As I went to fall in with my company I met the regimental postman who handed me a letter which I saw at a glance was from my beloved Louie. I had a conviction that there would be bad news in it. Bad news! Oh! what had I become when I deemed it bad news to hear that she was starting by the next mail to come to join me in India! And further that she had waited until now to announce that we had another baby to expect – the fruits of our too prolific fucking – about March next. She had not been sure and did not like to mention it until she was certain; the usual signs did not show themselves; but now she was certain that a baby was really in existence and had run nearly six months of its natural life! Then – if she did come – and Louie was a woman of her word – I should have before me a time when I should not have that intense pleasure in fucking her which I had when her womb was free from lading.

She said from my letters my spirits seemed increasingly low, that she was getting more and more alarmed and that coute que coute she would come and join me; she did not know where but she would find out in Bombay on landing. Next mail here! she must be in the Red Sea now! Or perhaps in the Indian Ocean and she would get to Fackabad almost as soon as we would! Oh! Fanny! Fanny! How could I have you now? Gods! To think that the day had come when I did not want the woman who at one time had persuaded my soul and my senses that I should never care for another; the woman whose darling cunt alone made my prick stand and had taken the shine out of all others! I was, I tell you, dear readers, torn with contending emotions. It was too late to stop Louie. She was as surely on her way as I had felt Mabel's dear little cunt! I should never fuck it now! No! nor Fanny's either. And just as I had at last made up my mind that I could no longer, without dishonour to myself or either of these charming girls, stay the craving which we all three felt.

No wonder Lavie who soon joined me on the dusty road found me glum and cast down.

'Look here, Devereaux!' said he. 'I know well what it is. You are just killing yourself with the foolish fancy that your prick will never stand again! Now listen to me! Be wise and give up such absurd ideas! You will find the old gentleman lift himself up again some day soon if you will leave him alone and let him wear off his sulks; but if your mind dwells on it you may render yourself permanently impotent, for the mind has great power over the senses. I'll just tell you a little story of myself as an illustration. It happened at Woolwich three years ago; I had been on duty at the Herbert Hospital and a brother officer came walking home with me in the evening, a fellow I was very fond of. It was about nine o'clock and on passing the artillery barracks I saw a very nice-looking girl, evidently a poll, standing on the pavement. I wished her good-night and asked her if she was expecting anybody. "Yes dear," she said, "I was expecting you."

'"Oh!" said I, "then come along and I'll go home with you. Where do you live?"

'"In Wood Street," said she.

'"That is not your street, Lavie," said my friend, "and it is mine, so you had better let me see the young lady home and go to your lodging yourself."

'"Not I," I replied laughing. "I want a poke and I am going to fuck this girl – am I not, my dear?"

'"Of course," said she, "you asked me first and I'll come with you but if your friend likes I'll go to him or he can come to me when you are done."

'"Buttered buns!" said my friend laughing. "No, thank you. Tomorrow night, however, if you will meet me at the road to the cemetery at eight I will take you home and we will have it out then."

'"All right," said she.

Well, we walked on and soon were at Wood Street and, just as the girl turned in at her gate and I was following her, my friend called out to her, "You had far better have come with me for Lavie is good for nothing and you'll get no change out of his balls tonight." The girl laughed and so did I.

'Well, we went upstairs to her bedroom and undressed and she was as fine and nicely made a little poll as you ever saw: good bubbies, nice skin, good arms and legs, and a fine black bush hiding a soft fat little cunt! But by Jove! I could not get a stand! The words of my friend kept ringing in my ears and I kept thinking to myself my God! fancy if it comes true! – and true it did come, simply because I doubted my own power. The poor girl was very much put about. Everything she could think of was tried – but in vain – to make my brute of a prick stand. I wanted to pay her and leave her, for I was miserable, but she like a little darling would not let me go. "You try and sleep," said she, "I won't touch you any more and I dare say your prick will be all right by morning and we can fuck then." I thought I never would sleep but at last I dozed off and, I suppose in an hour's time, woke up and found I had a glorious stand. The girl was fast asleep with her back towards me. Without wakening her I got one of my legs between hers, working myself round and along her until I had the right direction, and when she woke I had my prick buried in her cunt up to my balls. Well, she would not have it that way but insisted on my doing Adam and Eve and I never enjoyed a night's fucking more. I had her seven or eight times and when I went away after she had given me some breakfast she asked me if she had not done right to not let me go? She said she knew it was only nervous depression and the effect of fancy and that she had more than once had experience with it and so was not surprised when she was disappointed. So you see, Devereaux, how I, who had no such cause as you have to be weak, lost my power from simple imagination. Don't you indulge in fears any more.'

I thanked Lavie heartily for his sympathy and then told him how I had quite unexpectedly recovered; how I had had a wet dream and how delighted I had been. He was glad to hear what I had told him as he had begun to get alarmed for me but he evidently was curious to know why I was so very despondent. So I told him it arose from my having received a letter from my wife announcing her speedy arrival in India with a six months' baby in her belly and I said I was alarmed for her safety. Lavie was quite taken in and the rest of our conversation turned on the folly of pregnant women undertaking long and tedious journeys; the terrors of the hot weather; infant mortality in India and so forth, but my mind lamented the lost chance of dear Fanny's cunt just as it seemed so well within my reach.

On arrival at Akhtora I went direct to the Selwyn tent and found Mrs Selwyn and the colonel sitting in the shade of it, for the sun was burning hot although the air was so cool, it being in the middle of the delicious cool weather of northern India. Fanny who was sitting by her mother's side blushed. Oh! she blushed a beet-red blush which fortunately her mother did not see. Mabel standing in the tent door leaning against the door-pole grinned at me and turned red too for a moment and knowing that she had a dark background she gave me a perfect contour of her rising bosom, swelling out her fine little bubbies as much as she could and showing her legs too by occasionally putting her foot up against the opposite door-pole as high as she could reach. She had extremely good legs and very pretty feet and ankles. Jardine and Amy were sitting at the far corner of the tent. The colonel soon went off to see the camp and I then told Mrs Selwyn about Louie's letter.

Both she and Fanny called out in surprise at the sudden determination Louie had taken and looked at one another. Poor Fanny turned as white as death. So white that I thought she was going to faint. Mrs Selwyn saw it but fortunately did not put it down to the real cause.

'Fanny! Fanny! God bless the child! Did you ever see a mortal turn so white in a second?'