Ben Soul

by Richard George

were going badly. She had money, a job, influence in the City government, and sufficient sex to satisfy her body. Perhaps Ray had exaggerated Dickon’s happiness. Vanna vowed to find out.

  It took her several weeks to learn that Dickon was succeeding at the Mission and as an assistant to the City College chaplain. Dickon had a compassionate touch that relieved and invigorated both homeless street-dwellers and the often confused and pampered students at City College. Dickon, it seemed, was happy. Vanna’s fury grew. She thought about ways to interrupt his happiness.

  Fate helped her. She had recently taken a job as a social worker with the City. Some of her clients faced criminal charges. Vanna had power to influence the diminution or dismissal of these charges. The system assigned a certain young man, one Vincent Decatur, to her as a client. Mr. Decatur was a nominal student at City College, which he used for cover to earn his living as a male hustler. Vanna discovered he knew who Dickon was, and, indeed, rather admired Dickon. Vanna recruited Vin Decatur to embroil Dickon in a sexual scandal. After all, she thought to herself, nothing stirs religious people up like sex does.

  Vanna regarded the young man before her. He had a lean face, with a sharply defined nose. Probably in his early twenties, his face lines were clean and sharp under his black, tightly curled, hair. Vanna thought he would look like a crafty ferret by the time he was forty, especially given his occupation.

  “I see, Mr. Decatur,” she said severely, rather looking down her nose at the slender Vincent across her desk, “that you are accused of prostitution at City College.”

  “False charge. I’m a student there. The person in question simply made me a loan. The cops saw it, and got the wrong idea.” He shifted in the hard wooden chair.

  Vanna leaned back in her padded executive chair and stared at him. His eyes were as black and hard as obsidian chips. Vanna’s gray eyes were chips of marble.

  “Don’t give me that,” she said. “You are an obvious type. Do you do men or women? Or both?”

  “I admit nothing.” Vin spoke sullenly to the floor. His voice was small and hard at the same time.

  “Pity,” Vanna responded in chill tones. “I need someone at City College to perform a small chore for me. It could be beneficial to the performing party.”

  Vin looked up. This bureaucrat spoke his language. “What kind of chore?” he asked.

  “I need to get some embarrassing evidence on a man there, a sort of assistant chaplain. Dickon Shayne.”

  “Why Dickon Shayne? Everybody at the college likes him.”

  “Why doesn’t matter. It’s a long story for some other time, some other place.”

  “Right. Keep my nose out of it.”

  “Can you arrange some sort of scandalous situation that I can use against this man?”

  Vin’s eyes glittered. “I usually negotiate price before I commit to anything.”

  “You’re facing criminal charges,” Vanna said, “if I send a report that describes you as irredeemable. I’ll send that report, unless you cooperate.”

  “You should be on the streets, lady. You drive a hard bargain.”

  “I function quite well where I am.”

  “You want me to get this Dickon Shayne into a sexually compromising position? Then give you evidence of it? For that, you’ll send a good recommendation to the District Attorney?”

  “You’ve stated it quite well.”

  Vin stood and held out his hand. “Give me a few weeks? These things can be difficult to arrange on the spur of the moment.”

  “There’s a little time. Do it right.”

  Vin withdrew his hand and stuck it into the pocket of his denim jacket. Vanna had made it obvious she wouldn’t shake on the deal.

  “I’ll let you know,” Vin said, “when the deal’s done.”

  “You know where my office is. Goodbye.”

  Vin hunched his shoulders and turned to go out the door. He was already plotting his further moves.

  Riesling Rising

  Supper at the Floundering Flatfish led to more dates. Meanwhile, with Minnie Vann urging him on, Ben applied for, and passed, the test for computer operator at the Indigent Aborigine Insurance Company. He got an advance in position, a notable increase in income, and a major boost in his self-confidence. More and more he was coming to rely on Len’s advice. Len was twelve years older than Ben was, and had a lot of business experience.

  One evening, not long after Ben’s conversation with Minnie Vann, he invited Len to dinner at his apartment. He covered the worn table in the alcove that served as his dining area with a pale blue cloth he had bought just for this occasion. He got deep blue cloth napkins to go with the tablecloth. On it he set the table with a pale peach plate and salad plate combination he had found in a discount store and brought out matching knives, forks, and spoons. He was glad he didn’t have to set a service for more than two. He didn’t have that much that matched, yet.

  For an entrée he had decided to broil steaks. With them he’d serve a salad with vinaigrette and potatoes buttered with parsley and basil butter. For dessert he had a chocolate brownie magnificent in its decadence. Tea and coffee, tea for him, coffee for Len. Along with the entrée he’d serve a Merlot. The wine counter salesman at the supermarket had promised him it would go well with the steak.

  Ben dressed his bed, too, with clean sheets and a nice coverlet. If the evening went as he hoped, Len would spend the night with him. Then Ben dressed himself, choosing a lavender shirt and soft brown trousers. He made sure, before he dressed, that he and his underwear were clean and sweet-smelling. For a cocktail he had Len’s favorite bourbon. Len took preferred his whiskey with ice and just a little water, so mixers wouldn’t be a problem.

  When the doorbell rang, Ben took a deep breath, and moved swiftly to open it. He was most disappointed that it was not Len who stood there. His neighbor, a woman he didn’t know, handed him some envelopes.

  “Letters put in the wrong box,” she said. “Tell the damned postman I don’t get his union wages, so he should damned well get it right next time.” She then began to complain about the weather. Ben murmured appropriate “Mm-hmms” until he could gracefully get rid of her. He promised himself to avoid the woman in future.

  The doorbell rang again, shortly after he had closed the door. He opened it, once again to disappointment. It was the paperboy wanting his monthly payment. Ben got the money for him, chatted idly for a moment, and sent him on his way. Len was just coming up the stairs when the paperboy left. Ben waited for him, hoping he wouldn’t appear too anxious.

  “Hi,” Len said to him. “I brought some wine for your collection. It’s a Riesling. I know you like the white ones better.” He handed Ben the bottle.

  “Would you prefer this, or the Merlot I’ve got chilling, with your steak dinner?”

  “Oh, let’s be Lesbians tonight, and drink the red.” It was a strange opinion Len had expressed on more than one occasion that only Lesbians and straight Italians drank red wine and everybody else preferred white wines. Ben still didn’t know Len well enough to be certain whether he was joking or serious about the point. “Put the Riesling back for yourself.”

  “Okay,” Ben said, and stood aside so Len could enter.

  “Weather’s pretty hot,” Len said. He took off his jacket. It was a casual windbreaker. Under it Len wore a polo shirt, in a pale blue-gray that set off his blue eyes. It was the first time Ben had seen him in something that informal.

  “I like your shirt,” Ben said. “It’s a good color for you.”

  “Thanks. I just got it. I don’t usually go for something this casual, but, what the hell, it’s summer time.”

  “Casual’s good for you,” Ben said. He took the Riesling to the refrigerator and laid it on its side on the bottom shelf. Who knows, he thought, we may want a second bottle of wine tonight. Over his shoulder he said, “Rare, medium, well-done—how do you like your steak?”


  “Medium,” Len said.

  “Would you like a cocktail before dinner? I have bourbon.”

  “Not tonight, thanks. I had a drink with Hank O’Hara after work. He insisted he owed me one.” Ben had met Hank, and knew he was as straight as God makes them. He still surprised himself by feeling a twinge of jealousy.

  While Ben broiled the steaks, Len came into the kitchen and watched. “You like to cook, don’t you?” he asked Ben.

  Ben opened the Merlot to let it breathe. The wine clerk at the supermarket had insisted this was an important step. “Yes, I do. My Dad never understood it. He’d do a lot of things, like run a vacuum, or mop a floor, to help Mom. He said he owed it to her, because she helped him in the fields and barns when he needed it. He wouldn’t cook, though. Mom always told us we should be glad he didn’t.” When the potatoes were done, Ben made the herbed butter and them in it.

  “You said you lost both your mom and your dad. How?”

  “A car wreck, my freshman year at college. They were on their way back from a doctor’s appointment in Fort Collins, hit an icy patch, and spun out and rolled over. The patrolman said it was probably a quick death for both of them.” Ben plated the steak and potatoes. “I think I told you I’ve got a brother and sister-in-law in Colorado. They live on the family farm.” He took the salads from the refrigerator and drizzled the vinaigrette over them.

  “How about your family?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t know?”

  “I left home when I was sixteen, like I told you. I didn’t want to know then, and I don’t want to know now, what became of all of them. They weren’t my biological parents, anyway. Nobody knows who they were. The people who raised me just wanted a chicken poop scooper. They probably replaced me the next time the social worker went through town.”

  Ben didn’t quite know what to say to Len. He spoke of the whole thing as though it were a distant event. Maybe for Len it was. “Shall we eat?” Ben said. Over their food they let their talk roam from subject to subject as their whims took them. They were even silent for a few moments at a time, and at ease with one another.

  After dinner they sat in Ben’s small living room to watch television news. There were no news programs on, and Ben shut the tube off. He put his hand over Len’s hand on the sofa cushion and caressed it. Len responded by turning his hand over to grasp Ben’s.

  “Will you stay over?” Ben said.

  Len leaned over and kissed him. “I thought you’d never ask,” he said. “Sure, I’ll stay. I don’t have my pajamas with me, though.”

  “I don’t think you’ll need them,” Ben said.

  Encounter at the Eleemosynary Eel

  For some weeks Dickon waited for his copy of Dr. Sicknell’s papers to reach him. After they came, and he read them, he waited for some comment from Presbytery. Nothing came. After several sessions of midnight prayer, he left a solution up to God, and let the papers recede in his mind.

  Students came to him, grappling with the eternal problems of love lost, gained, requited, and unrequited, as well as the turmoil of success and failure and the confusion of being self-responsible at last. At Roman Hands’ suggestion, Dickon had commandeered a corner table at the Eleemosynary Eel, a favorite campus coffee shop and snack bar. There he held a kind of confessional, round table discussion, and general offer of availability from an older, perhaps wiser, but not quite a one-foot-in-the-grave person.

  The Eel, as the students affectionately abbreviated its name, was a moderate sized room with twenty-five round-topped tables. When the shop opened in the morning, each table had six chairs around it. By ten minutes after opening, the chairs were shuffled among tables to accommodate various groups larger than six. Counter personnel and waiters fought a losing battle all day to restore the opening configuration of chairs.

  Eels in a great mural that covered two walls watched the dance of the chairs. The eels writhed and wriggled through a great green and blue body of painted water. Each eleemosynary eel bore in its mouth a basket loaded with shrimp (in cocktail dresses), or crab legs, or a bottle of wine. Two eels, centermost on the back wall, writhed around each other. College students were quick to suggest the eels were mating; the artist had been called back to put a ball gown and tuxedo on the pair, to firmly suggest they were dancing. The garments did not deter the student imagination.

  The afternoon was warm. Dickon had ordered an iced tea, and was sipping it slowly to make it last. The college students behind the counter knew who he was, and why he was here. They left him alone to do his thing. Most of the tables were empty. It was a Wednesday, the favorite afternoon for mandatory attendance lecture classes where weary professors droned on about the insights of Western civilization to drowsing students.

  A wiry young man, dressed in faded jeans carefully sandpapered at the crotch, and at least one size too small for him caught Dickon’s eye. The man was obvious in his sexual display. His tee shirt stretched almost to the ripping point over his lean chest. His pectoral muscles molded the thin cloth. Dickon could see, from across the room, how the cloth puckered around his nipples. His curly black hair rode like a Greek god’s helmet above his almost too-thin face. Despite the sharpness of his features, something young and vulnerable drew Dickon’s attention. Dickon let himself savor the stirring in his loins without becoming obvious.

  Dr. Sicknell, whatever her intent, had brought Dickon to an epiphany. For the first time in his life, he accepted that he preferred to think of sex with men rather than sex with women. The idea of ever again mating with a woman mildly disgusted him. Celibacy did not appeal to him. So he watched the unsuspecting young men passing by. At night, he remembered Larry and Benny, or fantasized about someone he’d seen on the street.

  The young man with curly black hair looked at him and flashed a smile that lit up his face. Dickon caught his breath. The smiling face was approaching him. The young man stood by his table.

  “Are you Reverend Shayne?” he asked.

  Dickon cleared his throat. “Yes,” he said, “I am.”

  “Mind if I sit down?”

  “Please do.” The young man pulled out a chair. Dickon felt a wave of heat from the man’s body. He could smell musky cologne. Sternly he set aside his imagination and called on the preacher within.

  “I’m Vin, Vin Decatur.” The black eyes glinted with a secret amusement. Vin realized his prey would be easier to corner than he had thought. No need to hire a female third party. Closet case, maybe, but a player in Vin’s own court.

  Dickon’s voice came out strained, as though he spoke through split pea soup. “What can I do for you?”

  Vin’s grin broadened. “Maybe a lot of things. We’ll have to see.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t follow you.” Dickon felt rising excitement flushing his face. He looked down at the table, wondering if his reaction was all too obvious.

  “I think maybe you do, but you don’t know you do.” An insinuating tone in the young man’s voice prickled in Dickon’s fluttering psyche.

  “Look, guy, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he snapped.

  “You do, but you don’t want to know.” Vin shifted in his chair, so his knee briefly touched Dickon’s. Dickon flinched, but did not withdraw his knee. Vin smiled again, and let his knee brush Dickon’s, ever so slowly. Dickon felt heat redden his face. He couldn’t drag his eyes from Vin’s face.

  “Yes,” Vin said. Dickon felt a barrier inside crumble. He drew a long breath. Perhaps this was the sign he had waited for.

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “I’ve got something you want to find out about. Am I right?” Again the subtle rubbing of knee against knee.

  Dickon stared at the sharp face so delightfully framed by the curly black hair. “How do you know?” he whispered.

  “Gaydar,” Vin said. He grinned again, confident, and in charge. “My pla
ce or yours?”

  “I can’t do this,” Dickon said, and turned away. Vin’s fingers touched Dickon’s knee. He felt them burning through the denim.

  “I live in a mission room,” Dickon said. “Not very private, especially in midday.”

  “My place, then,” Vin said.

  “I shouldn’t.” Dickon strained to get the words out through the thickness in his throat. Vin stroked Dickon’s other knee.

  “Why not? I can tell you want to.” Vin’s hand increased its pressure. Dickon felt his tumescence rise. Vin stood up. “Coming, Reverend?”

  “Not quite, but close,” Dickon said and stood. He hoped his arousal wouldn’t be too obvious in his dark trousers. Vin glanced at his crotch and laughed.

  “You’ll be okay until we get to my place,” he said. “Use your briefcase to cover up.” He inclined his head toward the door. “Shall we go?”

  Emma Delivers

  After several weeks, Emma learned she was pregnant. She was most confused by this turn of events, though she might have expected it after her tryst with Haakon. She sorely missed her mother, even though she could imagine the scorn and shame her mother might heap upon her. Emma was frightened, a little, too. She had never been close to any friend who had gone through a pregnancy, nor had she sisters or cousins to consult. Her doctor, Ringda Bell, was from India, and not a man she could easily approach about the more intimate feminine mysteries of pregnancy.

  A new complication soon surfaced. One morning, shortly after opening the library, Emma took a call from Dr. Erma Geddon, her supervisor. She was “commanded” to appear at Dr. Geddon’s office the next day.

  Emma stopped at Gowns Galore, Purveyors of Fine Female Garments, to buy a new dress that would fit her a little better than her apricot linen (which, by the way, had one or two small smudges the dry cleaners despaired of removing safely). After much trying on of dresses and suits, Emma settled on a dark navy dress with white piping around the modestly high collar and modestly low hem. This she wore for her interview with Dr. Geddon.

  Dr. Geddon’s office was in a County Office Building on Fourth Street. The room was modest sized, and Dr. Geddon’s desk overwhelmed it. A large mahogany slab perched on eight Greek columns, with an ornate landscape inlaid in light oak on the modesty panel that faced the visitor. A huge chair, heavy with black leather, provided Dr. Geddon seating. Dr. Geddon was a tiny woman, and the chair swallowed her as if a python swallows a mouse.

  “Sit,” she said to Emma, indicating the dark oak chair on the visitor’s side of the desk. Emma perched on the edge of the uncomfortable chair. She knew from past visits that leaning back in the chair would cause the rungs to probe her spine with harsh bumps and knobs.

  “Thank you for coming in,” Dr. Geddon said. As always, Emma marveled how the woman’s voice belied her tiny size. Though her tones were soft Dr. Geddon’s words