Knowing The Right People

"That's terrible" I said at last, looking up from the paper, handing it back. Now that I was conscious of my surroundings again, I saw how sombre Delaroy seemed to be too. (Later I found that almost everyone of our age felt the same way, it was is if we had suffered the death of a wise friend. So powerfully had Beauchamp's books spoken to us that we all felt we actually knew him. There are passages in his writing that evoke a place or a thought so accurately that they can later seem to rival actual memories of real events. There are just two or three other writers who have ever done that for me, made me feel sympatica -- Emily Bronte in Wuthering Heights, Evelyn Waugh in Brideshead, and of course Scott Fitzgerald.)

I was miserable all day, thinking of that old man (this was at a time when 57 could be thought of as old) dying alone. I was 18, death wasn't much on my mind, but this was so close, so clear.

* * *

I breezed through that first year. My plan worked. I was good at Maths and I'd taken as much of it as the rules allowed; I was good enough at everything else. I was also fluent in French -- thank you, Mother -- and although that wasn't a requirement, it wasn't a minus either.

Valerie and I had sex a few more times before she took up a less transient relationship with an upper-classman. I missed her from a companionship point of view, but I have to admit that from the point of view of sexual gratification she never held a candle to my masturbation sessions.

* * *

There was one very big disappointment. The new Editor of Pantheon, Robby Burlap, wasn't as keen on my work as Professor Beauchamp had been.

Burlap had been one of the Angry Young Men from the fifties, a very successful socialist playwright. Now he was an Angry Middle-Aged Man, and he had parleyed his radical political views into a seat in Parliament, from which pulpit he railed against what he called the 'English Oligarchy', the undemocratic way in which a small coterie of well-to-do Oxbridge grandees ran the country.

After a very long delay, this same Honourable Robert Burlap, MP, in his capacity as the new editor of Pantheon, sent me a letter.

Dear Mr Wilson,

Please forgive the long delay in contacting you.

We all share in the great loss that has befallen our literary publication, I'm sure you join me in da-da da-da da-da.

Professor Beauchamp had recommended one of your pieces to the Pantheon's Selection Committee, of which I was a member, and am now Chairman. In this capacity, I have decided to defer his recommendation, due to the pressure of works of a more socially relevant character.

We at Pantheon da-da da-da

* * *

I had several of the elements that are supposed to make a person homosexual, notably a strong-willed mother -- bordering on overbearing in my case -- but the fact was that I preferred girls. I actually much preferred girls. I know that may seem odd, given the events I've been describing. But 'odd' is definitely the right concept to have in hand when the subject of my sexual makeup comes up.

I had no interest, sexual interest that is, in boys my own age. My only same-sex fantasy was of performing sexual services for someone older than myself, and the only same-sex experiences I had all conformed to that one scenario.

But while I preferred girls, the fact was that I had more indications of interest -- propositions - from members of my own sex. Usually from older members of my own sex. It's not that girls didn't like me. I was a little shy, but I was fairly good-looking and reasonably articulate. They just didn't, usually, want to have sex with me.

In my fantasy sex world, the one of masturbation that I visited basically every night, the girls were numerous. They usually also conformed to the general elements of all my fantasies -- they were often tied up, often put in submissive situations. But there were also slutty girls I met in dark corners of the world who wanted to suck my penis, to take it up the arse, to pose in the nude for me, the list was long. Anything except conventional sex with a conventional girl.

I think it was Somerset Maugham who remarked that if thoughts were subject to the law he would have spent most of his life in jail. I knew what he meant (though in Somerset's case, I believe the thoughts were more about the boys than about the girls).

Delaroy's sister was friends with another girl, also French, quite petite, very, very pretty. I didn't know her name but I liked her even more than I liked Delaroy's sister. And almost every night for a while she spent some time with me, tied up and with very little clothing on, being subjected to anal sex, as I urgently masturbated in the dark. In the real world, the only thing she seemed to like about me was that I spoke the 'best french of all the English boys'. In my mind I tried to twist this compliment into a scenario that resulted in her being desirous of performing fellatio for me but even for my imagination that was a tall order.

* * *

Charles Meech, 'call me Charles', owned Harrow House, the publishing firm that had made a name for itself discovering promising young writers. Most notably, thirty-five years earlier Charles' father had discovered Terence Beauchamp and published his first book, and Beauchamp stayed with the firm for the rest of his life, even though better and better-connected houses would have given their eye teeth to take him away.

Mr Meech contacted me out of the blue near the end of that first year at university. I hadn't written anything after the disappointment with Pantheon, but I still thought of myself as being a writer one day, and of course I was glad to go and talk to any publisher, let alone such a well-respected one.

His offices, around the corner from Berkley Square, were festooned with books and piles of manuscripts stacked higgledy-piggledy. Mr Meech himself was sitting behind a desk the size of a car, peering at some sort of list.

"I'm Andrew Wilson, Sir. How do you do."

"Yes, of course, Wilson, I'd recognize you anywhere. So glad you could come."

I smiled a little uncertainly. He must have an incredible memory. We had met once, at a function following Churchill's funeral, nearly four years previously. I had been fourteen or fifteen years old, and we hadn't talked at all, just been introduced.

"I'm surprised you remember me, Sir. We just shook hands that one time, and that was -- years ago."

"Oh," he looked at me quizzically. "I didn't realise we'd met, when ...?" He squinted at my face again.

"After Churchill's funeral, Sir."

"Please, call me Charles. But - yes, I see, that must be so. Forgive me, I don't recall meeting you, there were thousands of people there and they all seemed to want to shake my hand, we published him, you know. Winston was such a popular fellow ...

"But, yes, I see - you're wondering why I can say I'd recognize you anywhere. Well ...

"Pull up a pew, pull up a pew. See, I was asked to be the literary executor of Beauchamp's estate, Beauchamp asked me himself quite a while ago. You can imagine the stuff -- he'd collected books and stuff all his life, then there were his own manuscripts, he'd kept every word he'd ever written so far as I could tell. And of course people from all over the world had sent him their manuscripts, asking if he could get them published. You can imagine the quality; some of them weren't even in English! But he kept them all."

He smiled in the recollection, rolling his eyes. A little flicker of concern waved at me from my stomach as I began to see where he might be heading.

"And then there were the photographs. You know he was a keen amateur photographer. Well of course you do, you're in some of them."

He looked at me, waiting for a response. I smiled wanly, with as much warmth as can be managed when one's heart has stopped beating.

He nodded. "Yes, so many photos, all dumped in boxes and boxes and boxes ... and then there were the albums. Did he show you his albums by any chance?"

"Ah, yes, he did ... some anyway."

"Yes, I thought he might have. Well, there were just the three. Really superior work, didn't you think? Of course, Beauchamp didn't take those, they were Sir Cedric's - Cedric Clouter. You know who I mean?"

"Yes, I do. He photographed my mother."

"Of course. Lady Jane. But if Cedric knows you I'm surprised you haven't wound up in his collections, the ones he kept at Beauchamp's place - you're very much his type."

"I just met him that one time, at my parent's place. But ... Professor Beauchamp told me he took most of those photos himself. And they were definitely taken in his house."

"Yes, they were. But that was just the Professor's line, as it were."

"I don't ... quite follow you."

"Well, by pretending that work of such high quality was his own, Beauchamp was able to pass himself off as an 'artist'. Rather than as someone who had a strong interest in pornography. That way -- well, I bet he showed you the first album, the nudes album, as art."

"Yes, he did."

"Yes, you see his own photos were quite pedestrian, they wouldn't have done the job. But by using Clouter's work, he was able to sort of break the ice with the boys that Hewitt sent him."

"What do you mean, 'the boys that Hewitt sent him'?" I asked, stutteringly. But I knew what he meant.

"Didn't Professor Hewitt send you to Beauchamp?"

"Yes. He scouted me as a First Year writer for Pantheon."

"Exactly. Good ruse. Professor Hewitt would keep an eye out for likely candidates among the new students, boys who were known to have homosexual experiences, and who were the right 'type' -- slim, graceful, a little effeminate, hope you're not offended. He was usually guided."

"How -- how would he know they'd had homosexual experiences?"

"Well, he had ... older students. I'm sure if you think about it you'll remember someone from your past who might have known enough about you to direct Professor Hewitt to you."

"... oh, I see. Yes, perhaps there was someone." I remembered Bummer Harris. Professor Hewitt had told me Harris had recommended me. He'd just neglected to mention for what.

"Yes, there always was. And was it someone you'd had, er, experiences with? At Ranleigh, perhaps?"

My face was burning. "But -- how did Pantheon fit in? It's a real Journal. I thought it was well-respected."

"Oh, yes, the best, I agree. No, the only connection with Pantheon was that Beauchamp was editor of it, only part time, of course, people like Hewitt did the actual work, but Beauchamp was such a giant that he could publish anything he wanted, and he used it to, er, get to know some potential, er some potential ..." He trailed off.

"In your College there were two - you and a boy called Moody."

"Moody?" I said, incredulous. My room mate? That Moody? I wasn't surprised that he might have been sought out for Professor Beauchamp's little photography sessions, but the idea that he could have been published in Pantheon was ridiculous.

"Moody was published in Pantheon? He could hardly write a grammatically correct sentence!"

"Yes, that's what Robbie Burlap says, utter drivel apparently. But, no, he wasn't published in Pantheon. Neither of you was published."

"But we would have been? -- if the Professor hadn't died, I mean."

"In your case, yes. But probably not Moody. His piece really was terrible I'm told. He looked very fetching in his photographs though." And he laughed, and after a moment I did too, it was all just so ludicrous.

"Here" Mr Meech went on "see for yourself."

He pushed a small folder of photos across the table to me.

In the first one, Moody was standing by the window in the nude, looking back at the camera, trying to strike the same pose and the same empathy that the boy in Sir Cedric's photo had done. There were several in that general pose, then a few of him lying in the nude on the bearskin, essentially the same poses I had done. The quality of the photos wasn't poor, but they fell well short of being works of art, just as Meech had said.

In the next photograph, Moody was sitting in the chair by the table, sitting in the nude as I had done, sitting on the same velvet cushion I had sat on, and he had the head of Professor Beauchamp's penis in his mouth. Just as I had had.

I stared at it. Even in this strange context, sitting in Meech's office, the photograph exerted a powerful erotic pull on me, the slim, graceful student, completely nude, the large slimy stiff penis in his mouth, the photo itself, and my memory of my own episode, sent my blood racing and my penis was instantly stiff.

I tried to think of something to say, aware of Meech's eyes on me.

"Um, I'm slightly surprised that Moody let himself be photographed like this. I didn't think he was that -- extroverted."

Meech looked at me with a wrinkled brow. What I'd said apparently puzzled him. Did he perhaps have some reason to know that Moody actually was extroverted?

No. He looked at me for a long moment, and then reached under the pile of papers on his desk and pushed another folder over to me.

I wasn't surprised when I opened it and found the first photograph was of me, in the nude, looking back at the camera from in front of that big beautiful set of windowed french doors. I had hoped that this wasn't going to happen, that the half-exposed roll of film in the Professor's Rollei hadn't been noticed, hadn't been developed, hadn't found it's way back into my world.

But it had. In fact, of course, this was what Mr Meech had meant when he said that I hadn't changed, that I looked exactly the same - he'd seen this photo of me, looking back at the camera. A little coquettish.

Then the ones of me on the bearskin. Embarrassing, but not the end of the world.

But then the next one showed me seated in front of the Professor, in the nude, on the velvet cushion, just like Moody, and just like Moody, I was performing fellatio on the Professor.

"Fuck!" I breathed, staring at the picture. Then at Mr Meech.

"Yes, it's -- I thought that when I first looked at them -- at Beauchamp's own photos I mean. It's always the same - a few preliminary ones in which the boy is the only one in the picture, always posing in the nude, often looking at the camera, obviously aware he is posing. Then there are more photos in which the boy has sex with the professor, and those ones are always lower quality -- not well-framed, or even properly focused sometimes -- and, well, I think those ones were done with a concealed camera."

"I see." There were two more of me serving Professor Beauchamp, including when he had ejaculated so messily, half on my face, half in my mouth, leaving a large gob of spunk, I now saw, dribbling off my chin.

I stared at the pictures again for a long moment, sitting in the imperfect silence of Charles Meech's office, and acutely conscious of Charles Meech's eyes on me. Could he see I was getting stiff? Could he see I was panting?

"No need to be embarrassed," he said after a moment, and I looked up.

"Not on my account, anyway" he added. "I mean, I can see they have the potential for embarrassment, certainly, but as for myself - well, I'm the last person to judge. In fact ..."

He looked me, holding my eye for emphasis.

"... in fact, I rather enjoyed them. And it looks as if you enjoyed making them?" He still held my eye, smiling, holding a faintly quizzical expression, waiting for me to react.

I grappled for an answer, waiting for my mind to clear of the curious fog that always descended on me for a few moments when someone came on to me. It was self-evident that I had enjoyed making the photos - in the ones of my sucking Professor Beauchamp's cock, I was also masturbating myself with one hand.

"Yes, I did enjoy making them," I said lamely. I had by this time overcome the surge of lust that seeing the photos had broght on, but now it was exciting me to be discussing them with Meech.

"No need to be ashamed, it's quite common," he was saying, suddenly hearty. "In fact, if you'd like to experience er some more, come round to my place tonight for a drink. Have to be after dinner, though - I have to take a writer to dinner."

"Yes, that would be ... No photos, though" I said.

"I don't even own a camera." And he gave me a card with his home address on it.

* * *

Mr Meech had a large, dark house off Berkeley Square, around the corner from his office. As he opened a bottle of wine in his big, dimly-lit living room, he said

"Before I forget, Wilson, I must mention this." He put down the wine bottle and got some magazines from the next room and handed them to me. Going back to the wine bottle, he went on

"Have you heard of Viscount Lindmann, the German publisher?"

I hadn't.

"Well, he's bought a small London outfit, a magazine publisher, rescued them really, they were pretty close to extinction. They publish Swinging London Magazine and a few other titles - the ones I've given you.

"And Voltan, that's his name, has asked me if I could suggest a few young writers to him, for these magazines, and it occurs to me that it might suit you.

" ... if you could bring yourself to write for them - they're not the most prestigious publications. But ... look through them and see for yourself. Don't be too put off by what you read - if you think they're not very good, so does Voltan, he wants writing that's you know, a bit more with it, a few IQ points higher. You could definitely do that, from what I hear."

I told him I'd look at them.

"And I'd like to stay in touch with you myself, by the way" Mr Meech went on, pouring two glasses of wine. "You know we focus on young writers. And as for Voltan - he's the biggest private publisher in Germany, not a bad house to be writing for in the meantime."

He tried the wine, a little theatrically, and we moved over to the huge chairs by the fireplace, and once we were settled, Mr Meech re-directed the conversation to the main point.

"So you liked Beauchamp's photo albums?"

"Yes, I did."

"Yes, they're really terrific aren't they? Had you ever seen anything like that before?"

"No. Absolutely not, never!"

He looked at me appraisingly. "But I suppose you've thought about things like that - the um activities in the photos, I mean."

"Yes."

"Like, um, perfoming fellatio for a man?"

"Yes."

"Doesn't bother you that he's older?"

"No." I thought about it for a moment and said "Not at all."

"What about being tied up? Had you had thoughts about that before seeing Clouter's photos? I know a lot of people do."

I saw that the purpose of his line of conversation was to sort of prime me, and the thought emboldened me, let me slip the mooring to my usual caution and play my role for him. I had to shift in my chair to ease the pressure on my penis as it stiffened in my trousers.

"Yes. Especially that, especially being tied up. It's always been ... exciting for me." I fumbled for a word. I didn't have a very good vocabulary for these areas of fantasy, or for the states of arousal that they engendered - they were so private that I'd never spoken to anyone about them.

"But you weren't tied up in any of the photos he took of you - do you know why not?"

I had actually wondered about that myself - after all, the Professor was clearly interested, and I would certainly have acquiesced.

"Yes, I think I do know why not: the Professor didn't have time to tie me up, he had people coming for dinner."

Mr Meech laughed, a genuine chuckle. He pulled himself out of his chair - with an effort, he was quite bulky - and poured more wine. Standing beside me, leaning forward to pour the wine, I could see the prominent bulge in the front of his pants, which he made no effort to conceal. I was panting a bit, and I leaned back in my chair so that he could see I was stiff too - for both of us it was so obvious, even in the fashionable Tiffany half-light.