To thoroughly complete my damnation, I must tell of what occurred when I first arrived in Paris, before I found my Mamma Valerius, and my position in the Opera. I don't know why I think of it now... I think perhaps I dreamed of it, when I lay unconscious in the cavern below the Opera, at the mercy of the masked monster with the angel's voice who had led me quite away.
I have said that Mamma lived in Montmarte. Can you imagine what a place it was, for a youth just out of the country, carried away by everything they saw? Oh, how terrifying and beautiful! I had a little money-- it was stolen, I'll admit it, and from the church too!-- and I took a room. To do that, I had to be Christian for a little while.
I spent a week, in fact, as Christian, before seeking out my father's old friend, perched on the brink between two frightening lives. I sought work as a laborer, and found a little factory employment, though it did not go very well, due to the extreme delicacy of my features, the softness of my hands, and, to be perfectly frank-- my temperament was and is simply not suited for such drudgery! When I left at the end of my week, no one was sorry, save perhaps some of the ladies who worked in the other part of the factory, who liked to look at my hairless face, my long eyelashes, and sigh.
Why is it, that women favour pretty men, who resemble women themselves? Is it some subtle Sapphic inclination, manifesting itself? Or is everyone drawn somewhere to the middle, to the perfect, androgynous form that could be either? For I can tell you, I have never had any lack of admirers from either sex, particularly when in the guise of Christian. I think this is another reason, why in the end, I fled to the comfort of Christine. To be hated or ignored by one gender is better than to be leered at by both, particularly when, as I thought at the time, I could or would capitulate to none.
Raoul is, now that I think of it, not a little pretty himself, but I think that no one could ever mistake him for a woman. Oh, he is very masculine, in features and manner. Nor, as I have implied, and would like to make very, very clear, is he a sodomite. Oh, that is a coarse, horrible word for a lady to know! But it is no lady who tells you this, it is one who has known sodomites in its time, and can tell the difference.
The insatiable, nosy reader will persist, I am sure, and want to know then how the honorable Vicomte and his lady wife consummate their union. I will tell you: We make love, and that is all you need know. I am a confessor, not a pornographer, and airing the habits of the marital chamber is pornographic. I would no more discuss its secrets than a priest would the holy mysteries only he is permitted to know. No, that matter will remain between the honorable Vicomte and his lady wife, and you lot can, in the words of the horrible creature who inhabits her from time to time, frankly bugger off.
Oh, what a horrible, horrible thing to have written! I assure you, it is only to steel myself for the horrible things to come.
While I lived for that week, you see, I met a man whom, at first, I supposed to be gentle, while taking my evening meal in a tavern. I should like to say that I smelled him out from the start, but I did not, not completely. You see, while there were certain attitudes of worship assumed by those priest which raised me which were less than proper, they were, at large, worshipful, and very harmless, in my opinion. I thought, at first, that this gentleman was like that. I hadn't the slightest inkling of what a true sodomite was like, and what they would want of me... and it must be kept in mind, that though the gelding had stolen certain things from me, there are others which remain reasonably effective. Desire is one, and I was a fey sixteen, and a young boy besides. And oh, the gentleman was handsome enough. Not that, had I remained intact, I would have been a sodomite! Never! Not when I learned what they were like... But I knew from the priests, that a man paying attention to a young boy would not mind if he was incomplete in places. I repeat, that I had no inkling of the full extent why. Oh, you unknown snoop, you spy, you are likely profoundly gentle, and you do not know that of which I speak. Rejoice in your fortunate innocence! I lost mine swiftly.
For I went with the gentleman into the city, and a quaint townhouse, where he taught me what a sodomite was. Those lessons made a deep impression on me, I must say, for he kept me by his side for a solid three days, and he introduced me to some other sodomites, whose faces-- oh, their faces! Look, my hand, holding the pen, is trembling. I do not remember all their faces. I cannot! I remember their music, their laughter, high and false, their lewd jests, their fey camaraderie, their excessive polish and oiled hair. I remember their well-kept nails and their careful smiles, their falsity and their contempt and their filthy lusts and their snide self-hatred. But their faces? Only a few, only briefly. Oh, how I shake! Oh my...
There, I have had a small tonic and feel a little more settled. Every now and then, once I had escaped and fled, fled into Christine, sought out Mamma Valerius and buried myself in her matronly bosom as a suffering child, I think I saw a glimmer of them in the Opera, laughing in their boxes under the guise of proper gents. I know too, that there were certain of the tenors and so forth that engaged in that lewd, secret pastime, of habitual sodomy! I shan't name names. But they did not know me, for Christine had everyone completely snowed. I can safely say, once I had adopted her for true, wrapped in her as snugly as anything, no sodomite looked twice at me, save perhaps to admire my frock!
It was this gentleman, however, a Monsieur Q., I shall call him only, that took me first to the house of the Opera. And thusly, showed to me my future, as far as I could then dream. There are so many things, Oh, many! Stranger than dreams, aren't there? In life?
I think I dreamed again of him, that man and his oiled smile and his twittering, disgusting friends, the first time I went to the cavern under the Opera, laying there in a swoon. I think, in retrospect, it should have served as a warning, that-- For Monsieur Q. had shown me about things which are not always what they seem, and about horrors and masks, for the very first. Whatever good that warning would have done me then!
Aha! I am almost relieved that Richars is crying, and I must needs quit this labour, and attend him at once!
I have said that Mamma lived in Montmarte. Can you imagine what a place it was, for a youth just out of the country, carried away by everything they saw? Oh, how terrifying and beautiful! I had a little money-- it was stolen, I'll admit it, and from the church too!-- and I took a room. To do that, I had to be Christian for a little while.
I spent a week, in fact, as Christian, before seeking out my father's old friend, perched on the brink between two frightening lives. I sought work as a laborer, and found a little factory employment, though it did not go very well, due to the extreme delicacy of my features, the softness of my hands, and, to be perfectly frank-- my temperament was and is simply not suited for such drudgery! When I left at the end of my week, no one was sorry, save perhaps some of the ladies who worked in the other part of the factory, who liked to look at my hairless face, my long eyelashes, and sigh.
Why is it, that women favour pretty men, who resemble women themselves? Is it some subtle Sapphic inclination, manifesting itself? Or is everyone drawn somewhere to the middle, to the perfect, androgynous form that could be either? For I can tell you, I have never had any lack of admirers from either sex, particularly when in the guise of Christian. I think this is another reason, why in the end, I fled to the comfort of Christine. To be hated or ignored by one gender is better than to be leered at by both, particularly when, as I thought at the time, I could or would capitulate to none.
Raoul is, now that I think of it, not a little pretty himself, but I think that no one could ever mistake him for a woman. Oh, he is very masculine, in features and manner. Nor, as I have implied, and would like to make very, very clear, is he a sodomite. Oh, that is a coarse, horrible word for a lady to know! But it is no lady who tells you this, it is one who has known sodomites in its time, and can tell the difference.
The insatiable, nosy reader will persist, I am sure, and want to know then how the honorable Vicomte and his lady wife consummate their union. I will tell you: We make love, and that is all you need know. I am a confessor, not a pornographer, and airing the habits of the marital chamber is pornographic. I would no more discuss its secrets than a priest would the holy mysteries only he is permitted to know. No, that matter will remain between the honorable Vicomte and his lady wife, and you lot can, in the words of the horrible creature who inhabits her from time to time, frankly bugger off.
Oh, what a horrible, horrible thing to have written! I assure you, it is only to steel myself for the horrible things to come.
While I lived for that week, you see, I met a man whom, at first, I supposed to be gentle, while taking my evening meal in a tavern. I should like to say that I smelled him out from the start, but I did not, not completely. You see, while there were certain attitudes of worship assumed by those priest which raised me which were less than proper, they were, at large, worshipful, and very harmless, in my opinion. I thought, at first, that this gentleman was like that. I hadn't the slightest inkling of what a true sodomite was like, and what they would want of me... and it must be kept in mind, that though the gelding had stolen certain things from me, there are others which remain reasonably effective. Desire is one, and I was a fey sixteen, and a young boy besides. And oh, the gentleman was handsome enough. Not that, had I remained intact, I would have been a sodomite! Never! Not when I learned what they were like... But I knew from the priests, that a man paying attention to a young boy would not mind if he was incomplete in places. I repeat, that I had no inkling of the full extent why. Oh, you unknown snoop, you spy, you are likely profoundly gentle, and you do not know that of which I speak. Rejoice in your fortunate innocence! I lost mine swiftly.
For I went with the gentleman into the city, and a quaint townhouse, where he taught me what a sodomite was. Those lessons made a deep impression on me, I must say, for he kept me by his side for a solid three days, and he introduced me to some other sodomites, whose faces-- oh, their faces! Look, my hand, holding the pen, is trembling. I do not remember all their faces. I cannot! I remember their music, their laughter, high and false, their lewd jests, their fey camaraderie, their excessive polish and oiled hair. I remember their well-kept nails and their careful smiles, their falsity and their contempt and their filthy lusts and their snide self-hatred. But their faces? Only a few, only briefly. Oh, how I shake! Oh my...
There, I have had a small tonic and feel a little more settled. Every now and then, once I had escaped and fled, fled into Christine, sought out Mamma Valerius and buried myself in her matronly bosom as a suffering child, I think I saw a glimmer of them in the Opera, laughing in their boxes under the guise of proper gents. I know too, that there were certain of the tenors and so forth that engaged in that lewd, secret pastime, of habitual sodomy! I shan't name names. But they did not know me, for Christine had everyone completely snowed. I can safely say, once I had adopted her for true, wrapped in her as snugly as anything, no sodomite looked twice at me, save perhaps to admire my frock!
It was this gentleman, however, a Monsieur Q., I shall call him only, that took me first to the house of the Opera. And thusly, showed to me my future, as far as I could then dream. There are so many things, Oh, many! Stranger than dreams, aren't there? In life?
I think I dreamed again of him, that man and his oiled smile and his twittering, disgusting friends, the first time I went to the cavern under the Opera, laying there in a swoon. I think, in retrospect, it should have served as a warning, that-- For Monsieur Q. had shown me about things which are not always what they seem, and about horrors and masks, for the very first. Whatever good that warning would have done me then!
Aha! I am almost relieved that Richars is crying, and I must needs quit this labour, and attend him at once!