show gratitude for the blessings, however temporal, which the Good Lord sends to us poor sinners. The trick is, to be sure, to have the wisdom and the integrity to distinguish between those bounties which are the Lord's and those which come from Caesar or Mammon. Too many of us, I fear, are led astray because we cannot divine the demarcation line between virtue and vice.”
Again, despite my deplorable situation, I found amusement in his pithy commentaries by which he unabashedly justified whatever he enjoyed doing. The fact was that I had begun to believe that he actually credenced his very own words, and hence entered into the spirit as well as the act with a zest of gusto which the French innkeeper had already discerned.
I anticipated that he would require a constitutional after so hearty a repast, and such was exactly the case. Nothing would do but that he must walk through the cobbled streets of Calais to continue this thorough leave- taking of la belle France. He made numerous stops along the way, doubtless to peer into shop-windows, and each time I was jiggled about most rudely in the metal locket. I reflected that perhaps this was my own temporal punishment, this being incarcerated in a nest of silken pussyhairs, to remind me that I had spent so many of my days and nights in the most intimate association with that kind of verdure, both of the male and female species. Perhaps the Lord of Fleas was sermonizing me for my curious penchant. And I must confess that by now I was so saturated with the perfumed distillation of Laurette's golden lovedown that I longed to be elsewhere if only for a change of scent and venue as well.
The good Father Lawrence stopped at last for quite a long time, so that I wondered what new vistas as pleasure he was contemplating all this while. I suddenly heard a man accost him in short French: “Would M'sieu desire a little entertainment, early though it be in the day? The sky is so dark and the wind is so tumultuous, ma foi, that it might as well be night, being the proper time for such diversions as I can offer M'sieu.”
“Do you speak of fleshy enticement, my good sir?” The English ecclesiastic at once demanded.
“Je parle de l'amour,” was the reply.
“You speak of love, do you? Is this a free dispensation, or is there a tariff placed upon it?” my unsuspecting jailer pursued.
“But nothing in life that is really worthwhile is free, M'sieu l'Anglais.”
“It grieves me to hear you speak in such an unenlightened manner, my unknown friend,” Father Lawrence retorted in flawless French, “because I could stand here till doomsday and expound unnumerable joys which are part of our daily lot and which do not cost as so much as a sou or a centime. As an example, I give you the simple pleasure of spitting or clearing one's throat or blowing one's nose. There is no tax on any of these manifestations, yet each provides an exquisite pleasure at the moment. But to get down to particulars, what had you in mind when you spoke to me, recognizing me as you did as English and a stranger to your historic city?”
“It so happens, M'sieu, that in my Christian charity I have allowed two pretty young sisters from the country to occupy my room. They had come to Calais to seek their brother, who was a sailor on one of the vessels which put forth from our docks, sometimes to carry cargo, other times to war upon our enemies. Unhappily, they learned that their brother had been captured when his ship was boarding Algerian pirates off the coast of Gibraltar. They wept and implored me to help them earn the passage money which would take them to go before the Bey of Algiers to intercede for their brother's release. He is so badly needed to till the soil back at their old mother's firm in Beaulieu, that they would willingly sacrifice themselves in his exchange.”
“Now this is truly a marvel of Christian martyrdom,” Father Lawrence rejoined. And since I spend my last hours of vacation before I begin my new assignment in London, I would be happy to contribute alms to so praiseworthy a venture. I have but one question to ask of you: has* either of them the French or Italian pox?”
I heard the Frenchman utter a gasp of horror which, whether feigned or not, sounded utterly convincing: 'Mordieu! I would not dare to offer to M'sieu tainted merchandise, for that would be against the basic law of hospitality to foreigners.”
“From what I have observed in my few travels,” Father Lawrence somewhat dryly observed, “that is generally the last law which is adhered to. But no matter. Though I wear the cassock of my holy order, I am a man of parts sufficiently to discover for myself whether a young female is or is not afflicted so heinously. Take me to these two charming sisters, then, mon bon garcon!”
Once again my rude buffeting resumed, which told me that the good Father was striding onward in the company of the man who had accosted him. It was not a long walk, but I was thoroughly sick of my prison by this time, as you may well imagine. I decided that despite my over-familiarity with Laurette's cunny-fleece, it was the lesser of two evils rather than not to have it all, since it shielded me somewhat, and I am lean by flea-ish standards and am therefore more prone to hurt when I am rudely jostled.
“If M'sieu will do me the honor of going up this one flight of stairs, I will lead him to the demoiselles.” the Frenchman purred.
“I am glad that you did not say pucelles instead,” was the good Father's sardonic riposte, “for that would indicate that you were trying to palm them off on me as pure virgins, when you are simply attempting to make them whore for your fee.”
“Ah, but that is an insult! Does M'sieu take me for a macquereau?”
I do not take you for anything, my good fellow, but I simply wish to make sure that you do not take me,” was the taunting rebuke which Father Lawrence administered.
I then felt him ascend the stairs, the pocket of his cassock moving energetically as he took them resolutely – precisely the way he fucked or ate. There was nothing indecisive about my unsuspecting jailer, and a grudging admiration for him had already been born in my somewhat cynical heart.
“At this door, M'sieu,” the man said disdainfully, obviously irked by Father Lawrence's intonation that he was nothing more than a pimp.
I heard the turn of the knob of a door, I followed Father Lawrence willy-nilly, and then he stopped and stood still. “They are indeed enchanting. Leave us now, that I may hear their confession and determine what bounty will best serve them both in their sorrowful circumstances,” he told the man.
“But, M'sieu, we have not yet discussed my fee.”
“Nor will we, by all that is holy, until I have had an opportunity to listen to their story and to decide for myself whether it is what you have prompted and concocted or whether it comes from their very heart.”
And he added: “You have but to look at me to see that you will not be cheated, if a fee is indeed due for having led me to two deserving souls.”
There was a pause, and then the door closed with something of a slam. Father Lawrence had once again proved himself the master of a complicated situation. And then he spoke, his voice kindly and soothing, in a tone he seemed to reserve for the female ear rather than for the male's: “I speak your language, Mademoiselles. You have no need to fear me. I depart this night for London where I shall be attached to a holy seminary. I was told that you were in great need of aid.”
“Why, that is indeed true, M'sieu,” replied a charming voice that was elegantly low-pitched and retained a quality of huskiness which many men, I have found, find titillating to their cocks because it suggests the most lascivious intimacies between the sheets.
“Is it true that your brother has been abducted by the Bey of Algiers?” Father Lawrence pursued.
“Oui, oui, c'est bien vrai,” the low, husky voice told him with an effusive emotion that it could not conceal. “We had come, you must understand, from our little village where we and Jean, our brother, were born. We found at the docks a grizzled sailor who had been saved from shipwreck when the wicked Algerian pirates had attacked. He told us that poor Jean was seized by a dozen of the swarthy Moors and borne off onto their pirate ship, which then at once set sail. This sailor told us that the vessel of the pirates flew the flag of the mighty Bey, who is the scourge of all honest French and English seafarers. So Louisette and I, whose name is Denise, vowed that we would go to Algiers and on our knees implore that sovereign to take pity on our youth and purity and to accept us instead of Jean as his slaves.”
“From my first glimpse of you charming demoiselles,” Father Lawrence gallantly interposed, “my opinion is that the Bey would be vastly over-reimbursed for such an exchange. There would be two of you to your brother's one, which in itself would not be fair dealing. But since each of you is breathtakingly delicious, you would actually not so much be sacrificing yourselves as paying the Bey an unheard-of price to redeem your brother.”
“We are honest girls, M'sieu, even though we are but fifteen years old. Denise is my twin, but I am the older by an hour from my mother's womb,” Louisette now vouchsafed.
“Not yet your twin, since there is such a divergence in the two of you,” Father Lawrence declared. “And
