Desire in the Isles

by Roland Graeme

  Following the directions which Stewart had given Stash, the three men strolled through Castlebay. To their surprise, the town appeared to be supported in part by a modest tourist industry. The place was certainly more sophisticated and cosmopolitan than some of the other communities they’d seen.

  It was late in the afternoon, and, taking advantage of the warm weather, people were enjoying a late lunch or afternoon tea on tables set on the sidewalks outside cafés.

  As usual, Stash had done his homework.

  “Tomorrow we’ll visit Kisimul Castle, which is the home of the chief of the Clan MacNeil,” he said. “It’s open to the public. Back in the sixteenth century the castle was a base for pirate raids on English ships.”

  Stewart’s house, and the steam bath, was on the outskirts of the town, a short walking distance from the harbor.

  Stash, Carter, and Martin found the place without any difficulty. The property was enclosed inside a low wall, constructed of bricks of a distinctive soft rose-red hue. The house and the nearby bathhouse were built with the same bricks. Both structures were elegant, late Victorian in design. The grounds were landscaped and densely planted, with rosebushes competing with hollies, clipped boxwood, and other shrubs.

  A signpost beside the gate advertised McIntyre’s Steam Baths, founded 1926.

  “My God. This place has been in business that long?” Carter exclaimed.

  “Apparently. Think of all the semen which must’ve been spilled here, over the years,” Stash said.

  “Shame on you,” Carter replied, with a laugh. “That’s the sort of thing you’d expect me to say!”

  When they rang the bell, their host appeared. Excitedly, Stewart shook their hands, and then he took them into a sitting room. The furnishings were classic English Country, with an overstuffed sofa, armchairs, and ottoman, all upholstered in flowered chintz. Bric-à-brac of every conceivable sort, including some mournful-looking Staffordshire dogs, was displayed everywhere. Framed on the walls were some old advertisements for the bathhouse. One of these proclaimed that the establishment was An excellent resource for the restoration of the body and the calming of the mind.

  There was a fireplace, but in this warm weather its hearth held not logs, but an oversized, elaborate Minton majolica jardinière containing a pot of spring bulbs.

  “You’re just in time for tea,” Stewart said.

  He served tea, accompanied by sandwiches, scones, and sponge cake. An enormous tortoiseshell cat suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Strolling about on the carpet around the visitors’ feet, it scrutinized them with its wide brown eyes, and then it emitted a distinctly scornful-sounding meow.

  “That’s Jamie,” Stewart said. “Ignore him. The fat lazy bugger thinks he owns the place. He warms up to strangers eventually, but it takes him a while.”

  Carter indicated his camera. “Do you mind if I film, while you and Stash talk?” he asked.

  “Not at all. Not in here, anyway,” Stewart said.

  Carter shot some footage of Jamie, who obligingly lay on his back on the carpet in front of the fireplace, rolling back and forth with his four legs rather whorishly spread and his furry tummy exposed. Then Carter turned his attention to Stewart.

  Stewart responded to Stash’s questions, without any hesitation.

  “I’m very lucky, which I admit. I inherited a sizeable trust fund from my grandparents. As a result, I don’t really have to work for a living. I can do as I please. I run the bathhouse here, of course. But I’m also free to travel. I meet men on the internet—mostly other Scottish men who live in Edinburgh, Glasgow, or Perth, and so forth. If they can’t come to me here on Barra, I go to them. We hook up. We fuck,” Stewart said, frankly. “Why not? Why shouldn’t we?”

  “Can’t think of a reason why you shouldn’t,” Stash said.

  “Damn right. I like sex. Why shouldn’t I get as much of it as I want?”

  “So—despite the fact that you live here, on a small, isolated island—you still manage to enjoy yourself?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I find that fascinating. So what you’re telling me is that even in this isolated place you’ve managed to establish a network of sexual contacts.”

  “You seem surprised. I don’t see why,” Stewart said. “If anything, it’s routine—quite banal, actually. Sex is sex. Men, wherever they live, they somehow manage to find it. They seek out other like-minded men, and they satisfy themselves. All very easy and uncomplicated, when you think of it. I do my small part to facilitate the process. That’s all.”

  “Still, I think your story here is unusual, and interesting,” Stash insisted.

  Stewart was an excellent interview subject. He spoke freely to Stash about his life as a gay man on the island, while Carter filmed him. Stewart’s only stipulations were that the steam bath would be mentioned only in passing, and that no filming would take place on its premises.

  “I’m torn,” Stewart admitted. “Discussing my business at length on your show would be great publicity, and no doubt good for business. But on the other hand, I can’t afford to scare off my straight clientele, which I do rely on. Unfortunately, this isn’t London or Edinburgh. Gay life here is still kept under wraps, for the most part. Maybe that will change, during my lifetime. I hope so.”

  “I promise to be discreet when I edit this footage for the program,” Stash assured him.

  “Thanks. Well, gentlemen, if you’re ready, I’d like to give you a tour of the baths. I have to admit, I take a certain pride in it. Leave your camera here, Carter. It’ll be quite safe.”

  The four men left the house and walked to the bathhouse building.

  The front desk was manned by a muscular young number, in jeans and a tight-fitting T-shirt, which displayed his torso, shoulders, and chest to good advantage.

  “This is Malcolm, my right-hand man,” Stewart said. “I leave him in charge when I take my trips to the mainland. Besides him, I have three other guys working for me. I need them, you see, because we’re open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Even on holidays.”

  “That means you must keep the steam going day and night?” Carter guessed.

  “Exactly. In fact, I want to show you the steam room first.”

  Stewart led them through a locked door, into a large room. Carter was startled by what he saw. Inside the brick-walled space, a cluster of ornate machinery had an almost archaic, steam-punk look to it.

  “This equipment looks old,” Stash remarked.

  “It is. The boiler’s late nineteenth-century, but still works perfectly. It produces a tremendous amount of steam. Originally, it powered a small steam ship which ran aground near here. Before she broke up, everything which could be salvaged was, including the engine and the boiler. Ordinarily, the boiler would’ve been used in another ship. But the man who owned this property at the time was a bit of an amateur inventor. He wanted to tinker with various pieces of machinery which could be operated by steam. This building was originally a warehouse. The boiler was hauled here, and part of a wall had to be demolished to get it inside the building. One of the things the inventor did was lay pipes underground, to heat the house in the wintertime. Later, he had the idea of creating his own private steam bath, in which to entertain his male guests, as well as enjoying it himself. When my family bought the property, three generations ago, all they had to do was start enlarging the interior spaces, as they went commercial. The baths catered to sailors at first. Then it got a big boost during World War II, when so many merchant marines passed through here on convoys, and Navy men stopped here too, on furlough.” Stewart grinned. “Well, are you ready to take the steam?”

  “Absolutely,” Stash said, and Carter and Martin echoed him.

  “It’s on the house, of course. Let me get you gentlemen towels, and room keys.”

  Carter, Martin, and Stash were assigned three adjacent cubicles, each of which had a narrow bed, a small beside table, and wall hooks for clothes. They stripped, wrapped the to
wels around their waists, and left the rooms, locking the doors behind them with the keys they’d been given, which were on rubber bands which could put around the wrists.

  “It’s amazing to see this place here, really in the middle of nowhere. We might be in a big city with a large gay population, back in the States,” Stash remarked.

  “And you’re know that because you regularly patronize such establishments?” Carter asked.

  “And you don’t?” Stash retorted—which made Martin smirk.

  “Truce,” Carter suggested. “So, what’s the plan?”

  “Let’s split up and explore. If any or all three of us gets laid—that’s fine. What goes on here on Barra, stays in Barra. Agreed?”

  “Agreed.”

  “Good hunting.”

  “Same to you.”

  They separated.

  The interior of the bathhouse was a labyrinth of corridors, dimly lit, warm. Passing the closed door of a cubicle, Carter heard the unmistakable sounds of sex coming from inside the room. There was the slap of flesh against flesh, the squeak of old-fashioned metal bedsprings, and heavy breathing, punctuated by moans of pleasure.

  “Oh, fuck me!” a man’s deep voice demanded. “Get that big hard cock deep in my bum!” The speaker’s strong Scottish accent made fuck sound like fook, and cock sound like cawk. Interestingly enough, Carter found these linguistic quirks highly stimulating. Prowling about naked except for the towel wrapped around his waist, he felt his dick expanding, pressing urgently against the front of the coarse terrycloth covering.

  Shit—sex—yeah, lots of sex going on in here, obviously! Carter told himself. If I can’t get laid in here, it sure won’t be for lack of trying!

  Exploring the maze of narrow hallways barefoot, Carter turned a corner, and he collided with another virtually naked, towel-clad man.

  “Sorry,” Carter said.

  “Don’t be. Um, you’re hot. How about a kiss?”

  “We haven’t been properly introduced,” Carter protested, primly.

  “Improper introductions are the rule of thumb here. You’ve got a funny sort of an accent. What are you, an American?”

  “Guilty.”

  “You’re forgiven. I like Yanks. Every one I’ve ever met—he’s been hot as fuck.”

  “I’ll do my best not to disappoint you. To do my part to hold up Americans’ reputation.”

  “You’re far away from home.”

  “Yeah. Traveling. And having a good time here in the Hebrides, and especially here on Barra, so far.”

  “Maybe I should take it upon myself to make sure your visit is very enjoyable,” the other man suggested.

  During this conversation, Carter and his new acquaintance had been checking out other, quite objectively and shamelessly. Each man was assessing the other one’s potential as a sex partner.

  Carter’s possible trick was a big man, heavily muscled, with a pale skin which contrasted starkly with his black hair and black eyes.

  He was rather rough-looking, Carter decided, which he also decided wasn’t necessarily a deal-breaker. In his coarse way, this Scot was very handsome, with a slightly swarthy look about him—that jet black hair, that matching heavy beard stubble. His broad smile was devastatingly sexy, the sides of his eyes crinkling up seductively when he grinned. And he had beautifully even, white teeth and the most sensual full lips Carter had recently seen on a man.

  His body was very hairy, which Carter found a turn-on.

  “My name’s Quentin,” the man said.

  “Very Scottish. Mine’s Carter.”

  “Very American.”

  When Quentin looked at Carter and flicked out his tongue to lick and moisten his lips, Carter’s cock throbbed behind its token covering of terrycloth, as he thought about that mouth and that tongue caressing his meat, coaxing the hot, pent-up come out of it.

  Quentin wasn’t quite as tall as Carter, but he was stocky and muscular, and Carter envisioned that hidden—barely!—under the other guy’s towel there must be a nice, fat prick, a hard round ass, and a pair of solid, husky thighs. Speculating about these things, Carter suddenly felt light-headed and giddy with lust.

  “Are you a sailor?” Quentin asked.

  “Not professionally,” Carter replied. “My friends and I came here by boat, but as passengers.”

  The other man nodded. “We’re on a trawler. We fish these waters. We make the rounds of most of the islands. Every time we drop anchor here in Castlebay, though, I make sure to come here to the bathhouse. I need to sweat the smell of the fish out of me. And this is a surefire place in which to get laid, here in the Hebrides. I always have a good time here, and I hate to leave. You’ve met the owner, Stewart, have you?”

  “Yes, I have. He seems to be a very nice guy.”

  “Oh, he’s the best. Salt of the earth. Friendly. Generous. And one hell of a horny little fucker, of course. How about you, sport? Are you a horny fucker, too?”

  “I’m willing to let you be the judge of that.”

  “I’ve got a locker. I didn’t bother to pay for a room. I thought I’d go check out the orgy room. Join me?”

  “Orgy room? There’s such a thing here? The place doesn’t look large enough. And I thought straight guys come here, too.”

  Quentin grinned. “What they don’t know won’t hurt them. The orgy room’s a secret, although not a very well-kept one. Stewart and his employees make sure any customer who looks as though he might be interested in some group action finds out about it, sooner or later. Come on, I’ll show you. This way.”

  Quentin led Carter down the hallway. At the far end, the two men turned the corner—and Carter saw a narrow staircase, leading upward. Slung across the foot of the stairs was a chain, from which dangled a sign saying Private. No admittance past this point.

  Unhooking one end of the chain, Quentin gestured for Carter to precede him up the stairs. Following Carter, Quentin replaced the chain and sign.

  “See how easy?” Quentin asked. “Now you know the secret entry code,” he joked. “Guard it well.”

  At the top of the stairs there was a closed, but unlocked door. On it, a second sign, identical to the first, repeated the warning Private. No admittance past this point.

  “Additional security,” Quentin quipped, as he opened the door and ushered Carter through it. “Crude, I suppose, but effective enough.”

  Carter found himself in a dimly-lit, low-ceilinged space. It was windowless. The only light was supplied by low-wattage red-tinted bulbs in frosted glass fixtures fastened to the brick walls. The room was large enough for much of it to be lost in shadows. Steam issued from narrow horizontal vents high in the walls. The air was very warm and humid, and condensation beaded the walls and dripped down them.

  “We’re right under the roof,” Quentin explained. “Up here—you can suck and fuck, like an animal, with impunity. No names. No limits. And no regrets.”

  “Yeah? That sounds good,” Carter said.

  The floor, Carter saw, was covered by padded wrestling mats and mattresses, the latter encased in black rubber fitted bottom sheets. In the somber and slightly eerie red glow thrown by the light fixtures, the room seemed to be filled from wall to wall male bodies, most of them naked, a few retaining their towels, but all of them highly aroused. Many of the men were already engaged in energetic sexual activity, while others watched.

  “Suck me!” Carter heard a man exclaim. “Oh, suck my hot, dirty, horny cock!”

  “Fuck me!” another of the bathhouse patrons demanded. “Get that big prick deep in my arse! Come on, you fucker. Ream me out. Screw the hell out of my hole!”

  Quentin turned to Carter, with a knowing smile. “We seem to have come to the right place—haven’t we, lad?”

  “Yeah,” Carter responded.

  “Anything goes, up here. Don’t be shy. Go for it. Do whatever you feel like doing.”

  The arrival of two newcomers attracted some attention. Heads turned in Quentin and Carter’s direct
ion. Carter’s cock began pulsating painfully with excitement, and he could feel his mouth beginning to fill with saliva. As he saw several naked guys stare lustfully at him, he quite instinctively put his hand on his bulging crotch and began rubbing it through the terrycloth, as a lewd invitation to the searching, hungry eyes.

  Quentin nonchalantly pulled his towel off, and Carter did the same. They draped the towels over wall hooks provided for that purpose. Then both of them walked naked, their erections bobbing up and down with erotic urgency, into the center of the orgy room.

  Almost immediately, Carter felt a warm palm close over his ass cheek, and then somebody’s fingertip began rubbing its way up and down his hairy butt crack. Then, even more boldly, another hand was on his dick, massaging it passionately back and forth.

  Carter stumbled against another man’s nude body and, righting himself, he saw that two guys were lying on the mattress-covered floor at his feet, kissing each other on the mouth while they fucked—with one guy’s legs thrown up over the other’s shoulders, and his asshole clasped tightly around his reaming cockshaft. The couple humped away and moaned loudly together, as though they were the only two men in the room.

  Suddenly, other hands grabbed at Carter’s waist and pulled the unresisting American down into a sea of writhing, naked male bodies. His head went down and came to rest against somebody’s upturned bare ass, and as he twisted his head to look above him, Carter saw a gigantic cock and balls hanging in his face.

  He grabbed the cockhead between his lips and began fervently sucking on this anonymous tool, feeling it thrust itself deep into his mouth.

  Then he saw Quentin lying beside him, and Quentin’s cock being sucked by another naked man. Carter turned quickly and began licking Quentin’s chest, letting his tongue drip its way all over that husky, hair-covered expanse. He saw that, as Quentin lay on the mattress, his back against another naked back, that Quentin’s torso and legs were covered with black, curly hair, the hair becoming a mass of dense black thatch around the base of his huge, jutting prick.

  While Carter alternately licked Quentin’s body and the cock of the guy he’d started to suck, he felt somebody’s tongue lick his own crack and find his asshole, thrusting its hot wetness deep inside.