down. Must have worries on her mind. Then she slept quietly snoring in my arms.
Smith finishing breakfast. Stood up and pounded his chest. Coughed. Padded to the bathroom. Standing in the tub under the chilling shower. Marching back to the living room. Pulling the towel zigzag over the back. One display of vitality after another. Miss Martin shyly peeking from the kitchen. Comes in. Smith lifting her sweater. Nuzzling face between two white pears. Give Miss Martin a friendly morning embrace. Happy in the cabin. Great to be alive. Till the wail of the steam train on the other side of the Worrisome River headed for Cinder Town.
Brief moments of unfettered solitude left. Smith and Miss Martin entwined. Opening up her mouth to say there's the train. And Smith whispered last night you said sleeping the prelate would be blown. Sky high.
"Did I."
"You did."
Smith flexing the knees. Picking up Miss Martin carrying her to the bunk. Train pounding up the valley. Ten minutes more to town. Ten years between Miss Martin and me. Takes one back to high school. Fastened to her young body. Jesuits walked around. All the other kids were there. One tall faced thin ecclesiastic cleric said what is your name. Where do you live. I felt located. He was the prefect of discipline, hatchet faced and feared. Coming out of nowhere to grab you defenceless by the collar. Twisting. I wanted to say, hey watch the garotte. But he had a system of torture called jug. To walk round and round in circles for hours. Miss Martin pressing against your belly would have been forbidden. Lectures on sex. Every Friday. Boys today we discuss the process of generation. White haired and ancient this prelate was easily given to tears. As he said there is a fleshy shaft from which two spongy balls hang. There were terrible whispers. You old clot. Marriage was the holy joining together of two people. Without use of the rubber covering of the organ. Boys as you sit there now before me. In the sight of God. Don't dare use rubbers. I'm not. The shaft is sacred this prelate shouted. Standing here before you today boys, remember that thought. These young beautiful innocent girls who come each year on the school boat ride. Are of the purest and whitest. Dare you look or feel up their innocent dresses. Dare you. Or think impurely. The wretchedness the writhing the Lord God will smash down on your heads. Everyone in the class looked around at me. As the prelate shouted evil companions. They are the ones dear boys. Miss Martin. Wish you did not dream of dynamiting the prelate. As this one shook his fist right at me over the heads of my class mates, screaming shaft. Fleshy shaft. The smart alec behind me whispering between my shoulder blades, that he was on his way home to pull his right out of its socket and didn't give a sacred fart what the Lord God smashed down. While he was pulling. All that seventeen years ago Miss Martin. We had class nights with apple pie and soda pop. And swam in the swimming pool. The bushy sight of our language instructor for months in black and now in nothing. I was voted having the biggest one at the secret ballot on the length of shafts. A disgraceful litde group of boys. Amused by my member. Which God help me I wanted to roll up that day so it wouldn't show at all. Never take it sadly out again. Till the darkness of last spidery night Miss Martin fooling with it said you have such a beautiful one. Held in her fingers. Said her father died. Building the bridge. She rides the train across to work. Her mother never had the money to move away from the bitter memory. Miss Martin you must have been a funny little girl father protected till you were six. Wham. A big girder. Best time of day to do it now, fresh as daisies. Just shut down the brain. Let instinct take over. And first thing this morning, Miss Martin out dusting crumbs off the table. Speeding to and fro in her high heels. Were my fellow prepsters and presiding prelates to see me now they would say he has turned out, that Smith, just as we thought he would, bringing the school name constantly into disrepute. With that shaft of his. And Shirl was impressed by such a splendid