END OF VOLUME SIXTH

Volume 7

Chapter I

Gertrude's history continued. • Lusts roused. • The sister's confidences. • The wounded Captain. • Gertrude's nursing. • Antonio's greed. • Margaretta's moral views. • The Captain's lust. • The price of the watch. • Gertrude reckless. • The Captain's exhibition. • Success by the bedside. • Margaretta with child. • Gertrude and Captain at Paris. • Her disappointment. • Her love for me. • Our secret meetings. • The Captain's sodomitic wishes. • They separate. • She marries. • His death. • Her fine qualities. • Of my treachery.

Next day the battle of Solferino was fought. Every hotel and house in the town was filled with the wounded French, most of the Austrians were taken elsewhere. Every body was compelled to help the wounded. — Gertrude, a strong, big woman, was glad to get an employment at the largest hotel, in which most of the French officers wounded were placed. — Her future pseudo husband with a wounded leg was among them; and it fell to her lot to attend to him in some degree when his soldier servant was not there.

So as to make room for worse cases (the hospital headquarters were in the hotel), the Captain, like others, was moved to a private house. He had money, he liked her attention to him, and for money she went to attend him there. One day, when better, he threw his arms round her, kissed her, and said he wished she was his wife. Soon after he let his clothes be so disarranged that she saw his cock standing stiff as he lay, and either was, or shammed being, asleep. — She looked at his cock attentively and felt a liking for him. The cock evoked her lust, and she went to her room and frigged herself.

Both sisters never mentioned to any person the shagging the soldiers had given them, but it had a very stimulating effect on both. — Margaretta, it seems, had never referred to Gertrude's escapade with her lover at Strasbourg, nor talked about marriage pleasures, nor seemingly, as I made out in my many conversations with Gertrude, done or said anything to make Gertrude long for a cock to be put up her. She wanted evidently to stop sexual aspirations, to keep her steady, and get her married as soon as possible. — Gertrude told me that she herself was late in her monthlies coming on, and had no great longings for a male, and had not frigged herself till seventeen or eighteen years old. — She had spent with her lover at Strasbourg, and she pined after him, but it was for him rather than for fucking.

An Italian was at this time paying attentions to Gertrude, of what are called an honorable sort. But she never thought of his fucking her, and no man had laid hands on her ankles even, still less touched her quim, since her Strasbourg lover, till the soldiers did. — That shock to her nervous system set her and her sister eternally talking about fucking. The very night of the affair, tho half dead with fright and fatigue, the excitement and irritation of her cunt and brain was such that she frigged herself. There was such difficulty in getting accommodations in the overcrowded town, which they could pay for, that the whole family slept on the floor in one room. Her brain would not let her sleep, fucking was on her brain. The old man and children alone slept soundly, she laid as if asleep, in hopes Antonio would stroke her sister. — Margaretta had told her that she also felt need to be fucked again. — Antonio had been out all next day to see about his affairs, the two women talked about fucking all day, and about the soldiers' pricks and spunk. They compared their experiences, and at last frigged themselves before each other. — Margaretta told Gertrude what sort of prick Antonio had, and how often he fucked, and Gertrude told Margaretta, how her lover first got into her. There was at last complete confidences about sexual matters between them. — Lewedness had taken possession of them, and it's not to be wondered at.

The next night all huddled together, Margaretta let Antonio shag her. — She knew Gertrude close by was feigning to sleep, for the two women had so arranged it between themselves. — Antonio had hesitated for fear Gertrude should awake. — “Hush — no” — he said. But his wife, his cock in her hand, mused it up till he eased it in her. — Gertrude frigged herself — Margaretta imagined to herself a soldier doing it to her whilst Antonio operated. Gertrude's masturbations were accompanied by similar thoughts, about the many cocks which had plugged her cunt. — Working and at-tending to the wounded, then separated the two much after that night, but they talked of the soldiers when-ever they met. Some time after, Margaretta was ashamed of having let Gertrude know about her hus- band's fuckings. — Gertrude ceased to frig herself much, but now looked on men with different eyes, and desired to have one at her cunt, instead of her fingers. She wished she was married, for Margaretta had disclosed everything, even to the size and look of her husband's cock — the reserve which Margaretta formerly had maintained on such topics, for fear of encouraging lewedness in her sister, was gone for ever.

The sight of the Captain's doodle stimulated Gertrude's want of a male. — Soon he kissed her again, she kissed him, and a circumstance brought things to a crisis about two months after the battle. The Captain could then move about with crutches in his room, but could not get his trowsers on.

Antonio's house, barns, and stores were burnt, and he was nearly ruined, like hundreds of other peasant farmers. He had some money, but was not spending it. The Austrian officers had promised to pay for the things they had taken, and there was compensation to come — but they could not be realizable till the end of the war. — He and his wife worked in all sorts of ways to get money. His object was to get back to his farm, and make the place habitable again. A good opportunity then offered, but money was needed, and then her sister reminded Gertrude of her watch, chain, and money. — She agreed to sell it and lend the proceeds privately to Margaretta, but how to sell it was the difficulty. They went to a Jew, who offered something ridiculously small, and told them he knew that they had stolen it, and would tell the police. — “Ask the Captain to sell it — or buy it of you” — said Margaretta. “He is fond of you.”

Another difficulty arose. What would Anotonio think about Gertrude having the money? — “Say the Captain gave it you for nursing him,” said Margaretta. — “No,” said Gertrude, — “Antonio will think I've been letting him do it to me.” — “What if he does?” — said the other. — Now she had never told her husband that her sister Gertrude had been poked by her lover at Strasbourg, and sent quietly to them on account of that; having a fear perhaps that, if he knew it, he might fancy a poke in the same hole himself. — Gertrude refused, but the sister became so pressing, said how kind they had been to her, what a help it would be to them all if Antonio could only get back and pay for roofing their cottage (the walls were standing) and they could start again, that she prevailed on Gertrude to try to sell it to him.

Gertrude asked the Captain if he would sell the things for her. — “Mon dieu,” said he, “they are worth 1500 francs.” — She was staggered — thinking them not worth a quarter of the money. — The Jew had offered her 100 francs. — Who gave it her? — Her lover before he joined his regiment. — The Captain at once said she was lying. — “He must have been a gentleman, and well off then, for there are armorial bearings on it — and the watch is of German make — why the watch alone would have bought your lover off the conscription.” — She stuck to it that it was all true.

— “La, la, la, I see it. Your lover kept you and gave you it — now wasn't you his mistress?” — in vain she denied it. — “You come and live with me,” said he.