The Sun Goes Down

by James Lear

  “Boston. Ever been?”

  “Farthest west I’ve been is Hammersmith.” We stopped at a bakery, rows of pastries and breads in the window. The smell from inside was delicious. Conrad exchanged a few words in Maltese with the woman at the counter, who started stuffing things into paper bags.

  “Here we go. A meal fit for a king. Let’s go to the park.” On the other side of the main square, a row of palm trees made way for elaborate iron gates; beyond them were slightly unkempt formal gardens, the gift of the British Empire to even the most inappropriate climates. Roses struggled in dry, dusty soil, while uninvited native plants climbed, crept and flowered where the gardeners could not prevent them from doing so. An ornamental fountain depicting Neptune and dolphins appeared to have broken down. A few couples and families were strolling along the paths; Conrad led me to a stone bench at the far side.

  “Right,” he said, spreading the contents of his bag between us. “Pastizzi, the best food in the world.” Small pastry parcels, golden and warm. “And this is the local cheese. Bit of an acquired taste, makes you stink, but I love it.” White balls wrapped in paper, studded with what looked like whole peppercorns. “And for afters, if you’ve got room, this.” He produced a large pastry ring, covered with diagonal slashes through which sticky black treacle oozed. “And somewhere in here…” He rummaged in his kitbag and produced a large bottle of beer. “Dig in.”

  If I stayed too long in Malta I was going to end up the size of a house. Sergeant Major Conrad looked lean enough, but he probably spent every day doing vigorous physical activity. My only regular exercise is fucking, and I’d need a lot more of that if I was going to feed myself like this.

  Bill stuffed his face, washing it down with swigs of beer, wiping his mouth on the back of his hairy hand. I followed suit. He was right: the food was great.

  “What brings you over to Gozo, Bill? Work, you said, I think.”

  “Picking you up, mate. That, and a bit of bloody silly paperwork that needed sorting out up the road. They couldn’t organize a piss-up in a brewery, that lot.”

  “I bet you could.”

  “Yeah.” He passed me the bottle, still wet from his lips. “My drinking days are over, though. Army life knocked all that out of me. Used to run around the pubs back home, getting pissed every night, getting into trouble. Too much of that. It was either join up and sort myself out or end up in prison. Or dead.”

  “And here you are, very much alive.”

  “Yep. No regrets.” He rubbed his head. “Not many, anyway. It’s not a bad life.”

  “Sunshine. Good food.”

  “Yeah, all that. Not many birds though.”

  “Local girls not too friendly?”

  “They’re friendly enough, as long as you don’t mind their fathers coming after you with a shotgun. They like their daughters to be virgins. Catholics.” Cafflicks. He tutted.

  “Plenty of girls in Valetta, though.” Like most ports, Valetta was famous for whores.

  “Not my cup of tea, mate. I’ve never paid for it, and I don’t intend to start.”

  I thought of the five bucks I’d handed to Joseph Vella. “I should think not. Besides, you don’t want to catch anything, do you?”

  “That’s what Doc Southern’s always on about. He spends half his time dealing with the clap. I had it once, when I was seventeen, and that was enough of that, thanks very much.”

  “So now you just take care of yourself?”

  “You calling me a wanker?”

  “I guess I am.”

  He punched me lightly on the shoulder. “Get away.” And that, it seemed, was the end of that, as Conrad addressed himself to the more serious business of filling his belly, laughing as he did so. The setting sun was still warm, and when he’d finished eating he leaned back on his elbows and stretched his legs in front of him. “Lovely. And no work to do till I take you back tomorrow.”

  “How are we getting there?”

  “I’ll take one of the motorboats. They’ve got half a dozen of them around the place. One of them’s down your neck of the woods.”

  “Xlendi?”

  “Yeah. We use them instead of that fucking rust bucket they call a ferry. They were all out yesterday, but tomorrow I get to bring one back with you in it.”

  “That’s convenient,” I said. You can already see where my mind was leading me, I’m sure. “Are you billeted here for the night?”

  “Yeah. In the fleapit.”

  “Why not stay at the Continental with me? It’ll save a journey in the morning.”

  His eyebrows went up an inch. “Go on, then. Sure they won’t mind a scruffy bastard like me dossing down there?”

  “Of course not. You’re a member of His Majesty’s Armed Forces. And besides, you’ll be my guest.”

  “All right, Mitch. I don’t mind if I do. Make a change from lumpy mattresses and filthy bathrooms.”

  “The bed’s big and very comfortable. So’s the bath.”

  “Big enough for two?”

  “The bed, or the bath?”

  Bill laughed. “We’ll find out. Come on, Mitch. Let’s get the bus.”

  * * *

  The Continental lobby was empty when we arrived. Most of the guests were in the dining room; Martin was fixing (and consuming) drinks; Tilly was nowhere to be seen. I dreaded the sudden apparition of Claire Sutherland, who would doubtless make a big deal of me bringing a soldier into the hotel, but the coast was clear.

  Bill looked around with an appreciative glance. “They’ve fixed it up very nicely. I’ll have to be on my best behavior.”

  “Wait until you see the view from upstairs. Come on.”

  I took the stairs quickly; Bill was right behind me. The setting sun flooded my room with golden light. I opened up the windows.

  “Fuck me,” he said, leaning out, his ass stretching his cotton pants. “This is the life.”

  “Like it?”

  “It’s lovely. Right. Run that bath. I want to get these boots off.”

  He sat down on the bed and started fiddling with his laces. We were obviously not going to waste time with preliminaries. I turned on the faucet, and hot water gushed noisily into the tub. With a little care, we could both fit in there.

  Conrad’s feet were bare when I got back to the bedroom, thick veins running under pale skin. “That’s better. Worst thing about hot climates, wearing them boots all fucking day.” He wiggled his toes. “Mind if I undress?”

  “Go right ahead. I’m a doctor, remember.”

  “Yeah, course. Used to seeing it all.”

  He unbuttoned his pants and pushed them down over thick, hairy thighs.

  “You joining me?” he asked.

  “Would you like me to?”

  Bill pulled his shirt over his head. “We haven’t come here to play dominoes all night, have we? Come on.” He stood up wearing only his underpants. “Last one in’s a sissy.”

  His body was firm and strong—not the lithe, lean lines of Joseph Vella or Henry Jessop, but a man’s body, a little thick around the waist, deep chested, the arms long and heavy. He was tattooed on one arm, just below the shoulder: a dark blue script, blurred to illegibility.

  I wasted no time in stripping off and within about ten seconds I was naked. I wasn’t erect, but I was on the way. Bill glanced down, nodded his head to one side in an appreciative manner, and pulled his army shorts off.

  “That bath ready yet?”

  “Nearly. Give it a few minutes.”

  “You better come here then.” He leaned back on the bed and beckoned me over. I lay down beside him, and his arms were around me. Our hairy chests touched, warm and slightly sweaty. I could smell cigarettes and beer on his breath as I went in for the first kiss. He threw one leg across mine, turning me to face him, our cocks touching, both now hard. His hands were on my shoulders and back, pulling me closer. We kissed for a long time, our eyes sometimes closed, sometimes open and locked together.

  “Fuck,” he said a
t last, wiping his mouth just as he had after drinking his beer, “I’m glad I didn’t make a mistake this time.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Some blokes,” he said, his thick, dark eyebrows lowering, “get cold feet.”

  “Not me,” I said, pressing my toes against his. “See? My feet are warm.”

  “Yeah, well you’re a civilian. And a foreigner. Not that we aren’t all foreigners here. But you know what I mean.”

  “I know what you mean,” I said, grabbing his hard cock and squeezing. “Looks like you need some relief, soldier.”

  “Too fucking right I do. I’m getting sick of my own right hand.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “That’s a silly bloody question. We’ve got all night, haven’t we?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then I want to do everything—but first, I want that bath. Come on.”

  It wasn’t easy getting two grown men into a Continental Hotel bathtub without flooding the place, but with a little strategic planning we managed it. Bill got in first, his hairy arms resting on the rim of the tub, his legs open, cock sticking straight up out of the water. I climbed in over and around him, interlocking my legs with his, scooting forward to avoid braining myself on the faucet. We ended up with our balls touching. Bill took both our cocks in one large hand and pressed them together.

  “There you go, Mitch. That’s a nice sight.”

  “Sure is.”

  His other hand disappeared under the water and started pushing and digging around my thighs. I let him through, and his fingers quickly found their goal, pressing between my buttocks, caressing my hole. I moved forward, not wanting him to think for one moment that I’m one of those guys whose ass is strictly off-limits. As you know, I’m more of a fucker than a fuckee, but in some cases—for instance, with an older, weather-beaten, tattooed military man—I’m happy to open up those pearly gates. And this seemed to be exactly what Sergeant Major Conrad had in mind. It made sense. A man who’s run away from trouble back home, living and working with other men, the only women either whores or closely guarded virgins—of course he prefers to fuck men. Who in his right mind wouldn’t? There must be plenty of soldiers coming through the garrison at Valetta who were happy to oblige. And it occurred to me, as Bill’s finger slipped inside me, that he would be the perfect person to give me some inside information about dead Ned Porter and grieving Alf Lutterall. Perhaps he’d fucked one or both of them. Perhaps, as Sergeant Major, he had his pick of the lower ranks.

  The thought turned me on even more, and I groaned.

  “Want me to fuck you, then?”

  I like a direct question, especially when delivered in a rough Cockney accent by a man whose dick is squashed against mine. It deserved a direct answer.

  “Yes.”

  Bill half closed his eyes. “Good. Because I ain’t come for about a week, and I need a nice tight hole to stick it in.” From the way his finger was probing inside me, he knew his way around the rectal canal. “Got any Vaseline?”

  “I can do better than that.” One of the perks of working in a hospital is that I get my hands on top-quality surgical lubricants that give a much smoother ride than the traditional Vaseline and Brylcreem. If I was about to be spit roasted by Bill Conrad’s long, crucially thick cock, I was going to need all the help I could get.

  “Better get on with it, then, because if we carry on in here I’m going to come.”

  We washed quickly and stepped out of the bath, not bothering with towels; even in the evening, the air was warm enough to dry any moisture within moments. I handed Bill the little metal tube of K-Y Jelly.

  “What’s this, then?”

  “Try it.”

  He slapped me hard on the ass and said “Get your foot up on the bath.” I heard the slop and click of lubricant as he juiced up his dick. “I’m coming in.”

  Bill put one arm around my waist from behind and drew me towards him. His cock was perfectly aligned with my hole—and very slippery. I gasped as he pushed into me; it had been a long time since anything had been up there apart from fingers, and I was going to have to take it slowly. I guess Bill was used to breaking inexperienced steers, and he slowed his pace.

  “You all right?”

  “Sure. Just take it easy.”

  “I’ll try. But I need to get in pretty soon. I don’t know how long I can last.”

  My cock had shrunk a little at the first pain of his entry, but now Bill was stroking it again, coaxing me back to hardness. For a man with such big, work-calloused hands, he was gentle when he needed to be. My ass relaxed; his cock sensed it and glided slowly in. Soon he was balls-deep.

  “Good lad,” he said, still stroking my dick. “How does it feel?”

  “Fucking fantastic,” I said. The conversation didn’t get much further than that. Bill picked up the speed of his fucking, and within a minute or two we were both getting close. I let him take complete control of me, using my ass, milking my cock, his strong arms holding me. I had one foot on the rim of the tub, the other on the floor, but he was carrying most of my weight. I had a curious sensation of floating, all my being centered on the agonizing pleasure of his cock in my hole. My prick was spewing sticky fluid which Bill scooped up and spread over me, occasionally tasting his own fingers. I wasn’t sure when I started to come—it simply built and built and there I was, mouth open, eyes closed, Bill hammering away as I spat white jets over the marble tiles. He came inside me, the cadence never slowing, curling his hairy chest and stomach over my back, pulling me in, squeezing me and kissing me as he delivered those last bruising thrusts up my quivering hole.

  Then, slowly, he pulled out. We cleaned up and went to bed.

  It didn’t take long before we were at it again. Both of us were conscious of the fact that you don’t often get the combination of a comfortable bed, a willing partner and the time in which to enjoy them. Bill turned out to be every bit as versatile as me: he sucked my cock, fucked my mouth and then, when we were both ready for a second round, he straddled me and steered my cock into his ass. “This stuff is fucking brilliant,” he said, applying liberal amounts of jelly. “I’ll get Doc Southern to order some.”

  He rode me well, bucking up and down on strong thighs, and shot over my chest and up into my face as I emptied myself in his guts.

  After that, we slept.

  I woke at first light with Bill’s arms around me, his breath on my neck, a scratch of stubble on my shoulder, and a hard cock pressing against my ass. Like the comfortable bed and the privacy of the hotel room, it seemed a shame to waste it. And so, without much to-do, I slicked him up with lube and, lying on my side, steered him into me. He was still sleepy, his eyes heavy and barely open, but he knew what to do. He fucked me good and hard, jerking me off as he did so, and when I emptied my balls all over the sheets he just kept going. He pulled out just in time, jumped up and squirted his load in my face.

  Was this love?

  * * *

  We washed and dressed and went down to breakfast at eight; Tilly and Martin were as good as their word and didn’t bat an eyelid when I brought a friend. The fact that Bill was in uniform, and I was known to be there on official military business of some kind, may have mitigated the more obvious reason for his overnight stay; at least, nobody was making the sign of the horns or snatching up their children in terror as we passed. In fact, everyone seemed preoccupied, and it was only after asking Ralph several times that we managed to get served at all. Martin passed through the lobby at one point, looking somewhat disheveled, had a hushed conversation with Tilly at the desk (which, judging by the expressions on their faces, was not a whispering of sweet nothings) then disappeared into the office. Tilly’s heels clicked rapidly over the tiled floor and out of the building; she almost collided with Claire Sutherland, coming down to breakfast in a red kimono, dark hair loose around her shoulders—not quite the “hag” she’d promised me, but certainly a more informal toilette than she’d arrived w
ith. I hoped her diamonds were in the hotel safe.

  “Dear me,” she said to the dining room in general, “someone appears to have got out of bed on the wrong side this morning.” She raised her arms; her sleeves slipped back. “And such a beautiful morning! The sky, the sea, the sun… Ah!” She stood in rapture for a while, a faraway look in her eyes, and I wondered which play this scene was from. Then she rejoined us on the mortal plane. “Good morning Jessops,” she said, waving to the silent trio in the corner. They nodded politely back; Henry smiled, blushed and looked down at his eggs. “Good morning Mitch and…” She paused, hand outstretched, waiting for her introduction.

  “This is Sergeant Major Conrad,” I said. “He’s taking me over to Valetta this morning.”

  “And you’re giving him a hearty breakfast before you set off. What a good idea. I can’t bear crossing on an empty stomach either.”

  Did she wink?

  She sashayed over to the window, arranged herself decoratively in her chair and signaled for service. Ralph moved as fast as his old legs could carry him. Miss Sutherland certainly commanded respect.

  Tilly returned as we were leaving. She beckoned to me from behind the desk.

  “Dr. Mitchell.”

  “Yes?”

  “Could I have a quick word?”

  “Of course. I’m just about to leave for…”

  “There have been some complaints.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “About noise.”

  “What sort of noise?”

  “Coming from your room.”

  “I see. And who has made these complaints?”

  “That, of course, I am not at liberty to reveal.”

  Without her usual smile, Tilly Dear had a thin, mean-looking face. Perhaps this was why Martin drank so much; why he took occasional trips across the bay. Was that where he’d been last night? Was that the reason for her sour mood? I’ll say one thing for being a doctor—you’re frightened of nobody, unless they’re actually in a position to kill you.

  “If there are any further complaints, please ask the concerned parties to address me directly. I won’t bite.”