Harriet Daimler

Pleasure Thieves

CHAPTER I

Their silent pounding bodies were suddenly accompanied by the jangling of door keys getting closer to the cell. They rushed their pleasure, hoping to cheat the always present, always might-be-present guard.

"Faster, faster, for Christ's sake," the younger man pleaded. And the rattling created by their bodies stopped, replaced by the unmistakable sound of a key sliding into the heavy iron lock. The older man with the wise lined face pulled his body away from the young imploring animal.

"You're insane." The door was swinging open, and his fear made him limp.

"Coward, coward," Harry mocked, and with a graceful arc, his body was off the cot and standing at the sink, his back to the unannounced guard. The jailer looked knowingly at Phillip, stretched out on the cot, lighting a long American cigarette. Then he regarded the shuddering back of the tall blond thief. The young ones needed it a lot. The older ones could do without, but they taught their inexperienced brothers.

Showed them more in a six-month stretch than they learned in ten years on the streets.

The guard humiliated the gasping back by addressing it.

"You've got a visitor, Harry."

That surprised him. Phillip often had callers, but Harry had no connection, no sentimental patchwork outside the prison.

"A visitor?" he turned, buttoning his trousers.

"A woman," the guard announced curtly. "She says she's not your sister." She obviously impressed him. Harry didn't answer. He silently followed the guard out of his cell, not looking at Phillip who was watching the burning tip of his cigarette with scientific intensity.