Leonard Cohen - The Favourite Game

Breavman had studied the books. A subject cannot be compelled to anything which he would consider indecent while awake. But there were ways. For instance, a modest woman can be induced to remove her clothes before an audience of men if the operator can suggest a situation in which such an act can be performed quite naturally, such as taking a bath in the privacy of her own home, or a naked rest under the sun in some humid deserted place.

‘It’s hot, you’ve never been so hot. Your sweater weighs a ton. You’re sweating like a pig…’

As she undressed Breavman kept thinking of the illustrations in the pulp-paper Hypnotism for You manuals he knew by heart. Line drawings of fierce men leaning over smiling, sleeping women. Zigzags of electricity emanate from under the heavy eyebrows or from the tips of their piano-poised fingers.

Oh, she was, she really was, she was so lovely.

He had never seen a woman so naked. He ran his hand all over her body. He was astonished, happy, and frightened before all the spiritual authorities of the universe. He couldn’t get it out of his mind that he was performing a Black Mass. Her breasts were strangely flat because she was lying on her back. The mound of her delta was a surprise and he cupped it in wonder. He covered her body with two trembling hands like minedetectors. Then he sat back to stare, like Cortez over his new ocean. This was what he had waited for so long to see. He wasn’t disappointed and never has been. The tungsten light was the same as the moon.

He unbuttoned his fly and told her she was holding a stick. His heart pounded.

He was intoxicated with relief, achievement, guilt, experience. There was semen on his clothes. He told Heather that the alarm clock had just rung. It was morning, she had to get up. He handed her her clothes and slowly she got dressed. He told her that she would remember nothing. Hurriedly he took her out of the sleep. He wanted to be alone and contemplate his triumph.

Three hours later he heard laughter from the basement and thought that Heather must be entertaining friends down there. Then he listened more carefully to the laughter and realized that it wasn’t social.

He raced down the stairs. Thank God his mother was out. Heather was standing in the centre of the floor, legs apart, convulsed with frightened, hysterical laughter. Her eyes were rolled up in her head and shone white. Her head was thrown back and she looked as if she was about to fall over. He shook her. No response. Her laughter became a terrible fit of coughing.

I’ve driven her insane.

He wondered what the criminal penalty was. He was being punished for his illegal orgasm and his dark powers. Should he call a doctor, make his sin public right away? Would anyone know how to cure her?

He was close to panic as he led her to the couch and sat her down. Perhaps he should hide her in a closet. Lock her in a trunk and forget about everything. Those big steamers with his father’s initials stencilled in white paint.

He slapped her face twice, once with each side of his hand, like a Gestapo investigator. She caught her breath, her cheeks reddened and faded like a blush, and she spluttered again into cough-laughing. There was saliva on her chin.

‘Be quiet, Heather!’

To his absolute surprise she stifled her cough.

It was then he realized that she was still hypnotized. He commanded her to lie down and close her eyes. He re-established contact with her. She was deep asleep. He had tried to bring her out too quickly and it hadn’t taken. Slowly he worked her back to full wakefulness. She would be refreshed and gay. She would remember nothing.

This time she came round correctly. He chatted with her a while just to make sure. She stood up with a puzzled look and patted her hips.

‘Hey! My pants!’

Wedged between the couch and wall were her pink elastic-bottomed panties. He had forgotten to hand them to her when she was dressing.

Skilfully and modestly she slipped into them.

He waited for the unnatural punishment, the humiliation of the master, the collapse of his proud house.

‘What have you been doing?’ she said slyly, chucking him under the chin. ‘What went on while I was asleep? Eh? Eh?’

‘What do you remember?’

She put her hands on her hips and smiled broadly at him.

‘I’d never of thought it could be done. Never of thought.’

‘Nothing happened, Heather, I swear.’

‘And what would your mother say? Be looking for a job, I would.’

She surveyed the couch and looked up at him with genuine admiration.

‘Jewish people,’ she sighed. ‘Education.’

Soon after his imaginary assault she ran off with a deserting soldier. He came alone for her clothes and Breavman watched with envy as he carried off her cardboard suitcase and unused ukulele. A week later Military Police visited Mrs. Breavman but she didn’t know anything.

Where are you, Heather, why didn’t you stay to introduce me into the warm important rites? I might have gone straight. Poemless, a baron of industry, I might have been spared the soft-cover books on rejection-level stabilization by wealthy New York analysts. Didn’t you feel good when I brought you out?

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