted to

  my breach of the rules.

  However, it turned out that not all was lost. Either the

  search party did not find my notebook or they had not

  recognized the long list of island names it contained.

  The loss of the map obstinately reminded me of the is-

  lands we had passed. In the final days on the troopship, I sat alone with those pages from my notebook, committing the names to memory and trying to recall how each

  of the islands had looked. Mentally, I compiled a

  favoured itinerary that I would follow when at last I was discharged from the army and could return home, moving slowly, as I planned, from one island to the next, perhaps spending many years in the process.

  That could not begin until I had finished with the war,

  but the ship had not yet even arrived in sight of our destination. I waited on my hammock.

  On disembarkation I was assigned to an infantry unit

  who were armed with a certain type of grenade launcher.

  I was held up near the port for another month while I un-

  derwent training. By the time this was complete, my

  comrades from the ship had dispersed. I was sent on a

  long journey across the bleak landscape to join up with

  my new unit.

  I was at last moving across the notorious southern

  continent, the theatre of the land war, but throughout the three days of my cold and exhausting journey by train

  1 8 2

  T H E D I S C H A R G E

  and truck I saw signs of neither battles nor their after-

  math. The terrain I passed through had clearly never been lived in—I saw a seemingly endless prospect of treeless

  plains, rocky hills, frozen rivers. I received orders every day: my torment was a lonely one but my route was

  known and monitored, arrangements had been made.

  Other troops travelled with me, none of them for long.

  We all had different destinations, different orders. Whenever the train halted it was met by trucks that either were standing by the side of the rails where we stopped, or

  which appeared from somewhere after we had waited an

  hour or two. Fuel and food was taken on at these stops

  and my brief companions came and went. Eventually it

  was my own turn to leave the train at one of these halts.

  I travelled under a tarpaulin in the back of the truck

  for another day, cold and hungry, bruised by the constant lurching of the vehicle and at last terrified by the closeness of the landscape around me. I was now so much a

  part of it. The winds that scoured the bleak grasses and

  thorny, leafless bushes also scoured me, the rocks and

  boulders that littered the ground were the immediate

  cause of the truck’s violent movements, the cold that

  seeped everywhere sapped my strength and will. I passed

  the journey in a state of mental and physical suspension, waiting for the interminable journey to end.

  I stared in dismay at the terrain. I found the dark land-

  scape oppressive, the gradual contours discouraging. I

  loathed the sight of the grey, flinty soil, the waterless plains, the neutral sky, the broken ground with its scattered rocks and shards of quartz, the complete absence of signs of human occupation or of agriculture or animals or buildings—above all I hated the endless blast of freezing winds and the shrouds of sleet, the blizzard gales. I could 1 8 3

  C H R I S T O P H E R P R I E S T

  only huddle in my freezing, exposed corner of the truck’s compartment, waiting for this deadly journey to end.

  Finally we arrived somewhere, at a unit which was oc-

  cupying a strategic position at the base of a steep, broken rockface. As soon as I arrived I noticed the grenade

  launcher positions, each constructed exactly as I had my-

  self been trained to construct them, each concealed posi-

  tion manned to the right strength. After the torment and

  discomforts of the long journey I felt a sudden sense of

  completeness, an unexpected satisfaction that at last the disagreeable job I had been forced to take on was about

  to start.

  However, fighting the war itself was not yet my destiny.

  After I joined the grenade unit and shared duties with the other soldiers for a day or two, the first frightening reality of the army was borne in on me. Grenade launchers we

  had, but as yet no grenades. This did not appear to alarm the others so I did not allow it to alarm me. I had been in the army long enough to have developed the foot-soldier’s unquestioning frame of mind when it came to

  direct orders about fighting, or preparation for fighting.

  We were told that we were going to retreat from this

  position, re-equip ourselves with materiel, than occupy a new position from which we could confront the enemy

  directly.

  We dismantled our weapons, we abandoned our posi-