Delta of Venus - Anais Nin [101]
They sometimes drove to the abandoned farmhouse and spent the afternoon there. They became so saturated with lovemaking that if Pierre kissed Martha’s eyelids she could feel it between her legs. Their bodies were charged with desire, and they could not exhaust it.
John seemed a pale image. They did not notice that he was observing them. The change in Pierre was apparent. His face glowed, his eyes looked ardent, his body became younger. And the change in her: Voluptuousness was inscribed all over her body. Every move she made was sensual – serving coffee, reaching for a book, playing chess, playing the piano, she did everything caressingly. Her body became fuller and her breasts tauter under her clothes.
John could not sit between them. Even when they did not look at each other or speak to each other, he could feel a powerful current between them.
One day when they had driven to the abandoned farm, John, instead of continuing his studies, felt a wave of laziness and the desire to be out-of-doors. He got on his bicycle and began to ride aimlessly, not thinking of them but perhaps half-consciously remembering the rumor in the orphanage that Martha had been abandoned by a well-known prostitute. All his life, it seemed to him that, while he loved Martha, he also feared her. He felt that she was an animal, that she could enjoy people as she enjoyed food, that her point of view about people was completely opposed to his. She would say, ‘He is beautiful,’ or ‘She is charming.’ He would say, ‘He is interesting,’ or ‘She has character.’
Martha had expressed sensuality even as a little girl, in wrestling with him, in caressing him. She liked to play hide-and-seek, and if he could not find her she would give away her hiding place so he would catch her, gripping her dress. Once they were playing together and had built a small tent. They found themselves huddled together, very close. Then he saw Martha’s face. She had closed her eyes to enjoy the warmth of their bodies together, and John had felt a tremendous fear. Why fear? All through his life he was haunted by this recoil from sensuality. He could not explain it to himself. But there it was. He had seriously thought of becoming a monk.
Now, without thinking of his destination, he had reached the old farmhouse. He had not seen it for a long time. He walked softly over the moss and overgrown grass. Out of curiosity he entered it and began to explore. So he came quietly upon the bedroom where Pierre and Martha were. The door was open. He stopped, transfixed by the sight. It was as if his greatest fear had come alive. Pierre was lying back, eyes half-closed, and Martha, completely naked, was behaving like a demon, climbing over him, in a frenzy of hunger for his body.
John stood paralyzed with the shock of the scene, and yet took it all in. Martha, smooth, voluptuous, was not only kissing Pierre’s sex, but crouching over his mouth, and then throwing herself against his body and rubbing her breasts against his, and he lay back, entranced, hypnotized by her caresses.
After a moment John rushed off without being heard. He had seen the very worst of the infernal vices, confirming his fear that it was Martha who was the erotic one, and he believed that his adopted father was merely yielding to her passion. The more he sought to erase this scene from his mind, the more it penetrated into his whole being, stark, indelible, haunting.