Little Casino

The fool

DONALD SMIRKS AND TELLS THE FOOL THAT Liz told him, and that Mary, Liz’s best friend, told her, and that she, Mary, heard it from Georgene, who goes to Fontbonne Hall with Dolores, that she, Dolores, sometimes changes, after physical education class, into black lace underwear, garments that look, according to Georgene, like sin itself, garments that have been proscribed by the Pope, garments that the nuns have forbidden the girls even to think about, on pain of mortal sin.

The fool can no longer look at dark, tall, shy Dolores without having the urge to say or do something so idiotically reprehensible that the neighborhood will never forget it, even unto the tenth generation.

The fool can’t talk to Dolores without blushing.

The fool can’t think of Dolores without committing the terrible sin of self-abuse that will send him to hell soon after he loses his health and sanity and life. But Dolores will also be in hell, oh Jesus Christ, and naked, like everybody else. God must be out of his mind.

The fool thinks about talking to Donald concerning this vile tale, but Donald is a thickheaded lump of a boy, ravaged by acne, meanness, and varied budding pathologies, and would, the fool knows, probably snicker and grab at his crotch in overt insult to the dark goddess.

One day, when the fool sees Dolores skipping rope with Mary and Liz, the snowy whiteness of her slip glancing out, each time she skips, from under her navy-blue jumper, he realizes that he will probably collapse and die if he can’t stop thinking of Dolores standing, nervously blushing and trembling, in nothing but her black lace underwear, the specific configuration of which he cannot imagine. Just as well. A few minutes later, as the girls start for home and supper, Dolores approaches the fool and asks him if he’d like to keep her company on the following Thursday night when she baby-sits for the Ryans. He nods, from out of the darkness of erotic mania that has enshrouded him. That would be nice, he says, sure, he says, to the impossibly lovely and amazingly half-naked girl who is smiling at him. His hands at his side are, what are they? They are cauliflowers, much too big to put into his stupid pockets.

Mount St. Vincent’s Academy, St. Mary’s Academy, Cathedral Girls’, Bishop McDonnell Memorial. Each has at least one Dolores among their various student bodies. “Such is the way of Satan and his clever wiles, boys.”

There is no proscription, in the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, against the wearing of black lace underwear. If such apparel should become the occasion of sin, however, well, you’re on your own.

Donald, you will not be surprised to know, was secretly in love with Dolores, of course. He often whispered her name as he punched himself in the mouth. What the hell happened to your face, Don?

Donald liked to eat chocolate-covered graham crackers covered with grape jelly, and adorned with chopped-up marshmallows, all washed down with Dixie Shake. His acne sang the song of empty gratification.

To think that God might be out of his mind is blasphemous. On the other hand, is it blasphemous to think that God might occasionally wear a dusty-rose suit? A string of pearls?

“You’re on dangerous ground, boys, with a thought like that, just what the foul fiend likes to see.”

“La volupté unique et suprême de l’amour gît dans la certitude de faire le mal.”