Pussycat pussycat

“I’m down here to take my physical for the army,” he told her.

“So soon? I had no idea -”

“Well, I tried to tell you last night, but I never got the chance. You stormed out in such a hurry—”

“I’m sorry, Studs. It’s just that your mother—”

“Hey, buddy—” The man behind Penny tapped her on the shoulder, interrupting her.

“Yes?” Penny turned and found herself looking at a young fellow with a Beetle-style hairdo. His curly brown hair was longer than her own tresses. It took her a moment to absorb the fact that he was a man and not a woman.

“You think the shrink ’ll buy it?” he asked.

“What?” Penny said. “What did you say?”

“I said do you think the nut doctor will fall for the curly locks?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Come on. You don’t have to play innocent with me. You ain’t really queer. I can tell. Neither am I. But the question is will we be able to put it over?”

“What does he—?” Penny turned to Studs.

Once again she was interrupted by an MP. “Move along there,” he said. “Tighten up this line. Go on, now. Through that door.”

Penny followed Studs through the door and found herself in a narrow corridor lined with curtained cubicles on each side.

“In there.” The MP indicated that Studs should enter one of the cubicles. “And you take the next one,” he instructed Penny.

Groggy and bewildered, Penny did as she was told. She entered the cubicle and just stood there, not knowing what else to do. Ten or fifteen minutes passed by, and then a sergeant pushed the curtain aside and stood in the entrance to the cubicle. “Hey, buddy! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“N-nothing,” Penny Stammered. “I was j-just—”

“Never mind you were just! Hustle it up. We ain’t got all day. There are others waiting.”

“B-but what do you want me to d-do?”

“Oh, come on now! Save the act for the headshrinker! Just get out of those clothes, and fast!”

“What? What did you say?”

“Get undressed! That’s what! Now, I don’t want to have to tell you again. If you ain’t naked in three minutes, I’ll send a coupla MP’s in here to undress you.”

“But— But-—”

“Skip the buts! Strip! Now, that’s an order! Strip!”

Penny stripped.

CHAPTER NINE

WHAT ELSE could she do? The poor girl was so weary, so confused, so intimidated by military authority. In her Pavlovian state, she had no alternative but to do as she was told. So she stripped.

When she was naked, she saw that there was a good-sized towel hanging from a hook in the cubicle. Holding it timidly in front of her, she peeped out from behind the curtain. The young men were lined up in the aisle. The majority of them had knotted their towels around their waists. Penny tied hers somewhat higher, so that her bosom was covered, and joined the line. A few of the others cast curious looks at her, but they shrugged off the peculiarity of how she had chosen to position her towel as the line began to move.

Six at a time, they were ushered into a large, empty room with a chalk-line running down the center. They were lined up along the chalk-line so that their backs were so the examining doctor when he entered. “Drop your towels,” he ordered. Six towels crumpled to the floor. “Now touch your toes without bending your knees,” he ordered. The six strained to obey.

Kneeling, the doctor went down the line with a flat ruler. This he inserted under the feet of all. He paused at the third man in the line, unable to find space to fit the ruler under his instep. “You have flat feet,” he told him.

“I know,” the man replied happily.

“They will never take you in the army with flat feet.”

“I know.” The man grinned from ear to ear.

“How’d you get ’em, Mac?” the man beside him asked, muttering the question from the comer of his mouth.

“Simple. The last few weeks I been out stompin’ beatniks in them anti-war demonstrations. Enough stompin’ ’ll do it every time. An’ it’s patriotic, too.”

“Sure wish I’d thoughta that.”

The examining physician had now reached Penny. Like a true specialist, he kept his eyes directed downward. Feet were the only things which concerned him. Now, as he slipped the ruler under Penny’s instep, his eyebrows shot upwards. “Well, you’re certainly not flat-footed,” he observed. “I’ve never seen such a well-developed arch on a man.”

“It must come from wearing high heels,” Penny grunted.

“It must come from wearing high heels, sir!” the doctor chastised her. “I am a reserve officer in the armed forces of the United States of America, and you might as well get used right now to treating rank with the respect it commands!”

“I didn’t know you were rank. I’m sorry, sir,” Penny apologized.

“All right, then.” The doctor was mollified. “Now, about these high heels. How come, soldier? What are you, from Texas or something?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, I suppose it’s really your business. But it’s making your toes curl, you know.” The doctor stood up and left the examining room.

As soon as he was gone, the six prospective inductees straightened up. But not for long. Another doctor replaced the first and barked out the inevitable order. “Bend over!” The six bent and struggled to touch their toes once again.

“Spread your cheeks!” the doctor commanded.

He fit a sort of elongated monocle into one eye, stooped over, and started down the line. The fourth man brought him up short. He peered. He stepped back. He removed the eyepiece. He polished it with his handkerchief. He bent over and peered once again. “Good Lord!” he exclaimed aloud. He bolted from the room.

A moment later he returned, another doctor hurrying along behind him. “It’s this man here,” the first doctor pointed. “It’s unbelievable.”

“You must be seeing things, Dudley,” the second doctor remarked. He stooped over, fitted in his eyepiece, and looked for himself. “My God! You’re right!”

“I told you.”

“I was sure you were having a delusion. As a matter of fact, maybe we’re both having a delusion. We’d better call Louis in on this.” The second doctor scurried out and returned with a third doctor. “Look for yourself,” he was saying as he led the third physician over to the man. “Then tell me what you see!”

The third doctor stooped, peered, blanched and straightened. “I’ll be damned!” he said.

“What did you see?” the first doctor asked him.

“Another eye!” the third doctor admitted. “Staring straight back at me!”

“That’s what I saw,” the first doctor said.

“Me too,” the second doctor concurred.

“I thought I was seeing things,” the first doctor said.

“Me too.”

“Well, you weren’t,” the third doctor reassured them. “It’s an eye, all right. A blue eye. And it stared straight hack at me without blinking!”

“Excuse me, sirs.” The man they were examining twisted his head over his shoulder. “I think I can explain—”

“Silence!” the first doctor thundered. “You are in the presence of officers, and we did not give you permission to speak!” He knelt for another look.

The other two doctors knelt beside him.

“Wider!” the first doctor ordered the man.

“Dudley!” the second doctor objected. “You’re hogging it all to yourself. I can’t even see anything.”

“Well, I saw it first,” the first doctor reminded him. "And besides, Louis is pushing. That’s why you can’t see.”

“I am not pushing, Dudley. And I might remind you that you did invite me in here for consultation.”

“All right. Don’t get your feathers ruffled. We’ll take turns looking.”

But none of the three moved. And when they spoke again it was a chorus of mutual frustration. “Wider!” they chimed.

“Say,” Dudley turned to Louis. “You don’t suppose there’s a throat man up there, do you? Maybe it’s his eye we’re seeing.”

“Don’t be ridiculous! A throat man would never dare poach on our department. The throat specialists are all down the other end of the hall.”

“Well then, just where did this disembodied eye come from? And what’s it doing there? It’s eerie! I tell you, it makes me nervous! Staring back like that!”

“Please, sirs, may I have permission to speak?” the man under examination tried again.

“Oh, very well. Permission granted.”

“Thank you, sirs. Now, this is my grandfather’s eye and-—”

“Your grandfather’s eye? Then how did it get up your—?”

“Wait. Let him finish, Dudley.”

“Thank you, sirs. You see, it’s a glass eye.”

“Look, soldier, is this relevant?”

“I’m not a soldier yet, sir. But yes, it is relevant. You see, it popped out of his eye socket into the soup tureen at dinner one night, and before we knew what had happened, my mother had dished it out to me. I’m nuts about her soup, and I was spooning it in so fast that I never even noticed.”

“What kind of soup was it?” one of the doctors demanded.

“Matzohball soup, sir. That’s how it happened. I thought it was one of the matzohballs.”

“It seems an unlikely mistake.”

“You don’t know my mother’s matzohballs, sir. Anyway, that’s how it happened. Before I knew it, I’d swallowed Grandpa’s glass eye. And it’s been there ever since.”

“Doesn’t it bother you? Staring like that?”

“Well, I’ve never been able to see it staring, sir. I’m not double-jointed !”

“I’m aware of that. Don’t be disrespectful, soldier. Now return to your original position. And that’s an order!”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ve never come up against a situation like this before,” the first doctor said. “How do we handle it?”

“That’s your whole trouble, Dudley,” the third doctor told him. “You lack initiative. The solution is perfectly simple. It’s an eye, isn’t it? Very well then, it’s not in our department no matter where it happens to have lodged itself. It’s a matter for the optometrists. Just make a notation to have the eye specialist check it, and forget about it.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” The first doctor bent to examine the others as his colleagues left the room.

A moment later he was kneeling behind Penny. The view through his eyepiece gave him his second shock of the day. He found himself looking through Penny’s legs and straight into her upside-down face. An index finger of each hand was inserted in each corner of her mouth and she was pulling it wide apart. “Just what the hell are you doing?” the doctor demanded.

“You said we should spread our cheeks, sir,” Penny reminded him.

“Not those cheeks, you idiot! These cheeks. Here. These.”

“Oh! Sorry, sir.” Penny did as he indicated.

“You’re all right,” the doctor muttered, starting to stand up. Then something else caught his attention and he stooped over again. “You seem to be missing something there,” he remarked to Penny.

“I was wondering when somebody would notice that. It brings up a point I’ve been trying to raise, and—”

“With very little success, evidently.” The doctor allowed himself his little quip.

“What I mean is, with what I’m missing, I don’t really think I’m fit for army service.”

“You may be right. But that’s not my department. I only check for hemorrhoids. You have none, so I, have no choice but to pass you. Still, if you explain your deficiency to someone in charge, I’m sure they’ll exempt you from military service. Just out of curiosity, though, how did it happen?”

“I was born this way.”

“Might have known it. Those damn obstetricians are always botching things. They make all the money, sure, but they’re so damn inept they can’t tell the difference between an umbilical cord and— Yes?” The doctor turned irritably to the sergeant who had been trying to get his attention. “What is it?”

“They’re piling up outside, sir. I think we’d better move these people out if you’re through with them.”

“Oh, all right. I’m through. What did you say they were doing outside?”

“Piling up, sir.”

“Let’s not jump to conclusions, sergeant. I haven’t even examined them yet. Pile, indeed! Well, we’ll see.”

Towel in place again, Penny shuffled along with the others into another large room. This one was long and narrow. They were lined up against one wall at the far end. “Hold up the index fingers of your right hands,” a technician standing off to one side ordered them.

When they had complied, the technician flattened himself against the side wall and barked out a command: “Charge!”

Immediately six young soldiers stampeded from the far end of the room, wielding their bayonets in front of them. “Gung ho!” they screamed as they charged. “Kill the yellow Red Chinese bastards. Death to the Viet Cong! The hell with Wayne Morse!” The bayonets lunged for the kill. Six index fingers spurted red blood.

“Retreat!” The technician blew a whistle and the soldier about-faced and returned to the other end of the room at a trot. Only then did the technician step up to each of the bleeding fingers with a cotton swab and squeeze some drops of blood into six test tubes. He passed out Band-aids to the six prospective inductees. “Now to check your blood pressure,” he said cheerfully. Once again he flattened himself against the side wall. “Charge!” he shouted.

Swiftly and silently the six soldiers leaped to the attack. Now commando-style berets had replaced the helmets on their heads, and instead of bayonets they clutched leather-thong garottes in their hands. They pounced on their six hapless victims with ballet-like precision, bore them to the floor with a knee to the chest, and speedily looped the thongs around their arms.

Immediately the technician leaped atop the first prone man, pumped up the bulb of his gauge, and took a blood-pressure reading. He repeated this five more times, and then dismissed his assistants. “Okay. You guys are finished here,” he told the still trembling draftees. “Through that door to Heart & Lungs.” He pointed.

Penny followed along with the others. She found herself in a narrow room lined with open cubicles. In each cubicle there was a white-coated doctor with a stethoscope around his neck. Still clutching her towel primly about her bust, Penny entered one of the cubicles.

“Ever had any heart trouble?” the doctor asked.

“Not the kind you mean.”

“Why do you have your towel over your chest that way?

Are you cold?”

“No.”

“Then lower it. How do you expect me to examine you?” Penny lowered the towel.

“You’re pretty flabby in the chest there, son,” the doctor observed. “You don’t get enough exercise.”

“That isn’t it—-” Penny started to explain.

“Of course that’s it! Don’t argue with me. But don’t worry about it. The army’ll toughen you up. Teach you not to argue with officers, too. Now shut up. How do you expect me to hear your heartbeat? Quiet! That’s an order!” He pressed the cold disc of the stethoscope to her rib cage. “Take a deep breath and hold it,” he instructed.

“Say, Harry.” Another doctor stuck his head in the cubicle. “Are you free for bridge tonight?”

“I don’t know. I’ll have to check with Madge.”

“Okay. Do that. Irene said to ask you over. But no playing husband-and-wife partners this time. I had a helluva time setting Madge’s jaw that night she trumped your ace.”

“She had it coming.”

“Yeah. I guess so. Well, check back with me later, Harry, so I can let Irene know.”

“Will do.” The doctor turned his attention back to Penny. “Why is your face turning purple like that?” he asked. “Why aren’t you breathing?” He was getting a little worried. “What’s the matter with you?” He poked a finger into Penny’s solar plexus.

Her breath came out with a loud whoosh. “You said to hold my breath,” she explained. “And so I was holding my breath.”

“And so I was holding my breath, sir!” he rebuked her. “Don’t forget the ‘Sir.’ And I don’t remember telling you to let your breath out, either. You’ve got to learn to follow orders if you want to be in this man’s army, son.”

“I don’t want to be in the army,” Penny told him.

“That’s the trouble with you damn kids today. Soft and flabby! No respect! Let your hair grow like faggots! Don’t want to serve your country! You ought to be ashamed of yourselves! Go on, get out of here. You pass. Get out before I really lose my temper!”

Penny scurried out of the cubicle. She joined the line of men at the far end of the passageway. A moment later they were led into yet another small room and lined up with their backs to the wall.

“Drop you towels!” The doctor who issued the order was extremely short. As he approached the beginning of the line he looked like Toulouse-Lautrec playing marbles. “Short arm inspection! Drop your towels!” he repeated.

A few moments later he reached Penny. Staring straight ahead, his forehead furrowed. “What’s this?” he exclaimed. “Something missing here!”

“I know,” Penny said. “I’ve been trying to—”

“Silence! I didn’t give you permission to speak! Sergeant!” the pint-sized doctor’s voice thundered out.

“Yes, sir?”

“How am I supposed to conduct a short arm inspection when there’s nothing to inspect?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

“Just like the army! Damned inefficiency! The military mind is always so busy with logistics that it overlooks the simplest details. Now, Sergeant, there’s altogether too much carelessness around here. Misplacing forceps and cotton swabs is one thing, but losing something like this is ridiculous. Think now, Sergeant! Where is it?”

“Sorry, sir, but I really don’t know. I don’t think this man had it with him when he came in here.”

“That sounds pretty unlikely, Sergeant. I mean, after all, where would he leave it?”

“I don’t know, sir. All I know is that some of these people will go to ridiculous extremes to avoid the draft. They’re very cunning that way, sir.”

“Do you mean he might have deliberately cut it off to stay out of the service?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Incredible! I never would have thought a man would go to such extremes. And,” the doctor whined, “it certainly complicates my job. Just what the devil am I supposed to write on his form?”

“Why don’t you just write that I’m unfit for military service?” Penny suggested hesitantly.

“I don’t evaluate,” the doctor told her frostily. “Your fitness is figured on a point system. It is not my job to add up the points. All I do is rate you in the category to which I am assigned.”

“Then just rate me zero.”

“I can’t do that. I never rate anybody zero. And besides, it doesn’t apply. There are no signs of vermin in the pubic area. It would be dishonest to dock you points for that. I shall simply give you a rating of five and leave the rest to those who do the evaluating.”

“How many points do I have to lose before I’m rated ineligible?” Penny wanted to know.

“That is a carefully guarded secret.”

“Do you mean they might take me even though I’m missing a—”

“Possibly. Possibly. After all, it isn’t as though you had VD, or anything like that. But I don’t evaluate.” The little doctor marked her card and stamped it. “Move on now,” he told Penny.

Penny moved along with the others through a door labeled EYE-EAR-NOSE-THROAT. Here, one by one, they were seated in a large chair. Simultaneously, four doctors checked them over. With precise timing, instruments and lights were focused on their eyes, their ears, their noses, and their throats. Sometimes, unfortunately, the timing was just a bit off, and then the examination tended to develop into a sort of tug-of-war. Now Penny watched as this happened to the man in front of her.

“Ouch!” he yelled. “You’re tearing my nostrils!”

“Quit pulling!” The eye doctor backed up the subject’s complaint. “You’re making his pupils bounce like Mexican jumping beans!”

“Sit still!” the throat man commanded. “You’re liable to bite off the tongue depressor.”

“What’s this? What’s this?” the ear specialist mused. “Pierced ears?”

“Leggo my nose!” the prospective inductee screamed.

“Don’t be snotty!” the nose specialist ordered him. “I can’t see anything!”

“I knew it!” the throat man said angrily. “He’s swallowed my tongue depressor, and now it’s stuck in his esophagus. How am I going to examine the others without it?” He rolled up his sleeve and reached valiantly down the yawning throat.

“Agghhuoklghjkhghphumph!” the inductee protested.

“Superb sinuses,” the nose doctor judged, releasing the nostrils at last.

“Don’t see how you can say that.” The throat specialist had retrieved his tongue depressor and was busy taping it back in one piece with adhesive tape. “I find definite signs of post-nasal drip.”

“Ahh, they’re all drips,” the nose man told him. “Can’t turn him down on those grounds.”

“Why did you pierce your ears?” the ear specialist was demanding.

“I didn’t think they’d draft a man with pierced earlobes.”

“You were confused, son. What you meant to do was puncture an eardrum.”

“Damn! That’s right!”

“Wait a minute,” the eye doctor said. “There’s a notation on this fellow’s card to check his anal vision. Now what the hell do they mean by that?”

“I swallowed a glass eye,” the draftee explained. “The other doctor thought you should have a look at it.”

“Well, I’ll be damned! Always passing the buck! Okay! Bend over and I’ll have a look.”

The man did as he was told.

“Twenty-twenty.” the eye doctor decided. “Move along. Next.”

Penny sat down in the examination chair.

“Another one with pierced ears,” the doctor observed disgustedly. “These kids today can’t get anything straight. It’s all their mothers’ fault. Mothers today don’t knit any more. How can you expect a kid to puncture an eardrum right when he can’t even find a knitting needle in the house?”

“Ve-ry sensual sinuses!” the nose doctor commented.

“There seems to be something missing,” said the throat doctor, peering deep down Penny’s throat. “But it’s not my department.”

“Read the third line down on that chart.” The eye doctor pointed out the examination chart to Penny.

“What chart?”

“On the wall over there.”

“What wall?”

“Now, knock that off! Right there!”

“Oh. All right. Let’s see now—— V-I-E-T-C-O-N-G S-A-Y-S-.”

“Fine. Now the next line.”

“Y-A-N-K-E-E-G-O-H-O-M-E.”

“Keep going. Read the next few lines.”

“Manufactured by—” Penny squinted at the small print. “—the People’s Republic of Red China.”

“Twenty-twenty. Move along.”

The dental examination came next. The dentist eyed the bumps under the towel covering Penny’s chest appreciatively. He managed to secure a handhold on one of them as he peered into Penny’s mouth. “You have beautiful teeth,” he observed. “I can’t see any cavities. Open wider, will you please.”

Penny stretched her jaws.

“There seems to be something missing.”

“The throat doctor already told me that. Amazing how you can tell by looking in my mouth.”

“That’s not where I’m looking.”

“I beg your pardon.” Penny followed the dentist’s glance downward and saw that the towel had ridden up over her hips. “Oh, I see.” She reached down to adjust it. The dentist’s hand stopped her. He quickly tilted the chair and scrambled on top of her. “What are you doing?” Penny protested.

“I’m just going to fill that cavity. As long as you’re here, I mean, why not?”

“No! No!” Penny’s flailing arm reached up and tripped the drill. Inadvertently, she pressed it against the base of the dentist’s skull.

“Ouch!” he screamed, quickly sticking his finger in the little hole the drill had made.

“Fill that cavity!” Penny told him huffily, taking advantage of his discombobulation to flee the dental chamber.

Again Penny was ushered along with the others. This time she found herself in a room where several soldier-clerks were seated at desks and interviewing the prospective draftees. Finally her turn came.

“Have you ever had measlesmumpstyphoidfeversmallpoxchickenpoxscarletfeversyphilisgonorrhealeprosycancer or hives?” The clerk rattled off the question in a bored voice.

“Yes,” Penny replied.

“Have you ever broken your armlegcollarbonehipbone spineribsanklesorknees?”

“Yes.”

“Have you ever been treated for opthalmiaprostatetroublepalsybraind iseasekidneytroublehemorrhoidsoracne ?”

“I have."

“Okay. Move along.”

“Hold it!” The soldier at the next desk leveled a finger at Penny. “Cancer?”

“No. I’ve never had it.”

“But you can never tell when it will strike.” He jiggled a can at her and there was the clink of coins. “Give now before it’s too late. Help fight the crusade against cancer.”

Penny dropped in a few coins and kept going.

“Wait!” Another can was rattled under her nose.

“Muscular dystrophy!”

“I don’t care for any, thank you,” Penny said sweetly.

“Whatta you, a wise guy? Come on! Cough up!”

Penny coughed up.

“Motion Picture Relief Fund!” This time it was a basket barring her way.

“Now that’s going too far,” Penny protested.

“Ahh, come on. I’m a professional fund raiser, and this is the only pitch I could get into. Jobs is scarce, you know. All them amateurs is ruining the business. Please. Just give what you can afford.”

Penny dropped her remaining coins into the basket and started to flee the room.

“Hold it right there, soldier!” An authoritative voice brought her up short. “Don’t forget your Red Cross.”

“I’m not a soldier,” Penny told him. “And I’m out of change.”

“Bills are okay. Come on now. Look to the future. Some day you may be lying wounded in a foxhole in some far-off place, and you’ll be damned glad your Red Cross is on the job.”

“What will they do for me?”

“Bring you a doughnut. And don’t think you won’t appreciate it. Out there in No Man’s Land, with your guts spilling out, a doughnut and a cuppa java’ll go real good.”

“I guess under circumstances like that hot coffee would be pretty welcome,” Penny granted.

“Who said anything about hot coffee? Lukewarm is the only kind we serve. But don’t forget that doughnut.”

“Are you sure it won’t be stale?”

“Of course it’ll be stale! An’ damn lucky for you, too! You’ll be damn glad to have stale doughnuts to bombard the enemy with!”

“All right,” Penny sighed, slipping him a bill and heading for the door.

“Help plant a tree in Israel!” Another fund raiser blocked the exit.

“I’m not Jewish,” Penny told him. “And besides, I have no more money left.”

“Anti-Semite!” he muttered, grudgingly stepping out of her way.

At last Penny managed to make her exit. Now she was in a large classroom filled with desks. A sergeant indicated that she should seat herself at one of the desks. When the room was filled, he passed out test forms, placing one on each desk face-down.

“Now these here is aptitude tests,” he announced. “Dey tell us iffen you got language skills, or mechanical talent, or what all. Also, dey is intelligence tests, to see if you got logic. Iffen youse score high on dese, den maybe de Army sends you to Officer Training School. Only da creama da crap — I mean da crop—gets to be chicken looies. Now, turn ya papers over an’ begin.”

Penny turned her paper over. The first series of questions was multiple choice. Two plus two equals: a)three; b) four; c) seven; d) one hundred thirty-nine. Penny thought a moment and then deliberately checked c. Rapidly, she went through the entire test this way, trying to give the answers she knew were wrong. She finished quickly and handed in her paper.

“Tru dat door for da psycho-whatzis.” The sergeant jerked his thumb. “He’ll see ya soon as dis here is marked.”

Penny went through the door and sat down on a bench at the end of yet another line of men. A moment or two later someone sat down beside her.

“Hey, Penny.”

Penny looked up. It was Studs Levine. “Hello, Studs,” she greeted him.

“What are you doing here?”

“You tell me. All I did was stop to talk to you, and here am.”

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Studs chuckled.

“It’s not funny. They can’t draft a pregnant woman! Can they?”

“Don’t ask me, baby. I’ve got my own problems.”

“How does it look?” Penny asked. “Do you think you’ll be able to stay out?”

“It all depends on this psycho-joker. If I can convince him I’m a three-dollar bill, I’ll be all right.”

“How are you going to do that?”

“Hey, buddy,” another prospective draftee interjected. “It’s easy. Just grab him by the groin, that’s all.”

“I don’t know,” said another. “I heard they’re not rejecting fruits any more. Me, I’m playing it safe. I brought a note from my family physician that says I’m an incorrigible bed-wetter.”

“Are you?” Penny asked, curious.

“Just lead me to a bed and I’ll manage.”

“You big phony!” Still another joined the conversation. “It’s guys like you make it tough for us genuine bed-wetters! I been wetting beds all my life, and now I have to compete with an amateur. It ain’t fair!”

“I hear the army handed out a contract to Firestone for rubber sheets,” another said. “And now they’re going to take all you bed-wetters. I’ve got a better dodge than that. I loaded myself up on goofball pills this morning so’s my blood pressure would shoot up. Drove the heart specialist crazy, too.”

“That’s dishonest,” a new voice pointed out. “I’d never do that. I have scruples. I’m asking for an exemption as a conscientious objector.”

“On what grounds?”

“Religious. I’m a devout coward.”

Just then Penny was tapped on the shoulder. “Okay, you, inside,” the soldier told her. He led her over to a small office and closed the door behind her.

Penny found herself seated across the desk from a small man with a goatee and a pince-nez. He looked remarkably like pictures she had seen of Sigmund Freud.

“I am Dr. Freud,” he told her. “Dr. Sigmund Freud.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Nein! I had my name changed legally. I find that in private practice it gives my patients more confidence in me. Also, mein colleagues treat me with a great deal more respect. Except,” he sighed, “in Vienna. There they are skeptical. Very skeptical.” He shook his head. “But enough of that. It is you we must talk about, no? I see from the tests you took that you have great aptitude for the soldier’s life. Perhaps even an officer, you would make. Ja, you have the genuine military mind.”

“But didn’t I answer all the questions wrong?” Penny objected.

“Of course. A real dumkopf you are. Ideal officer material. But let us delve further. Do you like girls?” He shot the question at her.

“Well, yes. I guess so.”

“You guess so? So! And boys? Do you like boys?”

“Oh, yes.”

“You are trying to pull the argyles over my eyes, no? You think you can convince me you are bisexual.”

“I most certainly am not!” Penny was indignant.

“Then which is it, my boy, that you would rather play the kitchy-koo with? Girls or boys?”

“Boys, of course.”

“Of course? So! And when did you decide to wear your hair like that, young man?”

“A few years ago.”

“You like that length?”

“Well, yes. I do think it’s becoming to me.”

“Aha! And now the crucial question! Have you ever had relations with a man?”

Penny hung her head. “Yes,” she admitted in a very small voice.

“More than once?”

“No. Only once. Once was enough.” Penny sighed.

“Why do you say that? Explain.”

“Because I’m pregnant,” Penny confided.

“But you cannot be!”

I“That’s what I kept telling myself. But it was no use. I am.”

“You are really convinced that you are pregnant?”

“Yes.”

“Schizophrenia!” He stamped Penny’s card emphatically.

“Enough schizos the army has already. More they don’t need. I am rejecting you.”

“Thank you.” Penny got up to leave, almost bumping into Studs who was just entering.

“So, you want to be a soldier,” Dr. Freud greeted Studs as he entered.

“Oh, yeth, thir. Only I’m a homothexual. I do hope that won’t keep me out.”

“It won’t!” Dr. Freud told him grimly. “There are degrees in everything. So you’re a little bit queer. So what? That fellow that just left; now that’s what I call a homosexual. Ja! He’s actually convinced he’s pregnant. Now admit it, this you can’t top.”

“Well, no, but—”

“Aber no buts! Congratulations, lad. You are One-A!”

Studs slunk out of the office and caught up with Penny. “I’ve been drafted,” he told her. “How will I ever break the news to Mother?”

“Don’t worry,” Penny told him sweetly. “She’ll probably enlist right along with you. And God help the Viet Cong then. She’ll defoliate them with chicken soup!”

“But what will I do?” Studs moaned.

“Give them hell, soldier,” Penny told him. “Give them hell!”

CHAPTER TEN

“GIVE THEM hell!”

With those final words flung over her shoulder to Studs, Penny at last managed to make her exit. Emerging from the building, she found Balzac Hosenpfeffer waiting for her. He was both impatient and annoyed.

“Have you got dysentery, or something?” he greeted her sarcastically.

“What?”

“You said you were going to the john. And you’ve been gone for hours. I was about to give up on you. Where have you been? What happened?”

“You wouldn’t believe it. And it would take too long to convince you. But how did you make out?”

“It was a stand-off,” Balzac told her moodily. “They couldn’t come to a decision. So they’re referring my case to the Pentagon. They said they’d get in touch as soon as they heard anything.”

“Well, I hope it comes out all right. I have to say good-bye now. I’m going to grab a cab and get up to the office.”

“Won’t you have lunch with me?”

“Not today. Sorry. I really do have to get to work.”

“Oh. Well, thanks a million for everything you did in there for me. If I can ever return the favor ”

“I’ll remember that,” Penny assured him.

“I hope you do. I’d really like to see you again. Socially, I mean.”

“I know what you mean. And wipe that lecherous smirk off your face. Don’t call me; I’ll call you.” With those final words, Penny hopped into a taxi and waved good-bye to Balzac Hosenpfeffer. She gave the driver her office address, and some forty minutes later she was back behind her desk at Pussycat Publications.

There was a note pinned to her calendar. It said that Marie D’Chastidi’s husband had called to say that she was ill and wouldn’t be in today. Penny frowned when she read it. She had been hoping to have a talk with Marie, a talk that might help her evaluate Marie’s ability to step into her job when she took her leave of absence. Penny didn’t want to wait until the last minute to decide between her and Annie and Sappho.

Annie and Sappho were both out of the office, too. It was lunchtime and Penny had the place virtually all to herself. She’d decided to skip lunch, but an unexpected visitor changed her mind.

He was tall and good-looking with flashing white teeth, olive skin, jet-black hair, and dark, brooding eyes-—very Italian. He stood patiently and politely in front of Penny’s desk until she looked up and noticed him. “Yes?” she asked. “What can I do for you?”

“I’m Vito D’Chastidi, Marie’s husband.”

“Oh. Well, I’m glad to meet you.” Penny held out her hand.

She was startled when instead of shaking it he bent low and kissed it in the Continental fashion. “I am most pleased to meet you too, Miss Candie,” he said formally.

“There’s nothing serious wrong with Marie, I hope,” Penny said, recovering her aplomb.

“No. Nothing serious. She will be in tomorrow. I am taking advantage of her absence because I wished to talk with you alone, Miss Candie.”

“Oh? What did you want to talk about?”

“It is rather personal. I wonder if we might not go some place for a cocktail. Or, if you have not eaten yet, it would be my pleasure to take you out to lunch.”

“As a matter of fact, I haven’t had any lunch. And I certainly could use a drink. It’s been quite a morning.”

“Then it is settled. I am ready whenever you are.”

“Give me ten minutes.” Penny was still wearing the slacks she’d worn to the draft board. But she always kept a dress in her closet in the office just in case she wanted to change for an evening date. Now she went to the ladies’ room, put the dress on, powdered her nose, and rejoined Vito D’Chastidi. A few moments later they were snugly ensconced in a cocktail-lounge alcove, sipping their mar- tinis and waiting for the club sandwiches they’d ordered.

“Now what was it you wanted to speak to me about?” Penny asked.

“Marie. Our marriage. Our situation. This is not easy for me. But you are her boss. More than that, the nature of your work qualifies you as having some insight into marital affairs. Still, I do not know quite how to start.”

“Start at the beginning,” Penny advised him.

“Very well. The beginning.” Vito took a deep breath. “That would be shortly after Marie’s father died, the first time I met her. . . .”

Vito D’Chastidi had no idea of how bizarre would be the problem he would be called upon to solve when he went out on the service call to the Frustrato house. He noticed the black funeral wreath on the door as he rang the bell, and it made his manner even more respectful than usual to the middle-aged woman in widow’s weeds who answered. “You called for a locksmith?” Vito asked.

“Si. Please come in.” She led him into a parlor made dim by curtains still drawn out of respect to the recent dead. “I ask them to send a locksmith trained in Italy,” she said when they were seated. “You have had such training?”

“Si. I was born and raised in Genoa. My grandfather and father were locksmiths before me. They instructed me in my craft from the time I was a lad. And, since coming to America, I have spent much time studying American locks. I believe you will find me well qualified to handle your problem, whatever it is.”

“I hope so, Signor. It is your early training which will prove most valuable. Still,” she mused, “I could wish that you were not quite so young and handsome.”

“This will not interfere with my efficiency, I assure you.”

“I hope so. I most devoutly hope that is true. You see, the problem is of quite a delicate nature.”

“Have no fear. A locksmith is sworn to discretion. To him, the secrets of his trade are as sacrosanct as the confessional.”

“Very well then, Signor. My problem has to do with my husband who just died.”

“My condolences, Signora.”

“Grazie. Now, like yourself, my husband was born in Italy. He spent most of his life there. Our only child, my daughter Marie, was born there. Please do not be impatient. I tell you all this because it has much relevance to the task you have been summoned to perform.”

“Si, Signora. Take your time. Tell it in your own way. Continue.”

“I shall. Now, my late husband met his death unexpectedly. It was most untimely, as you shall see. He was crossing the street in the middle of the block when he was struck by a large truck.”

“Very sad,” Vito sympathized. “He should have crossed at the green, not in between.”

“Si. But I fear it wouldn’t have helped, anyway. He was color-blind. In any case, he was killed instantly. The truck threw him fifty feet. And, alas, in the course of his flight, the contents of his pockets were strewn all over the street. Among these contents was a key. A very important key. I have searched that street over and over again, but I have been unable to find that key.”

“What did the key open?” Vito asked.

“I am coming to that. My husband, because of his upbringing and environment, was a very old-fashioned man. He honored his father and his father’s father by following their precepts even after he came to this country. In particular, his attitudes regarding women were old-country attitudes. And in the part of Italy from which he came, this meant that a man who fathered a daughter took certain precautions when that daughter reached the age of puberty.”

“You don’t mean—?”

“Exactly. A chastity belt. It has been in my husband’s family for generations. It was made by a master craftsman of Verona more than five hundred years ago. And from the time she was eleven years old, my daughter Marie was forced to wear it by my late husband.”

“But how did she—?”

“He would unlock it in the morning, at lunchtime, and in the evening. Thus he regulated her natural functions. At all other times, however, Marie had to wear it.”

“And now the key is lost,” Vito mused. “What a terrible predicament !”

“Si. It is a terrible predicament. My husband has been dead three days now.”

“And do you mean that in all that time your daughter hasn’t—?”

“Si. That is why I called you. It is imperative that you unlock the belt as quickly as possible.”

“I should say. Where is she? Take me to her quickly.”

“She is in her room. Come. I will take you there.”

Vito’s first glimpse of Marie was of a pretty but wan girl of about nineteen years of age. She had the blonde hair and light complexion typical of northern Italy. Her figure was slender with well-shaped breasts and hips. Her face was well-sculpted, the features classic. But it was pinched now, held tight and distorted, which was understandable considering her predicament.

“Lie down flat on the bed, please,” Vito instructed her. “Do not worry. I shall be as gentle as possible,” he reassured her when an expression of alarm came into her deep-set brown eyes.

“Do you have to do that?" Marie’s mother objected when Vito reached to pull Marie’s skirt up over her knees.

“I can’t examine the lock if it’s covered, can I?” he asked reasonably.

“No. I suppose not,” she granted, still unable to keep the reluctance from her voice.

The skirt pushed up out of the way, Vito started to pull down Marie’s panties.

“That, too!” The mother’s voice climbed the scale.

“It is necessary.”

“My husband will surely turn over in his grave.”

“Good!” Marie spoke for the first time. “It serves him right, leaving me in a fix like this!”

“Don’t be disrespectful!”

“I don’t care if it is disrespectful. Three days now I haven’t been able to—”

“Hush! There is a man present.” The mother turned her attention back to Vito. The lock was uncovered now, and he was bending over to examine it. “Is it really necessary to get so close?” she asked suspiciously. ‘

“Si.” Vito drew himself up and adopted his most haughtily and professional manner. “I cannot work under these conditions, Signora. If I am to help your daughter, you must trust me. You must have faith in the ethics of the locksmith profession. You must place her entirely in my hands. I cannot relieve her discomfort if you persist in hovering over me and questioning my every move. I must insist that you leave us alone so that I may pursue my examination and take whatever steps I deem necessary to relieve this condition.”

“Very well.” The mother was intimidated. “But I’ll be right outside the door,” she assured Marie. “If anything untoward occurs, call out, and I shall respond immediately.” She left the room.

When she was gone, Vito continued his examination. Using a minutely calibrated tool with a tiny light on the end, he investigated the keyhole of the ancient device.

“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha,” Marie giggled. “That tickles.”

“Sorry, I—”

“This is not for fun!” The mother’s bulk filled the doorway again. “Control yourself, Marie! And you, young man, be more careful!”

“Signora! Will you please leave us alone!”

“Very well, but—”

“I know! But you’ll be right outside the door.” Vito pushed her out into the hallway and shut the door behind her. He returned to Marie. “I am going to see if I can feel the trip mechanism now,” he told her. “Please try to lie absolutely still.”

“All right.”

Vito inserted his pinky finger in the keyhole. When it was in past the first knuckle, he wriggled it searchingly. “I see,” he murmured. “What an odd mold. Yes, a very tricky shape. Ah, yes.”

“Ah, yes,” Marie echoed.

“Now, if I can just locate the dowel-pin that makes the mechanism respond . . . Aha!”

“Ah! Ah! Ah!” Marie sighed.

“I think I’ve got it!”

“I think he’s got it!” Marie sang out.

“Yes, I’ve got it now.”

“I’ll say you do! Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh!”

“Now, if I can just flick it with my fingernail . . .”

“Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“What’s going on in there?” Marie’s mother called through the door. “Marie, are you all right?”

“Oh, yes, Mama! Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“I can feel the trip mechanism moving now,” Vito said.

“Oh, so can I! Yes! Mother! Mother! Mother!”

“Did you call me, Marie?”

“No-no-no! Yes-yes-yes !”

“Make up your mind, Marie! Do you want me, or not?”

“I think it’s coming now,” Vito grunted.

“No, Mama! I don’t want you! Yes, it’s coming! It’s coming! Ah-ah-ah-ah!”

“Damn! That’s as far as I can move it with my finger!”

“Oh! Don’t stop! Please don’t stop now!”

“I can’t just about see the head of the dowel-pin. But I can’t get a grip on it with only one finger. And I don’t have a tool the right shape to make contact and grasp it.”

“Are you sure?” Marie panted. “Think! Maybe there’s a tool you’ve overlooked.”

“Marie! Is it coming?” the mother called.

“Not any more, Mama,” Marie sighed.

“We’ve hit a snag, Signora,” Vito added. “But please be patient. This is a very delicate operation. And all this yelling back and forth is very distracting. Please be quiet!”

He considered the problem for a moment, staring at the stubborn lock of the chastity belt. “There is only one way,” he decided. “Please to arch your thighs as widely as possible, Signorina.”

“What are you going to do?”

“The only thing possible,” Vito told her in a soft voice. “I am going to try to get a grip on the head of that pin with my teeth. It is the only way.”

“Well, it’s one way. . . . But I’m not objecting.” Marie did as he asked.

Vito buried his face, rotating his jaws slowly in an effort to reach the head of the dowel-pin. As if trying to help him, Marie also writhed in a circular motion, her eyes half-closed, her breath coming very fast again. It was in this position that Marie’s mother found them when, unable to stand the silence and suspense any longer, she flung open the door and re-entered the room.

“Marie! This is disgusting!” she shrieked.

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it!” Marie advised, continuing the rhythmic movements of her hips.

“Signor! What are you doing to my daughter?”

“I’bjutrygtogedthisgodabbedpidoud!” Vito replied.

“Do not talk with your mouth full, Signor! You will do me this courtesy, at least!”

“Got it!” Vito raised his head and removed the dowel-pin from between his teeth.

“Then I presume you will no longer find it necessary to stick your nose where it does not belong!”

“Spoilsport!” Marie muttered.

Vito ignored them both. Taking a long, narrow pair of calipers, he inserted the instrument into the keyhole, adjusted it, re-adjusted it, and finally, with a twist of his wrist, sprung the lock. “That’s it!” he exulted.

“At last,” Marie’s mother breathed a sigh of relief.

“Get outa my way!” Marie flung off the chastity belt and leaped for the door. A blur of motion, she sped down the hall to the bathroom. An instant later the bathroom door was slammed and locked behind her.

“She sure is in a hurry,” Vito remarked, gathering up his tools.

“Naturally, Signor. Now, you will be so good as to take this girdle of chastity with you and make a new key for it, si?”

“You mean you’re going to make her put it back on again?”

“Si, Signor. Out of deference to the memory of her father. He would have wanted it that way.”

“But it’s medieval!”

“Perhaps. And perhaps virtue is also medieval. But my daughter is a virgin, and it is my duty to see that she remains one.”

“All right. If that’s what you want. I’ll make a key for you.”

“Grazie. And—oh!--Signor. . . .”

“Si?”

“Be sure that you make only one key. Do you understand? Just one key, and break the mold.”

“It was not necessary to say that, Signora. I am well aware of the ethics of my profession.” Vito drew himself up haughtily. “I will contact you when it is ready and present my bill at the same time. Until then, arrivederci.”

“Arrivederci.”

Vito left then, and went back to his shop. But when he entered, he was greeted with a message that Signora Frustrato wished him to return immediately. It seemed that another emergency had arisen.

“It’s Marie,” the mother told him when he arrived. “She is trapped in the bathroom. The door lock must have jammed.”

“Are you sure? Perhaps it is simply that she isn’t ready to come out yet. After all, three days without—”

“No. She is finished. But you must rescue her.”

“My pleasure.”

“No, Signor,” the mother corrected him. “This is strictly business. And on second thought, perhaps she is better off where she is for the time being. Si, now that I think on it, it is better that you do not rescue her right now. First you go and make a key for the chastity belt. Then you can return and let her out of the bathroom.”

“I wish you’d make up your mind,” Vito grumbled. “If you’d decided this before, it would have saved me the trip.”

“My apologies, Signor. But my mind is now made up. First the key for the belt, then the bathroom door lock.”

“Well, all right. But I’ll have to charge you for this service call anyway.”

“Just as bad as a TV repairman,” Mama Frustrato complained. “The public is at your mercy!”

“And the pubic is at yours,” Vito punned as he departed once again.

He didn’t return until much later that evening. He brought the key to the chastity belt with him. It took but a moment to release Marie from her bathroom prison, and then, with the mother trailing along, they went into the bedroom so that Vito might latch the chastity belt in place.

Marie sat with her eyes lowered demurely as Vito’s hand slipped with subconscious deliberation. She bit her lip at the contact and contracted her thigh muscles so that the hand was forced to remain there for an instant. Turning red, Vito managed to extract it and finally secured the lock.

“The key, please, Signor?” The mother held her hand out imperiously.

“The key.” Vito handed it to her. “My bill.” He passed her a slip of paper. “My condolences.” He bowed to Marie. “Arrivederci.” He departed for what he thought was the last time.

But it wasn’t. There was a lapse of some six months, and then Vito was once again summoned back to the Frustrato house. Mama Frustrato was dying, and with her last gasps she was demanding to see the young locksmith.

“The key,” she moaned as he knelt beside her bed. “You must take the key!”

“But what will I do with it?”

“Open the lock at eight, twelve, and six. It is necessary.”

“I don’t think my schedule will allow-—”

“Your schedule! How can you think of your schedule at a time like this? Think of poor Marie’s schedule!”

“But —“

“I am dying. This is my last wish. Can you deny it?”

“No. Still —”

“Then you will take custody of the key?”

“Since you put it that way, yes.”

“Do you swear it?” She rose up in her bed, her eyes straining in the sockets as she stared at Vito. It was as if they were already staring from the other side of the grave. “Do you swear it?” she repeated.

“Si. I swear it.”

“And do you swear that you will never take ad—” Suddenly she seemed to choke on the words. The breath rattled in her throat. Her eyes rolled up in their sockets. Her head fell back to the pillow. She was still now, the jaw sagging open, the eyes staring lifelessly. Mama Frustrato was dead.

He was ashamed of it, but Vito’s first feeling was one of relief. He was pretty sure what it was that she would have demanded he swear to next, and he knew that such a vow would have put a great strain on his salvation. Marie was a very attractive girl, and he would now be forced into intimate daily contact with her. Vito doubted his ability to restrain himself in such a situation.

Still, at first he did restrain himself out of respect for Marie’s recent bereavement. Three times a day he called upon her to unlock the chastity belt. But he was most circumspect, and his fingers never trailed over her flesh as they had that first day he met her.

Marie, pure and innocent, didn’t even admit it to herself, but somewhere deep inside her she was disappointed at Vito’s scruples. In mourning for her mother, life was dull, and she had much time to remember the feeling Vito had once aroused. Piously, she dismissed the thoughts from her mind—but the feelings remained.

One day she called Vito. “Can you come right over?” she asked. “I need to be unlocked.”

“But it’s only three o’clock,” he protested. “You’re not due to be unlocked until six.”

“I’m sorry. But I’m afraid I’ve taken a laxative.”

“I’ll be right there!” ‘

That was the the first time. There were others after it. And their frequency grew until Vito came to tremble at the sound of the ringing telephone.

It rang at all hours. Early in the morning, at the most inopportune times during the working clay, in the middle of the night—at all hours. It’s all very well for a locksmith to have an obligation to his patients, Vito told himself, but this is ridiculous! And it got more ridiculous, until it reached the point where Vito’s life was so completely disrupted that he could neither work nor sleep. Finally, he decided to speak strongly to Marie.

“Look, this can’t go on,” he told her one night. “I can’t take it. Why can’t I just leave the key with you, and-—”

“You would break your deathbed promise to my mother?” Marie’s eyes filled with tears.

“I can’t help it! I’m cracking up! There’s no other way!”

“Yes, there is. There is another way. There is one way in which my demands on you might be lessened.”

“What do you mean?”

“If you married me!”

“Now, wait just a minute—!”

“It is the perfect solution! Don’t you see, Vito? If you marry me, you will be released from your promise to my dying mother. Once I am married, my virtue will no longer be at issue, and I can take charge of the key myself.”

“But, I don’t want— That is, I don’t think what I mean is I’m not ready— My financial position doesn’t allow— Shouldn’t love enter into-— Let’s not be hasty— Marry in haste and-—”

But all Vito’s protests were to no avail. In the final analysis, he had no choice. It was either marriage, or the nuthouse for him. He chose marriage.

And then there was the wedding night. In crisp, new silk pajamas, his hair combed neatly, an aura of after-shave cologne about him, Vito went to his bride. She lay on the bed in a filmy black nightgown, perfumed, her tongue peeping out between her lips, waiting. Vito dangled the key from his hand as he slowly approached her.

“And now this is yours.” He held it out to her.

“Thank you.” She took it and slipped it under her pillow.

“But aren’t you going to use it?’

“What for? I don’t have to go.”

Vito smiled at such naivete. “It is necessary,” he told her gently, “if we are to make love.”

“You mean that you wish me to submit to your carnal desire?” Marie sighed. “Mother told me that there would be nights like this.”

“You’ll enjoy it.”

“I will not! What kind of girl do you think I am?”

“My kind. My wife. Hurry. Unlock the damned thing.”

“Unlock it yourself if you’re in such a hurry,” Marie pouted.

Vito reached under the pillow, grabbed the key, unlocked the chastity belt, threw it aside, and flung himself over his wife. “At last!” he cried.

“Ouch!” she responded.

“There now, doesn’t that feel good?” he purred a moment later.

“I don’t feel a thing.”

“That’s not very tactful. Come on now. HOW about this?”

“I liked it better that first night when you were taking the belt off.”

“Don’t be silly! I was using metal tools then.”

“I know. That’s what I liked better.”

“Marie, you’re not trying.”

“Why should I? You’re trying enough for both of us.”

“There now! How about that? Wasn’t that thrilling?”

“Not as thrilling as the way the key felt when you used to unlock me.”

“Now! Now! Now!” Vito released his passion.

“Ho-hum . . .” Marie yawned.

“Phew!” Vito rolled over on his back.

“Are you finished now?” Marie asked.

“Yes.”

“Then I can put my chastity belt back on?”

“What for? I mean, you’re married now. There’s no need to --”

“I think there is. But you needn’t concern yourself, Vito. It is my responsibility now. Just because I’m married and no longer a virgin is no reason to allow myself to become promiscuous.”

It took a while before Vito truly appreciated the meaning of Marie’s last remark. At first he took her reluctance to have sex as simply the natural shyness of a new bride. But by the time the first year of their marriage had passed, he was facing the fact that he and Marie were engaged in an all-out battle over sex.

The battle centered around the key. Every night Marie hid it. And every night she came to bed with her chastity belt securely fastened in place. Two or three nights a week, they would have fights over her refusal to tell Vito where she’d hidden the key. But he only won the battles on the average of once a month.

Desperately, Vito attempted various sexual innovations, hoping they would arouse Marie’s appetite for making love. But they only disgusted her the more. And her attitude toward Vito became rigid with the conviction that he was a perverted and oversexed satyr. His frustration with his marriage grew and grew and grew. . . .

“Three years now it’s been like this,” Vito told Penny as they sat in the cocktail lounge and started on their third pair of martinis. “It’s driving me out of my mind. I need help!”

“I do sympathize,” Penny said earnestly. “But I honestly don’t see how I can help you.”

“I don’t know. I’m so confused. You’re my only hope. You see, when Marie took this job, I had hoped that it would change her. I thought working in an editorial office, coming into contact with sophisticated people, dealing with the romance problems presented in Lovelights, might broaden her outlook, increase her tolerance for sex, as it were. But it hasn’t worked out that way. She’s worse than ever. You’re her boss, and a woman of the world-—I can see that—perhaps if you could talk to her . . .”

“I don’t think it would help,” Penny said honestly. “For one thing, I’m not as experienced as you seem to think. I’m unmarried. I’m younger than Marie. I don’t think she’d have much respect for any advice I might care to give her.”

“Then what am I going to do? I can’t go on like this. I’m a normal man. I can’t take being locked out by my own wife. Look, let me be honest with you. I’m losing control of the situation. Last night, for instance-— I’ll tell you the truth. Marie isn’t out today because she’s sick. She’s absent because of last night.”

“What happened last night?” Penny asked soothingly.

“I wanted her. She was wearing her belt as always. I asked her for the key. She wouldn’t give it to me. She wouldn’t tell me where it was. I begged her. She refused. I broke down. I cried like a baby. That’s when she made her mistake. That’s when she laughed at me. She shouldn’t have done that. I went berserk. I ran into the kitchen. I got a hammer. I went back to her. I stood over the bed. She laughed again. I raised the hammer. And —”

“Oh, no!” Penny gasped. “You didn’t—-?”

“Murder her? No. What good would she be to me dead? Not that I’d be able to tell the difference, I suppose,” Vito mused. “No, I didn’t kill her. I merely swung the hammer at the lock of that damned chastity belt. If she wouldn’t give me the key, then I intended to take her by force. I smashed that lock with the hammer with all the strength in my body.”

“Did it break it?”

“No. Didn’t even make a dent. Those old-time craftsmen really built to last. Not like the jerrybuilt locks the opportunists turn out today. I tell you, there was none of this building a lock for obsolescence then. They really made them to hold!”

“But what has that to do with why Marie stayed out today?” Penny wanted to know.

“I’m afraid I did hurt her a little with the hammer.” Vito hung his head.

“Badly?”

“No. At first I thought I cracked her pelvis. But the doctor came this morning and examined her and said it was only bruised. She unlocked the belt for him,” he added bitterly. “Only me, her husband, does she deny access!”

“You have to get hold of yourself.” Penny patted his hand sympathetically.

“I know. I know. Say, look, if you won’t talk to Marie, maybe you can help me.”

“I’ll do anything I can.”

“Do you mean that?”

“Of course,” Penny assured him warmly.

“Thank you. Thank you.” He moved very close to Penny.

Suddenly she felt his hand moving up her thigh under her dress. She tried to close her legs, but he was most insistent in forcing them apart. Penny was about to object more strenuously when she looked into his eyes and saw the tears welling up there. Suddenly she felt so sorry for him that she decided to give in to his need.

But then something ice-cold against the warm flesh of her thigh made her reconsider. “What’s that?” She jumped back, pulling away from him.

“What?”

“That cold, metallic object against my leg.”

“Oh. That’s a key,” Vito explained.

“A key? What for?”

“What for?”

“Yes. What for?”

“I don’t know.” Vito was confused. “I always use a key. I mean, it’s been so long since I did it without a key . . .”

“But you don’t need it.”

“Yes. Well. It’s just that I don’t think I’d remember how to without a key . . .”

“I see.”

“Yes.” Vito moved the key higher and then poked with it suddenly.

“Ouch!” Penny jumped again. “Hey, that hurts.”

“You’re as bad as Marie!” Vito scowled.

“Well, I’m not going to let you stick that key in me! A girl could get tetanus that way!” Penny got firmly to her feet. “I think we’d better forget the whole thing,” she told him, turning on her heel and starting for the door.

“It’s always that way.” Vito buried his head in his hands and sobbed. “A decent locksmith can never find a keyhole worthy of his craftsmanship. Women! They are ever the downfall of the artisan! But somewhere—somewhere!— there must be a female whose passion I can unlock!”

“If you ask me,” Penny called back over her shoulder, “your trouble is that you’re playing the wrong key!”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

BACK IN HER office once more, Penny was really concerned. What Vito had told her about Marie D’Chastidi seemed only to complicate the problem of selecting a temporary replacement. A modern girl, married no less, who insisted on wearing a chastity girdle, was surely no better a bet to minister to the problems of the lovelorn than a nymphomaniac like Sappho or one driven to homosexuality like Annie. There were reasons why Penny should disqualify all three of her assistants. But she had to choose one of them; she had to make a choice; and she couldn’t delay making it too long.

She was still mulling it over when the phone rang. It was Balzac Hosenpfeffer. “I thought we might get together for a cocktail later,” he said blithely.

“You certainly are persistent.”

“If at first you don’t succeed—”

“Check your deodorant.” Penny sarcastically finished the sentence for him.

“Ouch! You’re kidding, I hope.”

“Yes. Don’t have a sniff-fit. I’m kidding. But I really don’t think I can—”

“Ah, come on. How can I show my gratitude to you if you keep giving me the cold shoulder?”

“You don’t have to show your gratitude. You thanked me. I accepted your thanks. That’s enough.”

“I can’t help feeling that it isn’t enough.”

“Have you got another bet with your friend, Mr. Hosenpfeffer?” Penny asked sweetly. “Is that it?”

“No. Really. I’d honestly just like to show my appreciation.”

“Well, it isn’t-—-” Penny stopped abruptly. The light bulb of an idea had flashed in her brain. “Wait a minute!” she exclaimed. “Would you really like to return the favor?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, then. Are you free this evening?”

“Absolutely. We could have a drink, and then dinner, and then go dancing or something—”

“Forget that ’or something’! As a matter of fact, forget that whole itinerary. If you have the evening free, there is something you can do for me that I’d really appreciate.”

“Just name it.”

“All right. Let’s meet for cocktails at five-thirty, and I’ll explain what it is.”

“Check.” Balzac suggested an intimate cocktail lounge in the neighborhood.

“Fine,” Penny agreed. “I’ll see you there at five-thirty, then.”

They said their good-byes and hung up. Penny sat a few moments, drumming her fingers on her desk, letting the sudden idea which had struck her during the conversation develop, allowing it to germinate and spread through her mind. Yes, it might prove just the thing to help her reach a decision. With Balzac’s help, she would arrange a test for the three candidates that should reveal which one was best qualified to fill her shoes. Yes, all she had to do now was to arrange for the conditions of the test.

Penny set about doing just that. First she buzzed Annie Fitz-Manley on the intercom and asked her to come into the office. A moment later she was standing in front of Penny’s desk.

“What’s up?” Annie asked.

“I wonder if you can do me a favor,” Penny began.

“Sure. Shoot.”

“I have a cocktail date right after work. But I’m expecting some proofs from the linotype shop. They have to be checked. Do you think you could stay a little late and wait for them for me?”

“I guess so. How late?”

“No later than eight. Actually, they should be here by seven,” Penny told her.

“Okay. Do you want me to check them?”

“You can start on them, but I won’t impose on you to do the whole job. I’ll come back around eight to finish them up, so you can leave then.”

“All right, Penny. Will do.”

“Thanks, Annie. I knew I could depend on you.”

After Annie left, Penny waited a while and then summoned Sappho Kuntzentookis into her office. “Have you got anything special on tonight?” she asked Sappho.

“Nothing in particular. Why?”

“I wonder if you could come back here after dinner and give me a hand. I’m expecting some proofs in around eight-fifteen or so and I need someone to help me read them.”

“Okay. I’ll be your sounding board,” Sappho agreed.

“Thanks. And don’t bother coming early,” Penny told her. “I won’t be ready until eight-fifteen. I’ll be waiting for you then.”

“See you then.” Sappho left the office.

Penny watched her go back to her desk, and then picked up the telephone and started to dial. There was a buzzing in her ear, a click, and then a voice: “Hello?”

“Hello, Marie?”

“Yes?”

“This is Penny.”

“I thought it was you,” Marie D’Chastidi said. “How’s everything going?”

“Fine. How about you? Are you feeling better?”

“Oh, sure. I’m fine now. I’ll be in tomorrow for sure.”

“That’s what I called about,” Penny said. “We have a sort of an emergency here, and I thought if you were up to it, I might ask you to help out.”

“Of course. What do you want me to do?”

“It’s a backyard problem. It’s running way over, and I have to cut it tonight. But the problem is I won’t have the galleys until late. About nine-thirty. If you really are feeling better, do you think you might come in then and give me a hand?”

“You mean nine-thirty tonight?”

“I’m afraid so. You can take a cab both way and put it on the expense account. What do you say?”

“What can I say? If it has to be done, it has to be done.”

“Thanks a million, Marie. I knew I could depend on you. I’ll be right here waiting for you at nine-thirty. Okay?”

“Okay.”

Penny hung up. She really did spend the rest of the afternoon reading galleys. At five-fifteen she put them away, and at five-thirty promptly she was at the cocktail lounge to keep her date with Balzac Hosenpfeffer.

By the time they started on their second drink, Penny had outlined the plan to him. Which probably explains why Balzac was choking on that second drink. Penny pounded him hard, on the back and he finally got his breath back and found his voice.

“A eunuch!” he exploded.

“That’s the idea,” Penny told him.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“It is not!” Penny said indignantly. “Unique perhaps, but—”

“You think being a eunuch’s unique—?”

“Well, isn’t it?”

“Well, sure it is! Too damned unique! That’s what I mean. I don’t want to be a unique eunuch—!”

“You don’t have to be,” Penny soothed him. “You just have to pretend to be one.”

“Why couldn’t I just be a virgin?” Balzac whined. “Just a plain, simple, garden-variety male virgin?”

“Because it’s too simple. I told you. Now, look,” Penny demanded. “Did you or did you not say you were willing to do anything to show your gratitude to me?”

“Well, sure. Anything within reason. But-—”

“Well then?”

“All right,” Balzac sighed. “I’ll do it.”

Penny led him to the now mostly darkened office building and rode up in the elevator with him. When they reached the door to the offices of Pussycat Publications, she left him. “Wait a few minutes before you go in,” she instructed him.

Then Penny slipped around to a rear door and used her key to enter the premises. Tiptoeing down a darkened corridor, she spotted Annie sitting at her desk. The red-headed girl was idly filing her nails. Penny managed to sneak behind her and into her own darkened office. She left the door slightly ajar and settled herself behind her desk. From here she would be able to hear and to see through the glass paneling into the lighted room beyond. But in the darkness no one would be able to see her.

Penny hadn’t long to wait. No sooner had she settled herself than Balzac Hosenpfeffer entered the outer room. Hearing the door close behind him, Annie Fitz-Manley looked up inquiringly.

“I am Balzac Hosenpfeffer!” he announced dramatically.

“Yes?” Annie cocked her head at him.

“I have to see the editor of Lovelights.”

“She isn’t in just now. I’m her assistant. Can I help you?”

“I hope so. Oh, God, I hope so!” Balzac’s tone was distraught with emotion.

“Calm yourself, Mr. Hosenpfeffer. I’ll do what I can. Now, what seems to be the problem?” Annie’s voice was meant to be soothing.

“Balz.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Call me Balz, not Mr. Hosenpfeffer. That’s too formal. And how can I confide in you if you’re going to be formal?” r

“Very well. Balz.”

“Yes.”

There was a long pause while Balzac gave a good imitation of a man trying to keep himself from going completely to pieces. Several times he seemed to be making an attempt to speak, but too overwhelmed by emotion to succeed. Annie waited patiently, but finally she decided to prompt him.

“Balz,” she said gently, trying to establish some rapport.

“Yes. That’s it.”

“What?”

“That! I don’t have any! That’s my problem.”

“Don’t have any, Balz?” Annie was confused.

“Right! Now you’ve got it.”

“Oh! I see!” A great light of understanding broke over Annie’s face. “But how—?”

“It was an accident. I’m a victim of progress. Of automation! God damn automation, anyway! It dehumanizes everybody! And it unmanned me!”

“Control yourself. And try to be a little more coherent, Balz.”

“That name! I can’t stand it!” He sobbed hysterically. “I can’t stand my own name. Every time I hear it, it reminds me! That’s what automation’s done to me!”

“Try to be calm. Please. Now then, tell me exactly how it happened.”

“I was selected to be a test case for a new product they were trying out,” Balzac sniffled. “It was a giveaway. All I had to do was use it for one month and give a testimonial. Then it was mine for nothing.”

“What sort of a product?”

“An electronic pants zipper. You don’t have to pull it. Just press a button at the waistband of your pants and it zips up automatically.”

“And you mean it —”

“Exactly! The timing was off. Or I pushed it accidentally, or something. I’m not really sure. All I know is, the damn zipper shot up, sliced clean as a whistle, and there I was—a eunuch!”

“But what did the manufacturers do when they found out what happened?”

“Just shook their heads, sad-like. ‘Back to the old drawing board’ —that’s what they said. ‘Got to get the bugs out’—that’s what they told me. But— But— It was too late for me.” Balzac broke down again.

“You should sue them!” Annie said indignantly.

“I am. For a million dollars.”

“Well, I certainly hope you win.”

“So do I. Maybe then I’ll be able to find a girl who thinks a million bucks is worth it to overlook my little defect.”

“But what would you do with her?”

“That’s what I came here to ask the editor of Lovelights. I need advice. I need help!”

“I think you need a good plastic surgeon,” Annie murmured.

“No. I saw one. There’s nothing they can do. They’re gone. They can’t be sewed back on again. Roots and all, they’re gone.” Balzac moaned pitifully. “But you’ve got to help me! Someone’s got to help me!”

“Annie?” A broguish voice called from the entrance hall. “Are you about, lass?”

“In here, Brian.”

“Oh, so there you are.” Brian Henannigan came into view.

“You’re early,” Annie greeted him. “The proofs haven’t been delivered yet. And Penny hasn’t come back, either. “Shall I wait for you, then?”

“If you like.” Annie remembered Balzac then. “Oh, this is Mr. Hosenpfeffer. And this is Brian Henannigan.”

“ ’Tis pleased I am to be makin’ your acquaintance, Mr. Hosenpfeffer.”

“Balz.”

“Now, wait just a minute there, me bucko! I’ll be askin’ you to mind your manners with a lady present!”

“No,” Annie explained. “You don’t understand, Brian. There’s no need to get angry. He meant no insult. Balz is his first name. He wants you to call him that. He dislikes formality.”

“Oh. ’Tis beggin’ your pardon, I am then-—Balz.”

“Still,” Annie mused, “I don’t know why he wants to be called that. After all, it is something of a misnomer.”

“But it’s my name!” Balzac protested. “At least I should be allowed to keep that!”

“Of course. Of course,” Annie soothed him. “If you want to be called Balz, then of course you shall. You have every right. You see,” she explained to Brian, “he has this problem and he’s come to Lovelights for help.”

“What sort of a problem?” Brian asked.

“He’s a eunuch.”

“Is that so now? Well, that is very interestin’. I don’t believe I iver met a eunuch before.”

“Well, you have now!” Balzac told him bitterly.

“Now I can see where that might very well be a problem, boyo,” Brian granted.

“It’s my sex life, you see.” Balzac responded to Brian’s sympathetic tone. “It’s been cut off.”

“Would you please not be puttin’ it so graphically.” Brian shuddered.

“I thought it was very apt,” Annie observed. “Sort of puts it right in a nutshell.”

“If I had even one . . .” Balzac moaned.

“I think you just have to be realistic about it,” Annie advised him. “You just have to resign yourself to getting along without women. You just have to face the fact that sex is out for you.”

“Now, just a minute, there!” Brian interrupted. “I don’t mean to be meddlin’ in your business, Annie. But you are bein’ a bit hasty there. An’ you’re offerin’ the man no hope.”

“And can you offer him any?”

“Possibly. Possibly. I can’t be but agreein’ that women are out for our friend here. But sex, afther all, just might be another matter. There’s more than one way to be skinnin’ a cat, you know. Oh, yes! Let’s just be considerin’ the other side o’ his problem now. That part which is still intact, so to speak. Lookin’ at it from a reverse angle, now-—”

“Brian, are you suggesting—”

“And why not? ’Tis little enough choice he has. Sure, an’ he should be grateful to take what he can get. An’ aren’t I just the fellow to be helpin’ him now?” Brian slung a comradely arm around Balzac and patted his shoulder.

“Well,” Annie mused, “I guess it would be a solution.”

“ ’Tis better than nothin’. You’ll be admittin’ that.”

“Yes. Yes, it is. I suppose what I’m really worried about is your motivation in all this, Brian.”

“ ’Tis better to give than to receive,” Brian said piously, reaching around to pinch Balzac’s cheek.

“But he’s already had one blow to his manhood-—”

“That’s putting it mildly,” Balzac muttered.

“Don’t you think this might really be another one?”

“Not at all. ’Twill open up a whole new vista to him.”

“I guess you’re right,” Annie said. “Yes. It is a solution. Well, Balzac—” She turned to him. “You’ve come to Lovelights for help, and we haven’t let you down. You’re going to get help.”

“What-—?” Balzac stammered, confused. “W-when—?”

“What better time than right now, me bucko?” Brian hugged him snugly. “Would that be the stockroom over there, Annie?” he asked.

“Yes? . .

“Then why don’t me an’ Balzac just be sashaym’ in there for a while, so’s we can be havin’ a bit o’ privacy.” He tugged Balzac to his feet.

“All right,” Annie agreed.

“Now, wait a minute,” Balzac protested. “I don’t think I —“

“It’s the best way,” Annie told him gently. “Believe me. Lovelights wouldn’t recommend it if we weren’t sure it would help you with your problem.”

“No! I don’t want to—”

“Give me a hand there, Annie, will you? He’s wrigglin’ so hard I’m findin’ it hard to hold him.”

“Come now, it’s for your own good.” Annie took Balzac’s other arm and helped Brian pull him along toward the stockroom.

“No! No! I don’t want to—- Help! Help!”

By this time Penny had taken advantage of the confusion of the struggle to slip out of her office unseen. She went around to the front door and made her entrance. “What’s going on here?” she demanded in a loud voice.

“Help! Help!” Balzac was screaming.

“You’ll be findin’ it most enjoyable, believe me,” Brian was saying.

“It will be good for you,” Annie was insisting.

“I said what’s going on here?” Penny shouted.

“Oh, Penny.” Annie dropped Balzac’s arm. “I’m glad you’re here. This gentleman has a problem he wants Lovelights to help him with. However, he’s a little shy of accepting our solution.”

“Shy, hell! Leggo of me, you pansy!” Balzac shouted.

“Let him go,” Penny said. “I’ll handle this,” she told Annie. “You and Brian just run along now.”

“But what about the galleys?” Annie asked.

“I’ll handle them too when they come in. Thanks for waiting, Annie. But you can go now.”

“Well, all right . . .”

“All right, me eye!” Brian was angry. “Isn’t it just like a woman now to be interferin’ with a man’s fun? An’ this is the second time this lady’s been competin’ with me. ’Tis a hell of a note when —”

“Come along, Brian.” Annie took him firmly by the arm and led him out.

“Boy, was I ever glad to see you!” Balzac said when he and Penny were alone. “Do you know what that guy meant to do to me?”

“I have a better than vague idea. But get hold of yourself. It won’t be too long before Sappho gets here and you have to go into your act again. Meanwhile, sit down and relax. I’ll be right back there in my office. You won’t be able to see me, but I’ll be there.”

A half-hour passed by before Sappho finally appeared. “Penny?” she called out as she entered. Penny didn’t answer. “Not here yet,” Sappho muttered to herself, starting for her desk. Then she saw Balzac. “Who are you?” she asked.

“I’m Balzac Hosenpfeffer.”

“Balzac? That’s sort of a far-out name, isn’t it?”

“Yes. But it’s part of my tragedy. You see, my mother was an N. Y. U. student who was seduced by her French Lit. professor.”

“And she never married?”

“No. Never.” Balzac burst into tears.

“Stop that crying.” Sappho looked at him disgustedly. “Stop it! I can’t stand to see a man cry. Now just cut it out, you weepy bastard.”

“Oh! Don’t call me that! How could you? Don’t you have any sensitivity?”

“It’s accurate, isn’t it?”

“Well, yes, but—”

“All right then. Now, suppose you tell me just what you want here, anyway.”

“I came to see the editor of Lovelights. I came for help.”

“Well, she isn’t here yet. But I’m one of the associate editors. So what’s your problem?”

Balzac repeated his bogus tale.

“So you’re a eunuch, hey?” Sappho looked at him with interest when he finished.

“Yes.”

“I never met a eunuch before.”

“Well, there aren’t many of us around.”

“I suppose not,” Sappho granted.

“We’re a pretty select group.”

“I suppose so.”

“And besides, how would you know if you met one or not? I mean, there’s no way of telling without-—”

“Oh, I’d find out,” Sappho assured him. “As long as it’s a man, sooner or later, I’d find out.”

“I see. Well, do you think Lovelights can help me?”

“I never met a man I couldn’t help,” Sappho murmured, pulling her skirt up and displaying a shapely leg as she adjusted her stocking.

“But you never met a eunuch before,” Balzac reminded her.

“So what? You think you’re the only one with a manhood problem? Believe me, you’re not. Every guy I meet has one. But believe me, I know how to straighten them out.” Sappho took his hand and pressed it against her warmly heaving breast. “It’s all in the mind,” she purred. “Believe me, when the body takes over, you’ll forget all about it.” Her hot breath tickled his ear now. “Yes, it’s all in the mind.”

“Being a eunuch is not just in the mind,” Balzac pointed out.

“Don’t think about it, baby. Just leave everything to Sappho,” she panted. “Sappho and Lovelights will straighten you out in no time!”

“That I doubt,” Balzac said pointedly.

“You do? Then what’s this?” Sappho’s fingers trailed up the inside of his thighs.

“I have a pencil in my pocket.”

“With lots of lead in it,” she cooed.

“I tell you, it’s no use.”

“Don’t be negative. Don’t be a defeatist. All you need is a little encouragement. Now, you just lean back and relax, and we’ll see if little Sappho can’t encourage you. Just keep your eyes on me now.”

Sappho backed off, her body swaying sensuously. Wriggling, she leaned backward across a desk, raised one leg, and kicked off her shoe. She repeated the gesture with the other leg. Then, slowly and rhythmically, she removed her stockings.

Looking provocatively at Balzac, she tossed back her long, black hair and swung into a sort of dance. It was slow and sensual, as if some invisible lute player was supplying unheard music with a harem dance beat right out of the Arabian Nights. At first her body merely swayed to this beat, hips undulating, large bosom seeming to ripple under the silk of the blouse she was wearing. But as her fingers crept up the buttons running down the front of the blouse, her tempo quickened slightly as if to hint at the frenetic movements which would follow.

The blouse was unbuttoned now, and pulled free of her skirt. It flared out behind her as she picked up still more speed. The half-moons of her breasts rose enticingly from the bodice of her slip, the flesh swelling with her excited breathing. Her face grew flushed, and her eyes sparkled as she lost herself in the dance.

Now the blouse fell from her shoulders. Her hands moved over her body in a prolonged caress. She squeezed her breasts; her fingers pinched the tips so that they distended almost visibly under the material of the bra and slip; her hands continued down to her hips, kneading them, rotating them, and then moved around behind her to caress the plumpness of her derriere. Finally, her hands moved to open the zipper at the waistband of her skirt, and the garment fell to the floor.

Sappho stepped out of it and continued dancing. Slowly, buttocks jiggling, she turned her back to Balzac. She bent from the waist, her fingertips grazing the floor. Her slip stretched tightly over her vibrating haunches. The globe of her derriere described a lascivious orbit. She turned around. A shrug of her shoulders and one slip strap fell halfway down her arm. A wriggling motion, and then her hand was over her head, free of the strap. A duplication of the motion and the slip hung around her hips. Sappho swung into a frug-type dance, gyrating jerkily. The slip slid down her legs and she stepped out of it.

Balzac licked his lips at the sight of her in only bra and panties. His eyes traveled up from her ankles, admiring her long, beautiful tapered legs with their olive-skinned smoothness and the delicate pink flush at the thighs. His gaze grew hungry at the sight of the full, womanly hips under the flimsy black panties she wore. His hands clenched eagerly at the sight of the bosom moving inside her bra, the outlines of the nipples clearly visible now, the breast-flesh straining above Sappho’s small, naked waist.

She was moving like a professional strip-teaser now, the lower half of her body arching and retracting in a series of bumps and grinds. Her hands slid down the sides of her body until the fingertips reached the waistband of the panties. Slowly, she rolled them down until only the scantiest, Bikini-type triangle covered the lower part of her body. Then again, her rhythm changed, this time to suit a slow, undulating belly-dance. The muscles of her flat stomach quivered, and her navel contracted and expanded in a pulsating invitation. It was a suction-like illusion which half drew Balzac to his feet. Sappho waved him back without breaking her rhythm, and slowly turned around. The globe of her derriere was clearly bisected now, the naked, glistening halves rotating in opposite directions in a demonstration of truly remarkable muscular control. His eyes riveted there, Balzac almost missed it when her hand reached around to the middle of her back and unclasped her bra.

She turned around again. The bra hung loose in front of her bosom now, barely concealing it. Her large breasts jiggled, and as she swiveled from side to side, Balzac caught glimpses of the firm, uptilted flesh bouncing in time to her quickening heartbeat. She slid one arm free of the bra, her fingers holding the strap clear of her breast, but in such a way that the cup still concealed it.

She came very close to Balzac now. Her fingers opened and the bra strap fell. He gasped at the redness of the roseate, clearly etched and wide as a half-dollar, the nipple itself a darker red, protruding a good half-inch, quivering as if with a life of its own. Sappho’s hand slid under the breast as she guided it close to his face. She let the tip just graze his lips, and when he responded, she laughed huskily and danced quickly away.

But the contact had aroused her as well. And her excitement made her hurry. With a wild gesture she tossed the bra halfway across the room. Both breasts bobbled free now, sculpted ivory melons tipped with strawberries and separated by a deep, almost mysterious, womanly cleavage. A tiny trickle of perspiration ran into this crevice, the result of her energetic abandon.

She cupped her breasts now and propelled them into a circular movement in opposite directions. Then she took her hands away. The breasts continued to spin like twin doves straining to tear loose from her body. Again she moved closer to Balzac. His jaw snapped to trap one of the doves. He caught it on the wing, but it quickly flew free, seemingly none the worse for the slight tooth-marks now marring its plumpness.

Eyes closed now, head thrown back, blue-black hair cascading over her breasts, Sappho strummed the dark red nipples peeping through the tendrils of hair. Like an accomplished guitarist, her fingers flew over them until they quivered with yearning. Then her hands dropped once again to her panties.

Bending at the knees, she leaned far backward. Only her pelvis moved in a long, pulsating undulation as she pushed the panties down. The soft, ebony down pointing to her womanhood was clouded by aroused passion. She closed her knees tightly, and the panties slipped off altogether. Then, still straining in a backbend, she moved them slowly apart, farther and farther, until the entrance to her tunnel of love was clearly visible to Balzac.

Abruptly, her body straightened, stiffened for a moment. She stood stock still as if seeking control to hold herself back. And then she dived for Balzac, straddling his lap, her fingers clawing at the zipper to his pants. “Come on,” she panted. “Hurry up! You want me now, don’t you?”

“Yeah!” Balzac rasped, his eyes bulging. “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!”

“Just a minute,” Penny shot out of her office. “What do you two think you’re doing?”

“Don’t be naive.” Sappho waved her away. “What does it look like? And how long have you been here, anyway? How long have you been watching us?”

“Never mind that.”

“What do you mean ‘never mind that?’ You could have at least coughed or something to let us know you were here. Some nerve! Spying on us this way!”

“Well, so now you know! And the least you could do is stop what you’re doing while I’m talking to you.”

“Why should we?”

“A very good reason which seems to have slipped both your minds,” Penny pointed out. “Remember, Balzac?”

“Remember what?” Balzac was still trying to work his pants down his legs. The way in which Sappho was straddling his lap was making it difficult.

“Remember that you’re a eunuch!” Penny told him with asperity.

“I am?!’

“You are!”

“Oh, yeah. I guess I am,” Balzac admitted reluctantly.

“You see?” Penny turned to Sappho. “It wouldn’t do you any good, anyway. You’ve just worked yourself up for nothing. It would only end in frustration.”

“I don’t see any harm in trying.” Sappho pouted.

“It could do a great deal of harm psychologically. This man came to Lovelights for help, and all you’re offering him is the ultimate in frustration.”

“I’ll settle for that,” Balzac muttered.

“No, you won’t!” Penny told him fimily. “Now, Sappho, get dressed. You can go home now. I’ll stay and see if Lovelights can’t offer some more practical solution to this poor man’s problem.”

“I thought you wanted me to help with the galleys,” Sappho said sulkily.

“Never mind them. I’ll handle them myself. I appreciate your coming in, but now you just run on along home.”

“I still think I could help him,” Sappho muttered as she pulled her panties back on.

“You’re not being realistic,” Penny told her. “Just what could you do for a eunuch? And what could a eunuch do for you?”

“What could a eunuch do for me? The Greeks have a word for it! Believe me they do.”

“What word ?”

“I’m not sure. I could look it up. But why bother?”

Sappho made one last-ditch attempt. “Why not just let me show you?”

“No.” Penny stood firm. “Just you go home now.”

“Boy! The things I do for you!” Balzac exploded when Sappho had departed.

“Well, you wanted to show your gratitude,” Penny reminded him.

“Yeah. But turning away something like that is above and beyond the call of gratitude. It’s downright wasteful, that’s what it is. Who knows when I’ll ever get another chance like that!”

“That’s your problem. For now just remember that you’re supposed to be a eunuch.”

“I sure don’t feel like a eunuch.”

“You don’t look like one either, with that—-that hatrack bulging out that way.” Penny averted her eyes. “Now, just calm down and get back in character,” she told him. “Marie will be here soon.”

“Oh, all right.” Balzac sat down and sulked while Penny returned to the concealment of her darkened office.

They didn’t have long to wait. Marie D’Chastidi arrived promptly at nine-thirty. Fifteen minutes later Balzac had finished his tale of woe, and she was clucking over his problem.

“If only I wasn’t already married,” she sighed, “I might really be able to help you.”

“How?!”

“By marrying you.”

“But I’m a eunuch!”

“Yes. I know. You just told me, remember. But that’s exactly what I mean. You may not know it, Mr. Hosenpfefffer, but you’re my dream man. We could have the perfect marriage. Why, I could practically throw away the key.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t you see? We could have a courtly marriage, with courtly love, ascetic, like in the days of Eleanor of Aquitaine. We could live together as brother and sister, in purity, with spiritual rapport, with no carnal contacts to mar our relationship.”

“I don’t think that’s exactly what I want,” Balzac told her.

“But do you have a choice? Actually, the more I think about it, the happier it seems to me we could be together. Yes! I’ll divorce Vito! For both our sakes. I’ll divorce him and marry you. We’ll live together in pristine chastity.”

“But you don’t understand! Even if I am a eunuch, I don’t want a sexless marriage.”

“All right, then. We’ll compromise. Yes, it could be even better that way. We’ll get you a toolbag. You can toy with my lock whenever you want, and that way there will be sex for both of us.”

“You call that sex?”

“Everybody gets his kicks different ways,” Marie reminded him. “And your choices are limited. Look, give it a chance. Believe me, once you get used to it, you’ll love it.”

“Well . . .”

“Here. Try it right now. Just try it.” Marie perched on a desktop and raised her skirt. “Do you have any keys with you?”

“Yes.” Balzac produced a keyring with a half a dozen keys dangling from it. “But-”

“Come here. Try them.”

“But they won’t fit. Will they?”

“Of course not. But that’s where the fun comes in. Go on. You’ll see.”

“Well, okay.” Balzac approached, stared at the lock confusedly for a moment, and gingerly attempted to insert one of the keys. “See,” he said. “I told you. It won’t fit.”

“Try jiggling it a little.” Marie arched her back.

“All right.” Balzac did as he was told. “I’m not getting anywhere,” he said after a moment.

“Oh yes you are!” Marie was breathing very fast now. “Don’t stop! Can’t you get it further into the keyhole?”

“It’s in as far as it will go.”

“Then try another key.”

“Okay.” Balzac inserted another key.

“Ah!” Marie sighed voluptuously. “That’s better.”

“You really dig this?” Balzac was finding it hard to believe.

“Yes-yes-yes! Turn it now! That’s it! Keep turning! Now you’ve got it! Hear the tumblers click? Ah-ah-ah-ah!” Marie bounced up and down strenuously.

Her excitement excited Balzac in turn, and he once again forgot himself. “Listen,” he suggested, “couldn’t we take that damned thing off and forget about the key bit? I mean, I could really unlock you if you’d give me half a chance!”

“No-no-no! Just keep doing what you’re doing!”

“That may be all very well for you, but what about me.”

“What about you? You’re a eunuch, aren’t you? Isn’t it satisfaction enough just to know that you’re giving me pleasure?”

“Well, no . . .”

Just prior to this, Penny had decided that things had gone far enough. She had sneaked out of her office, undetected, and around to the front door. Now she entered.

“Marie,” she called, deliberately sounding a warning before coming into view. “Are you here?”

“In here, Penny.” Marie quickly pulled her skirt down and motioned Balzac away. By the time Penny came in, she was sitting demurely at her desk.

“I’m afraid I got you down here for nothing,” Penny told her. “Those proofs won’t come until tomorrow. I’m sorry.”

“That’s all right. Oh. This is Mr. Hosenpfeffer. He’s come to Lovelights with a problem. And I think I have a solution for him.”

“I don’t think so,” Balzac said. “I’d really rather take it up with the editor.”

“But—” Marie started to object.

“That’s all right, Marie. I’ll handle it. You run along and grab a cab home now.” Penny waited until she was out of the office before thanking Balzac.

“That’s okay. It was interesting,” he replied. “I hope it was some help to you.”

“I’m afraid it wasn’t,” Penny admitted morosely. “All three of them flunked the test. How can I put a girl in charge of Lovelights who would handle a reader’s problem by trying to steer him into homosexuality? Or by doing a striptease to seduce a eunuch? Or by bypassing his problem and sucking him into her obsession for her own locked-in gratification? No, I’m right back where I started from.”

“So am I.” Balzac’s sigh matched hers.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, as it happens, there is an element of truth to that story we cooked up for them.”

“You don’t mean—?”

“No. I’m not a eunuch. But I am a virgin. The only twenty-five-year-old male virgin in New York, I’ll bet. Why did you have to stop Sappho, anyway?”

“I’m sorry. But look, you do have a problem. And that’s what Lovelights is for -- to help solve just such problems. Why don’t you let me try to help you?”

“Do you think you could?”

“Oh, I’m sure of it.” Penny stretched wearily and her breasts jutted out. Then, as if the movement had given her both inspiration and new energy, she turned briskly back to the matter at hand. “I’m sure of it,” she repeated.

“You know,” Balzac said, embracing her eagerly, “I think maybe you can help me. . . .”

CHAPTER TWELVE

“NOT THAT way I can’t!” Penny managed to struggle free of the eight arms Balzac seemed to have sprouted.

“Aw, come on!”

“No!” Penny retreated behind a desk. “Now, you just sit down there and let’s discuss this calmly. Without hands! That’s it. All right, now tell me what you think is responsible for your being a twenty-five-year-old male virgin.”

“Hugh Hefner.”

“What?”

“Hugh Hefner. The publisher of Playboy. He’s responsible.”

“I don’t think I understand.”

“Well, you know that philosophy of his? The one he writes every month? All sort of saying that people should be uninhibited and sexually emancipated, and all that jazz? Well, I always read it. And I believe it. I mean, in my head, I’m a true believer.”

“But what’s wrong with that?” Penny didn’t quite understand what Balzac was driving at. “I’ve read it, too. It’s a pretty sound credo. A little smug and heavy-handed and Luce-ly written sometimes, but basically sound. I don’t see why that would keep you from—”

“Don’t you see? I wanted to be like that so desperately! Liberal and libertarian where sex is concerned. Freely partaking. Enjoying! Living! Really living! I wanted to live the rabbit’s life, toppling bunnies in the cabbage patch one after the other!”

“Well, what stopped you?”

“Myself, I guess. As a rabbity bed-hopper, I’m a complete dud. First of all, I can’t afford it. Maybe Hefner can, but I can’t. Second of all, I guess I’m just not urbane. Oh, I try, but I just can’t carry it off. If I go to light a girl’s cigarette, the pack of matches goes up in my hand—-just the way it did with my draft card. When I attempt sophisticated conversation, it comes out Spooner-isma, and half the time I end up getting my face slapped. As a dancer, I’ve got two left feet. And the few times I came close to making love to a girl, I got embarrassed and fumbled and blushed so much that the girl always backed out. One of them even told me she backed out because I made her feel like she was taking advantage of me.”

“Why do you suppose you react that way?”

“Well, part of it is the girls themselves. The ones I get to meet, I mean.”

“What’s wrong with them?” Penny asked.

“Nothing, really. Realistically, I mean. But you see, I sort of formed my whole concept of women—in a sexual sense, I mean—-from looking at the ones they have in Playboy. Every month, for ten years now, as soon as I get the latest issue, I turn to the gatefold and I look. I look and I look and I look. They’re really beautiful, those girls. And they’re flawless. You know what I mean? Flawless!”

“Yes? So?”

“So I never yet dated a girl who looked so good. Hefner — he has the cream of the crop, I suppose. But me, Balzac Hosenpfeffer, I get ordinary girls. You know, girls whose bosoms sag a little, or girls with hooked noses, or girls who sweat.”

“Everybody sweats sometimes.”

“Not the Playgirl of the Month! No, sir! Those girls never sweat. All you have to do is look at them to know. They never sweat! And they don’t have pimples either, or hair on their arms, or even a mole! They don’t talk like they came from Brooklyn, either. Just looking at them you know their diction’s perfect. Oh, if only I could meet a girl like that!” Balzac gave a heartfelt sigh.

“You’d probably be terribly disillusioned.”

“Why should I be? Hugh Hefner isn’t disillusioned. And he actually gets to meet those girls. All the time.”

“Your whole problem is that you’re trying to identify yourself with Hugh Hefner.”

“Well, why not? He’s got a million bucks and a lavish hutch he probably keeps filled with bunnies and the kind of uninhibited attitude every young man should have. Sure I like to identify with him. Who do you expect me to identify with? Albert Schweitzer?”

“He’s dead.”

“You’ve got a point there. I might as well identify with him for all the living I’ve been doing.”

“Why do you have to identify with anybody?” Penny pointed out. “Just be yourself. Be Balzac Hosenpfeffer.”

“I don’t want to be Balzac Hosenpfeffer! I want to be Hugh Hefner! I want to be urbane and witty and sexually uninhibited!” Balzac fell to his knees and pounded the floor with his fists. Then he rolled over and kicked his heels. “I want to have the most beautiful bunnies falling at my feet. I want to be Hugh Hefner!”

“Gee, you really are hooked,” Penny said.

“I want to be a bed rabbit!”

“Come on now! Take hold of yourself!”

“That’s all I ever do! And I’m tired of it!”

“I didn’t mean that. I meant get up from the floor.”

Balzac rose and sagged wearily into a chair. “You wouldn’t have a carrot around, would you?” he asked morosely.

“No. Why?”

“It helps me sublimate.”

“That’s exactly what you have to stop doing,” Penny told him firmly.

“Sure. But how?”

“Well, the first thing you have to do is cancel your subscription to Playboy.”

“What?” Balzac was shocked at such heresy. “But what will I read? What will I ogle?”

“Well, why not substitute Lovelights?”

“Gee, I don’t know . . .”

“It would be a start. Look I just happen to have a subscription blank here, and —“

“It might not be a bad idea,” Balzac interrupted. “But what if I’m drafted? I mean, the way I stand with the board now, there’s no telling—”

“But what has that got to do with it?”

“If I cancel my subscription to Playboy, where will I get a Playmate of the Month to paste in my foot locker?”

“You won’t. So what?”

“So what? So that could be taken as downright un-American, that’s what! And aside from that, how would I ever face my buddies if they caught me reading Lovelights instead of Playboy? And suppose I’m captured with a copy of Lovelights on me? Think of the propaganda the Commies could milk out of that! Effete American soldiers reading romance magazines. Decadent, capitalistic asexuality! Think what that could do to our image in the world!”

“Oh, I see, you want to be a conformist. Now what do you suppose Hugh Hefner would say to that?”

“Gee, I never thought-—”

“Don’t think. Be brave. Be different. Sign here.” Penny shoved the subscription blank under his nose. “There now,” she said when he’d signed it, don’t you feel better?”

“Hell yes, but-—”

“But what?”

“Well, I still have this this powerful, unfulfilled sex drive. I still have this awful feeling of frustration. What am I going to do about it?”

“We’ll fix that,” Penny told him soothingly. “You just go home now,” she said, leading him to the door, “and when you get there, you take a nice cold shower. As cold as you can stand it. And whenever you get that feeling, you take another cold shower. It isn’t Playgirls of the Month that you need, it’s cold showers.”

“Somehow,” Balzac observed as the elevator doors opened in front of him, “I just don’t think Hugh Hefner takes cold showers.”

“Of course he does,” Penny told him. “He must. How else do you suppose he finds the time to write that long-winded philosophy of his every month?”

The elevator doors closed then, and Penny was alone. She went back to her office and sat down. Perhaps she’d helped Balzac with his problem, but her own problem still remained. She had three candidates to replace her, and all three should rightly be ruled out because of their personal troubles.

Thinking about it, Penny realized there was only one course of action. She would have to help them solve their troubles if they were to be of any use to her. But how?

Fate provided a third of the answer. A copy of Lovelights lay open by chance on Penny’s desk. She found herself looking down at an article by an eminent psychologist.

The title of the article was “How Hypnosis Can Solve Your Sex Problem.” Penny scanned it first, and then, her interest piqued, she started at the beginning and read it through.

By the time she was through, an idea was crystalizing in her mind. She dialed Annie Fitz-Manley’s number. When Annie answered, Penny painted a picture of a Lovelights crisis designed to make her return to the office immediately. And she managed to make sure that Annie would bring Brian Henannigan with her.

While she waited for them, Penny mulled her plan over in her mind. It would only work if she’d judged the situation correctly. It would only work if she was right in believing that Annie Fitz-Manley was not really a Lesbian, but was only driven in that direction because Brian, the man she was in love with, was a homosexual. If she was right, then curing Brian of his homosexuality and redirecting his sex urge toward Annie should resolve Annie’s problem as well as his. And once the problem was resolved, Annie should be clear-headed and capable enough to take over the temporary editorship of Lovelights.

When they arrived, Penny handed Annie a thick sheaf of galleys proofs. “Take these to your desk and check them very carefully,” she instructed Annie. “And Brian, would you mind staying here a minute? I need your help with something.”

“Sure, an’ I’ll be glad to help.”

When they were alone, Penny flicked off the overhead light. She sat in the shadows behind her desk and shined the desk lamp right in Brian’s eyes.

“Isn’t it a wee bit dark?” Brian asked good-naturedly.

“My eyes have been bothering me,” Penny told him. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“Well, no, exceptin’ for the way that lamp’s shinin’ so brightly at me.”

“If it bothers you, close your eyes,” Penny said soothingly. “Just close your eyes and relax,” she continued in a calculated monotone. “That’s it. Relax. Relax.” She swung a keychain like a pendulum just in front of the lamp. “Relax . . . Relax . . . Relax . . Your eyelids are getting very heavy now . . You can’t keep them open . . . You’re tired . . . So tired . . . Your eyes are closing . . .They’re closing . . . Closing . . . Closed . . . Your eyes are closed now . . . You’re asleep . . . You’re asleep . . . But you can hear me . . . You’re asleep, but you can hear me . . . Can you hear me, Brian?”

“Yes.” Brian’s voice came from very far away.

“Good. Now, I’m going to ask you some questions and you’re going to answer them. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now, Brian, why are you a homosexual?”

“I . . . like . . . men.”

“Why do you like men, Brian?”

“Because . . . they’re . . . so . . . masculine.”

“I see. And why don’t you like girls, Brian?”

“Because . . . they’re . . . so . . . feminine.”

“That figures. And what do you dislike most about femininity, Brian?”

“There’s . . . nothin’ . . . to . . . be . . . holdin’ onto.”

“Explain that, Brian. What do you mean?”

“Nothin’... at all... to... hold... on to... when. . . makin’. . . love. . . to. . . a. . . woman. . . It makes . . . me . . . be . . . feelin’ . . . insecure . . . Like ... ridin’... a horse... bareback... with... no saddle pommel . . . to . . . be . . . grabbin’ . . . Lovin’ . . . a man . . . there’s . . . somethin’ . . . to... grip.”

“Aha! So that’s it. I understand. Now, Brian, you’re going to do exactly as I say, right?”

“Right.”

“And you’ll take everything I tell you as the absolute truth?”

“Aye.”

“And after you wake up, you’ll remember what I’ve told you, and continue to believe it and act accordingly.”

“That I will.”

“All right, then. Brian, you’re a masterful horseman. You’re an expert bareback rider. You don’t need a pommel to hold.”

“I’m a masterful horseman,” Brian repeated obediently, “an expert bareback rider, an’ I’m not needin’ a pommel.”

“That’s right. Pommels are dirty.”

“Pommels are dirty.”

“They’re disgusting.”

“Sure, an’ pommels are disgustin’.”

“Holding a pommel will give you warts on your hands.”

“I’ll be getting warts on me hands from a pommel.”

“Playing with pommels will drive you insane!”

“Pommel-playin’ will be drivin’ me looney.”

“You’re never going to want to grasp a pommel again.” Penny told him. “Never! Never again!”

“I’ll nivir be touchin’ another pommel so long as I live!”

“Now,” Penny took a deep breath “Do you still prefer men?”

“Sure . . . an’ . . . why . . . wouldn’t . . . I?” Brian droned.

“Remember the pornmels, Brian. Now, how does that make you feel about men?”

“It’s isn’t makin’ me feel anythin’ about men. . . . But saddles, ugh! . . . Sure an’ the very idea of a saddle makes me nervous now.”

“Men are like saddles!” Penny seized the opening. “Men are saddles. Repeat that after me now. Men are saddles! Repeat it three times. Men are saddles!”

“Men . . . are . . . saddles . . . Men are saddles! . . . Menaresaddles !”

“Exactly. And now how do you feel about men, Brian?”

“They’re disgusting! They’re saddles! They have pommels! I hate men! I hate them! I hate men!”

“Not just symbolically,” Penny cautioned.

“Not just symbolically. I really hate them. I hate men.”

“Good. And you will remember that when you wake up. You hate men. They disgust you. And then what will you want to make love to Brian?”

There was a long silence.

“Brian?” Penny tried again. “What will you want to make love to after you wake up?”

“Sure... an’... what... would... you... be . . . offerin’?”

“It’s for you to decide, Brian. What do you feel love for?”

“Me parakeet,” Brian said firmly.

“But you can’t—”

“I want to make love to me parakeet.

“No, Brian. You can’t. Besides, maybe it’s a male parakeet.”

“It is not! Do you be thinkin’ I’m queer, or somethin’?”

“No, Brian.” Penny soothed him. “You’re not queer. We know that. You hate men, remember? But you can’t make love to your parakeet. You’re just confused, that’s all. What you really want to make love to is a woman.”

“I do?”

“Of course you do. Think about it a minute. Wouldn’t you like to make love to a nice, feminine woman?” '

Brian thought about it a moment. “No,” he decided finally. “I’d rather make love to me parakeet.”

“But why?” Penny managed to keep the exasperation she was feeling out of her voice.

“Sure, an’ a woman ain’t got no feathers the way a parakeet does.”

“But feathers are dirty. You hate feathers.”

“You do. You hate feathers.”

“I do?”

“Yes. You do.”

“I hate feathers.”

“Good. Now, wouldn’t you like to find a nice, soft woman waiting for you when you get home? A girl like Annie, say?”

“I’d rather find me parakeet.”

“With all those dirty feathers? Why?”

“So I can strangle it. Feathers, ugh! I want to be gettin’ home an’ stranglin’ me parakeet.”

“Forget the damned parakeet!” Penny exploded.

“I’ve forgotten the damned feathery parakeet,” Brian echoed obediently.

“Feed it poison!” Penny raged.

“What?”

“The parakeet.”

“What parakeet?”

“The one you’ve forgotten.”

“I don’t understand,” Brian droned.

“That’s all right. Just forget it.”

“I’ve already forgotten it. Beggin’ your pardon, but you’re gettin’ a mite redundant.”

“Right.” Penny heaved a sigh. This was more complicated than she’d expected it to be. “Now, listen very carefully, Brian. You want a woman. Do you understand? A woman!”

“I . . .want . . . a . . . woman.”

“That’s it. You want Annie. You want Annie Fitz-Manley.”

“I want Annie.”

“I think he’s got it,” Penny murmured to herself.

“But what be I wantin’ her for?” Brian asked.

“For sex, you boob!”

“For sex boobs?”

“For sexy everything! You want Annie for sex. You want to make love to her. You can’t wait to make love to her. Only to her. You can’t wait!”

“I can’t wait to make love to Annie.”

“Right. Now, just remember that. Hold it in your mind. When I count three and snap my fingers, you’re going to wake up. And you’re going to want to make love to Annie Fitz-Manley. Now, and for the rest of your life, you’re going to want to make love to her.”

“I want to make love to Annie Fitz-Manley.”

“Right. Now— One . . . Two . . . Three!” Penny snapped her fingers.

“I must have dozed off.” Brian rubbed his eyes.

“I guess so.” Penny turned on the overhead light.

“Where’s Annie?” Brian asked.

“In there.” Penny pointed.

“Then I’ll be goin’ to her now.” Brian started out the door, shedding his clothes like a moulting canary as he went. By the time he reached Annie, he was wearing only his shoes, socks, and shorts. He embraced her from behind before she saw him. “Annie, me love,” he panted. “Let’s!”

“What? Brian, what are you doing? Brian, you’re tearing my bra, Brian, stop! No, don’t stop! Brian, if you’ll just give me a minute, I’ll take them off without—-— Oh! You ripped them, too! Brian, what’s gotten into you? Oh! I don’t care! But right here, Brian? In the middle of the office like this? . . . Oh, my darling, you really can’t wait, can you? Oh, my, I can see that! . . . But what about Penny? She’s right in there! She’ll see us! . . . Oh, darling! Ahhh! Yes! Yes! . . . Sorry if this embarrasses you, Penny . . . Now, Brian! Now-now-now!”

Ever discreet, Penny left then. As she went down in the elevator, she congratulated herself. She had indeed solved Annie’s problem. The scene she’d left behind her confirmed it without a doubt, And Annie would certainly be a better temporary editor for Lovelights because of it.

Inspired by her success with Annie, Penny decided to drop by Sappho Kuntzentookis’ place on her way home to see if she mightn’t be able to help her as well. The door to Sappho’s apartment was ajar when Penny arrived. She knocked softly, and when there was no answer she pushed the door open and went through the foyer to the living room.

She stopped in the doorway, not knowing quite what to make of the scene which greeted her. There were a dozen or so men strewn around the living room, some thumbing through magazines, one or two puffing on cigarettes rather nervously, none of them talking to each other, or even looking at each other. It was obvious that they were all strangers to one another. The atmosphere was like that of a dentist’s waiting room—polite, quite, impersonal, anticipatory.

Even considering the atmosphere, though, the men seemed an oddly assorted group. There was a tough-looking Marine, two very young and very jittery sailors, a button-down Madison Avenue type who kept zipping and unzipping his leather attache case, a bearded beatnik, a youngster wearing the syrup-stained apron and white cap of a soda jerk, a unshaven and muscle-bulging dockworker strumming a baling hook, a meter-reader still wearing the jacket and cap of the electric company, a teenager in a black leather jacket, and others. All in all, it was quite an assortment, about as well-balanced a cross-section of masculinity as one could hope to find.

There was a question in all their eyes as they looked up at Penny. But they were either too polite or too shy to put it into words. In any case, their attention was diverted as the door leading to the bedroom opened.

A milkman came out, zipping up his trousers. He picked up his bottle-holder -- still half-filled-—from beside the couch, and headed for the foyer. From the darkened bedroom behind him. Sappho’s voice sang out merrily: “Next!” The soda jerk stood up and began unbuttoning his white jacket as he headed for the bedroom door.

Penny had seen enough, She followed the milkman out. Obviously Sappho had been so frustrated by the interlude with Balzac that she had decided to allow her nymphomania free play. And, Penny realized, this was no time to attempt to cure it.

Or was it? Suddenly Penny had an idea. Some of the basic psychology data she’d picked up in her reading now popped into her head. And following it was the thought of a sort of shock treatment to help Sappho. Yes, a kind of shock treatment that just might shock her right out of her nymphomania!

Penny went into the first open drug store she passed and headed straight for the phone booth in the rear. She was in the booth a long time. Incredulity, disbelief and suspicion poured out of the receiver in response to all she said. But she kept pounding away, purring into the mouthpiece seductively, trying to arouse erotic feeling at the other end with her voice, overcoming arguments with lewd suggestions, wearing away resistance with passionate promises, pleading and luring and inviting-—and in the end, finally making the invitation stick.

A half-hour later the cab pulled up in front of Sappho’s building. An elderly man’s head popped out of the rear window. “Young Miss,” he called to Penny on the sidewalk. “You it was who called me?”

“Yes.” Penny hurried over to the cab.

“The driver you promised to pay.”

“That’s right.” Penny paid the driver as the man got out of the cab. “Follow me,” she said then, leading the way into Sappho’s building.

“A big crush you really got for me, eh?” The elderly man chuckled. He reached out and pinched Penny’s buttocks as she preceded him up the stairs. “Hard to believe it is, at my age. That a young girl like you should—”

“It isn’t me,” Penny interrupted. “It’s my friend.”

“Aha! I should have known. Too good to be true, it is. This friend? A bow-wow she is, eh?”

“You can be particular at your age?” Penny stared him down.

“I suppose not. Tell the truth, at my age, I ain’t got a helluva lotta opportunities. But then, truth is I ain’t got a helluva lot of jizzum or drive left either. Only thing is, I sure do have less opportunity than I do jizzum. So, young Miss, if this ain’t some kind of gag or something, I’m very grateful for the chance.”

“It’s no gag,” Penny assured him, leading him into the living room. “At least not the way you mean.”

The waiting men looked up as they entered. The Marine was just coming out of the bedroom, looking smug and satisfied. Sappho’s voice trilled again, sounding a little bored this time: “Next.” The button-down huckster got to his feet,

“Just a minute.” Penny blocked his way.

“What do you mean? I’m next.”

“Yes, I know. But I’m going to have to ask you to be a gentleman and give up your turn. This man is rather aged and infirm and I’d like to ask all of you to allow him the priority of his years.”

“Well, all right, I guess,” the adman said with just a trace of annoyance.

Some of the other grumbled, but a husky young man wearing a cap that said Dandy Diaper Service shamed them out of it. “You just go right on in, old-timer,” he said benevolently. “The rest of us can wait. We’ve got more time left in us to wait, anyway. You just go on and crowd it in while you still can.”

“But it could kill him!” There was still one objector among the group.

“So what?” the diaper man turned on him. “Can you think of a better way to go?”

“Okay.” The protester subsided.

The rest of the group smiled encouragingly at the old man as he entered the bedroom and closed the door behind him. Sighing to herself as she watched it close, hoping she was doing the right thing, Penny sank into a chair and settled back to wait.

She didn’t have to wait too long, It was only ten or fifteen minutes later that the cry of shock and surprise from Sappho sounded from behind the closed door. “Daddy!” she exclaimed loudly. “It’s you! Daddy!”

After that there was nothing but silence for a long time. A very long time. And as still more time dragged by, the waiting men began to grow impatient and restive. Finally the man who’d objected before put the general feeling into words for all of them.

“I knew we shouldn’t have let him go to the head of the line!” he said.

“What do you mean, you knew?” the diaper man retorted. “How could you know? An old man like that—”

“He sure is taking a long time,” the adman whined. “Do you suppose he can’t—?”

“Are you kidding? Listen to them bedsprings go!”

“Wow! That’s' right! Where do you suppose he gets all that energy?”

“For her to be taking this long, he must really be terrific.”

“Well, they say experience comes with age.”

“Yeah, and experience pays off.”

“In this case, it sure does.”

“That’s fine for him, but what about the rest of us? When are we going to get our chance?”

“You aren’t!”

The heads of all the men swiveled to take in Sappho, wearing a sleazy negligee and standing in the doorway to the bedroom. “You can all go home now,” she told them. “I’ll be tied up for the rest of the night. And tomorrow night, too. As a matter of fact, don’t ever come back! You disgust me! All of you! I’m ashamed of myself,” she continued as they started to file out, grumbling and cursing as they went. “I’m ashamed of myself for giving my body to one man after another in a vain quest for satisfaction when all the time there was only one man I ever really wanted, Well, I’ve got him now. And I don’t need any other man! Not now! Not ever again! Yes, I was a nymphomaniac. But now I’m cured. Cured! Do you hear? I’m cured!” She shouted her last words at the back of the last man to depart. Only then did she notice Penny sitting in a chair in the shadows at the side of the room. “What are you doing here?” Sappho asked, surprised.

“Never mind that! The question is, what are you doing?”

“That’s not really your business, is it?”

“Yes. It is. I brought him here. I brought him because I thought that finding yourself in bed with your own father would shock you out of your nymphomania.”

“Well, it has.”

“Yes. And right into incest!”

“Well, what did you expect?”

“I thought you’d stop. Naturally. I mean, your own father— I didn’t think you’d go on—-”

“But why not?‘ Don’t you see, Penny? You meant to help me and you have. I’m over my insatiable appetite for men now. I’ll never be a nymphomaniac again. This is what I always wanted, but I’d never admit it to myself. I never really wanted plumbing fixtures, or men. I just wanted Daddy!”

“And now you’ve got him.”

“Yes.”

“But he’s an old man. The pace will kill him. Then what will you do?”

“I’m not sure. But I won’t go back to what I was. I’m sure of that. Don’t make moral noises, Penny. Be happy. I’m cured!”

On that note Penny left. And as she wended her way homeward, she realized that insofar as editing Lovelights was concerned, Sappho was indeed cured of the insatiable appetite which might have interfered with her work. Yes, she could handle the job now, and Penny wouldn’t have to be afraid of her missing a press date or anything because she was making love to some man in the stockroom.

Annie and Sappho, two down, and that left only Marie. But not tonight, Penny decided. She was too tired. She just wanted to get home and straight to bed. No, she wasn’t going to worry about Marie D’Chastidi’s problem tonight. She wasn’t even going to think about Marie.

And then she was forced to think about her. Just as Penny entered her apartment, the telephone started ringing. She ran to answer it.

“Penny?” It was Marie D’Chastidi’s voice. “Penny, I’ve been raped!”

“What? What do you mean? I don’t understand.”

“I’ve been raped!” Marie repeated, quite agitated.

“But how could you be? Weren’t you wearing your—?”

“Yes. Of course I was. From force of habit, really. I mean, Vito is away tonight, and I was all alone, so there didn’t really seem any need to wear my chastity belt. But out of habit I put it on anyway when I went to bed.”

“Then how could you have been raped? Did some man get hold of the key, or —”

“No! The key was well hidden. No man would think of looking where I put it.”

“Where did you put it?” Penny asked.

“In the freezer compartment of the refrigerator. Under the ice-tray.”

‘That’s so apropos it’s almost poetic,” Penny observed. “But how were you raped? And who raped you?”

“A safecracker.”

“A safecracker! ? I didn’t even know you had a safe.”

“We don’t. You see, we live right next door to a bank. It’s a basement apartment, you know. Anyway, he was tunneling through to the bank vault and he must have taken a wrong turn or something. He came up right under my bed.”

“Sounds like a pretty inept safecracker.”

“Not really. I think he’s just got a bad sense of direction. He’s really a pretty good safecracker. I mean, I haven’t really had too much experience judging safecrackers, but from my experience tonight I’d say he must stand pretty close to the top of his chosen profession.”

“How can you talk like that if he raped you?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, Penny. I liked it!”

“You liked it?”

“Yes. I can’t tell you how it made me feel. First those delicate fingertips manipulating the tumblers, and then the click when the lock opened, and then— Well, you know! He raped me! And for the first time I realized what’s been wrong with my married life. It’s not that I’m frigid. Not really. I know that now. It’s Vito. He just never knew how to unlock me, to turn me on. Well, I’ve been unlocked now, and I’m never going to be locked again. Penny—” She paused dramatically. “Do you know what I just did ?”

“No. What?”

“I threw my chastity belt in the furnace!”

‘That’s wonderful.”

“Yes. Isn’t it? I’m a new woman, Penny. And best of all, Vito’s working late again tomorrow night and the safecracker’s coming back to have another go at the bank. Except I don’t really think there’ll be time for the bank. Oh, Penny, isn’t it grand? At last I’m a woman!”

“Congratulations.”

There was more jubilant chatter from Marie, but finally she hung up. Wearily, Penny crawled into bed. Well, she told herself, all three of her candidates were straightened out now. Any one of them would be capable of taking over Lovelights.

Only then did it occur to her that she was really right back where she’d started from.

All three were equal again. How was she going to choose among them?

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE ALARM pulled Penny out of a deep sleep the next morning. Groggily, she shut it off and staggered out of bed. Still weary, she got dressed and plunged into the subway. When she emerged, she saw that she still had a little time, and decided to stop into a drug store for some coffee.

There was something familiar about the back of the girl sitting next to Penny at the counter. As she swiveled around to pick up her check, Penny recognized her. “Excuse me.” She tapped the girl on the ann. “Aren’t you Lascivia Levine? Studs’s sister?”

“Yes. Oh, I remember you. You were in the Ginza the other night with Studs.”

“That’s right. And how’s the family?” Penny added politely.

“Lousy. Mama had another heart attack yesterday. That’s the third one this week.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” Penny said with genuine sympathy.

“Yeah. Well, it won’t kill her,” Lascivia pointed out. “No. I suppose not.” Penny paused awkwardly, not knowing what else to say. “What do you think caused it?” she asked finally, when Lascivia showed no signs of leaving.

“Studs, of course. He’s being drafted, you know. He’s leaving the day after tomorrow.”

“Oh! So quickly!” Penny’s heart gave an unexpected leap. ‘Well, if you see him, ask him to call me and say good-bye.” It was out before she knew she’d meant to say it. “Will do. Well, see you around.” Lascivia left then.

She must have spoken to her brother soon afterwards, because it was only mid-morning when Studs called Penny at the office. “How about going out with me tonight?” he asked without preamble.

“Gosh, Studs, I don’t know. I haven’t been getting much sleep lately. I’m awfully tired, and I really meant to go to bed early tonight. Can I have a raincheck?”

“Afraid not. Uncle Sam has other plans for me. It’s tonight or never.”

“Oh. That’s right, I forgot. Lascivia told me you were leaving for the army day after tomorrow. All right, then. Pick me up at my place about eight. Okay?”

“Will do.”

After she hung up, Penny spent the morning catching up on her work. She worked right through lunchtime and into the afternoon. It was after four when the ringing of the telephone interrupted her again. This time it was Balzac Hosenpfeffer.

“Penny,” he said excitedly. “Guess what? Great news. I’ve heard from the draft board. The Pentagon says they can issue me a new draft card and still grant me my exempt status.”

“That’s wonderful, Balz.”

“Isn’t it? What do you say we go out tonight and you help me celebrate?”

“I’m sorry,” Penny told him. “I can’t. I already have a date.”

“Damn it! Why do I always get one heartache after another. Please change your mind, Penny. I’m aching to see you.”

“Aching, Balz?”

“Yeah, that too. Please break your date, Penny.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t.”

“But what will I do?”

“Take a cold shower, Balz.”

“Another one?”

“Yes, another one.” Penny hung up and went back to her work.

An hour later she left the office and went home. She was ready and waiting when Studs arrived at eight o’clock. He was preceded by the odor of steaming chow mein.

“I thought it might be nice if we had dinner here, just the two of us,” he said. “See, I brought some champagne, too.”

“But I hadn’t—”

“Aw, come on, Penny.”

“Studs, I got all dressed to go out!”

“And you look beautiful. But this is my last night home. And who knows? I might be killed. So humor me just this one time, Penny.”

“Oh, all right.”

“That’s my girl. Now you go and get some glasses for the fizzly while I set out them ricey, noodley vittles.”

An hour later they were starting on the second bottle of champagne, and what chow mein remained was growing cold in its container. ‘The trouble with Chinese food,” Penny was saying, “is that fifteen minutes after you eat, you’re hungry again.”

“Yeah. But I’m not hungry for the same thing.” Studs leered.

“What do you mean?”

“Have some more champagne and I’ll show you.”

“I’ve already had more than I should. I feel tiddly. It’s a nice feeling, though, sort of warm and relaxed.”

“That’s it. You just stay warm and relaxed.” Studs came around behind her and bent to kiss her, his hands sliding down from her shoulders to her avocado-shaped breasts.

“Oh, Studs, don’t Penny murmured. “I promised myself I wouldn’t have any sex until after the baby was born. I mean, isn’t it a sort of desecration?”

“No, baby. Don’t be foolish. Why deny yourself?” Studs kept on crooning the soothing words, overcoming her objections, his hands moving over her body.

And finally Penny did forget her reluctance under his caresses. Studs had always been the one man who could turn her on. He was the only man who had ever taken her. Just that once. And even if Penny wouldn’t admit it to herself, her body knew that it was aching for him to possess it once again.

Passively, she allowed Studs to lead her to the couch. He kissed her on the lips again, a deep kiss, their tongues clashing like flaming swords. Then his lips traveled over her face, grazing the half-shut lids over the blue eyes, nibbling at the high cheekbones of the oval face, breathing hotly into the shell-like ears. His hand surrounded one breast now, and he could feel its panting warmth through the silk of the dress, through the material of the flimsy bra.

Penny felt the clenching of the hand, too, and it made her moan low in her throat. She found herself biting his earlobe, gently at first, and then more violently. She felt the hard quiver of his response then, as he pushed her down on the couch and lay beside her.

His hand reached under the dress, pushed it up, slid along the silken length of her stockings until the fingers touched the burning thigh-flesh. Penny's nails raked his back and then her hand slid inside his shirt and tangled with the thick hair on his chest. . . .

“Come on, Studs.” Penny opened her eyes and looked at him feverishly. “Hurry up!”

“Do I have to—? I mean, should I take some precau-—”

“No. Just come on. Hurry, my darling. I’m burning up!”

“But did you take your birth control pill today?”

“Don’t be ridiculous! That would just be locking the barn after the horse was gone. Wouldn’t it? Now, stop worrying and take me. Hurry!”

And Studs did.

They were on the bed, happy and exhausted, when the sun came up to put an exclamation point to their night of passion. Only once before had Penny ever felt so happy, so satisfied. And that had been with Studs, too. Only this time, somehow, she felt even closer to him. She had never felt so close to anybody before in her life.

It was this feeling of closeness which at long last impelled Penny to tell Studs the truth about his part in her impending motherhood. “Yes,” she told him. “You really are the father. It can’t be anyone else because there never has been anyone else.”

“Gee, Penny, couldn’t you have told me that before I was drafted?”

“I’m sorry, darling.”

“If you’d told me then, I would have married you, you know.”

“And now?”

“Sorry baby. There’s no percentage now.”

“Oh, Studs!” Penny wailed.

“Sorry, baby. Anyway, I got to be moseying along now The Viet Cong w0n’t wait, you know!” Studs got out of bed then and started pulling on his pants. “Like you said,” he continued when he’d finished dressing, “I’ll give them hell!” And then he was gone.

Penny didn’t go to sleep. She just brooded. It was some hours later that her brooding was interrupted by the ringing of the telephone.

“Hello?”

“This is the doctor from the laboratory, remember, no? A mistake, I’m afraid there has been. So some sad news for you I have, Mrs. Candie.”

“Miss Candie,” Penny corrected him automatically.

“Oh, so? Then some good news maybe I have for you, Miss Candie.”

“What is it?”

“In a minute, I tell you. But first, if you are pleasing, when the shpritz you brought here the other day, in what did you carry it?”

“In a brown paper bag. Why?”

“Come now! Are you telling me you shpritzed into a brown paper bag?”

“Well, no.” Penny evplained. “I used a coffee container. And then I put that in the bag.”

“Aha! And was this a coffee container which had been used?”

“If you mean did it have coffee in it before I used it, yes.”

“Then everything that explains! Miss Candie, when the bunny the bucket kicked, I tell you that you are pregnant. Right?”

“Right.”

“Wrong! I was wrong. A big enough man I am to admit my mistakes. An autopsy we perform on our fuzzy friend, and what do you think we’re finding?”

“What?”

“From you being pregnant, he doesn’t demise. Caffeine poisoning it is that kills our rabbit! Caffeine from your coffee container. So not pregnant you are, Miss Candie. How do you like that?”

“I like it fine,” Penny told him. “Just fine. And thanks for calling, Doctor.”

Well! Penny breathed a sigh of relief. That solved more than one problem. Besides clearing up her own personal difficulties, it also made it unnecessary to choose between Annie and Marie and Sappho. Now she wouldn’t have to take a leave of absence. She wasn’t pregnant. Hallelujah! Too soon we rejoice and too soon we are disillusioned. So it was with Penny. Only a few short weeks went by, and then she realized how misplaced her rejoicing had been. And then she remembered the one small detail which had slipped her mind. A growing suspicion gave her cause to remember.

That night with Studs, that night they’d made love a second time, that night before she’d found out she wasn’t pregnant—that night they had taken no precautions! And now, now . . . So, once again Penny found it necessary to hop onto the Fifth Avenue bus with a brown paper bag in her hand—this time with a bottle rather than a coffee container inside it.

And once again, some hours after she’d returned from that journey, Penny received a telephone call. “Hello, Mrs. Candie this is?” the voice at the other end said. “Good news, have for you—~”

“Miss Candie,” Penny interjected.

“I see.” A long pause. Then — “Well, Miss Candie, trouble I’m afraid you’ve got . . .”