Anaïs Nin - Delta of Venus

When he again turned over to push his wild sex against her she pushed him away, angrily this time. Her hand aroused him, and he could not lie still.

She said, ‘I will make you come this way. Enjoy yourself.’ He lay back quietly enjoying the caresses. But as soon as he closed his eyes he saw the soldiers bending over her naked body, he saw her legs forced apart, the opening dripping from the attacks, and what he felt resembled the furious panting desire of the soldiers.

Mary Ann suddenly closed her robe and stood up. She had grown completely cold now. She sent him away, and he was never allowed to see her again.

At forty Pierre was still a very handsome man, whose successes with women, and the long and now broken liaison with Elena, had given the local people much to talk about in the small country place where he had settled. He was now married to a very delicate and charming woman, but two years after their marriage her health had grown poor and she was a semi-invalid. Pierre had loved her ardently, and his passion at first seemed to revive her but slowly had become a danger to her weak heart. Finally her doctor advised against all lovemaking, and poor Sylvia entered into a long period of chastity. Pierre, too, was suddenly deprived of his sexual life.

Sylvia was naturally forbidden to have children, and so she and Pierre finally decided to adopt two from the village orphanage. It was a great day for Sylvia, and she dressed lavishly for the occasion. It was a great day for the orphanage, too, because all the children knew that Pierre and his wife had a beautiful house, a big estate, and that they were reputed to be kind.

It was Sylvia who chose the children – John, a delicate fair-haired boy, and Martha, a dark and vivid girl, both about sixteen years of age. The two had been inseparable in the orphanage, as close as a brother and sister.

They were taken to the big, lovely house, where each was given a room overlooking the wide park. Pierre and Sylvia gave them all their care and tenderness and guidance. In addition, John watched over Martha.

At times Pierre observed them with envy of their youth and comradeship. John was fond of wrestling with Martha. For a long time she was the stronger. But one day while Pierre watched them, it was John who pinned Martha down to the ground and managed to sit on her chest and cry out his triumph. Pierre then noticed that the victory, following a heated mingling of their two bodies, did not displease Martha. There is the woman beginning to form herself already, he thought. She wants the man to be stronger.

But if the woman was appearing timidly now in the young girl, she obtained no gallant treatment from John. He seemed intent on treating her only as a playmate, even as a boy. He never complimented her, never noticed the way she dressed or her coquetries. In fact, he went out of his way to be harsh with her when she threatened to be tender, and to call attention to her defects. He treated her without sentimentality. And poor Martha was perplexed and hurt but refused to show it. Pierre was the only one aware of this wounded femininity in Martha.

He was lonely on the big estate. He had the care of the farm adjoining it, of other properties owned by Sylvia throughout the country, but it was not enough. He had no companion. John dominated Martha so completely that she would pay no attention to him. At the same time, with the experienced eye of the older man, he could see very well that Martha was in need of another kind of relationship.

One day when he found Martha crying and alone in the park, he ventured to say tenderly, ‘What is the matter, Martha? You can always confide to a father what you can’t confide to a playmate.’

She looked up at him, for the first time aware of his gentleness and sympathy. She confessed that John had said she was ugly and awkward and too animal.

‘What a stupid boy,’ said Pierre, ‘that is absolutely untrue. He says that because he is too much of a girl and can’t appreciate your type of healthy and vigorous beauty. He is a sissy, really, and you are wonderfully strong and beautiful in a way he cannot understand.’

Martha looked at him with gratitude.

Henceforth it was Pierre who greeted her every morning with some charming phrase – ‘That blue color suits your skin so well’ or ‘That is a very becoming way of wearing your hair.’

He surprised her with gifts of perfume and scarves and other little vanities. Sylvia never left her bedroom now, and only occasionally sat in a chair in the garden on exceptional, sunny days. John was becoming absorbed in scientific studies and had been giving less attention to Martha.

Pierre had a car in which he did all the errands for the supervision of the farm. He had always gone alone. Now he began to take Martha with him.

She was seventeen, beautifully formed by a healthy life, with a clear skin and brilliant black hair. Her eyes were fiery and ardent and rested lingeringly upon the slender body of John – too often, thought Pierre as he watched her. Obviously she was in love with John, but John did not notice it. Pierre felt a pang of jealousy. He looked at himself in the mirror and compared himself with John. The comparison was rather in his favor, for if John was a handsome youth, at the same time there was a coldness in his appearance, whereas Pierre’s green eyes were still compelling to women, and his body exuded great warmth and charm.

Subtly he began his courtship of Martha, with compliments and attentiveness, becoming her confidant in all matters, until she even confessed her attraction to John, but added, ‘He is absolutely inhuman.’

One day John insulted her openly in Pierre’s presence. She had been dancing and running, and looked exuberant and alive. Suddenly John looked at her reproachfully and said, ‘What an animal you are. You will never sublimate your energy.’

Sublimation! So that was what he wanted. He wanted to take Martha into his world of studies and theories and researches, to deny the flame in her. Martha looked at him angrily.

Nature was working in favor of Pierre’s humanness. The summer made Martha languid, the summer undressed her. Wearing fewer clothes, she was becoming more and more aware of her own body. The breeze seemed to touch her skin like a hand. At night she tossed in bed with a restlessness she could not understand. Her hair was unbraided, and she felt as if a hand had loosened it around her throat and were touching it.

Pierre was quick to sense what was happening to her. He made no advances. When he helped her out of the car his hand rested on her fresh bare arm. Or when she was sad and talking about John’s indifference, he would caress her hair. But his eyes rested on her and knew every bit of her body, whatever he could divine through the dress. He knew how fine the down was over her skin, how free of hair her legs were, how firm her young breasts were. Her hair, wild and thick, often brushed against his face when she leaned over to study the farm reports with him. Her breath often mingled with his. Once he let his hand stray around her waist, paternally. She did not move away. Somehow his gestures answered deeply her need of warmth. She thought that she was yielding to an enveloping, paternal warmth, and gradually it was she who sought to stand near him when they were together, it was she who put his arm around her when they were driving, it was she who rested her head on his shoulder late afternoons on their way home.

They returned from these supervising trips always glowing with a secret understanding, which John observed. It made him even more sullen. But now Martha was in open rebellion against him. The more reserved and severe he became with her, the more she wanted to assert the fire in her, her love of life and movement. She flung herself into the comradeship with Pierre.