had fought for him twice before, but they had been bar brawls and not quite so sinister and painful as this.

Jack's tough, supple body was one of the things Terry liked best about him. Jack was small but he was deceptively strong. He might have walloped Terry if he could have brought himself to do it, and sometimes Terry went begging for it; sometimes he needed it. But Jack had done it just once. That had been the time a year ago when another stranger had turned up in this very bed.

Now Jack faced Terry and Terry knew it was his turn. He was nearly as excited as he was afraid. He backed against the closet door and said, “Jack, let me explain," but he only said it because the room was so quiet and Jack looked at him through eyes that were dark, brooding, almost murderous.

Terry waited, naked and smooth and beautiful as a Greek lad carved in marble, and quivering with with what? With anticipation, with fear, with impatience.

Jack said, "Get your clothes on and get out." He stood in front of the boy, suffering but immovable.

"What?" Terry exclaimed. He was almost disappointed.

"Get out."

"But Jack! I-" He stared. Was this the end? Really? It couldn't be. "I-I don't want to go," he stammered.

"I don't care. I'm through caring what you want and what you don't want. I'm going to start caring about myself for a change. I've had enough of you, Terry. You're a cheap little punk. You just happen to a a pretty one and you have some charm. But you're nothing for me to risk my sanity over.

"Now get out of my house. Take your lousy friend over there and go have fun on a park bench. I don't care. Just so you don't come back."

Terry enjoyed the bawling out in spite of himself. He would have taken a few slaps without protest, but the bawling out would do-provided it wasn't serious. But it never was. Jack was too much in love with him.

"You still love me, Jack," Terry said softly.

"If I didn't love you I'd be able to keep you, Terry," Jack answered.

It was so odd a thing to say that Terry felt frightened again. "You don't mean it," he said. And he came toward Jack with a frown to caress his shoulders cautiously. "Do you?" he added in a whisper.

Jack stood his ground, mute with fury and humiliation and a recognition of the end. Terry put his arms around him and kissed his lips and rubbed himself against Jack but he might as well have approached pure stone. When he stopped to look at Jack's face in alarm he saw at last what Jack saw: It was all over between them.

Terry went to the closet and got his clothes on. He dressed in a silence broken only by queasy groans from his friend on the bed, looking over his shoulder at Jack now and then.

When he was dressed he turned and asked, "Can I come back for my things tomorrow?"

"You can't come back at all, Terry. Take what you can carry. You and your friend." He spoke with sharp scorn. "I'll take the rest over to Julian's in the morning. You can pick it up there.'

"Please don't make me go." Terry pleaded. "Jack, if you'd only—”

"I'm going out," Jack broke in. "I'll be back in an hour. Get your friend out