Unknown Diners

Chapter Thirty-Five

Catherine's iPhone chimed as they sipped their tea. She pulled it out from her computer sheath, thumbed it on and saw the flashing icon. "New email on WebMail. That must be Barbara." She opened the browser, tapped to the site and logged in.

Sorry, didn't think... If you're doing the walk-on ferry, we can pick you up at the terminal. Save a taxi.

She replied: Sailing over, anchoring in Plumper Cove on Keats.

Ten minutes later, another chime. We have guest moorage here in the marina. How big are you?

She replied: 20 metres.

Three minutes later: Big... Give me a few minutes.

Twenty minutes later: We'll send our tender over for you in the anchorage at 2010. I'm sure you're hard to miss, what's the boat's name?

Catherine saw Lorne's nod and sent a confirming email. Burgundy hull, the name Tastevin is on the bows and stern.

Lorne regained his seat from his tweaks after falling off and adjusting the sails and the vane to start running down the west side of Gambier. "They seem to be professional and efficient."

"Fancy outer garments. We've seen their dirty underwear."

The wind served them well, and mid-afternoon they sailed onto the anchor in the marine park. After they had settled in and Lorne had completed the logbook, they sat cuddling, pleasuring and talking. She reached down and hefted his sack. "The next team ready yet?"

"That feels so good when you hold me like that." He nodded at the clock on the panel. "Sixteen ten. Been a little over eight hours. Maybe wait another three or so to keep closer to the twelve hours. Add another ten or fifteen million to the team."

"My eternal scheduler. You have no idea how endearing you are. How much I love you." She gave his balls a gentle massage. "Keep working, guys." She looked up into his eyes and giggled. "The boss says you're not finished yet."

They continued their light conversation as they lay on the settee tenderly touching and caressing each other. After half an hour or so, Catherine asked, "So he stitched you up? With wire?"

"Yeah."

"I've been trying to sort out the mechanics of it. I can visualise sewing up a woman's vulval lips — some Muslims still do that. Fuck! They even cut away the clitoris. What a horrible ritual. So sick. But a penis? How?"

"Connolly pushed it back inside, squeezing the foreskin and —"

"Back inside?"

He sat up and shifted. "Like this." He worked his penis into his pubes, and she stared at the gathered empty skin. "He stitched through here, at the base of the skin, trapped me inside."

"Fuck! Hurt? I'm sure it must have."

"Not as much as when most of the stitches ripped out with the first of my nightly erections."

"Fuck!"

"Do you want to stop here?"

"Do you?"

"I can keep going a bit if you can." He brought her hand down. "Here, hold this." She took the gathered empty skin from him. "Feel the pressure?"

She nodded. "A lot of it. It certainly wants to escape."

"Imagine it with the force of an unstoppable nocturnal erection behind it."

"Fuck!"

"Let your hand loose. Watch."

"Fast. I can't imagine that with an erection's force behind it."

"You can still see the scars from the ripped stitches."

She bent down to examine and then kiss them. "So, that's the stitching thing Doctor Kellogg was writing about?"

"Yeah. Connolly had talked about how circumcision hadn't worked on him. He had done himself but he still masturbated."

"Done himself?"

"Yeah. His early sex education lessons included showing me pictures of him cutting his away."

"Fuck!"

"Stop for now?"

"Yeah."

They lay back in the cushions and cuddled. Silently.

They were awakened by loud shouting coming from a boat anchoring in the small bay. Catherine sighed as she turned to kiss his neck. "So common, isn't it? It's almost always the man... I shouldn't laugh. It's actually sad."

"Yeah, it is. I've always wondered what the woman was feeling. I still do."

She squeezed him tighter. "Embarrassed, diminished, belittled, emptied. That's some of it."

"Fuck."

"Yeah, at least for me, when Nathan... God, I love you."

He pointed to the clock. Eighteen forty-five. "Let's send in the next team a bit early."

She grabbed his hand. "Yeah, down in the cabin. Less disruption." They rose from the settee and headed below.

As she was kneeling and washing him in the shower an hour and a bit later, she said, "I'm amazed by how well this works, after all it's been through."

"I'm delighted you enjoy it. It's funny now, thinking of how revolted I was at the thought of your seeing it. Had to have been hypnosis."

"Sure makes sense to me." She rinsed it off, licked it and took the heads into her mouth, then backed off. "Quite a mouthful, even soft." She licked it again. "Once we can spare seeds to spill on fallow ground..." She giggled. "Torah training. Once we're past my fertile period, I'll be all over this." She took it into her mouth again and looked up into his eyes as she slowly nodded.

"Oh, my fuck. Oh, God!" He cradled the sides of her head as he trembled. Then he backed her slowly off. "We need to finish here, dry and dress. Molly's tender is due shortly."