4
1.
There were three sons, and at this time the eldest of the three was Orgone (the Wrestler). He was the best athlete in the kingdom. Twenty-six years old, his supremacy had been recognized for a decade, and though there were a fair number of athletes whose skills in particular sports or events were greater than his, every athlete nonetheless honored Orgone as foremost among them. This was because no athlete was superior to him in two important areas of bodily endeavor: wrestling and copulation.
2.
For instance, once, three years ago, young Ralph Bunn foolishly beat Orgone (by two-tenths of a second) in the 100-meter run. Orgone immediately threw a double hammerlock on Ralph and fractured both his arms. Then he took Ralph’s wife, Pearl, for a walk under the grandstands, where he screwed her three quick times in a row, dog-fashion, while the excited fans in the bleachers peered down through the slats and, with a frightening ferocity, cheered.
Ralph, lying at the end of the 100-meter runway, unattended, writhing in pain, was full of praise for Orgone’s marvelous running ability. — I jumped the gun! he kept insisting.
3.
Because of his reputation, Orgone was desired even by women who had only heard of him. Naturally, this added to his reputation. Who is more respected as a copulator than the man desired by women who have never even seen him? One defines respect here, however, as a careful form of envy, which is not true respect. Thus it was that a survey taken four years ago revealed that no fewer than 36,312 young men were traveling about the kingdom saying they were Orgone the Wrestler. Shrewdly, Orgone publicized a claim which he hitherto had made only in private, that he could satisfy anyone, male or female, he fucked, and the number of false Orgones quickly fell off.
4.
Orgone thought well of his father, the king, and treated him with deference. His younger brothers, men perhaps a shade more complex than he, he treated with derisive tolerance. He loved to snap their naked buttocks with a wet towel. Crr-r-ack! — Gettin’ much pussy? he demanded.
— Fuck off, they snarled in unison.
— Hah! ‘Course you’re not gettin’ any! Little ol’ puds like yours, who’d want to get stuffed with weenies like those, when they could have a goddamn sequoia! he roared, thrusting his enormous organ out in front of him, letting the warm waters of the shower splash over it.
5.
Later, serious, he said to Dread, — I like to work out. It’s as simple as that. To work myself right out of the world. If I push myself hard enough, to extremities that can be reached only if one is already in superb shape and is physically gifted, the only noise I can hear is that of my breath and blood, I see nothing except through a film, I am aware only of my body — and of that I am totally, almost religiously, aware. The intensity is exquisite. The same thing happens when I’m fucking someone. I become the world. All of it. I probably could accomplish the same thing with yoga, but how would it look for a dauphin to be a yogi? It’s more politique for me to get off on sports and balling.
6.
— Yeah, Dread mumbled. He cracked open his Belgian 10-gauge and peered down the barrels at the twin circles of light at the end. — That’s one way to deal with death. But it seems a bit of an avoidance, wouldn’t you say? I mean, why sublimate the inevitable?
He jammed a wad of oil-soaked cotton into one barrel and ran it to the end with a long, steel rod, catching it with his tobacco-stained fingertips.
7.
The youngest of the three, Egress, who had been feigning sleep, rolled over in his bunk and faced the others. — It occurs to me, he announced in his usual, pontifical manner, — that you’re both in your own ways protecting yourselves against the proper and necessary expressions of yourselves as the typical sons of a typical king and queen in a typical, middle-sized kingdom.
— And just exactly what “expression” would that be, Mister Wiseass? Orgone inquired.
— Violence, Egress said, smiling warmly. — Talk about sublimation, he added. — You two might as well be alcoholics. Or why not drugs? Sports, sex, death—hah! You guys make me laugh. You two run your egos as if they were government agencies and you meek bureaucrats, he laughed, pitching a handful of eightpenny finish nails at them.
8.
— Hey, knock it off, Egress, or I’ll pound the shit out of you! Orgone yelled, ducking the nails. Egress turned back to face the simulated-log wall next to his bunk. Dread continued cleaning his shotgun, as if nothing had happened, and after a few moments, Orgone resumed reading his pornographic magazine, chuckling loudly at the cartoons, trying occasionally, but vainly, to interest his brothers in ogling the photographs of the young women’s bodies. — Son of a bitch! he would cry. — How’d you like to get into that! After a while, unable to share his excitement with them, he lapsed into a leering silence and flipped through the pages with one hand, rubbing his lumpy crotch with the other.
9.
When Orgone had finished looking at the magazine, he put it down on the floor beside his Morris chair and said, — Listen, guys, I’ve been meaning to ask you something. What did you think of that creep in the green suit who was at court yesterday, the one Twit told us about? You two move in funnier circles than I do, so what do you think? Is he some kind of suicidal fairy? I mean, is the guy political?
He jumped up and started to crank out deep knee bends, his tight double-knit pants bulging hugely at the calf and thigh as he descended and ascended, one-two-three-four, one-two-three-four! He was able to finish fifty quick ones before either of his brothers could answer him.
10.
Dread responded with a cynical, weary laugh. Then he said, — Aren’t you really worried about how political the old man is?
Crown Prince Orgone leaped to the carpeted floor and snapped off a hundred perfect pushups. — One trouble with being in my kind of perfect condition, he said as he finished, — you have to work harder and harder just to get a little exercise. I mean, look at me! I’m not even breathing hard!
11.
— What the old man should do, Egress said, facing the wall, — is turn all three of us over to the guy. Then the question would be whether he had given us to him or him to us. Now that’s what you call “political,” he said pointedly. — He won’t, though. The old man’s not able to think abstractly, never mind act abstractly, for Christ’s sake, he snorted.
Orgone grabbed his sneakers from the closet and made for the door. — I’m going down to shoot a few baskets, maybe run some laps. Is that ballboy on duty today, the crippled one?
— You mean Twit? Dread asked.
— Yeah, the slimy one.
— You like that humpbacked, slimy stuff, eh? Dread teased good-naturedly.
— Try dope, Egress mumbled.
— Fuck you guys, Orgone said, slamming the door.
12.
On his way to the gymnasium, Orgone passed through his mother’s knot garden and, glancing up, saw his father staring down at him from the tower adjacent to his private office. To the left of his father, Orgone saw two black rooks fly into the sun. As he entered the gymnasium, a black cat scurried across his path. He shot, and missed, fourteen easy set-shots in a row, and then, ominously, made the fifteenth. After missing seven more, he gave up and ran a dozen laps on the track with Twit, who, later, in the shower, ejaculated prematurely and burst into tears, running from the room when Orgone began to curse. All the towels in Orgone’s locker had large rust-stains on them, and he dropped a bottle of body cologne on the tile floor and cut his left foot on a piece of the broken glass. These were omens, and Orgone knew it.