For several months everything reverted to normal for Mr. and Mrs. David Fortune of Hillsborough. David was given a more responsible position at All-Plant Insurance, and would soon be earning forty thousand a year, instead of the measly twenty-five thousand he'd been pulling in before his fall from valor and inhibition. Montclair seemed impressed with the boy's staunch victory in his battle with the devil, although David suspected the old boy could do with a bit of guidance himself. While watching his goatish employer slap the rumps of both office-boys and secretaries, David wondered if there mightn't have been a Valerie Hudson in his life at one time. Or at least half a Hazel-Harry?
At home, too, the pattern snapped back to its treadmill of rigid sobriety, with their Sunday evening sex-skirmish as comfortably premeditated as ever. Having been over-rehearsed for years, Linda and David each did their "let's get convivial" bit, both afraid to let loose and show the other how many exotic new twists and tricks had been added to their repertoire. This sort of "opening-up" process was reserved strictly for strangers; for after all, as husband and wife their most important obligation was to remain good friends, and everybody knows that in passion lie all the seeds of hate. Neither of them had managed to retain any respect for the lovers they'd unearthed during their bacchanals, and such a flagrant lack of mutual esteem could never work in the home. Consequently, in bed this beautiful young couple continued to cool it, for the roles they'd sworn to enact were far too solemn for them to start enjoying their intercourse like a couple of loose-limbed pagans.
There was David's conscience, of course, which was still lodged thickly in his libido, although, for a while he tried desperately not to recognize this truth. However, even if he hadn't failed so miserably at the Prince of Vice, he would surely have taken the pledge anyway, after discovering that Linda was pregnant. If a philandering husband needed an Act of God to make him see the light, that was the act to do it. How shoddy and contrite David felt, to think that a part of him had been growing within her while he'd been out subverting his morals among strangers. To atone for this betrayal he would now devote his whole life to making her placid.
But as the months went by and Linda's time drew near, all of David's newly-paved sex-drives reared their knobby little heads again; for now even the Fortunes' limited bedtime gymnastics had to cease. But oh dear Lord!.. How Linda longed to show him those other methods she'd learned, the moist French-style sharings taught to her by Brad and Darlene and their revolving chain of team-mates; David, at the same time, wishing he might put her through those very same wet-paces. Yet, since they were honor-bound to stick to the scripture, each were thwarted by those unwritten laws of connubial temerity.
"Can you be patient for a few weeks, dear?" she would ask, giving him one of her close-mouthed "I'm Your Auntie Wife!" kisses.
"Yes," sighed David. "If it takes forever, I will wait for you." But he didn't sing it.
And he waited. Those were the bad weeks. All the gut-tearing fevers and images came back to him, assailing. He would lock himself in the bathroom at home, the men's room at work, and desperately wag himself rigid with nostalgia, summoning up all those wistful losses… voluptuous mouths and bodies and members. With Valerie herself leading the brigade, grinding all valves and calling all shots. Because she was still his motor and impetus, ringleader vice-queen not yet exorcised. And in seeing this mind's vision of her, he saw the others, as if she alone had given them birth… Oooh Christ… Those strange and dangling blooming ones still lurking and untasted and all a part of the same lusty cloth of degradation, fresh contours of adventure to drink or to impale. God, how those appetites clung to him! Would only castration cut him free forever?
So David thought about her. About them. How easy it would be to lift the telephone and dial a still-unexplored number. A flick of the fingers and all his buried agonies would find reprieve. The Hot Triumvirate: Valerie, the telephone, and them. Three spectres that stayed with him, ripened.
Linda, meanwhile, had been suffering in much the same fashion, although, thankfully, she'd been much too pregnant to be lusting. She had gradually stopped going to Brad Grogan's apartment, not only because of her condition; he had grown increasingly wilder and more indiscreet, inviting too many questionable types to his apartment, the place getting so crowded that people often had to "make out" while dancing simply because there was no room to do it lying down.
However, Linda went on seeing Darlene Morrison for an occasional lunch in town, although she had deftly managed not to be alone with the girl again. She faced enough disturbing problems now without adding that unsettling influence. Darlene phoned several times a week to inquire about the children and offer advice regarding Linda's condition, never failing to remind the latter about her promise to let her have Brad's baby, should David prove difficult and refuse to accept the child as his own. Linda had regretted that hasty gesture almost as soon as she'd made it, hoping the girl would forget it. But Darlene talked about it constantly. Linda didn't doubt that she was genuinely fond of children, and several times had given in to her request to visit Janice and Larry during trips to Golden Gate Park. Not that she feared any sort of blackmail if she refused to let the girl meet her children. But more than once Linda wondered what might happen when, or if, David welcomed their new baby with open arms. She had a strange feeling Darlene would want something else, if she couldn't have that baby. At present, Linda didn't want to think what that something-else might be; except that whenever she thought of Brad and Johnny and all their blistering performances, Darlene was a part of it. Not as a threat, but as a memory of desire. And promptly stifled such thoughts by reminding herself how constant and devoted her dear husband had been of late, knowing their whole life would hang in the balance when David got his first look at Brad's baby… resigning herself to accepting whatever decision he made. Either a punishment or a rescue, she would take what he offered and find it just.
When Linda's baby arrived, right on schedule, her fears that it would be a perfect latin-flavored replica of Brad Grogan were somewhat allayed. It was a female. Seven pounds four ounces. However, nobody who saw this ravishing little brunette was thrown off the scent in the least. The hair was a fuzzy jet-black, eyes dark, and the olive tones of the skin were downright Mediterranean.
At the hospital, the antiseptic face-mask they gave David luckily hid most of his expressions as he held the yapping infant in his arms. Nor did his eyes reveal any emotion save that of paternal pride. He noticed Linda raising weakly in her bed, her eyes boring holes into him.
"Isn't she an angel, David? Mother says I was a sort of brownette until I was five…"
Her eagerness to mention this point at that particular moment convinced David of the truth. But his eyes danced and smiled as he handed the baby back to the nurse.
"Then you feel she'll turn blond during kindergarten?" David said to his wife.
"She's bound to!" said Linda, nodding her head incessantly.
The nurse gazed up at the ceiling and whistled an old standard. David knew it was Little White Lies, but he kept smiling, even after removing the mask. And now, a whole flaming montage of vital statistics swept through his mind. Brad's threat to get back at him after he found out about Joyce, promising to hit him right where he lived. Linda's recent frantic extra-curricular activities.
He gazed steadily at the little Greek-bearing mother in her bed, wondering how she could still retain all that innocence after a stomping affair with Brad Grogan, propped up in that sea of purest maternity-white. David recalled her old revulsions for Brad, and the revelation came as no surprise to him that it was primarily because she disapproved of him so strongly that this could have happened at all. But how beautifully off-the-hook this left him! Linda had been so involved with her own illicit affairs, she'd had neither the time nor the energy to become suspicious about his-which placed him in a fantastic bargaining position as her wronged and blameless husband, for now only one of them had to lose his illusions about the other. Since he was in no danger of having a baby who resembled Valerie, his reputation was still secure and intact. And, as he tenderly smiled and kissed his deflated helpmate, David meant to hold onto everything Linda still felt he deserved: the clean-white world of Suburbia, forty thousand a year, prestige and public dignity-and, what was most valuable, at last he had something on her, his perennial virgin-faced wife, a trump-card he could now use to lubricate his own flaring desires, those gnawing appetites which, until the birth of Brad's bastard, he'd feared must be kept buried forever.
By presenting him with Brad's tiny Latin temptress, Linda had re-opened some sweet doors for David. The Underground! All those snarling degeneracies Valerie Hudson had shown him could be his once more, if he was careful and selective. No longer would there be that martyred saint in his house keeping him constipated with false guilt. His germ-free idol had feet of clay just as clammy as his own, so now David felt free to ooze right back into those pits and fraternize!
He played the role of Duped Daddy with great sincerity, and soon Linda seemed quite convinced that he accepted their new baby as his own. David decided she mustn't ever suspect he knew the truth, for this might give her the incentive to re-grease her loose morals, which was a most unattractive idea for any husband. Who wanted a wife that laid around? She was now a woman who had been bitten once by the virus of Satan, and was so humbly grateful not to have been found out by her husband that now she had learned her lesson and would henceforth take the veil. So be it. David meant to keep her in that vault of chastity and repentance, while he very cleverly fulfilled his heart's dirtiest desires. By now he'd become sufficiently familiar with the diverse enticements of the flesh to realize one needn't dabble at top-speed every waking hour in order to maintain a balance of sensuality. Why not part-time debauchery with everybody else? But with spice this time… Ahh yes!.. With novelty…
After Linda returned home from the hospital, there were several weeks of disturbing phone-calls and letters from Darlene Morrison. Finally, when Linda told the girl there was no hope of ever putting her new baby up for adoption, Darlene stated some new requests, calling them "consolation prizes." If she couldn't claim full-time ownership to one of Linda's babies, why not part-time control of all of them?
"Let me go to work in your house as the children's governess, Linda!.. I swear, you'll never regret it!"
Coolly, Linda had asked for some time to think this over. And when she thought about the idea, it was the girl she considered, not the children's needs, nor Darlene's professional aptitudes. She thought of Darlene herself, the lithesome one, and thought of their soft supple hours together. Linda refused to dwell on the alternative threats involved here, or what might happen if she refused the girl's request. Hostility and tension would arise if they discussed exactly what Darlene would do if Linda closed all doors to her, and Linda was too excited by the prospect of having this mercurial being in her house every day to want to kill their mutual sparks with quarrels or recriminations.
When she discussed the matter with David, she found him as passive and trusting as ever. She knew, of course, that she didn't deserve such faithful worship from the poor dear cuckold, but, nevertheless, clung to it for dear life.
"I'm planning to discharge Flora, David," she told him one evening. "She's getting on now, you know, and now that there are four children to take care of instead of three… well, we need someone younger and more vigorous…"
"You do what you think best, darling," he said, lending her cheek a stiff upper-lip. "The servant-problem is your domain, and I trust you implicitly in that department."
"Well I…" She cleared her throat. "I already have a girl in mind. She comes with excellent references. Been working in a day-nursery in San Francisco for five years, and I… I saw her at the employment agency. She's very bright and attractive, and… she's colored, David. A light Negro girl. Do you mind?"
"Don't be silly, Linda," he chuckled. "Like a lot of other American men these days, I've learned that brown can be quite beautiful."
Suddenly she caught his eyes and held them. "Then you do want the very best for our children, don't you, David?"
He returned her gaze, calmly, blandly. "I want them to have everything we've built here, Linda, everything we are. Now and in the future."
She gave him her Madonna-grimace. "You're so good, David."
"And you, my pet, are true."
Although it was a Tuesday, the solid young-marrieds were convivial that night… a Lucky-Linda-Special. However, since it was important to David that she still see him as the same neat and limited automaton she'd housebroken at the altar, David dutifully refrained from sludging it from side-to-side or doing anything too damp. At one point when she pretended to gasp with pain, David was positive she was yawning. Well, his heart went out to the poor, repressed girl, but his passions for her would still remain military, filial and chained… Ahh dear friend of my sunset years ahead, we are interweaving poetry and we are valentines, and for us Life's Highway is a trailing pastorale. Lovers are elsewhere… and they're for me alone, trapped housewife, not you!
"Ooh, what a lovely, quiet room!" said Darlene a few days later. Linda was installing her as the children's governess, showing her the house and the bed sitting-room that was to be hers. The two women stood on the threshold together, close enough for their hands to touch, but abstaining. Darlene looked eager and vibrant, with her flowing russet hair, her coffee and cream complexion. Linda went a little breathless as she tried to visualize what it would mean to have this provocative creature in her house every day, so ready and able to do her bidding.
Seeing that the girl carried only a mammoth purse, Linda asked if she expected the rest of her luggage later.
"Oh honey, you must be kidding!" Darlene laughed, gently squeezing the hand of her new mistress. "I'm not gonna sleep in. Just five days a week, and I hightail it back to the city every evening. I've got a husband to think of, you know. Johnny's back working days now, and that sex-maniac wants me in bed with him every night of our lives. Thai's what yow husband wants from you, isn't it, sweetie?"
Darlene's expression was arch and meaningful, but barely suggested all the varied combustibilities of their situation.
Yet, Linda felt moved to protest this decision for purely domestic reasons. "But the babies will need attention during the night too, Darlene. I thought surely you knew that…"
Darlene emitted a friendly chuckle. "You mean that lovin' husband of yours wouldn't dash into the nursery and pick up his youngest whenever he hears her wailin'? After all, honey, she's his pet brunette, isn't she?"
Linda went tense and turned her eyes away. "That was uncalled for, Darlene. It's simply that we've always had someone here all night, and… I'd feel safer if we continued that policy."
"Oh well, it shouldn't be too difficult to find a night-nurse for the kids, someone to take over after I go home…"
Linda glared at her, wanting to tell her what an outrageous demand this was. Then her eyes trailed downward to the voluptuous pout of girlish bosom, and up again to the full, red mouth. And Linda remembered all the artful graces of this girl, and smiled. "A night-nurse. Of course! Why didn't I think of that?" Then she gazed at the full-sized bed. "It would have been a pity to let all that comfort go to waste."
Darlene's eyes followed hers to the bed. "Oh no, darlin', that's not goin' to waste. In fact, it'll be gettin' double-duty, if you know what I mean."
Linda met her eyes, and felt a sudden chilling tremor about the thighs. "No, Darlene, I… I don't know what you mean."
Darlene edged her body forward until the two women touched at their most bosomly points, the girl's voice low, furtive… "In the early afternoon, when Janice and Larry are still in school and the babies are having their nap… think of it, Linda-between one and three in the sunshiny daylight. Us. Here. Ballin' ourselves silly five times a week…!"
Trembling, Linda had to grip the girl's hand to steady herself.
When David met Darlene later, he heartily approved: "She looks like just the girl to get things done around here, darling. She's so young and energetic, I'm sure it'll take a load off your mind just having her here…"
David now saw his house as a well-staffed, rock-bound citadel of decorum, and with Linda nailed safely to the cross of her transgressions, he was ready to investigate some untapped variations of the double standard.
Valerie again. Never very far from his mind, that elegant instigator, his lady of the sewage. Valerie, who had led him to the others. God, what a chorus-line, dancing and dangling and beckoning in the dreams of him, the moist nocturnal fancies… voices and tongues thick with gloating sex-entendre… daring him, jeering… And she was the crux.
He couldn't remember how long he'd been carrying the slip of paper in his wallet… the phone-number, the combination of digits that would whirl him into orbit once more. Umm!.. But newly now, more deeply astray than ever. The notorious choice.
Luscious pimp-body Valerie and her nefarious wheel-of-fortune, spinning him towards this destiny…
It was during his lunch-hour one day that David finally decided to make the call. He stole secretively to a distant phone-booth on Market Street, nervous and oh fire again with the threat of danger, the adventure of desire. He pulled out the long torn portion of The Gash Gazette, running his finger down the line of ads, canceling out one, then another. At last his eyes reached the ad he knew he'd been born to answer: "Active Male Stud-Well Endowed-Tall and Tan and Hung and Versatile-Available for Straight, Bi, and Gay Guys and Gals-24-hour service."
Shakily, David dialed the number, his blood pounding in his veins… (oh be still my heart!)… A husky male voice answered. "I saw your ad in the Gazette," David began.
"Yes, Sir, what's your pleasure?"
David began to perspire, and he knew he was stammering and felt ridiculous. "Are you… uh… busy this Saturday afternoon?"
"No. I could handle you at two on Saturday."
… Handle me!.. thought David, summoning up the tremulous pictures, the rough wet grabs. The boy gave him his address. David gave him a name. "How much do you charge?"
"Twenty an hour."
"You're not affiliated, are you?"
"Huh?"
"I mean, are you free-lance, or does someone manage you?"
A low, rueful laugh. "Nobody manages me, baby. I fly alone…"
… Baby he calls me!.. thought David… oooh!.. basso profundo calling me baby…!
"You're everything you advertise, aren't you?"
"Like what?"
"It says here that you're… well-endowed, which also means that you can produce when called up, if you follow me…"
"Eight and a half inches, baby, and I produce every time somebody touches me."
David let out a deep sigh, then waited until his breath came regularly. "Great. You sound like just what I've had in mind for weeks. I'll see you on Saturday. And if you… uh… show promise,"… clumsy attempt at humor here… "I'll take from you on a steady basis…"
"Aw man, that'd be cool, baby. I'll see ya Saturday!"
David's wheel of fortune was at last rolling in the right astral direction. New homes away from home opened wide their doors to him…
Brad Grogan put in a similar phone-call that week, a clutch of desperation. Down on his luck and needing money, he now found a readymade dream in his future. Quite by accident.
One night, when he was feeling particularly lonely and desolate, he resorted to his half-forgotten computer-list for the first time in months. There was only one untried name left on the sheet, and what fond memories he had of the others, having sapped each of them dry in his own inimitable style.
He dialed the number. A woman answered, and her voice was so beautiful and cultured, he could listen to her talk for hours. Oooh, I hooked a lady-type this time, he thought, and they're the ones who really crawl for it… So here goes another notch in my nuts… one more pussy-slave to squat, swallow, spit-up and forget…
"Could we possibly meet and have coffee?" he asked, in his lowest, sexiest tones.
"I think it could be arranged," said the girl. "Although I have a particular fondness for Irish coffee. What's your name, by the way?"
He told her, and noticed now that the girl had a slight lisp.
"And I'm Valerie Hudson," she said. "Why don't we meet at the Buena Casa? I know it's always terribly packed in that place, but I like to see how a man stands out in a crowd."
… Va va voom!.. oh, I'll stand out for you, all right…!
"Great," he said. "But… how will I know you?"
"I'm five-one, with silver blonde hair and very long fingers. Now, what do you look like, Brad?"
"I'm six-four, 185 pounds, and very long… uh… lashes!"
"Well now!" said Valerie, already charting out his price-tags and performance-schedules. "You sound real promising. Big husky guys like you make me feel so lost and defenseless…"
"Hold that thought!" he laughed. "I'll see you at one!"
When they met the crowd threw them together, and they stood very close, Valerie reaching out to give him her usual thumb-sampling sea! of approval… "Ooh my goodness, Brad!" she lisped. "Have you ever been a I model?"
"Hell yes!" he lied. "Can't you tell by the way I pose?"
Two days later Brad was punching in at Valerie's place, daily. New job, new ass, new tomorrow…
As for Mr. and Mrs. David Fortune of Hillsborough, the cool machinery of their lives never ceased to function. The habit-structure of marriage stayed the same for them, and they never quarreled and still were buddies. Now that they'd been properly mated they had a solid future together. Sexual security. The dearest. Ask any anthropologist.