Wilt by Tom Sharpe Read Free Book Online Page A

have a relationship. Not an intimate one,’ said Sally, ‘not

    a meaningful one.’
    ‘I don’t know many twos who can either,’ said Wilt. Sally dabbed her finger in his

    coleslaw.
    ‘Oh but you do. You and Eva have this real thing going between you.’
    ‘Not very often.’ said Wilt. Sally laughed.
    ‘Oh baby, you’re a truth baby.’ she said, and got up and fetched two more drinks. Wilt

    looked down into his paper cup doubtfully. He was getting very drunk.
    ‘If I’m a truth baby, what sort of baby are you, baby?’ he asked, endeavouring to

    instil the last baby with more than soupçon of contempt. Sally snuggled up to him and

    whispered in his ear.
    ‘I’m a body baby,’ she said.
    ‘I can see that.’ said Wilt. ‘You’ve got a very nice body.’
    ‘That’s the nicest thing anybody has ever said to me,’ said Sally.
    ‘In that case.’ said Wilt, picking up a blackened sausage ‘you must have had a deprived

    childhood’
    ‘As a matter of fact I did,’ Sally said and plucked the sausage from his fingers. ‘That’s

    why I need so much loving now. She put most of the sausage in her mouth, drew it slowly out

    and nibbled the end. Wilt finished off the coleslaw and washed it down with Pringsheim

    Punch.
    ‘Aren’t they all awful?’ said Sally, as shouts and laughter came from the corner of the

    garden by the grill.
    Wilt looked, up.
    ‘As a matter of fact they are,’ he said. ‘Who’s the clown in the jockstrap?’
    ‘That’s Gaskell. He’s so arrested. He loves playing at things,’ In the States he just

    loves to ride footplate on a locomotive and he goes to rodeos and last Christmas he

    insisted on dressing up as Santa Claus and going down to Watts and giving out presents to

    the black kids at an orphanage. Of course they wouldn’t let him.’
    ‘If he went in a jockstrap I’m not in the least surprised,’ said Wilt. Sally laughed.
    ‘You must be an Aries,’ she said. ‘you don’t mind what you say.’ She got to her feet and

    pulled Wilt up-’I'm going to show you his toy room. It’s ever so droll.’
    Wilt put his plate down and they went into the house. In the kitchen Eva was peeling

    oranges for a fruit salad and talking about circumcision rites with the Ethiopian, who

    was slicing bananas for her. In the lounge several couples were dancing back to back very

    vigorously to an LP of Beethoven’s Fifth played at 78.
    ‘Christ,’ said Wilt as Sally collected a bottle of Vodka from a cupboard. They went

    upstairs and down a passage to a small bedroom filled with toys. There was a model train

    set on the floor, a punchbag, an enormous Teddy dear, a rocking horse, a fireman’s helmet

    and a lifesize inflated doll that looked like a real woman.
    ‘That’s Judy,’ said Sally. ’she’s got a real cunt. Gaskell is a plastic freak.’ Wilt

    winced. ‘And here are Gaskell’s toys, puberty baby.’
    Wilt looked round the room at the mess and shook his head. ‘Looks as though he’s making up

    for a lost childhood,’ he said.
    ‘Oh, Henry, you’re so perceptive,’ said Sally, and unscrewed the top of the Vodka

    bottle.
    ‘I’m not. It’s just bloody obvious.’
    ‘Oh you are. You’re just terribly modest, is all. Modest and shy and manly.’ She

    swigged from the bottle and gave it to Wilt. He took a mouthful inadvisedly and had

    trouble swallowing it. Sally locked the door and sat down on the bed. She reached up a hand

    and pulled Wilt towards her.
    ‘Screw me, Henry baby,’ she said and lifted her skirt, ‘fuck me, honey. Screw the pants

    off me.’
    ‘That,’ said Wilt, ‘would be a bit difficult.’
    ‘Oh. Why?’
    ‘Well for one thing you don’t appear to be wearing any and anyway why should I?’
    ‘You want a reason? A reason for screwing?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Wilt. ‘Yes I do.’
    ‘Reason’s treason. Feel free.’ She pulled him down and kissed him. Wilt didn’t feel at all

    free. ‘Don’t be shy,