Entering the place I felt like a farmer come to town. Immediately I was dazzled, dazzled by the sea of faces, by the fetid warmth radiating from hundreds of over-excited bodies, by the blare of the orchestra, by the kaleidoscopic whirl of lights. Every one was keyed to fever pitch, it seemed. Every one looked intent and alert, intensely intent, intensely alert. The air crackled with this electric desire, this all-consuming concentration. A thousand different perfumes clashed with one another, with the heat of the hall, with the sweat and perspiration, the fever, the lust of the inmates, for they were very definitely, it seemed to me, inmates of one kind or another. Inmates perhaps of the vaginal vestibule of love. Icky inmates, advancing upon one another with lips parted, with dry, hot lips, hungry lips, lips that trembled, that begged, that whimpered, that beseeched, that chewed and macerated other lips. Sober too, all of them. Stone sober. Too sober, indeed. Sober as criminals about to pull off a job. All converging upon one another in a huge, swirling cake mould, the colored lights playing over their faces, their busts, their haunches, cutting them to ribbons in which they became entangled and enmeshed, yet always skilfully extricating themselves as they whirled about, body to body, cheek to cheek, lip to lip.
I had forgotten what it was like, this dance mania. Too much alone, too close to my grief, too ravaged by thought. Here was abandon with its nameless face and prune-whipped dreams. Here was the land of twinkling toes, of satiny buttocks, of let your hair down, Miss Victoria Nyanza, for Egypt is no more, nor Babylon, nor Gehenna. Here the baboons in full rut swim the belly of the Nile seeking the end of all things; here are the ancient maenads, re-born to the wail of sax and muted horn; here the mummies of the skyscrapers take out their inflamed ovaries and air them, while the incessant play of music poisons the pores, drugs the mind, opens the sluice gates. With the sweat and perspiration, with the sickening, overpowering reek of perfumes and deodorants all discreetly sucked up by the ventilators, the electric odor of lust hung like a halo suspended in space.
Walking up and down beside the Hershey Almond bars stacked one upon another like precious ingots, I rub against the pack. A thousand smiles are raining from every direction; I lift my face as if to catch the shimmering dew drops dispersed by a gentle breeze. Smiles, smiles. As if it weren't life and death, a race to the womb and back again. Flutter and frou-frou, camphor and fish balls, Omega oil ... wings spread full preen, limbs bare to the touch, palms moist, foreheads glistening, lips parched, tongues hanging out, teeth gleaming like the advertisements, eyes bright, roving, stripping one bare ... piercing, penetrating eyes, some searching for gold, some for fuck, some to kill, but all bright, shamelessly, innocently bright like the lion's red maw, and pretending, yes, pretending, that it's a Saturday afternoon, a floor like any other floor, a cunt's a cunt, no tickee no fuckee, buy me, take me, squeeze me, all's well in Itchigumi, don't step on me, isn't it warm, yes, I love it, I do love it, bite me again, harder, harder...
Weaving in and out, sizing them up—height, weight, texture—rubbing flanks together, measuring bosoms, bottoms, waists, studying hair-dos, noses, stances, devouring mouths half open, closing others ... weaving, sidling, pushing, rubbing, and everywhere a sea of faces, a sea of flesh carved by scimitar strokes of light, the whole pack glued together in one vast terspichorean stew. And over this hot conglomerate flesh whirling in the cake bowl the smear of brasses, the wail of trombones, the coagulating saxophones, the piercing trumpets, all like liquid fire going straight to the glands. On the sidelines, standing like thirsty sentinels, huge upturned jugs of orangeade, lemonade, sarsparilla, coca-cola, root beer, the milk of she-asses and the pulp of wilted anemones. Above it all the almost inaudible hum of the ventilators sucking up the sour, rancid odor of flesh and perfume, passing it out over the heads of the passing throngs in the street.
Find some one! That was all I could think. But whom? I milled around and milled around, but nothing suited me. Some were wonderful, ravishing—as ass, so to say. I wanted something more. It was a bazaar, a bazaar of flesh—why not pick and choose? Most of them had the empty look of the empty souls they were. And why not, handling nothing but goods, money, labels, buttons, dishes, bills of lading, day in and day out? Should they have personality too? Some, like rapacious birds of the air, had that nondescript look of wrack tossed in by a storm—neither sluts, whores, shop girls nor griseldas. Some stood like wilted flowers or like canes draped in wet towels. Some, pure as chick-weed, looked as though they were hoping to be raped but not seriously damaged. The good live bait was on the floor, wiggling, wriggling, their eloquent haunches gleaming like moire.
In a corner beside the ticket booth the hostesses were collected. Bright and fresh they were, as if they had just stepped out of the tub. All beautifully coiffed, beautifully frocked. Waiting to be bought and, if luck would have it, wined and dined. Waiting for the right guy to come along, that jaded millionaire who in a moment of forgetfulness might propose marriage.
Standing at the rail I surveyed them coolly. If it were the Yoshiwara now ... If when you glanced their way they would undress, make a few obscene gestures, call to you in a raucous voice. But the Itchigumi follows a different program. It suggests that you very kindly and sincerely pick the flower of your choice, lead her to the center of the floor, bill and coo, nibble and gobble, wiggle and woggle, buy more tickets, take girl have drink, speak correctly, come again next week, choose ‘nother pretty flower, thank you kindly, good-night.
The music stops for a few moments and the dancers melt like snow-flakes. A girl in a pale yellow dress is gliding back to the slave booth. She looks Cuban. Rather short, well built, and with a mouth that's insatiable.
I wait a moment to give her a chance to dry off, as it were, then approach. She looks eighteen and fresh from the jungle. Ebony and ivory. Her greeting is warm and natural—no ready-made smile, no cash register business. She's new at the game, I find, and she is a Cuban. (How wonderful!) In short, she doesn't mind too much being pawed over, chewed to bits, etcetera; she's still mixing pleasure with business.
Pushed to the center of the floor, wedged in, we remain there moving like caterpillars, the censor fast asleep, the lights very low, the music creeping like a paid whore from chromosome to chromosome. The orgasm arrives and she pulls away for fear her dress will be stained.
Back at the barricade I'm trembling like a leaf. All I can smell now is cunt, cunt, cunt. No use dancing any more this afternoon. Must come again next Saturday. Why not?
And that's exactly what I do do. On the third Saturday I run into a newcomer at the slave booth. She has a marvelous body, and her face, chipped here and there like an ancient statue, excites me. She has a trifle more intelligence than the others, which is no detriment, and she's not hungry for money. That is simply extraordinary.