Alec

by William di Canzio

Holy Mother Church was free enough with her abominating and execrating the likes of Alec. Confirmed in such beliefs? The rabid old sow could fuck herself first.

Golden pollen from the evening primroses clung to his black hair, adorning him eerily, beautifully, like some woodland god.

As he had the night before, again he called out crazily to the sky, “Come!”

At once Alec knew what he must do. He climbed the ladder quietly, then through the window and into the room. Hall was in bed, watching in silence. Alec leaned his gun carefully against the windowsill. He went to Hall, knelt beside him, and whispered, “Sir, was you calling out for me?” Hall said nothing, but his gaze was gentle, even grateful. “I know, I know…,” Alec said and touched him.

“I’m called Maurice.” They talked quietly, intimately—about when they first saw each other, about Alec’s kissing the girls (“those people,” Maurice called them—jealously, to Alec’s delight), about his watching two nights at the Russet Room window.

The sheet was tangled across Alec’s middle; he pulled it away. Maurice smiled at the welcome, lay beside him, warmed him with his embrace, and nestled his face against Alec’s neck, his breath like a wordless whisper. He touched the head of Alec’s cock and showed him the droplet on his fingertip. He wiped it on his own cheek. Alec found Maurice’s lips with his own and parted them gently, the way Van had taught him, with the edge of his tongue.

“Did you ever dream you had a friend, Alec? Nothing else but just ‘my friend,’ he trying to help you and you, him. A friend,” he repeated, sentimental suddenly. “Someone to last your whole life and you, his. I suppose such a thing can’t really happen outside sleep.”

At moments they were clumsy or rough: they bruised each other with their passion.

He was the one who’d pursued, kept watch, climbed the ladder, risked getting caught, or worse—rejected, punished, disgraced.

He was the hero of their night together. And he was very happy with Maurice, with the beauty his face revealed when close to his own, with his strength, his ardor, his wish to keep Alec in his arms, to please him: You mustn’t call me sir … I’m called Maurice.

You’re going abroad … Alec now asked himself why. Surely not for “getting ahead,” like Fred. Wasn’t it rather for the kind of freedom he’d just tasted? To be one with a man of his choosing, who, like him, wanted a friend, Nothing else but just “my friend,” he trying to help...

When he took off his shirt, he still could smell Maurice. He inhaled deeply, happily. And he smiled when he saw their spunk, dried on his belly and legs, on his chest and shoulders, plenty of it, all mixed together.

If only they’d leave it! Tonight he’d climb that ladder with no hesitation. He and Maurice would wear themselves out with love, and sleep again in each other’s arms, and wake with their lips not inches apart.

The pain of rejection would belong only to him, since Maurice held the power to hurt, accorded not only by money and class, but also by Alec’s own yearning.

Chance, or nature, had mated the young men so perfectly that, even after one night together, their separation was painful to Alec; his flesh remembered Maurice’s, vividly, palpably, as if he were actually present.

I since cricket match do long to talk with one of my arms round you, then place both arms round you and share with you, the above now seems sweeter to me than words can say …

Writing those phrases, he remembered how passion had humbled Maurice, or had led him, willingly, to humble himself. Alec did so now in turn:

The sacraments can be a great comfort in times of change. It’s a first step. Set sail with a clean heart and conscience.”

“Maurice,” he said aloud. You know right from wrong … Two days ago he did know. He knew that the Church and the law were wrong and that his own desires were right because they had led him to Maurice.

Their night of happiness had vindicated him, redeemed the loneliness and confusion, proven the truth, the goodness, of his desires.

But now, if these same desires could lead to the despair he was feeling today, maybe they were indeed wrong, as everybody said. M...

In body and mind, in their passion for each other, they were equals.

The force of this pain shocked him: he could feel it just there in his gut. Would it ever ease? Could he do nothing to help himself?

I come of a respectable family, I don’t think it fair to treat me like a dog. My father is a respectable tradesman. I am going to be on my own in the Argentine. You say, “Alec, you are a dear fellow”; but you do not write.

It felt good to chide Maurice, but still his words had no force. He wrote and underlined: I know about you and Mr. Durham. Let Maurice squirm. Yes, that was good. Still, he could feel tears rising as he wrote:

“Now, look at this. That snipe of a bellhop at the Wilton hotel, turns out the gent he touched for cash is quite aboveboard and well-connected. The little blackmailer’s facing six months’ hard labor…” “Blackmail?” Alec said. “What else would you call it? ‘Extortion,’ I suppose one might say to be polite.” “Maybe he was just fightin’ back, the lad I mean; maybe the gent took advantage.” “‘Lad’? Says here he’s twenty; he knows what’s what.”

Thus he’d put together that the British Museum was not too far from St. Pancras Station, which he therefore chose for his destination; likewise he mentally noted the name of a pub the valet liked and a hotel where he’d stayed—“nothing grand, of course, but perfectly clean.”

Three years later, he was wiser, having tasted some of life’s bitterness.

He tried to keep his rage against Maurice burning.

when he closed his eyes and rested his head, instead of feeling anger he’d recall the tenderness of their night together, his lover’s kind ey...

Now the city was itself, driven by the vying hungers of those millions of mouths.

Certain men stared voraciously, the way they stared at Alec. They’d scan his form with a practiced glance, catch and hold his eye. He marveled at how openly they dared to show their desire. Or maybe it only seemed so to him because he shared it.

Everybody looked repulsive—pasty, blotchy, damp, and cross, because the rain required more clothes than did the August heat.

Alec stepped closer, next to the bust of Hadrian’s beloved, the melancholy Antinous. When Maurice turned to face Alec to answer, he was struck by the likeness between the gamekeeper and the beautiful carved image.

“I could marry tomorrow, if I like,” he bragged, though he was certain now, after his night with Maurice, that he never would.

They would peer at a goddess or vase, then move at a single impulse, and their unison was the stranger because on the surface they were at war.

When he chose to reply to some remark and their eyes met, he would smile, Alec’s heart would melt in the warmth, and he would smile back.

He was beginning to sense that the actual situation was a practical joke, almost—and concealed something real, that they both desired. Serious

Maurice replied, “No, my name’s Scudder.” Scudder? Alec realized that Maurice did know the old man and did not want to be recognized. “It isn’t,” Alec said, “and I’ve a serious charge to bring against this gentleman.” “Yes, awfully serious,” remarked Maurice, and he rested his hand on Alec’s shoulder so that his fingers touched the back of his neck. The touch stirred Alec, as did Maurice’s taking his name for his own.

“Where are you going with your serious charge?” said Maurice, suddenly formidable. “Couldn’t say.” He looked back at Maurice, whose coloring stood out against the stone heroes, perfect but bloodless, who had never known such bewilderment or infamy as Alec did now. He realized what a fool he’d been to imagine this splendid man could care for him, and more of a fool to plot to force him to do so. “Don’t you worry—I’ll never harm you now, you’ve too much pluck.”

“It’ll all go no further—” He slapped his own mouth, as Maurice had done in the rain at the Russet Room window. “I don’t know what came over me, Mr. Hall. I don’t want to harm you. I never did.” “You blackmailed me.” “No sir, no…” “You did.” “Maurice, listen, I only—” “Maurice, am I?” “You called me Alec … I’m as good as you.” “I don’t find you are!” There was a pause before the storm;

“Oh, let’s give over talking. Here—” and he held out his hand. Maurice took it, and they knew at that moment the greatest triumph an ordinary man can win. They saw now how natural it was that their abandonment to each other at Penge should have led to peril. They knew too little about each other—and too much. Hence fear. Hence cruelty. They held and they held: their gaze at each other was steady, firm, warm as the grip of their hands.

“Can’t come to London again—Father or Mr. Ayers will be passing remarks.” “What does it matter if they do?” “What’s your engagement matter?” They were silent again. Then Maurice said, “All right. To hell with it,” and they walked on together in the rain.

Alec wailed, like a child. He pushed Maurice away; his chest heaved mournfully; then he pulled him close, pressing their hearts together with violence, and embraced him as if the world were ending.

The calm voice stopped Alec’s rummaging. He gazed at Maurice reclining on the bed, his skin glowing from their hours of love. He looked serene, confident, and satisfied, and indeed he was.

His manner had changed. As Alec no longer deferred to him, so Maurice no longer patronized; rather, he spoke frankly, one friend to another. This new equality was more than Alec could endure; he went back to poking around for his clothes.

“It’s a chance in a thousand we’ve met, we’ll never have the chance again and you know it. Stay with me. We love each other.”

In fact he appeared especially graceful at the moment, the pale light silhouetting his taut figure and glorious hair. There was a natural elegance about Alec, a refinement in his features and the shape of his limbs, not the mere vestige of adolescence, but rather a quality that would be his all his life. His beauty took Maurice’s breath now—like that of the carved image on the column from the temple at Ephesus they’d seen yesterday, Hermes guiding the soul of Eurydice to the underworld. But his beloved was infinitely more beautiful because he was alive with a bright, bright spirit. “She never will see you,” he said. “I shan’t live at my home.”

“No. There’ll be enough money to keep us while we have a look round. I’m not a fool, nor are you. We won’t be starving. I’ve thought that much, while I was awake in the night and you weren’t.” There was a pause.

“Oh no, no—not love! Now, that’s too bad. Tell your old pal. Some handsome boy breakin’ your heart? We’re cads, ain’t we all, the entire masculine half of the human race.”