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  “Now bend over, mister,” she said, “and drop yer panties.”

  Chapter IX.

  In which the Prisoner encounters with the Fly and endeavours to escape.

  Several minutes had passed since his buttocks had endured the last buffet of humiliation. He had heard the door close behind him, the phlegmy cough and spit of his assailant, the screech of the cross-bolt and the snapping of the locks. His backside burning, his boxer shorts and twilled slacks still around his ankles, Smedlow listened as the high-heels click-clacked down the hallway. That bitch. Even now her odor of hair oil and tobacco -- and the dogbreath of her arousal -- lingered in his nostrils.

  His fingertips began to tingle -- and suddenly it was impossible to fight the growing panic that his cell was unbearably too small: familiar symptoms of the fits that had tormented him since childhood. So he was not in the least bit surprised that now his prison began to spin -- the pus-green of the door, the slithering snakes, the filthy sink and seatless toilet, the slimy walls and heap of hay turning faster like a vile carousel until the first suspicion of nausea grew to a conviction in his throat -- and there was nothing left to do but vomit, gasp for air and wet himself.

  There, now, wasn’t that better? He found himself lying face-down on the straw, but it was still a few minutes before the spinning would stop and he could calm himself sufficiently to wipe his mouth and legs and pull up his underwear and pants.

  His very first fit had overtaken him when Mrs. Kravitz had locked him up among the galoshes and jars of school paste in the third-grade cloakroom. She had found him, ages later, in a puddle of disgrace, a discovery that had been greeted by the shrieking jubilation of his classmates. Unpleasant memories, but sufficient to remind him that he was, in fact, himself, Max Smedlow, a man with a history -- and not a head of cattle to be plundered for its steak by a crew of backwoods cretins.

  Something was biting him on the neck. As if by itself, his hand leapt up to smack it, but the instant he felt the stupid sting of his own slap, he saw the insect buzz away -- a meaty horsefly which even now paused on the livid white lip of the seatless crapper.

  For a few moments, as a distraction from his misery, he watched it: its hind legs brushing off its wings, its antennae twitching, its two big eyes agog, its bulbous bristly abdomen all bloated with its meal. Smedlow felt a powerful urge to squish it, but remembering that he was in danger of losing more than blood, decided instead to see if even the smallest and most desperate hope lay waiting in the hidden tunnel.

  He found himself, moments later, gasping for air and scraping his hands and knees in stuffy twilight. There was hardly any space to move. The walls were scratching at his sides. And something definitely smelled bad. Within minutes his gasping had become desperation -- and he tried to reassure himself that he was getting all the air he needed. Since his own hulk blocked out any possibility of light coming from his prison cell behind him, it was reasonable to conclude that the dingy light illuminating the bricks, mud, and upright timbers of his passage must be coming from somewhere in the tunnel up ahead. Why, the very fact that there was any light at all was more than ample reason to be hopeful.

  He crawled forward, twisting around corners -- but before long found himself lowering his head, bending at his elbows and leaning forward from his knees in order to accommodate himself to the apparent lowering of the ceiling. With some difficulty he reached backward into his left pants-pocket, pulled out the lighter, flicked it open, thumbed the wheel -- and saw the upturned carcass of a rat. Beyond the rat there was no doubt whatsoever that the tunnel became significantly lower.

  Smedlow now attempted to crawl backward and found, unfortunately, that he could not: although eyesight had told him where to twist and how to duck and squeeze, he did not have this benefit in reverse. An atrocious panic gripped him, which -- after a period of frantic and quite futile wriggling -- he tried to quell by measured breathing and by reminding himself that this was, after all, a tunnel which some poor dead bastard had managed to travel through.

  Lowering his head, flattening his belly to the floor, he wormed his way forward. But despite his best effort, crushing his rump against the opposite wall, he still couldn’t avoid touching the rat -- the tickle of its claw, the odor of its death, its eyes like tiny raisins.

  It was only after another eternity of muffled screams and squeezing suffocation that he emerged -- not into a room exactly -- but onto a tiny floor of wooden planks bridging what seemed to be the narrow vertical shaft of a brick chimney. Daylight streamed down from a distant oblong overhead: but no, scaling the sheer surface of those walls was obvious insanity. And yet the horrors of the tunnel, which resumed across the small expanse of floor, were equally unthinkable.

  Someone, with whom Smedlow now began to feel a disagreeable intimacy, had been stranded here before him: a pair of ancient underwear huddled in the dust. A laceless shoe was sticking out its tongue. He also saw a clogged comb, a chewed-off slice of beef jerky, several empty bottles, an old hammer -- and a heap of fallen bricks. But where, exactly, had they fallen from? Looking up, then behind and above him, he saw, half covered with vines, the darkness of a jagged opening.

  Jumping up, he repeatedly failed, but finally managed to grab this broken wall: hanging by his hands, his flimsy arms straining to lift the dead-weight of his ass, he now somehow pulled himself up -- and into the dusty darkness of a wider tunnel. He had no sooner relit his lighter, forced himself to ignore a particularly nasty spider, and resumed his crawl than a muffled howling, followed by the piercing shriek of something fighting for its life -- vile sounds which he hadn’t heard for days -- came floating up from somewhere in the prison far below.

  After several more minutes of crawling, he found himself suddenly tumbling through pitch-blackness, a horrifying freefall broken by the pain of the floor upon his back and the pleasure of seeing a fresco of naked nymphs and rampant satyrs on the ceiling. His next uneasy glance took in a gilded sedan chair festooned with cobwebs, a rusted mantrap and an ornately carved oak privy stool. Someone, as if just risen from the can, had left an open volume on its arm. Nearby, a mildewed harpsichord slouched beneath a heap of bric-a-brac -- including a dusty periwig, a set of moldy dentures, a flintlock pistol, an ivoried snuff-mill and several bottles of brackish liquid containing what appeared to be human fingers. All this was disturbing enough, but even more arresting were the relics of a more recent date: a daguerrotype of a wonderfully buxom maiden in chains and a disintegrating newspaper -- dated August 17th, 1804 -- on which the words “MISSING,” “MANHUNT,” and “EATEN” were still distinctly legible.

  He turned his head back and forth, looking for an exit. But then it struck him suddenly, miserably, like a bully’s punch in the soft flab of his belly -- that the doorway had been all walled up with bricks. A shaft of sunlight fell down from an impossibly small window, holding a swarm of mosquitoes in its beam and splashing a golden disk on the green stone of the floor. “Some day,” he thought, “they will find my bones in here.” Grimacing with pain, struggling to his feet, Smedlow only now for the first time noticed the desk -- with an ink-bottle, a goose’s quill and pile of yellowed papers. It was a manuscript:

  Book II.

  The English Fella’s Tale

  Anno Domini 1687

  I.

  . . . and presently we did disembark from our galleon in a pleasant cove, and those few of our men whom the pox had wasted, my mariners did bury forthwith, besprinkling their corses with lyme and o’erwhelming them with rocks, lest ravening beasts should disturb their rest and spread the plague still further. No sooner had we thus fulfilled the melancholy offices of Christian Buriall, than we did find ourselves encircled by a fearsome flock of salvages. For they had stol’n upon us with silent tread most wondrous whilst the men did dig and pray and weep for those poor comrades they had lost.

  “I shall be slain,” cries Young Bromley, “and my corse become the food of buzzards!”

  “Tsk! Tsk! Be silent!” says I
.

  But finding ourselves thus encircled and outnumbered by these salvages, many of whom did brandish spears and whose bedaubed countenances rendered them yet more odious to look upon, we stood for that moment bemazed. Stood, I say, but that were more trope than truth, for in sooth I myself didst sit within my litter whilst old Mitchell and Young Bromley stood without giving shoulder to my burden.

  “Oh marry! marry! I shall be slain!”

  Thus it was that young Bromley yet again did whimper and quake, and since he thus had disquieted the repose of my couch and since fortune now teetered in uncertain balance, methought it meet to descend from my chair forthwith. Which no sooner had I done, than these salvage brutes made moan and were sore afraid, and did raise their hands to shield their eyes as if o’erwhelm’d by the sudden brightness of my splendour. The largest of these devils, whom I was to learn hereafter was their prince, albeit he had neither orb nor crown but was stark-naked save for a necklace of sharp teeth which he bore about his gullet, now cur-like upon four did crawl towards me and with feeble moans and other such-like shows of brutish consternation, endeavoured to discover what it was I held within my hand.

  “Egad,” methinks, “what foolishness is this?” But when I did discern the meagre cause of this brute’s great anguish and sudden subjugation, methought that my sides would brast in twain for the mighty laughter which I must perforce suppress. For in my hand I yet held the gilt looking-glass which the Duke my father had given me when last we parted and into which, moments ere this, I’d gazed to purge a pustule whilst the crew of our small ship interr’d their comrades in the sand. ’Twas this mere glass, into which the sun shone with so fierce a vigour whilst my foot touched ground, that had astonied these brutes with the advent of my glory as if some heathen god had deigned to walk on earth amongst them. When now I saw how thus it stood and that these salvage brutes were conquered by a chimera, I restrained my mirth and gave their prince my least favourite snuffbox and other such trinkets which I had about my person.

  “O marry! They will slit my throat,” yet again cries Bromley “and my widowed mum be left without a farthing!”

  Yea, it even befell that young Bromley, whose shivering face all this while had betrayed a wonderful deal of misery, did now beshit himself and fall to howling upon the ground and altogether make a great show of unworthy terror, in such wise that these salvages began to mutter ’mongst themselves as if it were they questioned how so great a god could have so weak a servant.

  “Fie! Fie!” says I. “Thou hast disgraced thyself and disgraced the King, whom God long keep, bless and preserve!”

  And so it was I gave the brutes Young Bromley, for he was but an indifferent footman and the exchange of gifts is ever a politic practice amongst princes.

  II.

  This heathen prince did seize upon Young Bromley with a right good liking. For I had no sooner made this proffer of my bounty, than this salvage did sever Bromley his right ear -- which thereupon he did thrust into his maw with grunts and upcast eyes and other such evidences of seeming relish, in such manner as we ourselves might dote upon a capon or some other dainty. For these wretches, who have not Christian souls but mutter their blasphemies to monstrous idols, scruple not to banquet upon human flesh, which they aver is sweet and prize more than swine or pullets.

  Now inasmuch as Young Bromley was a forfeit to these heathens and could not therefore lift my chair, as he was wont, it was a scullion, Simkyn Potter, whom I chose to do my bidding in his stead.

  “Milord,” then says this Simkyn, whose breath was like a jakes, “what thinkst thou of yon heathen strumpet? I trow there’s not a sweeter dish in all of Drury Lane.”

  This same Simkyn pointing his thumb at this crowd of naked salvages (a hellish assemblage of legs and teeth and brutish buttocks) I there beheld, like a flower in a fen, as tasty a sweet as e’er the sun did look upon. Ere this she had not been amongst these wretches, or else she had hardly ’scaped my notice. Had I first seen her at her prayers in St. George’s or ambling in her glass-coach on the Mall, she would have quite outshone the other charmers and been well worth the tumbling. But as it was, she did cling unto that doltish prince, whom I did ween to be her father. And as he was all a wrinkled fruit and foul to look upon, so was she sound and plump for the picking.

  “Here’s goodly sport enough,” methought. And straightaway I did throw a glance and caught her eye and full well could see, plain before me and with scarce a stitch to hide her ripeness, that she was a juicy thing of foolish giggles, as beauteous and brainless as a doe. Thereupon my yard rose up like a cedar and inwardly I burned to have the tousling of her.

  I cannot say, these many years later, what decided me to journey on in the company of these salvages. Of a certainty I did hanker to swive this wench -- I was then the veriest thrall to the lickorous, hot blood of my youth. I neer spent in my breeches, I had such a mind to her. And there was somewhat in the smell of dankish air that meseemed did beckon me into those forests. But, over and above that, I had been bewitch’d by an antique volume I had filch’d and now did much consult -- an old Spannish Friar’s history of his travels which averred that these heathens possess’d a vast deal of gold and a wondrous elixir of eternal life.

  It would be tedious to relate how thereafter we did wend thorough the heats and hillocks of those forsaken climes. If there were gold, I saw it not, though still I had hopes. For salvages are great fashioners of gold, though they reckon not its worth. Besides, there were dragons enough and where dragons abound, there treasure needs must lie concealed. For crokadells aplenty did languish in the mud. Yea, and other slime-begotten monsters -- such as the Lyzard-man of which the Spannish Friar Montalvo had writ -- sure did lie in ambuscado in those pestilential forests.

  And now for the first time I did sigh and bethink me how far I did find myself from Oxford, though ’twas not for the Latin I repined. Indeed, I had sooner studied buggery, for bordelloes more than books had ever been my schools. Natheless, Oxford had been merry and had it not been for the gaming and the dueling and the deflowering of my cousin (which did most particularly provoke my father’s ire), I might still have drunk my fill at Balliol and cribb’d my lessons with the other wags. But the Duke my father had taken exception to my peccadilloes and threatened to settle his fortune on my pious brother, were I not to bring his business to some good account. And so now I trafficked in sugar and tobacco, though I had no great liking for these seasick ships and the company of men less worth my while than dogs.

  How oft did I recall the odour of ale on a barmaid’s breath, the smell of baking bread on St. Giles Street when dawn blushes like an unclothed virgin and huswifes sweep the cobbles, yea, and Mistress Felsham’s bawdy-house wherein for a guinea my ardour was wont to sate itself in fleshly fragrance which outstripped the seraglio of the heathen Turk. Thus within my litter did I pass long hours sighing for Oxford, nor was there solace save in sleeping or in nosing the treasures of my portmanteau. For -- I know not how it was -- but my fancy had long been inflamed by smells, in such wise that a harlot (even though she be otherwise most grievous to look upon), yet if she were possess’d of a good ripe smell and were ready for the sport, I did find her greatly to my liking. My cousin Belinda, by way of example, did have a schoolgirl’s wan and soapish smell, the which was very indifferent by itself but when blended with the robust odours of the barn wherein we lay, bravely spiced the pleasure of her taking. These smells, I say, held such soveraign sway o’er my manhood that even soiled stockings and pettycoats, the which I kept in my portmanteau against the hap of abstinence, could very well -- so long as they exhaled some goodly savour -- excite the gratification of my ardour.

  Yea, each entombed memento did evoke the fervid perfume of the past. A garter which I filch’d off a harlot in Bristol, Belinda’s night-cloaths still pungent with the sweat of her lying-in, my brother’s wife’s smock yet fragrant with the sap of her reluctant hunger -- these divers under-garments, whereupon my nose did graze like a fo
xhound hot upon the scent, did incite the riot of my blood and relieve the tedium of my journey. Indeed, odour and pleasure had been so long thus commingled that I was now a very idolater of soveraign smell: for smell did arouse my manhood like the pink flesh and kisses of the stews.

  “Milord! Milord! Milord!”

  Thus thrice rudely, whilst my nose did regale itself in the ambrosia of silken drawers, did the voice of my erstwhile tutor crow like a barnyard cock. This excellent tutor, this pedant Thorogood, this bag of farts and dusty bones whom the Duke my father had retained to overwatch my haviours in his stead, did full oft thus interrrupt my leisure with his prattle. Therefore, I was not like to have paid him mind -- had my ears not moreover been assaulted by a great hubbub of barbarous gibberish.

  “The salvages, milord! To arms, milord, to arms!”

  Parting the curtains of my sedan and observing a great press of salvages who did seem full wroth and brandished clubs and knives which they did strike their foes withal, I did now charge the very pistol with which, not seven months since, I had wounded my cousin Fawncey, Belinda’s brother, in a duel. Strange it is, but even in this present extremity, whilst these salvages did roil and spew their gibberish roundabout, I could not chuse but bethink me of that confounded ass stammering about his precious sister’s honour. And now, whilst I did soundly ram and cock my engine, I did seem to see again his poetick milksop eyes a moment ere I blinded them.

  “Milord! Milord!”

  Thereupon I descended, and remarking that my charmer’s father, the salvage prince, was like to have his gorge hacked by a bepainted brute of the most fearsome proportions, I discharged my piece forthwith and -- as I had done with my cousin Fawncey -- surprised this painted heathen in the eye. Whereupon he fell to ground with plenteous blood and strenuous writhing most piteous to behold.