Communion. So?
I can love my murderer. I am certain of his intentions. I can trust him.
I slipped out from his arms before he became aware I was going.
'Carmencita!'
'I am going to bathe, darling. Will you bathe with me?'
'Of course!'
'Come then, put your hands on my hips and follow me in the dark. I know the way!'
We walked over the thick carpets to the door of my private bathroom. I turned on the light.
'Run the water,' I said.
He bent down at once to the great black sunken bath and the water gushed in through the faucet.
We stepped in, one at either end, and locked our thighs. The water lapped up as far as my breasts which floated on top like water lilies.
'Passionate love is the fear of death, Prince! You want to sink out of existence under another's control.'
He was stroking my left calf.
'You talk so much of death, Carmencita!'
'Our honeymoon ends in death, Prince.'
'It is unbelievable!'
'It is certain.'
He didn't reply.
'You'll break your word?'
'No.'
'I shall be crucified, Prince, and tortured to death on the cross. I want death because I also fear it. To accept it in its most hideous form is to conquer it.'
I smiled, pleased with myself.
'That is the contradiction of human existence, its negation is its affirmation and its affirmation is its negation.'
'Let me kill you,' he said quietly.
I stared at him.
'Would you, Prince? Would you?'
He paled.
I smiled.
'There is plenty of time, Prince. Soap my breasts and watch the bubbles break on my nipples!'
As he came over me with the soap, it occurred to me that if I knew such a man were capable of killing me, I might not find it necessary to leave him. Oh, foolish Prince…
— 5-
Later, while we were making love in the bath, coiling about under the warm and softened water, I whispered: 'Will you really kill me, my darling?'
He replied only in body movements. He refused to answer. And then he came and his slime hung in the water like a strange sea creature, drifting like an amoeba just under the surface where I laid my waiting mouth.
He watched, fascinated, and my eyes which held his were curtained with lust when the soft amorphous mass slipped in.
— 6-
I slipped into a lethargy where lust made no response to his gentle caresses.
I tried hard to simulate it, but he sensed that I was no longer with him and he became jealous and suspicious. He began to whine.
At that point I became cruel.
I told him that either he must whip me or I would whip him. I told him that he must obey or else I would break the pledge and leave at once. What did I care? I could walk out on both of them, on Miguel and himself, and return to the brothel where any night I could meet death by knife at the hands of a drunken sailor. Why not?
My Prince put on a soldierly air.
He would not raise a finger against me. He would consent to be whipped.
I made him hold the two posts of the big bedstead, thrust his rump slightly backwards and stand with his feet apart.
I selected a thin cane. This man would either die by my hand or he would consent to kill me. What happened after that didn't matter. It would be interesting.
I looked professionally at his tightly-packed buttocks, poor child that he was in reality!
I put my whole strength into the first stroke. He gasped with pain. I struck again, aiming at the mark of the first. This time he flinched, but obviously he had decided to prohibit himself from registering pain. Good enough. I would reduce him. My third stroke was perfect. In spite of himself, his mouth burst opened and he gasped. Terror was in his eyes at the fourth. I supposed he dimly realized that if I went on long enough I would kill him.
My fifth stroke was my second perfect one. It hurt him so much that he lifted one foot off the floor and, his hands losing their grip at the same time, he fell down on the floor beside the bed.
'Get up!' I hissed.
When he took his time, either pretending to be, or in fact, in great pain, I slashed him once beautifully across his naked belly and brought a delicate curtain of blood sprinkling down.
He stared at it with a shocked expression in his eyes. His hand touched it and his fingers came away red.
'Do you still wish to be my lover?' I said.
'Yes!'
'And will you whip me or must I continue?'
He gritted his teeth.
'I will not whip you!'
'In that case, please be good enough to resume your former position; your hands on the bedposts.'
He tried to unnerve me with a look, but I gazed at him coldly, without pity.
I struck him six further times before he fell again in a heap, this time weeping freely and hiding his head in his arms. When he fell, I struck him twice and after an interval of about five seconds, a third time. Then I threw the cane at his bleeding body and left the room.
That night I passed alone, locked in another bedroom. Twice during the night he knocked at the door and implored me to let him in. 'Go away,' I said in a tired voice. 'I may see you tomorrow if you obey me.'
In the morning he waited for me outside the door.
'Carmencita!'
'You haven't slept?'
'Not a wink!'
'So much the worse for you! We have a long day ahead of us. Immediately after breakfast I intend to whip or be whipped. I have a lust for thongs.'
'Good God, how long must this go on!' the demented man cried.
'It is your own choice, Prince. You may leave the estate when you will. Or you may stay here and live your
