Snowdrops from a Curate’s Garden

THE NEEDS OF THE NAVY The air of the room was quite sweet and heavy with the savour of forbidden kisses ; a faint moist sense of sweat steamed up in the twilight, and there was a sound of breath that did not dare to breathe, of sighs choked by fear. The midship- man’s head silently turned round and his tongue pushed languidly forward to touch the lips of the lieutenant. A sound in the next room ; both trem- bled violently, sprang from the sofa where they had been lying and hastily arranged the disorder their passion had made necessary. The middy took his lover’s hand, raised it to his lips, bit it hard with sudden mad desire and whispered, in a voice shuddering with un-satiated lust “ Ah God ! Ah God ! I love you now ! ” He slipped through the door and left Andrew Clayton to sweet memories and disquieting thought of the future. For Monty Le W... had never given him his love before. Monty was a dark, languid-eyed boy with jetty hair ; there was about him the indefinable air that sexual per- verts recognize so quickly, a closer union than ma- sonry can boast. In fact, he had not been on board H.M.S. Osiris a week before the Captain had pro- moted him to a dignity sufficiently high to excite the envy of the boys who had till then held the proud distinction of favourite catamite. A furious battle between the jealous beauties ended in their growing so excited over the spilt blood and the vio- lent physical pain that the spectators were scan- dalized by the sight of an impromptu orgie as infu- riate as the fight had originally been. The boys were [81]