Edmund White - Our Young Man

The baron reached behind him and turned on a faucet that poured water directly onto the raw concrete floor. It flowed into a drain, an industrial-looking drain. No doubt the baron hoped the sound of water would sympathetically induce Guy to pee, but no such luck. He should have gulped three Diet Cokes before coming.

Guy wondered what the scenario was for tonight. Hadn’t Pierre-Georges said the baron liked his orgies to have narratives? It seemed tonight the baron was a bad dog, who kept racing forward to bite his masters on the leg until they whipped him and drove him back into a kennel. The baron actually was uttering, “Gr-r-r,” in an amateurish way that Guy found attachant ; at least, mercifully, he was no longer begging for Guy’s piss.

The other men were all of a type — tall, balding, skinny, pale, tattooed, almost as if they were vagrants who slept rough, smelling of old cigarettes and beer, their asses wrinkled and flat like deflated balloons but their dicks big and bridled with shiny cock rings. They all had nascent beards and one man, who looked as if he were in his forties, had a broken tooth. He was the only one wearing a motorcycle jacket and no shirt. His ribs were countable, his stomach flat as a drumhead, his chest stringy with sparse, long hairs.

The bad dog made a rush for Guy’s calf and bit into it. It was painful and released enough adrenaline to power an angry outburst from Guy, who lashed the cur back into its kennel; a second later Guy wondered if he’d actually hurt Édouard and broken the skin, but there was no way to ask.

The dog bite hurt; he could see he was bleeding and he tried to remember if he had any runway dates this week where he had to wear shorts. (He didn’t think so.)

Now that the dog had been sufficiently subdued, all the masters drew a tighter and tighter circle around it and forced it to suck them one after another as dogs will. Then the man with the broken tooth made the dog lie paws-out, faceup on the cement floor. He squatted over it and strained and shit in its mouth. Its mouth was a black hole and it was weeping and chewing. Guy knelt down to Édouard and Guy whispered with concern, “ Ça va, Monsieur le Baron? ”

“‘Monsieur le Baron’?” Pierre-Georges said angrily.

“How did you know I said that last night?”

“Édouard phoned me. He was very irritated and disabused.”

“I felt sorry for him. I was worried about him.”

“So he said,” Pierre-Georges said acidly. “The scales fell from his eyes and he no longer thinks you’re a real man but some sort of mama’s boy.”

“I knew it was a blunder but I felt genuine compassion for my friend—”

“A blunder? I’ll say. That’s what he wanted; he’d paid two hundred dollars to each of those types. Since his childhood, he told me he’s dreamed of being disciplined as a bad dog and then forced to eat a turd— un étron .”

“No one has that fantasy. Little boys want to be cowboys or fireman — no one wants to be a bad dog forced to eat shit. Not even a Belgian baron.”

“ Chacun à son goût ,” Pierre-Georges said philosophically.

“What should I do when I see him the next time?” Guy asked. “How should I act?”

“It’s finished. He won’t bother you again. No more intimate or name-day parties. No more amazing gifts. You might be invited as an extra on a crowded stage if you’re lucky.”

“But we’re friends!” Guy objected.

“Oh, sure. Do you think he invites you because he likes your scintillating conversation about the ups and downs of the rag trade? Do you think he has a burning interest in the rag trade?”

“We have other subjects, serious subjects.”

“I forgot: Your sad childhood. Your Buddhist chants. No, it’s finished.”

Guy thought for a while. “He talked about his sad childhood, too.”

Pierre-Georges snapped, “The only thing sad about his childhood was that he couldn’t convince any of the footmen to shit in his mouth.” Pierre-Georges was warming up to his role as the disabuser. He’d come over to Guy’s for the emergency. He smiled for the first time today. He opened a white paper bag and pulled out a croissant, found a plate in the cupboard, and ate it. As Guy’s manager he of course didn’t offer him anything to eat; Guy’s breakfast was always a cup of black coffee, which he was sipping now while looking sheepish.

After a solitary lunch (a third of a chicken salad at the Front Porch, a neighborhood restaurant where he liked the campy waiter), Guy felt absolved and talked himself into a storm of irritation. He was tired of feeling foolish for a simple act of human kindness. He’d been brought up by a sainted mother. Was it his fault that he couldn’t despise a kind old man, even someone as deeply perverted and depraved as Édouard? Guy imagined most aristocrats were decadent. He was proud of his humble origins. His instincts were still unimpaired. A decade in fashion hadn’t spoiled him. He was still a good person, a simple boy of the people from Clermont-Ferrand and, thank god, not a shit-eating Belgian. He tried to feel sorry for Édouard, for making a mess out of his life.

He decided he’d invite Édouard to dinner. He knew how to cook eel in green sauce, which Édouard loved. And Guy would wear his leather harness and shorts and have menottes , cuff links — no, handcuffs! — dangling on his left side. After a bottle of Gewürztraminer, the baron would end up on his knees begging for it. He’d always been fond of Édouard, who’d been so kind to him, who’d bought him this house, who’d celebrated his name day. He was strange, but then they’d had some good conversations.

But when he phoned Édouard the butler told him once, then twice, that “ Monsieur le Baron est sorti ”—not at home. He decided to phone at eight A.M. before the butler, who’d never liked him, would have arrived and he’d get the cook, who adored him. But Marguerite for some reason was very cold, too, and told him “ Monsieur le Baron est sorti .”

“ Ça va, Marguerite? ” he asked cheerfully.

“ Ça va, Monsieur Guy. Et vous-même? ” She’d said tu to him for ages, and Guy felt rebuffed. He said, “I’ll call back,” and she said nothing. He hung up.

A week went by. At last Guy received a creamy envelope embossed with the baron’s coat of arms (two books surrounding a lion and the words MON PLAISIR), inviting him to a large reception honoring the Belgian king’s birthday with the note, “Business attire.” Oh, it would be a straight evening, a champagne reception for dozens of business associates and their wives. No opportunity to flaunt his leathers there!

He made sure he’d look better than everyone else and took a long time with his toilette. His Armani suit, his lace-up Churches, his classic white shirt, and the solid maroon silk tie — and, of course, the emerald. He felt sure the baron would melt when he saw the emerald. It would bring back so many memories.

But the party was a rout, all Belgians (mostly speaking Flemish), toasting the king with American champagne, none of the usual crowd of hot guys, nothing to eat except pretzels (which for some reason the baron thought elegant), several awkward conversations with slow-talking businessmen who wanted to find out how Guy knew the baron and did he work for one of his suppliers, then a sudden general departure at eight engineered by the hateful, tight-lipped butler (the invitation had specified six to eight), and Guy had only caught a glimpse of Édouard, and when he tried to talk to him, the baron had brought forward a fat man in a sports jacket and said, “Oh, good, you two can speak English. Fred, Guy,” and the baron rushed off to kiss an old woman’s hand as she entered the room. Guy waved at Walt, who pretended he didn’t see him.