The New Life

by Tom Crewe

He was beautiful, more beautiful than John remembered.

He thought he might be twenty years younger.

“I’ve written books.” “You’re a famous man!” “No. Only in a small way, for those with particular interests.” He wanted immediately to change the subject, but at the same time liked the look on Frank’s face.

“You didn’t answer me,” he said. “About what sort of man you are. I think I can tell, as it happens.” “Go on.” “Clever, like I said. Brave, for coming here. But lonely, else you wouldn’t have.”

They looked at each other. John thought again what he had missed by not seeing Frank naked at the river—the little triangle of skin at his collar invited, like an open window.

“Tell me something, Frank,” John said, liking to say the name, liking the way Frank’s eyes widened in response. “When you pretended to swim off, in the park. How was it you didn’t look to see whether I was laughing?”

“I’m glad I made you laugh. I supposed I had, when you wrote.”

But then he was mastered by his desire, to please. He handed over the cigarette case, wrapped in his handkerchief.

There was something thrilling about the way his hands kept disappearing beneath the table. “I’m glad you

“It’s kind of you,” Frank repeated, slipping the case into his pocket. A look of determination came into his face. “Tell you what, I’ll just go and relieve myself, and then we’ll have a walk with our smokes, how’s that?”

The pleasant numbness created by the beer had only strengthened his feeling of passivity, of being washed willingly along into a new situation.

“I’ll help with that.” Frank was standing behind him. He leaned over to pick up the full drink, the smell of him very close, his jacket brushing John’s face, the buttons almost cold. John didn’t turn around, only sat in this new proximity, staring at the tabletop while Frank took great consecutive gulps. “There

took hold of John’s arm, pulling him back onto the curb and down a narrow passageway, scuffing his shoulder painfully on the brick. They stopped halfway and stood facing each other in the loose dark. The passage led out onto the Theobalds Road, from where came a low thunder of traffic and a haze of amber light. The rapid movement had made John breathless with surprise. “This is what you want, isn’t it,” Frank said quietly. John had begun to nod, even though it wasn’t spoken like a question, when Frank roughly took hold of his lapels with both hands. John couldn’t help it—he started back, even raised his hands feebly in defense, his hat slipping, but Frank kept his

grip, tightened, pulled, pulled him close, against his chest. His mouth fell on John’s like a trap. John buckled under it, the hard mouth on his soft, wet on wet. Their mouths tasted of smoke and beer, the beer running liquidly under the smoke, one tongue to another.

He placed his hands on Frank’s cheeks, the new stubble like grit, then cupped them under his ears, then spread them on his neck, ...

Their bodies were pressed close together. Frank’s was lean, taut. John tried to make himself flat against it. They were hard against each other, John could feel Frank’s cock...

“Mrs. Higgs won’t take kindly to me bringing a gentleman back at this hour, especially not one as distinguished-looking as you. So, you’d better go that way and catch a cab. Will you write me a letter, John?”

And he thought to himself, I am in love. I am in love. I am in love.

Does Whitman imagine that there is lurking in manly love the stuff of a new spiritual energy, the liberation of which would prove of benefit to society?

And if so, is he prepared to accept, condone or ignore the physical aspects of this passion?

nicked for a kiss, can you?” John was about to reply that he didn’t know, when Frank’s breath was suddenly on his face. Their mouths at first were as dry as the day outside; then it became like drinking from a cup, the kiss like water, wetting their lips.

The question was there. “Will you take off your clothes?” He couldn’t help from sounding pleading. Frank laughed. “Will you take off yours?” “Not yet.”

Catherine said, “Where did you find him?” “I told you, in the park.” “Today?” “Another day. You will have to know him, Catherine.”

“Because I do not intend to give him up.”

“Why have you always brought them here?” “So I can believe I am not ashamed.” “But you are, Johnny. It is natural.” “No,” he said. “It is unnatural. It is unnatural to attempt to destroy the physical instinct, until every other instinct is withered and dead, and this one still persists.” The boredom was now so intense that tears stood in her eyes. Her face injured him with its familiarity. “I did not marry for this,” she said. “Neither did I.” “Oh, but you did.”

“There are lots of words now, ones we needn’t be ashamed of. Invert, Uranian, Urning, homosexual. ‘The intermediate sex’ is my phrase. Our role in the New Life will depend on the blend within us—the body of a man and the soul of a woman, or the body of a woman and the soul of a man. We are a kinder race, unconcerned with propagating ourselves. We see differently.”

about Whitman—about the ‘Calamus’ poems. Wanting to know if I agreed they were about men loving men. Passionately.”

“You forget I met Whitman,” said Carpenter. “I had forgotten. When was it?” “In ’seventy-six.” “And?” “We spent the night together.”

Here to put your lips upon mine I permit you, With the comrade’s long-dwelling kiss or the new husband’s kiss, For I am the new husband and I am the comrade.

“Men write to me, you know,” Carpenter said. “There are lots of men, picking up the clues we leave. I am not sure if Addington means to leave his, or if he cannot help it. I do not think Whitman could help it. Men wrote to him and it made him unhappy. He frightened himself.”

“Different things—that the world must change, and not they.” “I see.”

He realized they were laughing at the bulge in his trunks. “It wakes me up,” he replied. “It’ll do that all right.”

“He talked about leaving clues. For certain kinds of men to read.”

“I am more and more convinced that sex holds the secret.” “To the future? You are brave.”

men loving men, for instance—could constitute a new system of morality.

A study of inversion could establish scientifically that sex was not defined by procreation—it would be a step towards proving that it was an instinct that took countless forms, all within the range of human possibility, all conducive to happiness.

Carpenter was too eccentric and blatant a figure, too well-known for taking extreme positions, to make a satisfactory partner; besides,

“You have made a mania of your ideals,” he said. “Be practical. It does no good to stifle instinct. You must take a mistress,

Frank pulled the curtains to, clinking on their rails. The room became dim and brown. They undressed where they were standing, vaguely concentrated.

They went over to the bed and Frank lay on his back, his feet planted and his knees up. John spat three times into his palm and wetted his cock. Frank closed his thighs round it and John began to push and retreat. The pressure, the warmth and tightness of it, he felt almost in his head. His cock slipped and stretched.

It was a great relief to talk so casually of what he had never told anyone. He found the words came easily.

“He is a prophet. Men loving men—it is a bridge between the classes, he says.”

“If you say so, Mr. Addington. Where do you get all your money from?” “My father made investments. I live on the interest—that and what I earn from my books.” “So you’re the problem. People like you.” “Yes. But we are also the solution, if enough of us alter how we think.”

“You needn’t. Like you said, it’s hard keeping secrets if you’re with people long enough. Anyhow they’re freethinkers. So long as I don’t make a parade of myself they won’t complain. Like I won’t go on about them and their books and the funny sorts of people they have coming round.”

Any act of “gross indecency” between males, in public or in private,

a Misdemeanour punishable with two years’ incarceration and hard labour. Connection per anum, with or without consent, is penal servitude for life. Very truly yours,

You suggest a meeting. I am ashamed to say I suffer a great deal from a shy nature, and am convinced I am most coherent and useful on the page. It is unorthodox, but could you conceive of carrying out our project—at least in its initial stages—by correspondence?

With Jack the invisible fact was folded over on itself; a secret beneath the secret. He looked around the room, at the men talking and eating and drinking and smoking. Were any among them like Jack, or Carpenter, or John Addington? Who were

“do women still have special obligations, over and above those they share as equal members of the community? To children, for example? As men might be responsible for physical defense.”

don’t believe a woman should