Free Watson, Ian - Novel 16 by Whores of Babylon (v1.1) Page B

alewife, since
they all wore simple gowns and no cosmetics. A few women had straw tangled in
their hair, so these must have stayed overnight sleeping in the courtyard or
the cloisters; or maybe these were women who had stayed for many nights and
tired of performing a thoroughly scrupulous toilet.
                 Actually,
the pederast’s description had been quite slanderous.
                 Quite;
not entirely. Here was the spotty dumpling. Here was the horse, angular and
bony. However, the freckled redhead was a comely girl. And here was a young
tanned bosomy blonde, though she was plump and greasy. And here, a handsome
strong-looking Negress with skin of polished ebony over rippling muscles; she
could probably bend iron bars, clutching them in her ivory teeth.
                 No,
the pederast wouldn’t have liked a strong woman. Or a bosomy one.
                 Surely
this was a disgusting way to assess people? But did he not, at the same time,
assess himself? Did he not assess the criteria by which he chose to judge - and
thus discover those private criteria which under ordinary circumstances would never
have such free rein to express themselves?
                 No,
the pederast wouldn’t have liked this one . . . Thus Alex shifted the blame,
away from himself.
                 If
the fellow was a boy-lover, why did he come to a woman’s temple? Homosexuality
couldn’t be illegal in Babylon . Alexander the Great had loved men as well as women. ‘Greek love’ and
all that. . .
                 Probably
the pederast could have satisfied himself elsewhere, except that his tastes ran
to the boyish rather than to actual young men. Perhaps he disliked the physical
inconveniences involved (as Alex imagined them).
                 Alex
felt increasingly confused, and tried to concentrate. Should he choose the
‘obvious’ tanned blonde? Or the horsy woman who was definitely ugly; though why
should her body be ugly too? Lying with her might prove an alien, disconcerting
experience for both of them. There was a certain deft familiarity about the
joining of bodies accustomed to such manoeuvres; and Alex, while not
particularly accustomed, was nevertheless not wholly unaccustomed. The ugly
woman might be unused to lovemaking. Contrariwise, she might be far more
sensual; whereas beauty might be frigid. She might be wiser in the ways of Babylon , if not in the arts of love. Ought he to
seek the familiar? No.
                 He
was glad Deborah wasn’t here; though several more women were turning up now,
and in their wake more men.
                 Why
was he glad? Was he happy that her tryst had arranged itself quickly? Relieved
that she hadn’t seen him? Glad for whose sake?
                 He
realized that this temple could teach people of themselves: of their mixed
emotions, false chivalries, sanctimonious shams, egotisms, lusts and illusions
- so that they could at last learn love, affection, joy? Ishtar’s temple could
expose and disorder your emotional routines as a way station to a future which
must be grasped emotionally, before all else.
                 When
he made his choice it was by accident. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a
glimpse of Deborah emerging from the hall accompanied by a tall, robed,
black-bearded man, wearing a beehive of a turban, who inclined his head and
then walked off, swinging a walking stick.
                 Alex
was at the end of a row of mats, standing before someone who might have been
the pederast’s ‘mouse’. A little mouse with shortish brown hair and small, ordinary
features; neither beautiful nor otherwise. She looked to be in her late teens.
                 Burrowing,
he found the first coin to hand. Without inspecting it, he dropped it in her
lap. ‘You,’ he said.
                 With
a faint smile, she said, ‘You must say, “In the name