“Come on, honey,” Therese said, “let’s get it over. I got to get out again tonight.”
The boy stepped away from her voice, collided with the screen and abruptly sat on the bed. Before he could rise, Therese put her arms round him and drew him down. His hand touched the soft inner part of her thigh, and he stiffened with the horror of it.
She said, “I bet you ain’t had a woman before.” She said it quite kindly.
“Don’t touch me,” the boy almost whimpered; “getaway from me.”
Therese put her hand down on him. “Don’t be screwy. You got nothin’ to be scared of.”
Under her touch, a long-forgotten lust stirred in him. The quickening of his blood terrified him, and he threw her away from him so violently that she rolled on to the floor. He sat up in the dark. His shirt was plastered against his thin chest, and his eyes glared into the suffocating darkness.
For a moment there was a thick silence in the room, then she said, “All right, John, if that’s the way you want it.”
He swung his legs to the floor. “That’s not my name,” he said unevenly.
He heard her get to her feet and grope over to the table. “I don’t care a——what your name is, John. You’re gettin’ out of here quick.”
She struck a match and relit the lamp. She was quite naked, except for her shoes and stockings. The crumpled bills he had given her made a disfiguring lump in her leg. She adjusted the wick carefully and then turned. The boy saw she was furiously angry and he suddenly felt frightened of her. She mustn’t turn him out now. He would run into those soldiers, waiting outside for him.