Venus in India (17 page)

Well, then, I woke up, and at first wondered where I could be, but my arm in a sling, and a feeling of painful stiffness all over me, quickly recalled my wandering memory. There was someone in my room. I could hear him or her gently stirring on the chair, but I could not see who it was. I called out in a weak voice, 'Is anyone there?'

'Oh! Captain Devereaux! Are you all right then? Do you know me?' cried the sprightly Fanny, who came swiftly and smiling to my bedside, looking as fresh as a rose and as neat as usual, for Fanny was a very tidy girl at all times.

'Know you!' I cried in surprise, 'of course I know you, Fanny dear!'

'Mama! Mama! Papa! Come Captain Devereaux is not silly now. Come! Come!' she cried, running out of the bedroom.

Mrs Selwyn soon came as fast as her weakness would permit her, for the deadly narcotic which had been administered to her had made her exceedingly ill, and this was the first day she had left her bed since the events which I have, I fear, so feebly described, took place. At first she could not speak from emotion The tears rose to her eyes and sought along the lashes a place to roll forth, which at last they did. She took my unbound hand in both of hers and pressed it, and at length finding her voice, said, with much emotion and very slowly, 'Oh! Captain Devereaux! Captain Devereaux! What do we not owe you?'

'Nothing at all, dear Mrs Selwyn.'

'Nothing! Oh no! We owe you everything, the lives and honour of our girls! We can never repay you!' and without another word she bent down and kissed me, letting her tears fall upon my cheeks.

I could not but feel moved. Fanny stood by looking on with a mixture of amusement and apprehension on her face. Very comical. She was evidently amused at her mother kissing me, but why she should be apprehensive I could not tell. At all events she said nervously, 'He does not call me Louie now, mama!'

'Why! Did I call you that?' said I.

'Oh yes! You seemed to think I was your wife! You would insist that I should come to bed! You said you wanted me very badly, and I do not know what other rubbish.'

'Well! Fanny! That shows that Captain Devereaux loves his wife and that his only thoughts were on her when he was delirious!'

'Was I delirious?' I asked in amazement.

'I should think you were,' said Fanny, bursting into almost uncontrollable laughter. 'The things you said to me! You would have it I was your wife!'

'Ah, me!' said Mrs Selwyn. 'I never saw your wife, Captain Devereaux, but I never in my life wished a man not to be a married man as I wish you were not!'

'Because then he would marry me!' laughed Fanny.

There was a little awkward pause which I ended by saying, 'And I should have got a good and very lovely wife in that case, Fanny!'

Fanny blushed and looked more than pleased. Her eyes assumed that look which at times gave them the appearance of speaking love and affection.

'Ah now!' said I, laughing, 'if I were only a Mohammedan and you another, Fanny, I could marry you now! But you see we have the misfortune to be Christians.'

'Worse luck,' said Fanny with a sigh.

'Well! said Mrs Selwyn, 'I can only say that if it could be a pleasure to a mother to give her daughter to a man, it would have indeed been a pleasure to me to give Fanny to you, Captain Devereaux, for you have deserved her.'

'And who can tell,' said Fanny, innocently and quite unconscious of the sense of her words, 'but he may have me yet!'

'Come, Fanny! Captain Devereaux's beef tea. I can see he is tired. We have been talking too much to him and Dr Lavie will be furious with us if he finds it out.'

The colonel here entered the room. He looked the picture of misery and woe. His conscience smote him. He knew that the young man lying prostrate and unable to move before him on his daughter's bed was in that condition owing to his lust. Poor man! He knew that a number of innocent persons had gone to their doom for the same cause, and that his wife and one daughter were still ill from effects springing from the same cause. I took his grieved appearance to be simply that of sympathy, but as he wrung my hand, he said quietly to me, 'Devereaux, I owe all to you and you owe all to me!'

'How, colonel?'

'I owe you the honour and lives of my girls - and - I ought never to have gone to Peshawar!' and he drew his hand across his eyes and groaned heavily.

Presently he added, 'Lavie tells me it will be some little time before you are strong enough to resume your duties, and that he would like to see you in your own quarters which are nearer to him, but he allows that you will be better in a house where you can be nursed and looked after, so you will remain here till you are quite well and strong again.'

'Thanks very much, colonel. I hope, however, I shall soon be all right. How is Amy?' I added, 'I have not seen her.'

'She is still in bed, poor girl!' said the colonel. 'The attack made on her had a very curious and I am sorry to say a serious effect. She has had a recurrence of an ailment which attacked her as a baby.'

'There! Never mind,' said Mrs Selwyn, 'never mind what is the matter with Amy. Captain Devereaux will be contented with knowing she has received a shock - not to be wondered at - and is still very low and depressed. Come, Fanny! get Captain Devereaux his tiffin!' and mother and daughter both left the room.

'It is a most singular thing,' said the colonel, looking carefully out of the door before he spoke, 'but poor Amy as a baby had a relaxed sphincter and - you understand? And it has come on again. Lavie says it is most unusual, but hopes to get her all right again so long as she is not allowed to pass anything but liquid. You understand?'

I felt inclined to burst with laughter, only I was so weak, and I remembered that my amusement arose from poor Amy's having been buggered.

'But, colonel, what could have brought it on now?'

'Lavie says shock, only shock.'

My goodness! I had noticed the peculiarity in the colonel before, viz., a determination not to see, or want of power, perhaps, to see, things as they were. He knew as well as, perhaps better than, I did, how addicted Afghans are to sodomy. Another man would have at once suspected this relaxation of the sphincter in poor Amy to be due to her having been buggered, but, like the ostrich, the colonel buried his head in the sand of obstinacy, and refused to see what was apparent. He did not wish to think a daughter of his could be buggered, therefore she had not been buggered. That is all.

Lavie, too, questioned me very closely as to what I saw the Afghan do when I caught him with Amy.

'Now, Lavie,' said I, 'I don't know what you expect to hear, but let me tell you this, the light in her room was very dim, I could not see very well. The moment I saw him, he seemed to see me, and we were hard at it trying to kill one another immediately!'

'You could tell me more, Devereaux, I am certain. I see I must tell you what I fear happened. Poor Amy has the sphincter of her - her - anus ruptured - at least, I say it is ruptured. Jardine says it is only unnaturally distended. If it is ruptured, an operation will be necessary. If Jardine is right none may be wanted. I should feel myself on safe ground if I knew for a certainty that she was buggered, for then the state of her anus would be explained. The colonel says, however, that as a child Amy always had a weak sphincter; even so, some violence must have brought it on so badly again.'

'Lavie, you are a gentleman, and I can trust you, but don't let it go any further, don't even tell Jardine, for it may be one of the unhappiest things that can happen to poor Amy to have the truth known. She was buggered and completely buggered too! The blasted Afghan's prick was buried in her arse as deep as his balls and he roared at me that he had buggered her and would bugger me too!'

'I thought so,' said Lavie, gravely. 'I knew I was right. I am certain it is rupture and not abnormal distention of the sphincter. But I am afraid, Devereaux, that the mischief has been done. Nobody, of course, knows for certain, but everybody in the whole camp believes that Amy was buggered, and the men are ready to kill every Afghan that comes in. Most unfortunately, the lessons you have been giving to the girls come in so handy for a joke, too. It was young Crean who started it when Jardine said he was not sure but that Amy had been buggered. Says Crean, "Then she is BA, Buggered Amy! Oh! ho! Now we can chaff Devereaux and congratulate him on one of his pupils having taken her degree."'

When I was well enough an official enquiry was held and, briefly, these were the facts which were elicited.

The soldiers were, on arrival at Cherat, warned that if they ever went shooting on the mountainsides, they must always be in parties of five or six. If fewer in number, they might be attacked; if greater, it might alarm the natives. But the whores had deserted, and the only fucking the men could get as such was at the danger of their own lives and those of the obliging women they could from time to time find herding goats and cattle. It appeared that two parties of six men each, making a total of twelve, met accidentally at a lonely place in the glen, in which were two fine young Afghan lassies in charge of some cattle. The offer of a rupee from each man made the maidens joyful and they willingly earned twelve rupees each, for each man had each girl turn about. The girls returned delighted to their village and the Tommies came back to camp much relieved.

The promise had been given of more rupees for more fucking, but alas, the promise never could be fulfilled. Somehow or other the tribesmen found it out. The inevitable consequence for the poor unfortunate girls was that their noses had been cut off and, thus mutilated, they had been paraded before the assembled men, women and children; then they had been slowly burned to death. Moreover - these poor girls having been considered to have been virgins - a desperate vengeance was to be taken on the English at Cherat. It was a pity that Mrs Selwyn should have engaged her ayah at Peshawar, where she had gone to meet her husband on his return from the war. This ayah had Afghan blood in her veins and Mrs Selwyn made a mortal enemy of her by boxing her ears for some impertinence or slackness of duty.

This happened just about the time when the irate tribesmen were looking out for English virgins to rape. Fanny, Amy and Mabel were the only fuckable girls in Cherat, and the ayah, knowing what was happening, plotted with the tribesmen to give these poor innocents into their hands at the first opportunity. When Colonel Selwyn went to inspect the whores, the consequences were what I have endeavoured to narrate. It goes without saying that that the ayah disappeared and was never heard of again. But for the fortunate circumstance of my having that extreme feeling of uneasiness, all three girls would certainly have been raped, buggered and perhaps killed too; as it was, only poor Amy was buggered.

It is curious how events hang one upon another. The flight of the ayah necessitated the hiring of another, and Mrs Selwyn engaged, on the recommendation of a lady of Peshawar, a woman whom I felt certain she never would have entertained had she seen her first, for Sugdaya was the most lovely native woman I ever saw. Mrs Selwyn knew that owing to her own weak health and consequent inability to give the colonel those satisfying nights of really succulent fucking which keep married men chaste and quiet, a man of his passionate temperament must feel desire at times press him immensely. To admit so tempting a piece of flesh as Sugdaya into her house was therefore rash to a degree, but once done it was impossible to undo. Sugdaya was modest in demeanour and assiduously avoided the colonel, devoting herself to her duty to Mrs Selwyn and the Misses baba [term of affectionate respect for the children of the family], and in fact becoming Mrs Selwyn's right hand.

CHAPTER THREE

Captain Devereaux Bows to the Inevitable

At last came the longed-for orders. We were to start to march in December to Rawalpindi, there take the train - the line having been opened as far as that now - and then proceed to one of the nicest stations in Bengal - Fackabad.

If I had time I should like to describe this march in detail, for marching in India is truly delightful, but I can only tell of two incidents of which the first affected relations between Colonel Selwyn and myself, and the second raised me to Heaven only to plunge me down into Hell. Let me explain.

The first night of the march we encamped at Shakkote at the foot of the hill. Lavie and I, who were inseparable, went for a stroll and did not get back to camp until after dark. Going to my tent I met Soubratie outside who made me a mysterious sign and told me in a whisper that the colonel sahib was asleep on my bed.

Out of curiosity and wondering why he should have chosen my bed instead of his own, I gently and in spite of Soubratie went and peeped. My camp lantern was dimly burning, turned down as low as possible where it stood on the ground, but there was light enough for me to see that a man was on my bed between the thighs of a woman and fucking her deliciously. I could not see their faces, but I could see their bottoms and such an enormous pair of balls hanging and quite hiding any part of the cunt which might otherwise, perhaps, have been seen when the prick to which they belonged was drawn out of it as far as could be before the next home thrust, that had not Soubratie told me it was the colonel, I should have guessed it was he. I could not resist it. I went straight in as though I had expected nothing. The poor colonel looked up, blurted something, and I roared with laughter!

'I really beg your pardon, colonel! I did not know you were here! Never mind, I won't say a word and I won't disturb you.' And before he could say anything I left the tent.

By and by out he came. I made as if I didn't wish to see him, but taking me by the arm he said, 'Devereaux, Devereaux, I must offer you a thousand apologies! For God's sake don't tell anybody! My dear boy, if your wife were as delicate as mine, you would understand how impossible I find it to go without a woman. Don't betray me, Devereaux! Don't! It would kill Mrs Selwyn! I can't help it but she would not understand. Oh! boy, speak!'

'Of course I won't tell, colonel. But why on earth do you look at Mrs Soubratie when you have such a lovely ayah in Sugdaya?'

'Because, my boy, take my advice, if you ever fuck a woman who is not your wife, don't let her be one of your own household. Now! if you would like to fuck Sugdaya yourself, you are welcome. Would you?'

'My dear colonel, I am really very greatly obliged, very greatly indeed, but I think I lost too much blood up the hill there to feel the want of a woman again before my wife joins me.'

Well! If you do - you know - Sugdaya or any other - remember,' said the colonel.

I am sure he did not intend to include Fanny or Amy in the 'any other'.

On the third day of our march we arrived at Nowshera. How my heart beat at seeing the familiar dak bungalow, once the very temple of Venus, in which I had officiated as her high priest, and had offered so many sacrifices to her with joy and thanksgiving in her favoured shrine between the fair Lizzie Wilson's voluptuous and beautiful thighs. I was tired with the march - not that the distance we had taken was at all excessive but I had not yet recovered my strength after the tremendous blood-letting at Cherat. Lavie had marched with me. The colonel and his family, attended by Jardine, had gone ahead, and sat on the very verandah where the struggle between Lizzie and Searle had taken place. They looked at us as we marched by with the regiment to the camp ground behind the bungalow, between it and the Kabul river. Amy and Mrs Selwyn had each been brought in a dhooli or palanquin, and Jardine and the colonel kept Fanny company.

In the evening after I had strolled to the banks of the river, from visiting which I had been withheld on my first stay by the superior attractions of Lizzie's delightful cunt, I got back to my tent where I found Soubratie mounting guard again, and he told me with a grin that the colonel sahib was there speaking to his woman in master's tent. I went and peeped in very quietly and had the felicity of seeing the colonel without his coat or trousers on, lying beside Mrs Soubratie, whose fine, fat brown cunt he was manipulating with his hand while she was grasping those balls so remarkable for their colossal size. Evidently the interested pair were making ready for a second assault and soon I saw this accomplished. The colonel, evidently, enjoyed himself very much and judging from the little feminine ripple of laughter which from time to time issued from Mrs Soubratie, she likewise profited by the nice titillation which her admirer's very full-sized prick was occasioning her. Soon came the vigorous short digs and then the final hard squeeze home, which told me in eloquent silence that the colonel was inundating the shrine with the oil of his manhood; then, withdrawing his prick from its hot retreat, he lay down panting for a few minutes and after a little while got up and commenced dressing his nether limbs. Had I seen this good performance some weeks earlier before I had been so disabled by my wounds I should have been driven nearly frantic and have had my own prick in such a state of alarming stiffness and fury, that I should probably have waited to see the colonel safe out of the tent, and then gone in myself and in spite of Mrs Soubratie's big hands, which always spoiled any idea of fucking her that came into my mind at Cherat, where I had at the time no other available cunt, I should have gone in and had a round or two with her then and there, and worked off the extra effervescence of my feelings. But now! Oh! It was sickening to me! Not a stir came in my prick. Not a ghost of a stand. Not even a ripple.