The Good Life

FOREWORD

In the autumn of 1943, with the world at war, certain small circles in New York were rocked by the Lonergan-Burton murder case. The facts were simple: Patricia Burton Lonergan was brutally murdered in her New York apartment on a weekend when her estranged husband, Wayne Lonergan, happened to be in the city on a brief leave from the Canadian Air Force. But the case had the ingredients that are presumably dear to the hearts of the American public — violent crime, scandalous sex, money.

The press had a field day. It is said that Lonergan’s trial for murder attracted wider coverage than any in more than a decade. Television was too young to be represented, but everybody else was there. To a limited number of New Yorkers, it was more of a family affair. The Lonergans were decorative figures in the city’s nightlife. They were people one knew. When it was learned that the police had seized their address books and were going through them name by name, a number of familiar faces abruptly disappeared from view.

I knew Wayne slightly and had friends who knew him very well indeed. I remember him as a very attractive young man with something vaguely intimidating about him. Perhaps I was easily intimidated in those days.

I have invented a fictional character who obligingly does many of the things that Wayne Lonergan did. The pertinent facts from the public record of Wayne’s life have been retained — The New York Times obituary is, with necessary name changes, as it appeared — but the intimate details are purely fictional, and even the well-covered trial left gaps in the record that I haven’t hesitated to fill in with my own inventions.

This then is a work of fiction with a few well-publicized facts to point the way. There is no doubt that Wayne was married to Patricia and that she was murdered. Only conflicting motives emerged from the police investigation and the trial, but rumors circulating at the time couldn’t be presented as evidence to provide a plausible explanation.

Gordon Merrick

Le ClosVorin

Tricqueville, France

September 1986

PROLOGUE

PHILADELPHIA, 1986

Something was definitely wrong. He couldn’t pinpoint a specific pain. It was all through him, a painful lethargy like a straitjacket that impeded movement of every part of him. He wanted to go back to bed or ease himself into the nearby chair but remained on his feet and continued across the room, shuffling like an old man.

Was that what was the matter with him? Had old age crept up and struck him during the night? Was he about to die? He was suitably dressed for it in clean cotton pajamas and a light wool robe — not silk but no synthetics either. An easy job for an undertaker.

He didn’t want to start thinking about death. There was nothing to think about — death was death, period — but for the last few years, ever since he had turned sixty, an acute consciousness of death had been growing in him. A strangely delayed reaction, considering that all his life after the age of twenty-five had been death-centered.

He wondered if he would still be newsworthy if he died. Would all the old headlines about the Langham slaying be dusted off and spread across the front pages again? He hoped not, for his son’s sake, not that it could affect him much.

The flurry of publicity stirred up by his release from prison had appeared when the kid was in his mid twenties, a sensitive, impressionable age. The kid was past forty and had probably forgotten his father. Perry hoped the newspapers would leave it at that. If their only news was that he was dead, it would be a bit late for the meeting between the jailbird father and millionaire son that he sometimes let himself long for in weak and sentimental moments.

His shuffling progress carried him to the piano, a baby grand, where he stopped, supported against it with his hands resting on its gleaming surface, and waited for something definite to happen inside himself that would force him to call a doctor. He couldn’t go on feeling like this before something snapped.

There had never been anything wrong with him. He’d been told about a slight irregularity in his heart, some sort of murmur, and he had a tendency to high blood pressure but nothing serious. No one dies of exhaustion, but that was all he felt — drained, spent, used up, as if every slight effort he made would be his last. He was breathing normally, and yet he felt as if he weren’t getting any air in his lungs.

He glanced at the small collection of silver-framed photographs on the piano — Billy, Clifton Webb, Libby Holman, Tallulah, Cole Porter. And Bet, of course, looking her most glamorous in a studio portrait he’d taken himself with his new Hasselblad — the photo that had been blown up to fill the front pages of all the tabloids in October 1943. Mementos of past glory. An odd assortment perhaps but with something in common: They had all sucked his cock. There had been one of the Duchess of Windsor, but it had disappeared. And slightly apart from the others, Timmy in uniform — the perfect face, the perfect gentleman — who’d almost stolen his heart.

When he was being let out of prison, he didn’t know the piano and these particular framed photographs would still be in his possession. Whoever had packed up Bet’s house must have had orders to set them aside for him. He’d had a letter from some lawyers saying that the things were still being held for him after almost twenty-five years.

They were, mysteriously, all that he’d been allowed to keep from his marriage. He and Bet had bought the piano out of the lavish sums of money Bet inherited after they were married, when they were furnishing their first apartment. The frames had been presents to himself from himself, all from Tiffany’s, all with the initials PL deeply engraved on them. A grand piano bearing a display of silver frames had been his idea of high style at the time.

There was an additional photograph that didn’t match the others, smaller, framed in cheap leather, a color snapshot of a beautiful young girl: Bet at seventeen. She was stretched out on the deck of her father’s yacht, the Belle Époque, in the port of Saint-Tropez.

He moved his finger and touched the sweet, pointed breast pushing against the slick material of the one-piece bathing suit — they were one-piece then, way back in 1939. She had the wide-eyed look she’d had in their secret cove the first time she’d seen him naked. Not a shocked look but delightedly astonished.

He pressed his finger gently, half expecting the nipple to harden as it always did to his touch. The most beautiful breasts he’d ever seen — not showpieces but exquisite formations of tender flesh. He’d held his head against them that first time and moaned with pleasure.

That entire summer — the summer before the war — was pure pleasure. The most perfect time of his life; the happiest time. He’d fallen rapturously in love, and Bet had given herself to him with delicious innocence. They’d been enthralled with each other’s bodies, and she’d invented games and positions that kept him delighted.

She was brilliant at elaborate cloak-and-dagger strategies to keep their affair secret from her father’s watchful eye. Billy’s vigilance was no match for her clever maneuvers. They’d had sex practically under his nose without his knowing. She was insatiable, and Perry found keeping both her and Billy satisfied a bit of a strain — a pleasurable strain.

He looked from the snapshot to the professional portrait. The snapshot was Bet; the portrait, Bettina. How could that innocent girl have turned so quickly into this manufactured product — a superficial and beautiful movie star? He blushed even now when he thought of the words — filthy and obscene — that the full, carefully made-up lips were capable of uttering.

He slowly drew his hand back and pulled himself upright against the comforting security of the piano before attempting the last leg of his strangely leaden journey across the modest room. He made it to the door and opened it.

The New York Times lay on his doormat on the drab landing as usual. He looked down at it, trying to read the headlines upside down. He didn’t think he was going to be able to pick it up. If he managed to lower himself to it, he would have to stay there. He would be found lying in the hall reading the Times by the first person who came up the stairs.

He cautiously shoved the paper through the door with a slippered foot and closed it behind him. He leaned against the door breathing slowly, waiting to gather strength for the next move. He could lie down on his own floor if he wanted to.

He slowly lowered himself, propped against the door, and picked up the paper. The exertion left him feeling no better and no worse.

Using the doorjamb as a handhold, he pulled himself up again in intermittent stages until he was once more standing. Catastrophe had not yet overcome him, but he felt as if it had.

He held the front page up in front of him and ran his eyes over the headlines. Everybody was fighting everybody else. So many dead in Beirut. A tidy number in Punjab. An unspecified number in Nicaragua. Death was always good for a headline.

There was a report about AIDS at the bottom of the page. That was the one thing that wasn’t likely to kill him. He wondered as usual if his life would have been transformed if AIDS had been prevalent forty-odd years ago. No Billy and hence no Bet? He doubted it. Rich older men were probably still picking up susceptible young men regardless of the threat.

He suddenly crumpled the paper between his hands and stared with bewilderment at the wrecked remains. What had brought that on? It fell from his hands.

Perry took a step into the room, and then it hit him, a pain so inconceivable that it took his mind another few seconds to encompass it. He couldn’t localize it. It was all of him, tearing him apart, destroying him. It propelled his right arm up from his side as if he were trying to free himself.

His hand closed around a familiar heavy object. He could feel the irregularities and curves of the warm bronze cupid — the plump buttocks, the sharp tips of the wings that had torn his hands. It was the lamp. The bronze lamp in their bedroom. The hideous scene was replaying again in his mind as it had at least once a day for over forty years.

It was Bet who’d grabbed the lamp first. She’d wrenched it from its socket — she was crazed, wild — determined to commit violence. She swung the lamp above her head as he ducked and jumped out of her way. Then he lunged and wrested the lamp from her.

I won’t let you corrupt my son! she shouted.

He’d been running from this horror since he was twenty-five years old. He had to make himself invisible.

Which of his changing identities did he have to escape from now? His Canadian Air Force uniform? His prison uniform? He clawed at his bathrobe but couldn’t get it off. Death paralyzed him. Death more vivid than life, brighter than life.

A dark film descended over his eyes. Perhaps this pain meant it was finally over. For an instant he knew what death felt like and then in his turn was mercifully struck down. What a relief.

The headlines on January 10, 1986, announcing the sudden death at the age of sixty-seven of the convicted murderer Perry Langham, key figure in the sensational Langham case, didn’t point out that his life had ended long before that on a sunny Sunday in October of 1943. He had been dead for more than forty years. That wasn’t the story the newspapers told, of course. As he had expected, they raked up all the old scandals — the father, the daughter, the lover-husband — with scarcely a word about mitigating circumstances.

Fair enough. He had never told the whole truth.

PART ONE

NEW YORK CITY, OCTOBER 1943

Life in the Canadian Air Force suited Perry. So did the uniform. He’d never looked or felt better. The discipline and rigid training had toughened him and made it easier to face the separation from Bet.

Perry’s being in the Air Force also suited Bet. His being away in Canada and out of New York suited her even more. She had the baby and the Beekman Place house to herself.

Since Bet’s social life had become even more strenuous with Perry away, it was actually Nanny Brown who had Little Billy and the house to herself. Bet often allowed herself the luxury of staying out all night — sometimes several times a week — since there was nobody to answer to. She’d grown weary of making up excuses, so this new arrangement was perfect as far as she was concerned.

Perry’s friend Johnny Jardine had an apartment near Beekman Place, and Perry stayed there on his first weekend pass after basic training. He thought it wiser not to break in on Bet’s new freedom, and besides, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what she was up to.

When he went around to the house that first time, Bet was conveniently absent. After ringing the doorbell repeatedly — he was hesitant about using his key — he was finally greeted by Nanny Brown, who apologized for not hearing the bell.

We were out in back, she explained as she led him down the hall and into the garden, which was filled with expensive swings, toys, slides, and a sandbox as big as a swimming pool.

Nanny Brown left him alone with his son, who was thrilled with a huge fuzzy stuffed elephant Perry had brought him. He spent the most pleasant hour he’d ever had with Billy and promised to bring him another elepan on his next visit.

On his next pass he and Johnny had barhopped all over Manhattan with the notion of perhaps bumping into Bet while she was out on her rounds. Their search had been fruitless. All they managed to do was get drunk.

Perry slept late into the next morning and just had time for a quick shave before dashing out to see Billy. He was afraid Billy’d be having his lunch or his nap and he’d have to wait around. He didn’t want to run into Bet.

He couldn’t imagine why he had spent so much time looking for her last night. He’d written that he was coming and hoped to see her but told her not to make any special plans. He was still giving her her head.

He’d enjoyed being with Billy so much the last time and hoped that their being alone together would set a pattern for his visits. He’d tried to find another elepan, but the nearest he could come was a slightly ridiculous oversize giraffe.

By the time he got to Beekman Place, he’d worked up quite a sweat by practically running all the way carrying the awkward animal. He rang and rang and waited and waited. Nanny Brown must have gone completely deaf. Finally he used his key, figuring that if Bet had been there, she’d have answered the door herself by now.

The house felt empty. He called tentatively before actually going inside the hall and walked quickly down it to check the back garden. It was as empty as the house felt. It was strange being in what he still thought of as his own house but feeling like a burglar. He had to consciously stop himself from tiptoeing cautiously and forced himself to move with purpose.

And the purpose was a beer. His hangover and his run had made him thirsty, and he went to the kitchen and opened a bottle of beer and stood drinking it straight from the bottle. The Air Force had taught him many things. He could imagine Laszlo and the crew of the Belle Époque frowning in disapproval.

He finished the first beer and opened another, sipping it more slowly as he wandered through the dining room and up the stairs into the living room. It looked like home. There were his photographs on top of the baby grand. His Graham Sutherland still hung over the bar table. He and Bet had agreed that his nude portrait would cause less comment — or, more likely, stunned, embarrassed silence — if it were hung in their bedroom. Besides, Bet had laughed, I don’t want everyone who comes here to see what they’re missing.

Perry suddenly had an urge to see the picture. How would it measure up next to him now? His newly hardened muscles ought to compare favorably with that youth he could hardly remember ever existing — that youth pushing a chair at the World’s Fair and arriving breathless and full of expectation for that first sitting with the artist.

On the next landing he paused and listened intently at the door of Billy’s room to make sure that nobody was there. He opened the door silently and got a whiff of the extraordinary smell that was Billy. He drank it in. It was the cleanest smell he’d ever known. He held his breath so that he wouldn’t contaminate the air with the exhalation of stale beer as he carefully propped up the stuffed toy on Billy’s bed.

Going on up the stairs, he again found himself moving with catlike grace, barely touching the floor, creeping soundlessly along the corridor like an intruder toward Bet’s door — no, their door, damn it; it was still his too — where he listened intently again. The emptiness of the house was almost audible.

The smell from the top-floor bedroom when he opened the door was heavy with perfume. The room was in the usual disarray he associated with a hasty exit by Bet. He could almost hear her anguished cry of Oh, God, I’m late! hanging in the air. He moved automatically to pick up her clothes and put them away but stopped himself before touching anything. He was an outsider. Mustn’t touch.

He took another swig from the bottle and turned slowly to look at his portrait. For some reason he thought it might have been removed, but there it was. There he was as the artist saw him. Perry was mesmerized and drawn to the painting. The memory of the artist’s adjusting his hand just so, ordering him to bend his knee like that was so vivid that he could hear his voice.

He remembered now how he’d started to get a hard-on and was afraid he’d ruin the pose. He smiled up at his cock. It really was something. Staring at his cock immortalized on canvas made the real one stir. Was he really like that?

Without taking his eyes off the picture, he put his bottle on the chest of drawers and took off his jacket, feeling behind him for a chair to toss it onto. Slowly he unbuttoned his shirt, slipping it out of his trousers and off his shoulders with sensual deliberation. Unfastening his belt and undoing his fly caused his cock to throb and stretch. He giggled. I’m doing a striptease for myself, he thought.

By glancing to his right, he could see himself reflected in the full-length closet mirror. This was fun; there were three of him. He could have a threesome. Like the ones he and Bet and Timmy had had, only he’d have to play each part.

Bending to untie his shoes brought his face close to his cock. Why, hello there, he said aloud and glanced quickly around behind him. What if somebody caught him doing this outrageous pantomime? They could have him locked up. He squatted to get at his shoes more easily and to get his cock out of his sight.

With shoes off he straightened and slid the trousers slowly down over his hips, moving them slightly with his arms stretched above his head in a parody of a stripper. He kicked the pants away from him.

He didn’t know where to look. The mirror held him for a moment, but his attention was drawn again to the painting. He had been painted showing almost a full erection. It really was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen. He ran his hands over his chest and slowly down over his abdomen, as flat now as it was in the picture, and watched his hands in the mirror. By taking two steps back, he could get both the painting and the mirror in his range of vision, which caused him to take a sudden deep breath, stunned by what he saw.

His hands felt real flesh; his eyes saw hands on real flesh; the canvas became a third mirror, and he thought for a moment that it too had started to move. The hand on his thigh in the picture seemed to move toward his cock, and his painted cock seemed to grow. He could see all three of them at once, and his hands became so uncontrollable, they moved down to his cock, stroking the pubic hair beside it and slowly moving along it until he held it gently with both hands. It filled them and ached for release.

He moved one hand to his balls and cupped them as the other hand started to move with practiced ease on his hardened flesh. His head dropped back, and for a moment he thought he was going to come. He straightened and took a deep breath, filling his vision with the sight of himself — all three magnificent cocks straining beautifully with potency.

What the hell, he thought, why not? Why not make himself come?

His hands started to move on himself more purposefully. His buttocks tightened, and his hips thrust forward. He could see all his muscles, all trained and sleek from recent physical training, rippling in the mirror, taut and defined in a more perfected, mature way than in the portrait.

He looked so cool in the painting — so in charge but virginal. He was just a young man naked on a chaise longue, beautiful but a bit vapid. It wasn’t lewd; it was just a study of youth. He felt ancient now by comparison.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw himself again in the mirror and thought he looked perfectly ridiculous. What a silly thing jerking off was. He let out a hoot of laughter at the sight he made pounding at his cock and threw it out of his hand as though it burned him.

He stiffened again with apprehension. Had he heard something? Voices? A door slam? Could it be Bet? Perhaps Nanny and Little Billy? It would probably amuse Nanny to find him in front of a mirror masturbating.

He was blushing like Timmy as he fled to the bathroom, his cock swinging crazily in front of him. He slid the glass door to the shower stall open and jumped into it. He could explain taking a quick shower more easily than he could a narcissistic hand job in front of his portrait, even to Bet.

With the water running, he was cut off from any sounds in the house until the bathroom door was flung open and he heard a scream.

CALIFORNIA, 1935

Perry was eleven when something called the Crash happened. He didn’t understand the connection between Wall Street and their small farm in Ohio, but shortly after the Crash, the farm was gone, and they were on the road.

They were on the road for more than six years. He quickly learned that it was the Depression, which meant that there weren’t any regular jobs. His father got work here and there — farm laborer, handyman, garage mechanic, anything. They lived in rooming houses or broken-down houses with foul outdoor toilets. They were always moving after jobs. He couldn’t remember ever going hungry, but he got awfully tired of beans.

His clothes weren’t much shabbier than his schoolmates’, but there was always an inner circle who lived in nice houses and whose fathers had businesses that hadn’t gone bankrupt. He never had any close friends.

He discovered books. Everywhere they went, even quite small towns, there were public libraries. He devoured novels about a life he never expected to know, where people always seemed to have money and plenty of time to get involved in complicated love affairs. There was one that touched him deeply called The Great Gatsby, about a mysterious guy who came from nowhere but was a millionaire. He got shot at the end because of some mix-up about a woman. He wished there were more in the book about how he got to be a millionaire. That was what Perry wanted to find out about. It had something to do with his being befriended by some old rich guy.

When the Langhams finally hit California, Perry hoped it was as far as they would or could go. His father got a job driving a truck. By then, they were living in a loathsome trailer that they parked in a trailer court off Alameda Boulevard in Oakland, across the bay from San Francisco. Perry picked up high school in the middle of the winter as a junior.

He hated the trailer — four of them living together in it, all piled on top of each other — and the public toilets and showers, but the school was the best he’d ever attended. He prayed that he could finish high school there without another move. He might end up with a few friends, perhaps even with a steady girl.

When they were still there at the beginning of his senior year, he almost let himself believe that he was going to be lucky this time. But no, they were going to move on to Seattle and a better job.

He was trapped in his father’s never-ending search for something better. There was nothing better than the Bay Area as far as Perry was concerned, and he hoped for some miracle that would allow him to stay and graduate from this school. If not, he was going to have to start all over again — new teachers, new courses to try to get interested in, new friends, new girls. You stopped giving a damn when you had to start all over again once too often.

They say Seattle’s real nice, he heard his mother say. We’ll be able to get rid of this trailer and rent a little house.

The main thing is to get up there quick, his father said. We can get away from here in a week, May be less. I want you kids to finish up whatever you’re doing in the next few days and be ready to go.

That was it. There was nothing to be said. Perry felt like crying but clung to the thought of living in a house again anywhere to cheer himself up. It helped a little.

He was going home from his part-time job in a furniture store a couple of days later when he stopped to help a woman who was having trouble getting a big bag of groceries into her car. She gave him a guarded look and then accepted his offer.

With the groceries safely stowed in the backseat, he straightened and looked at her. She was standing back, looking him over. What a charming-looking boy, she said. What’s your name?

Perry.

I’m Mrs. Rosen. Can I drop you anywhere in return for your gallant help?

Thanks. I’m going over to Alameda Boulevard if that’s not out of your way.

Get in.

She was an attractive woman, and Perry thought she was very elegant in her simple summer dress. She had dark hair, stylishly arranged, and regular features. She was a bit old but not too old to be pretty. Her manner was brisk but friendly.

He went around and got in beside her. She took a moment to fish around in her expensive-looking bag for her keys.

I’ll tell you what, she said, putting the key in the ignition. Why don’t you come home with me and let me give you a drink as a reward? I’ll bring you back.

Well, I was just going home to clean up and change.

You look very clean and tidy to me. But if you want, you can take a shower at my home.

I might take you up on that if you mean it. Washing isn’t very convenient where I’m staying.

Where’s that?

A sort of student hotel near school, he lied. He didn’t want to tell her he was living in a trailer. She was a classy dame. The car was big and comfortable, a new Chrysler. He knew they cost at least a thousand bucks. She started it and pulled out into the traffic.

Not with your family? she asked.

They’ve gone north for my father’s work. I’m finishing high school. Stretching the truth, he wondered why it shouldn’t be true. If he found a good part-time job, he could get by on his own. His family didn’t need him. They’d probably be glad to get rid of him.

How old are you, Perry? Mrs. Rosen asked.

Eighteen. Close enough, he thought.

That’s a wonderful age. Are you planning to go to college?

No. We don’t have the money.

That’s too bad. But I’m sure you’ll succeed at whatever you do. She paused. You are a very handsome boy.

Well, thanks.

She drove up into the hills behind Oakland, and they began to pass fancy houses in big gardens. It figured. She didn’t look as if she lived in a dump.

After another few minutes she slowed and turned into a drive and came to a halt in front of a long, low house set in a big lot. The nearest neighbors were a couple of hundred feet away. He’d never known anybody who lived in a place like this. Rosen was rich.

Is this yours? he asked.

Yes, much to my ex-husband’s regret.

I wondered about your not having a wedding ring. Do you live here alone?

At the moment. My daughter’s away at school. She’s eight. Come along now.

They let themselves out, and Perry pulled the groceries from the backseat while Mrs. Rosen unlocked the front door. They entered the foyer with a big living room beyond. Picture windows looked out over the bay, and the furniture was luxuriously modern. It looked like things he’d seen in the movies.

She put a hand on his arm. Let’s put that in here, she said, indicating a door. She kept her hand on his arm as he carried the groceries into a big immaculate kitchen with fitted counters and cabinets. The whole place was like something in the movies. There, she said, indicating a counter. She removed her hand after giving his arm a little pat. You’re an angel. Let’s have that drink. What do you want? Something alcoholic?

Whatever you’re having.

Do your parents let you drink?

Sure. His parents didn’t have much to do with it. He didn’t have any money for drinks. He sometimes had a beer. Only about four years ago there hadn’t been any bars because of Prohibition.

I guess you’re old enough. It’s no fun to drink alone.

She was getting out ice trays when the telephone rang. She handed him a silver thermos shaped like a bucket. Put some ice in there. I’ll be right back. She gave his arm a squeeze and hurried out as the phone continued to ring.

He filled the thermos, wondering if he could score with this stylish lady. She seemed to like to touch him. He couldn’t imagine her naked, getting laid, but even the rich must do it. He sure as hell needed it. He was getting a hard-on just thinking about it. She looked as if she had a nice body, with good, firm breasts, even though she wasn’t all that young.

She returned with a little frown between her brows. What a nuisance. My maid is ill. Can’t come this week. She smiled and shook her head. Come on, let’s have our drink. You have the ice? She glanced into the bucket and put the lid on it. You’re very useful, Perry. Bring it along.

She tucked a hand under his arm, and they entered the living room. She led him to a table laden with bottles and glasses and then looked at him with a smile that was warmly intimate without being flirtatious.

Why don’t you take that windbreaker off? This room gets hot in the afternoon sun.

He did so and draped it over a chair.

Are you going to have a martini with me?

I guess so. What is it?

Gin mostly, with a drop of vermouth. I’ll show you how to mix them. I hope we’ll see each other often.

As often as you want.

His mind was busy with a lot of wild ideas. A solitary woman, a big luxurious house — she even had a maid. His mother had worked as a maid in a private house in Phoenix on their way west only a couple of years ago. It was impossible not to wonder if there was anything he could do that would make her want him to stay. He thought of telling her that he was leaving, but he didn’t think they’d known each other long enough for her to care. May be with a drink she would begin to get ideas too.

She finished stirring ice and liquid in a tall glass container and filled two cocktail glasses, holding the ice back with a gadget that looked made for the purpose. She handed him a glass and lifted hers to his.

Be careful. It’s strong, she warned. She took a step closer and put a hand on his chest. You have lovely broad shoulders. You’re very fortunate. You have a wonderful build for such a young boy. You’re very attractive, Perry. I probably shouldn’t say things like that. I’m almost twice your age. She looked him in the eye and took a sip of her drink.

His cock flexed and sprang to life again. He didn’t know whether he should try to hide it or let her see it. He didn’t want to shock her.

Age doesn’t matter, he said. Anyway, thirty-six is young.

Thirty-five, she corrected him firmly.

Amazing. I thought you were about thirty. He took a swallow of the drink and almost choked. My goodness. That sure is strong, he exclaimed.

She laughed lightly. I never have more than two. Sip it, don’t gulp it. She put a hand on his back as she moved in beside him and directed him toward a big sofa upholstered in pale rough material in front of the fireplace. Do you have a regular girl?

No, not really.

Does that mean you might have some time to come see me again?

I’ll say.

Her hand was on his waist as they reached the sofa, and she gave him a little pat. They sat beside each other. There was a low table in front of them for their glasses.

He took another swallow of the drink and tried to think of something to say that would keep their conversation going in the direction she had chosen.

She looked at his handsome young face, coming to a decision. She was playing with fire, but she couldn’t stop. She found him devastating and had been alone so long that she was ready to take a risk. He had very good manners, and she trusted his candid brownish green eyes.

Everybody would tell her she was mad to bring him here since he was a boy she knew nothing about. He could have robbed her or raped her, not that she was sure she could put up enough resistance to make it rape. He was handsome but not in a commonplace way: His well-modeled features had distinction, and his mouth challenged her to possess him: strong, with a hint of cruelty but capable of sweetness too.

He had a watchful quality suggesting a reserve of power that was striking in one so young and was also a challenge. He was a beautiful young animal. She had noticed his crotch when he was helping with the groceries, and she had been gripped immediately by a shameful longing to get her hands on it. It was a handsome display of masculinity and had become more so in the last fifteen minutes.

He was still a bit of a stripling, but she could see that when his body filled out a little more, it was going to be overwhelmingly desirable. She could always send him away if he didn’t please her.

She took another sip of her drink and put the glass down and turned to him. I was thinking on the way up, she said casually. Are you really quite alone?

Well, only until I finish school. I’ll join my family then.

Of course, but until then, if you’re not comfortable at the hostel place, why don’t you move up here?

He couldn’t believe his ears. He didn’t have to go on wondering if there was any chance of seducing her. She’d offered him all that he could have possibly hoped for.

You mean here? In this house with you? he asked, scarcely able to contain a whoop of joy.

I don’t see why not. There’s plenty of room. I feel that we’re friends already. You’d save on your rent.

His mind raced, trying to think of objections his parents might make. But how would I get to school?

There’s a bus about a block away that goes downtown, but I could usually take you. It’s not a problem.

As it turned out, there was no problem about anything. Particularly, getting him out of his clothes. Another martini, and he was in the mirror-lined bathroom. Naked, he thought of undressing Mrs. Rosen and had a determined erection. He caught sight of himself in the mirror. He couldn’t remember ever having seen himself full-length before with nothing on. Not bad. His cock looked far from puny.

The soap was perfumed and a curious shape, not a block with a medicinal smell he was used to.

I’ve brought you a towel.

He jumped at the sound of her voice. Thanks. If you leave it there, I’m about finished. He was standing stark naked having a conversation with an attractive woman only a few feet away from him. His cock expanded until it stood.

Come out and talk to me, Mrs. Rosen said. You don’t have to hide in there.

He never dreamed a woman could ask for it. He must be mistaken. He didn’t want any trouble. I’m naked, and, well…

I didn’t expect you to shower with your clothes on, she laughed. I have a towel for you. You don’t have to be modest.

If you’re sure you mean it. Don’t blame me if you’re shocked. He opened the door and took a step forward, his hands hovering near his cock for concealment in case she was outraged.

She wasn’t. She was wearing a sheer red negligee with nothing underneath. I’m shocked but in a very pleasant way. What a stunning boy. She moved toward him. Absolutely stunning.

That was the last coherent thing he remembered her saying. She dropped down on her knees and ran her lips and tongue along his proud virility and then turned down to his balls.

He was struck dumb with amazement. He didn’t know girls did such things. For that matter, he didn’t know anybody did such things. She did things that sent thrills racing through him. She wanted his cock. He felt an exultant new power in him. He could do anything he liked with her. She had surrendered herself to him.

He dropped over her and pulled flimsy material away. She fell back onto the floor in a tangle of red cloth. She somehow freed her legs and lifted them around his hips and gripped him. She was seized by a frenzy of passion, her hands reaching for him, her body writhing.

Perry surprised himself. He knew how to fuck. He apparently knew how to fuck very well. He had never felt so confident of himself. He drew his hips back until his cock almost disengaged and drove hard into her. He drew back again and entered her slowly, letting her feel him moving into her inch by inch while her body pitched about under him and she shouted and begged for it. He was finally fucking a woman the way he’d always imagined it, body to body, stark naked and not keeping anything back from each other.

When he could contain himself no longer, he came in her tumultuously. It was the orgasm of his life.

He listened to Mrs. Rosen’s cries of rapture, the quick little succession of grunts that accompanied the tremors that he felt sweeping through her body, saw her face transfigured by what he supposed was called ecstasy and wondered if it made her fall hard enough for him to allow him to quit his stupid job and devote himself to fucking her. If she liked it as much as she seemed to, she might figure out a way to send him to college so that she could keep him with her.

She liked it well enough to get him established in her house. He had a little trouble convincing his mother of the practicality of the arrangement. He worked for his keep in the garden on weekends. He had a room attached to the garage. It was only until June when he graduated. Then he’d come to Seattle.

Mr. Kashman at the store knows the whole family. It’s all arranged. I met the lady this afternoon, Mom, he said with a flutter of trepidation around his heart.

Fresh from Mrs. Rosen, he was shocked to see that his mother was looking old. She was only thirty-eight, just a few years older than the woman he’d rolled around with on the bathroom floor, but his mother looked almost like a different generation. He remembered how pretty she had been when they were still on the farm and hated the years on the road that had worn away her youth. It was unfair. Was his youth going to be worn away too?

You mean you don’t want to go with us?

No. It’s not that. You know that. It’s a chance to get school out of the way once and for all. You understand how much I want to graduate here. Then I can get a proper job and help out. Think what a lucky break it is for all of us, Mom. There was a desperate pleading in his voice.

We’ve been through some pretty hard times together, but we’ve always stayed together. Your father prides himself on being able to take care of his family. We’ve got our pride. Never been on welfare. She lifted her head proudly for a moment, then looked down at her roughened hands. Having never been on welfare was something they clung to as evidence of their integrity.

She lifted her eyes and smiled at him with something like mischief. But your father’s a reasonable man. I think I can work it. She patted his hand. I want the best for you, Perry.

He’d managed it. He was free. His gratitude was expressed with a whoop of delighted relief. He jumped up, banging his head on the metal ceiling in the process. He leaned over and hugged his mother, laughing with glee. Oh, God, Mom, I’ll never be able to thank you enough.

He felt the wrench of parting more sharply than he’d have imagined. His sister, Meg, hung on to his neck and cried.

He’d almost cried himself. But to be finally leaving this despised trailer with its smell of kerosene from the cook stove that permeated everything, to be finally leaving the daily canned stew, the cramped quarters that made him shrink in his clothes every time he entered the place, the sounds they made sleeping virtually on top of each other, the complete lack of privacy — to be leaving all that was such joy that nothing else mattered.

In the months leading up to graduation, he learned a lot from Mrs. Rosen. He learned not to use words like classy or fancy. He learned how to make martinis, open and pour wine, use a bidet (Is it for washing your cock? he asked; she laughed, Yes, mine too), order