Flesh and Spirit

I thought of Celia and how I'd seen her as the love of my life; a love and life that had come crashing down. I noted, not for the first time, how thinking of her didn't give me that pain in the guts it once had. What it did do was to remind me of my sexual deprivation and how I'd need to find myself a willing partner.

That led me on to wonder about Martha. Did she have a lover or lovers? Was it true what some people said, that women have a different approach to sex than men? Were they able to more easily manage without sex? From what I'd seen of girls, especially since the advent of the pill, they got as horny as men and could be just as promiscuous.

I shrugged mentally and hoped I'd find a few promiscuous girls at The Hill.

Martha seemed to have said all she wanted to say on the subject of her marriage and widowhood. She rose and said, "How about a cup of tea before bed."

"Fine," I replied. I was to discover that a cup of tea played an important role in Martha's life, and was used to meet every crisis and predicament.

Chapter 5. And so to Work.

The next day work began in earnest. Foster had left some material, supposedly ready for the next edition, but to my eyes it was poorly written, so I did some re-writes.

Ned came in and asked, "Did you move in with Martha?"

"Yes."

"Good...good, I suppose you'll be going with her to the City Council meeting this evening?"

The City Council was my responsibility and I hadn't checked when the meetings took place, but I pretended I did know, but asked, "Does Martha go to the meetings?"

"Of course she does, she's a member of the Council, probably going to be the next mayor – or would it be mayoress – better check that, we've never had woman mayor before."

He laughed and went on, "When you have a man as mayor his wife becomes the lady mayoress. As Martha's not married you might have to fill in; wonder what we could call you."

He guffawed loudly and started to move away, but changing his mind he came back to me and said, "Don't forget, Martha knows about everything that moves and doesn't move in this town. If a bee stings a dog's backside she knows about it. She's as a good a source of information as you'll find, so stick to her."

"As good as Old Snoop?" I wondered, but kept the thought to myself.

Sylvia, who had heard our conversation, came across to me. "He's right Greg, Martha knows it if anyone does. I often tap her for information; she's a formidable lady.

"Yes," I thought, "she does seem to know how to take over."

I learned more about her formidableness that evening as I sat through the City Council meeting taking notes.

Much of it was quite dreary until they came to the subject of speed humps in Florence Nightingale Avenue. Councillor X proposed that humps be placed in the avenue. Councillor Y pointed out that Councillor X lived in the avenue and that this was the upmarket part of the city and as usual the rich got what they wanted before...etc.

Councillor X pointed to the dangers to the children in the avenue and the speeding cars. Councillor Y pointed out that there were hardly any children living in the avenue and there were other streets that did have a large numbers of children, and in any case the only vehicles that went down the avenue were those of the residents.

Councillor X got angry and asked if Councillor Y was suggesting that he, Councillor X, was engaging in an exercise of self-interest and trying to use undue influence. Councillor Y said, "Yes I bloody well am," and the chamber went into riot mode with the mayor trying to restore order.

At this point Martha rose to her feet and said, "If it is a matter of self-interest I should point out that Councillor Y managed to get the new children's playground constructed on the vacant block on the corner of his street, and he hadn't raised his voice when his brother-in-law got the contract to construct it."

"Here, here," cried Councillor X, and Martha went on the point out that, "Councillor X had remained curiously silent when his daughter, who was singularly unqualified for the job, was made assistant to the City CEO.

The chamber lapsed into silence apart from the clearing of throats, and the mayor suggested that the matter of speed humps be left over until the next meeting. "In the meantime we can ask for a report on the traffic flow through Florence Nightingale Avenue."

There was a general cry of "Here, here," and without any decision as to who should make the report they passed on to the next business.

During the drive home I commented on the matter of the speed humps and Martha laughed.

"It didn't really have anything to do with speed humps; it's just that those two hate each other."

"Why's that?"

"Ah well, Councillor Y found out that Councillor X was having and affair with his wife. Councillor X went off and told Councillor Y's wife and then all hell broke loose. Now, whatever one of them proposes in Council the other one opposes. It's a matter of principle with them. You'll see a lot of that."

It wasn't exactly the flood, fire, famine, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and wars of the Daily, but I thought I did have a story.

As we drank our late night cup of tea Martha asked if I'd like to go on Saturday and see the unusual mine that she'd previously mentioned. I said "Fine," and so to bed after the doubtful excitement of the City Council meeting.

Over the next few days I started to pick up the details of my new job. I found that it not only covered events in the city, but took in the areas beyond. This mainly amounted to news about the state of the countryside as it affected the pastoralists who ran cattle; would rain come to break the current drought? If it did come would it cause floods and would the nearly depleted city reservoirs be adequately replenished?

Friday evening Martha warned me to wear only old clothes for our visit to the mine since it would be very cramped and dirty.

Next morning I put on my oldest jeans and T-shirt and found Martha similarly clad, only her jeans and shirt seemed to mould to her buxom figure more elegantly than mine did to me.

We drove out to the mine just in time to join a party of tourists about to descend to its depths. We were equipped with hardhats that had lights attached to them, and the guy conducting the tour looked at me and grinned.

"What do you know about Cornish miners?" he asked.

"I knew what he was getting at and replied, "They were short and stocky."

"That's right, so what does that tell you?"

"I'm in a lot of trouble." I'm over six feet tall.

He grinned again, and the led the way down into the mine.

The opening was little more than a hole in the ground with some steps carved into the clay. We only got in a few metres when three or four tourists fled back up to the surface.

It was narrow and with little headroom and it had no props. It was pointed out that this was a technique used by Cornish miners; the walls and roof of the mine was self-supporting. I prayed that this was true – that it was self-supporting.

We had to duck and crawl most of the time and Martha was just ahead of me. In the light of the lamp on my helmet I could see her firm buttocks, her jeans stretched tight over them as she negotiated the various obstacles. I had a vision of what lay beneath the cloth of her jeans, and thought – if you will pardon my crudity – "I'd like to have her crying on the end of my prick."

I decided this was a vain hope, and in any case we had come to the end of the tunnel. We crouched there as the guide told us about the silver that had been extracted and how it had been the first mine in the area. Then he asked us to switch off our lamps, so as to experience total darkness.

It was the darkest dark I'd ever known and eerie. I pictured those early miners working in what was no more than a hole in the ground, their only illumination being candles. I didn't envy them.

We turned our lamps on again and returned to the surface by a different route, and I was damned glad to see the sun again and breathe the open air.

It had been an interesting visit, made even more interesting for seeing Martha from, as it were, a new perspective.

There was a rough sort of restaurant on the site so we ate a simple lunch there, and then made our way to the remains of a small town nearby. This, like the mine, had been the first community to be established in that area, but now little remained of it. Among the places that were still in use was a pub, museum and two or three art galleries that were occupied by some solitude seeking artists.

The other significant occupants was a herd of camels that wandered about the place, the descendants of the long ago means of transport used in the region, and now left to themselves. They plodded around just as they felt like it.

"We'll take a look at one of the big mines some other time," Martha said.

"What about tomorrow?" I asked.

She looked at me reproachfully and said, "Tomorrow is the Lord's Day."

Those firm buttocks were almost erased from my memory to be replaced by the stern Sabbatarian.

We drove home and Martha set about preparing and evening meal. While she was doing this I worked on my computer, writing up some of my stories for the Weekly.

Saturday night, and if I'd been in the city I would probably have gone to one of the city night clubs and raged on until the early hours. Not that I'd done much raging since Celia's departure from my life. I knew that The Hill abounded in clubs, but they were not the haunts of youth like the city clubs where dope, booze and loud music prevailed; they were more the gathering places of families.

I thought about this, but oddly found myself not really missing the old haunts as much as I thought I would. I was actually looking forward to a quiet evening with Martha. Was I growing up at last?

And quiet it certainly was. Martha sat at her computer apparently performing complex miracles of accounting on the Excel programme. I had been warned not to disturb her when she was working, so my first idea was to go to my room and watch television on my portable set. I changed my mind about this; I somehow felt I didn't want to be isolated from Martha so it was agreed that I could watch television in the lounge as long as I used an earplug or headset for the sound.

I'd not been an avid television watcher ever since I'd become a teenager, and now I found the stuff on offer was stupid – inane. I switched off and another miracle took place. I selected a book from Martha's considerable library, and started to read. I got so engrossed in the story that I was taken by surprised when Martha announced, "Tea's ready."

I reluctantly put the book down. We talked over the day and I assured Martha that I'd enjoyed it, and boldly added that I'd enjoyed her company. The Sabbatarian image had faded again and the firm buttocks had been restored.

This change reversed itself again when Martha said, "The Lord's Day tomorrow and church; good night."

All very confusing.

She went off to bed and I followed her example, taking the book with me. I must have gone to sleep still reading it because when I woke next morning it was lying beside the pillow.

Chapter 6. A Wet Sunday Afternoon.

I got out of bed. A shower and then I had to make a decision about what to wear for the occasion. Remembering the adults attending church in my childhood I decided that my suit with collar and tie were appropriate, but when I saw Martha I wondered if I had miscalculated.

She seemed to favour the sort of garment I had first seen her in; loose fitting. I don't know if she was self-conscious about her buxom figure and was trying to conceal it, but if that was her intention, she failed, and a damned good job too.

The knee length white dress she was wearing, like the first one I had seen her in, had that tantalising tendency to hang from the points of her breasts. Added to this was the fact that when wearing this sort of garment she never wore bras. If anything is calculated to stir a guy up, it is the sight of firm female mammary glands moving tauntingly beneath thin cloth as if mocking him and daring him to touch them.

I did my best to put on a going-to-church face and hide the erection Martha had inspired; with what success I'm not sure because Martha kept looking at me as if she knew what she doing to me and was enjoying it.

"It's going to be a scorching day," she commented, "don't you think you're a bit overdressed for it? We're not very formal at church, you know."

I took that to be a signal that I could wear something less strangulating, so I went back to my room and changed into a pair of grey slacks and a white open necked shirt.

The time came, and sighing inwardly as I anticipated an hour of boredom, I drove with Martha to the church.

I was somewhat taken aback when we entered the church. As Martha had said, their dress was not very formal; in fact nearly everybody seemed to be casually dressed. The people were not sitting in straight neat rows, as I remembered them from childhood. They sat in a semi-circle and out the front a group of white clad young people were gyrating and singing, accompanied by a pianist and a small band. The music seemed to a sort of soft rock.

"Hill Saints Youth Choir and band," Martha informed me.

Soon the congregation were singing along, clapping and stamping their feet in time to the music.

When the gathering seemed to have reached fever pitch a man and a woman made an appearance. I had no idea how they arrived, they just appeared, rather like the demon king through a trapdoor on a stage.

"Our Pastor and his wife," Martha said.

They wore no ecclesiastical robes, both being clad in jeans and T-shirts. Having arrived they began to regale us with all that "The Lord has done for us."

After a while people in the congregation began to cry out in a way unintelligible to me, but the Pastor's wife seemed to know what they meant.

"Our bother has just told us that the Lord is great."

There were cries of "Alleluia" and "Praise the Lord," from the congregation.

"Our sister has told us that Jesus saves."

The cries were repeated, and so it went on until the choir sang again. After that, and to my amazement, Martha got up and went to the front. There she sang in a beautiful contralto voice, "Nobody Know the Trouble I've Seen." When she finished there was more stamping and clapping.

She came back to her seat beside me, her face flushed and eyes glittering. Interspersed with all this were brief prayers that seemed to consist of thanks for this and that addressed to "Father."

Things seemed to rise to a crescendo, and then the pastor addressed the gathering.

"I'm going to say a few things about the Holy Spirit this morning." The "few things" seemed to spin out into many things, and with each of his declarations the cries of "Alleluia" and "Thank you Jesus," burst forth.

To a boy brought up with a traditional religious background it was both bewildering and entertaining, and when I felt that about half an hour had passed I glanced at my watch and discovered it had been and hour and a half.

The speaker ended and there were more choruses. The emotions of the congregation seemed to rise to fever pitch. Beside me I could feel Martha trembling with what I supposed was religious fervour. There was another climax, a blessing was said, and gradually, with hugs and kisses all round, the congregation began to disperse.

It had almost been like an orgasmic experience. First the love play and the working up to full arousal, then the moment of climax followed by the descent from the height of excitation down to relative peace and tranquillity.

I say "relative peace and tranquillity," because that was the state most of the congregation seemed to be in as they chatted and dispersed, but not Martha. She seemed to be agitated – charged up.

As we emerged from the building the day, as Martha had predicted, had grown hot, but it had become clammy as well. Looking at the horizon I could see dark clouds gathering and heard the distant rumble of thunder.

"Let's get home before the storm breaks," Martha said, so we made our way to the car, Martha clinging to my arm. She was still trembling and her face was glowing. She seemed to be little like the Martha I had come to know over the past few days.

When we arrived back at the house Martha had still not simmered down. Once inside she seemed unable to keep still and as she busied herself making tea I could see her hands shaking. In the meantime the humidity in the atmosphere had risen still further and it was a bit like being in a Turkish bath.

I was sweating and could see the beads of perspiration on Martha's brow. With such weather conditions you might suppose that lethargy rather than activity would be in order, but not so with Martha; she continued with her almost frenetic activity, moving about doing seemingly pointless jobs.

She turned on a rather antediluvian air conditioner, but it was of such a type that although it might have brought the temperature down, it only added to the already nigh on insufferable humidity.

Concerned for Martha I asked, "Are you all right?"

She looked at me, her eyes bright, their pupils dilated.

"Yes, I feel wonderful, alive, energised. That's the effect the church service often has on me, it seems to stir up a wonderful vitality; I feel full of love and ...and...I want to give."

It had begun to grow darker, and glancing through the window I saw that the storm clouds were almost overhead, covering the sun. There were vivid flashes of lightening, and the thunder that had been a distant rumble when we came out of church, was now crashing around the house.

"Didn't you feel it," Martha asked, "the...the spiritual awakening."

"Well, it was certainly very lively and entertaining."

"Lively and entertaining." she protested, "didn't you feel the power of the spirit?"

"I...I...well I felt something."

"It says in the Bible that God "Will pour out" his "spirit on all flesh," Martha murmured.

"Does it...er...yes of course it does."

"Spirit and flesh," Martha went on in a slightly dreamy tone of voice. "Men and women are supposed to become one spirit and one flesh, do you believe that?"

I had seated myself in one of the armchairs, Martha sitting on the divan opposite me. She had hitched up her dress so that I could see her thighs and that, together with her talk about "flesh," seemed to make the situation very seductive.

Despite the debilitating humidity I had a very definite longing for some female flesh; specifically at that moment, Martha's flesh. To be even more specific, that delectable flesh that resided at the top of her thighs just beyond my vision.

In answer to her question about men and women becoming one spirit and flesh, and mentally setting aside the spirit aspect, I replied, "Yes...yes...I'm sure that's right."

No doubt hypocritically I said a silent prayer, "God, let me become one flesh with Martha this afternoon."

I'm not convinced that God answers prayers, especially prayers of the sort I'd just prayed, but as if in response to my silent supplication Martha patted the divan and said, "Why are you sitting over there? Come and sit beside me, I won't eat you."

I got up and on legs that felt as if they could hardly support me I crossed to her and sat. I drank some of my tea, trying to dislodge what felt like a lump in my throat, as Martha continued.

"You know, Greg, I think we sometimes deny the flesh too much, don't you?"

I don't think I had denied my flesh; it had been a case of my being denied female flesh by no choice of my own, but deciding it might be profitable to go along with Martha I said, "Yes...yes...I suppose we do."

"I think that denying the flesh is an affront to God."