The Good Life (6 page)

He opened the glasses case and put on a pince-nez like the ones Roosevelt used. He stood in front of the folder of drawing paper and worked quickly with a soft pencil while he continued to sip his drink. His attentive eyes darted disconcertingly over Perry's face.

The face wasn't a beautiful one in the conventional sense. It was far too strong to be pretty. The odd angles of his high cheekbones and the prominent bridge of his nose gave his face an angular asymmetry that pleased rather than stunned. His eyes were the center of his face — the humor in them glittering — surrounded by luxurious lashes, not long but furry, giving his eyes a depth that was further accentuated by his thick, straight brows. His hair was a straight, nondescript brown that clung to his head like the fur of a slick animal — not spiky like straight hair can be — with a beguiling tuft that fell over his wide forehead. The overall effect was one of manly strength and health, his mouth and straight teeth completing the picture of good, solid American stock.

Perry had never had his picture drawn before; he felt as if Billy were ferreting out all his secrets.

“Are you an American?” Perry asked.

“Very much so. For several generations.”

“I thought you had a slight accent at first.”

“Speaking French a great deal and mixing with Britishers, you pick up little speech habits without even knowing it. I hope I don't sound affected.”

“No. It's just different. I like it.”

“I'm glad of that. The family started out in Milwaukee, in fact. German stock. One of those impossible Germanic names and Jewish to boot. My grandfather very sensibly simplified it. You've heard of Mt. Vernon stores, the food chain? That's the family business.”

“Really? We have those on the West Coast.”

“They're everywhere. My grandfather was a very shrewd businessman. He put his fortune into a family trust. I don't know how many millions it is by now. My father's dead. My mother inherited. She remarried and lives up on Park Avenue with my stepfather. Everything will come to me in due course, but she allows me to take a reasonable share now. That's why I can live in France.”

“You like it?”

“It was very gay in the '20s. One knew everybody. The Depression put an end to a lot of the fun, but I think it will come back if there isn't a war.”

For a moment the silence was broken only by the sound of pencil on paper. Perry was confronted with big money at last. He was going to have to move fast if he expected to get his foot in the door. Billy's plans to go back to Europe were discouraging.

“Can I see what you've done?”

“Of course. They're only rough sketches, but I think I'm getting it. I'll never be a great artist, but I've been to schools here and in France, and I've developed a certain professional competence. Have a look.”

Perry rose and stood beside him in front of the easel. Billy took off his pince-nez and put his arm around Perry's waist. Perry relaxed into the embrace. There was something precise and slightly fussy about the older man's manner that made Perry doubt that he'd let his life be seriously disrupted by a stray new guy, but enough might happen between them so that he'd remember him on his next visit.

Perry turned over the drawings. Sketchy though they were, he could see his likeness in them. He looked like quite a dish.

“They're very flattering,” he said.

“They're not, I promise you. You're too modest.”

Billy's hand moved up along Perry's side to his chest. Perry's cock responded. Billy was no beauty, but he was rich. He knew “everybody” and undoubtedly could take his pick. Perry couldn't help being sort of thrilled that he'd picked him.

“You feel as if you have a splendid body.”

“You're flattering me again.”

“I don't flatter,” Billy snapped. “It would be insulting to you. You don't need to be flattered.” He withdrew his arm and turned to face Perry more squarely, apparently mollified by his impatient protest. “You know what I would like? Would you be willing to pose for me in the nude?”

Perry's heart gave a little leap of excitement. That was more like it. Billy's reaction to the ill-chosen word had given him a small scare. Rich older men didn't like to be crossed. They expected to get what they wanted. Perry was going to be allowed to show his stuff. If Billy liked what he had to offer, he might take him around town and introduce him to some of his important friends before he left.

“Naked?” Perry asked with a careful note of hesitation. “Well, sure. I wouldn't mind. I guess we're getting to be friends.”

“How delightful. You can hang your clothes in the bedroom. In here.” He put his hand on Perry's behind, and they crossed the landing to a big, handsomely furnished bedroom. “The bathroom's there if you need anything. We're alone. You can take everything off. I'll wait in the other room.”

Perry took a deep breath. His heart was pounding. His cock was in an uproar. It was exciting to lay his body on the line. He would soon find out its worth. May be everything. May be the permanent escape from the past that he had dreamed about for so long. He was getting so close to the good life if only he could find the money to pay his way in. It was there waiting for him. He was sure of it.

He extricated himself from his pants with difficulty and stripped. He ran his hands over his chest and abdomen and out along his cock for a reassuring feel of everything he had that he could count on. It mustn't fail him now.

He was suddenly struck by terror. How could he hope to win out over the competition? New York was full of better-looking guys than he. How many more chances would he get? Everything depended on Billy, and Billy probably thought of him as just another easy pickup.

What had given him the idea that he was going to be lifted out of the crowd for special treatment? Hubie? Matt's story about Cole Porter? Nothing solid to go on there. Billy would have what he wanted from him and return him to his life sentence at the Y.

He was terrified that taking his clothes off was going too far; he was playing all his cards in one desperate gamble. He had to win.

The anxiety was eased by the lift it gave him to show himself off. He watched his cock swinging out in front of him as he returned to the studio room. A winner? It had to be.

He stopped near the door. “Can I come in?” he asked. Perry looked down once more at his nakedness, took a deep breath, and crossed the threshold.

Billy looked up, and his face brightened with pleasure. He approached, looking him over with attentive eyes. “My word, Perry. Your body is spectacular. How adorable of you to let me see you like that.” He reached for his cock and moved his hand on it. “Ravishing. I'm very partial to a well-built boy. You struck me as remarkable yesterday. Let's go back to the other room.”

He toyed with Perry's cock as they crossed the landing again. He sat in a chair in the bedroom, placing Perry in front of him, and ran his lips and tongue along his cock while he took his shoes off. He drew back and looked at it. “Yes. You have a gift for giving pleasure and the good fortune to be beautifully equipped to do so. You delight me. I won't be a moment.” He withdrew to the bathroom and closed the door behind him.

Perry backed up to a table and perched on the edge of it, his feet planted on the floor in front of him, his cock slanting up on conspicuous display. His hopes were beginning to soar. A rich man, obviously with the experience for his opinion to mean something, had called his body spectacular and beautifully equipped.

He looked down at his “ravishing” cock and saw it give a little upward surge of potent urgency. He could almost come on the spot just thinking about the things Billy had said to him. He had been right to show him the works at the start. All he had to do was keep Billy hoping for more and make him want to have him around until he left so that he could establish a solid foothold among New York's upper crust.

In a moment Billy returned wearing a dressing gown securely closed down the front. Perry slid to his feet from the table and went to meet him.

Billy handed him a slim flexible whip less than three feet long. “You can use that,” he said. “You mustn't worry about hurting me. I enjoy it.”

Perry looked from the whip to Billy and gave his head a perplexed little shake.

“It's quite all right,” Billy assured him. “Being beaten by a superb young man like you will be an exquisite pleasure.” He closed his hand around Perry's cock. “Yes. Remarkable. It stays superbly hard.”

Perry swallowed and found his tongue. “You want me to hit you?” he asked in a stunned voice.

“Certainly. Haven't you beaten anybody before?”

“No.”

“Many people like to be beaten, just as others enjoy administering punishment. I think you might like it. Give me a good thrashing. I'll warn you if you go too far. If it gives you an orgasm, be sure to direct it at me. I adore feeling boys coming on me.” He went to the bed and with a few agile movements was stretched out naked on his stomach.

Perry felt as if he were losing his mind. He approached the bed slowly, holding the whip. There seemed to be a film over his eyes. He looked down at the smooth white body, not fat but soft-looking and well-rounded. Something in him cringed from what was expected of him. He wanted to throw down the whip and rush from the room. He stiffened his will and gripped the whip and, with eyes narrowed, brought it down on the buttocks. Flesh quivered.

“Yes. Harder,” Billy ordered. “Everywhere. Not my head. Like that. Oh, yes, you're superb. I knew it.” He lifted his head and craned around to look at him. “You're beating me. I want whatever you do to me. Beat me, my beautiful boy.”

Perry found an urge in him to hurt his victim. To his amazement his flagging erection was suddenly rigid, straining upward with an almost uncontainable need for release. He wanted to punish everybody who had denied him all the things he ever wanted. He wanted to take revenge on this man for never having known what it was like to do without the good things in life.

Lust boiled up in Perry, raw and untamable. His body was shattered by orgasm. He shouted his triumph and saw his semen hurtling from him onto the soft white body below him. He saw the other's convulsions and heard his whimpers, and then Billy slid from the bed, dragging his dressing gown with him to hide himself in another room.

Spent and appalled, Perry slumped into a chair with his head bowed over the arm, waiting for the monstrous fantasy to fade from his mind's vision. Would he have to perform this disgusting act to become part of the world he dreamed about?
Could
he?

If he were requested to do this regularly, he wasn't sure the good life was worth it. Perhaps it was just some sort of perverse test, and if he'd passed it, so much the better. But if Billy wanted him to beat him again, he'd do everything possible — short of ruining his chances, of course — to avoid a repeat performance.

When Perry straightened up in his chair, Billy came bustling back, looking refreshed and cheerfully unruffled in a different dressing gown. “Come, let's freshen our drinks,” he suggested. “What a heavenly boy you are. Don't wear anything. You're lovely like that.”

They returned to the studio room while Perry tried to work himself back into the normal world as he knew it. He wondered if many guys would be willing to do what he had just done. He had become reasonably familiar with the “queer world,” and he had never heard of anything like it. It must have established him in Billy's mind as more than a stray pickup. A plus, perhaps, if he could get over his revulsion.

He took the full glass Billy offered him and sat with his legs parted and a hand spread on his thigh, fingers pointing at his quiescent cock. He didn't much like people to see it like that, but Billy might already be hoping to see it stand up again. His eyes kept dropping to it.

“I feel an unusual rapport with you, Perry,” he said, “an unusual understanding. I'm rather tied up these days. Are you free on Sunday?”

“That's a big day at the fair. I'll probably work overtime. My regular day off is Wednesday.”

“That's even more convenient for me. Can you come here after your work on Tuesday? We could have dinner somewhere, and if it gets late, perhaps you'd like to spend the night here. We could have a lazy Wednesday together.”

“That sounds good.”

“Wonderful! It's a date. I'll have to start thinking about getting ready for dinner soon.”

Perry took a long swallow of his drink. He needed it. Everything was going too well for him to play it cool easily. He didn't want to seem too eager.

“We have time for another,” Billy added and rose. “Finish that and come here a minute.”

Perry drained his glass and stood. Billy stepped closer. He was a good two inches shorter than Perry. He ran his hands slowly over Perry's chest and down his sides to his cock. It started to lengthen and fill out. Perry didn't think he could get a hard-on yet and didn't want to — that was for Billy to think about until Tuesday — but he was glad it was beginning to be worth looking at.

“It's lovely to hold you there. It feels so alive and powerful. Come. I want you to see something. I think I know how I'd like to paint you.”

Billy pulled out an antique chaise longue that had been pushed out of the way with some other furniture. “Lie down here.”

Perry did so with his feet up. Billy stood over him and began to handle him in a proprietary way. “Just this leg up. The other one here with the foot on the floor. Hold this arm up over your head—like that. You can let this one lie here relaxed. Yes, just let your hand dangle.”

Billy stepped back to survey the effect. His hands on him had kept Perry's cock in a state of development. It was hard enough to stretch out along one thigh.

“You're the most seductive boy I've ever seen,” Billy said with satisfaction. “Power in repose. We must find time for me to do it.”