Julien was really shaken by what had happened in the woods with Snot. Therefore, in the following days, even if he maintained with his servant a formal and detached relationship, he wasn't able to send away from his mind that fact, in all the smallest details. And he didn't succeed, as strongly as he tried, not thinking about it.
So, he passed from time to time through sense of guilt, repentance and determination not to allow such things to happen any more, sense of pleasure and of renewed desire, and temptation that now he explicitly admitted. Remembering what Snot told him, he avoided looking the boy in his eyes. But he could not avoid seeing his beautiful body, his open and gentle face, nor not to notice the care and attentions with which Snot continued to surround him.
At times, and especially in the night hours, when he was lying alone in his wide bed waiting to fall asleep, a so acute desire seized him that he came to desire to have Snot there, near him...
All that made Julien plunge into an incredible confused state. Not knowing any more what to do, how to behave, he decided to open his heart in confession to the family chaplain, the old Father Monjouvet who had the renown to be, beside a saintly man, a wise man. He fully confessed himself, telling everything with honesty and disclosing to him his confusion. He explained to the old priest that it derived from two contrasting impulses - that to surrender to the desire he felt for his servant, and that to resist to it. The old priest listened to him, without interrupting him.
At the end, he said, "If you really want to go back to a life of abstinence, how it would be workable, you have only one solution. Send away from the castle that servant. You could also report him and have him punished, but after all, you know very well that you are not less guilty than him, because your desire is already a guilt. Therefore, make him go, but with magnanimity, and forgive him, if at your turn you want to be forgiven. But send him away from you."
Julien nodded in assent, thanked the priest, received the absolution and went back, serene, reconciled with himself and determined, to his rooms. He at once summoned Snot. When the boy appeared in front of him, all his determination, all his self-confidence begun to waver, to fade away.
"At your orders, sir."
"Yes, Jaquot. I decided... Well, you have to never again... It is indispensable that..." but he was not able to say what he had resolved to say. And he made the mistake of looking in the eyes of the boy, and Julien's desire pushed its way through his determination, shattered it, and surfaced in his glance. His eyes started to caress the boy's shapes, the desire strengthened, until it flared up, unrestrainable.
A hint of a pleased smile crossed Snot's face, but this time something restrained him. He put his hands, closed in fists, at his sides, his legs barely spread, his pelvis lightly pushed forward almost in a silent offer, and said with a low voice: "If you really want me, sir, you have to make up your mind. I am here, for you. But afterwards, you are not to beat me and to call me a devil."
Julien looked at him, tense, deeply stirred, still. A knot seemed to close his throat, but he replied, his voice hoarse with desire, "I want you."
"I am here, sir."
"Undress."
"After you, sir."
Julien started to untie his jabot with trembling hands. Snot, slowly followed suit. One after the other, Julien's clothes slipped to the floor, and one after the other, Snot's ones followed them. After a short while, both were with just their culottes on, standing one in front of the other, visibly aroused.
"Touch me..." the young knight implored.
"After you, sir."
Julien, after a very short hesitation, raised his arm and brushed the boy's chest. Then Snot repeated that light gesture. Little by little they drew nearer and their caresses became more explicit and intimate, until Julien untied the string of his servant's culottes and Snot immediately did the same. Now completely naked, just a span separate them. Then Julien adhered to the boy's body, trembling and shuddering. He embraced Snot, and brushed his lips with his own. Snot at once returned the kiss which became intimate, deep. Julien started to gently push the other towards the wide canopy bed. They climbed on it and then Snot held Julien tight to him, wrapping his body with his arms and legs. Their members, already for a long time hard and erect, were pressed the one against the other between their hot bellies. Julien gently freed himself from his servant's hold and glided down, down on his body, kissing and licking it, until he arrived to seize with his lips his quivering member. Snot turned round so that he was able to unite to his master in a passionate sixty nine.
Julien had lost any restraint, any hesitation, any inhibition, and was participating with passion, accepting and returning Snot's attentions. He offered himself to the boy, and welcomed him inside himself, enjoying that strange annoyance mixed with pleasure that the other's member gave him at each thrust. Then he asked Snot to give himself to him, and took him with a sense of elation, feeling with joy he was welcomed, received into the warm pleasure channel that swathed his member and throbbed around it...
This time they made love for a longer time than their first time, and with more transport. The room was slowly darkening as the sun approached the horizon.
When at last, in a last passionate moan both reached orgasm almost in unison, the bed was wrapped in half darkness. For a few minutes they lie still, panting, still half embraced. Then Julien drew back a little, interrupting their contact. Snot turned to look at him, but the darkness prevented him to decipher his master's expression.
"Is everything all right, sir?" Snot asked almost in a whisper, somewhat worried.
Julien didn't answer.
"Is everything all right, sir?" the boy insisted.
The other, once again, remained silent, but after a moment Snot clearly perceived a light sob barely restrained.
"But... are you crying, sir? What happens?"
He stretched his hand and put it lightly on the other's side, perceiving his trembling before his master drew back again.
"Go away, I pray you... Go away. I didn't want, I don't want. Yo made me fall again. You have to go away. I don't want to see you any more, any more... Go, go away... go away... go..." Julien said with an sorrowful tone, and more and more in a low voice.
Snot withdrew, went out of the bed and silently dressed. He left Julien's room, the castle, and reached his room above the stable. Any who would have met him during that short way, would have seen the boy dark in face, disheartened, almost shocked. Snot threw himself, still dressed, on his pallet. He pondered. He could not understand. Why on earth did his master first desire him, then refuse him? Was he not happy with him? And yet, both times he had enjoyed it, he had liked it, he was sure of that. Then why afterward he punished him, and now he chased him away? What did he do wrong, what evil? He didn't want to see his master in that state, he wanted him to be serene, happy. But why, when he was sure he gave him happiness and pleasure, he instead saw him plunge in that state of intolerance, of pain, of bitterness?
That evening he didn't take his dinner and neither could he fall asleep that night. This was, for the boy, the first problem he didn't know how to solve, but that he could not and would not just throw to his back.
On the following day, the servants chief called Snot. When the boy arrived, he told him that he had been fired. The young master didn't want Snot any more at his service or in the castle. The man gave him a service letter, a bag of coins, and asked him to give back his livery and to leave the castle at once.
Snot went back to the stable, crestfallen. He pulled off his livery and put on some patched up clothes that Marcel had gathered for him.
Marcel asked him also to read the service letter and concluded, "With such a good letter, you will easily find work in any other castle. But what did you do, to be sent away so at once?"
"Nothing. Nothing of nothing."
"Bah, if you say so... Sure, if you got into trouble, they would not have written a letter like this... But, what do you want, nobles are done that way, you can never be able to understand what flutters in their minds."
Snot, taking letter and money bag, bid good bye to his companions and left the castle. He didn't know where to go, what to do. He didn't feel like going back to the forest life, even though doing so he would be able to see again Julien, at least from far. Anyway, his lord didn't want to see him any more. Therefore he went away, sad, without even thinking where to go. He just followed the road.
Meanwhile in the castle, Julien was tormented. He had found the strength to make that painful decision, he knew he had to do it, but he didn't feel proud nor happy at all. He was experiencing that lacerating dichotomy between principles and instinct, rule and desire that often torments a right conscience. And reason, which has to be the support that helps us solve the problems and to overcome the conflicts, was at his turn divided, uncertain, and found from time to time, arguments in favour of principles or in support of instinct. So he plunged into a state of deep confusion and distress that didn't let him rest.
The family at once became aware of his state and, not being able to understand the reason for it (and it was for sure not Julien who would have enlightened them) his father decided to take Julien with him to Paris so that he could amuse himself. Therefore, about ten days after Snot had been sent away from the castle, Julien went away also, going by coach to the not distant Capital where the King and his Court resided after the crowd had forced him to leave Versailles.
The Count, together with his wife and younger son, escorted by armed servants, because of the disorders that were troubling these days, was going to the Court for two reasons. He wanted to meet his elder son who was in service there as a King's Guard, and he hoped also to be received by the King to ask for justice about some of his estates where the farmers, from mid July of the year before, had refused to give him the products.
All long the journey Julien remained close in a gloomy silence, immersed in deep and contrasting thoughts.
Similar thoughts, even if different, at the same moment were preying also on Snot. Having left the castle, he wandered without aim for some days until he found himself at Paris' gates. It was the first time in his life he saw a town, and the vision of the Capital amazed him, for the density of the buildings, for the number of the people he saw around him, and for the unceasing noise that surrounded him. He looked around with wide, astonished eyes, dumbfounded and dazed, and he was more pushed forward by the crowd than going in a precise direction.
Sunset was nearing when he noticed a man, around thirty five years old, with a big tricolour cockade on a red beret who, leaning on a door frame, stared at him.
The man met the boy's eyes and addressed him, "You coming from a farm, lad?"
"No, from a castle."
"Ha, did you jilt your master?"
"No, he sent me away."
"What did you do? Did you rebel against his arrogance?"
"No. He just sent me away, so."
While talking, the unknown man's eyes were evaluating him from head to toe, scanning him, until Snot saw light up in those sharp and dark eyes an unmistakable light.
And soon the foreigner said, "You don't have a place to sleep? It is becoming night..."
"No, I just arrived."
"Don't you know anybody, here in Paris?"
"No, nobody."
"Well, come with me, lad. I like you."
Snot did neither like nor dislike that person, but all considered, to have a roof and a bed where to rest suited him, even if he clearly understood the reason of that generous offer. That man was anyway better than the Blade. Just for a moment he told himself that, however, he was not his lord, but at once he chased away that thought. His master, to whom he wanted to give all of himself, had chased him away. Yes, he gave him a good letter and not little money. However, he was determined to use neither of them. No, it was not that, what he expected from Julien.
Therefore, shaking this thought off, he followed the man. This one, after turning in several streets and lanes, entered a gate and went upstairs to the fourth floor. He made Snot enter a small, dreary flat, bolted the door and immediately took him to his bed.
"I like you, lad. You have a nice little ass. And I really need some fresh meat. Undress, go on, tonight I want to amuse myself," he said decidedly while his eyes shone with lust and the man bustled around with flintlock to light a lamp.
Snot nodded and at once started to undress. The man seemed surprised, but pleased for the ready acceptation of the boy. Setting the lamp near the bed, he too started to undress in his turn, without losing sight of his young prey. As they were undressing, the man started to lick his own lips, almost as if he was anticipating the taste of a delicious morsel. Snot was not conscious of his beauty, but the man was, and almost couldn't believe his luck. He made the boy lie on his belly and almost jumped on him. Without preliminaries he immediately gave vent to his desire, penetrating him with few skilled strokes. Snot let him do so, for the first time after he left the Blade, remaining almost passive. All lasted very little.
When the man got his load off, he shut the lamp and said: "Let's sleep, now... I don't even know your name, lad..."
"Jacquot."
"And then?"
"Chambord."
"Good, Chambord, I am Roubeau, Jean Roubeau. I like you. If you want, you can stay here with me. I'll find you a job. What are you able to do?"
"Caring horses."
"Here in Paris that is not so useful. I'll find you something. To be a National Guard gives some privilege, do you know?"
"All right."
After a short while the man was snoring. Snot didn't fall asleep soon. He was not used to the unending humming that permeated the town even in night time. He was thinking of Julien, now so far away, and he could not suspect that, right on that night, in the castle, they were preparing the coaches that would be bringing his master to Paris.
On the following morning Roubeau took him to an innkeeper, his friend, who agreed to take Snot as an inn-boy. So Snot started to work in the inn to the evening, when Roubeau passed to take him. The man stopped for a while, drank, chatted with the other customers that he seemed to know from the first to the last, then he went back to his dreary flat with Snot. Here the man, punctually, evening after evening, amused himself fucking at his ease, and for a long while, the boy.
Snot had lost his cheerfulness, and just thought of Julien, whom he missed more and more.
For the young de Jambville, his trip to Paris was an empty parenthesis. In the Court life was no more that of old times. You could see only frowned faces, and nervousness and confusion reigned. His brother told him the appalling details of what happened after the 14th of July against the aristocracy and he told him that several nobles had already sought refuge abroad. His father was worried but Julien was barely interested in these facts. His mind was elsewhere, mainly after a fact that troubled him deeply.
He was in Paris for three days when, amongst the King's Guards at his brother's order, he thought he saw a young soldier that was Snot. He was not, but the resemblance was exceptional and that was enough to completely upset the young man.
At night, alone in his bed, recalling that Guard and Snot, for the first time he masturbated and, in the moment of the acme of pleasure, he dejectedly murmured, "Jaquot, oh Jaquot, where are you?" then burst in tears feeling infinitely lonely, sad and empty.
He got up to wash himself, and meanwhile he was thinking, "Why did I send you away? Why didn't I keep you with me? Why must what I feel for you and you for me be evil? Why can not two men make love? Why?"
He passed the following days more troubled than ever, and often he made to himself solemn oaths that he would never again fall in his sin... and as soon as he was alone he masturbated longing for Snot. Then he repented, and made again serious resolutions, to again surrender at the first occasion. His sexuality had woken up, and he was no longer able to make it drowsy, especially now that in his thoughts and in his dreams came back in an almost obsessing way the images of those two only, but complete, intercourse he had had with the beautiful Snot. He could not even suspect that the boy was so near to him.
He was in Paris for ten days, when it happened to him to be alone with the cadet son of the Duke of Varennes, in one of the waiting halls of the Louvre. Julien was sitting on a narrow sofa near the fireplace, and waited for his father, who at least had been received by the King. The young de Varennes was pacing up and down the hall, waiting to receive orders, as in that period he was a page in the Court.
Suddenly he stopped in front of Julien, and said, "Don't you feel bored, Monsieur the Knight de Jambville?"
Julien shook himself, "No... I was thinking."
"It has been a while that I've been observing you. You have been still like a statue from when you sat there. Your mind has to be very far. A damsel, perhaps?"
"No... I have no girls to think about."
The de Varennes sighed then said, "The same is for me, do you know? Do you allow me to sit here near you?"
"Certainly, I pray you."
The other youth sat and, being the sofa so narrow, their legs were in contact. Julien had like a quiver and became stiff.
The other seemed unaware and continued: "I am bored, on the contrary. All the day long in wait for who knows what. If I had at least a friend peer to you. Beautiful and refined as you are. A person with whom I could spend some moments of relaxation, of friendly intimacy..."
Julien caught, in that sentence, and even more than in the words, in the tone it was said, a veiled allusion to something particular and, after a first moment of hesitation, he thought he could guess what the other was trying to communicate to him. Even more because now the leg of the other was pushing against his own a little more than what the scanty space of their sofa would justify. So then he looked in his eyes, and the page smiled at him. Julien felt a second quivering and just then became aware that the other, even if not really beautiful, was fascinating. And he felt afraid and attracted at once.
"I don't yet know your name..." he said, almost to break the embarrassed silence that lie between them.
"Alexandre Claude Ferdinand de Varennes, King's page, at your service."
"I am... but you already know my name, isn't it?"
"Yes, certainly. Do you not have friends, here in Paris?"
"No, not even one real friend."
"How do you spend your time, then?"
"Following my father where he goes."
"Do not you have your own life, then?"
"No..."
"What do you think, being my guest at de Varennes Mansion, one of these evenings?"
Julien was about to decline the invitation but the other, guessing his hesitation, added, "I would really be honoured. It is such a bore, in these days of my life! I pray you, accept!"
"I do not know... If ,Sir, my father has not different plans..."
"Very well. I will ask him as soon as he will come out from the private room of His Majesty." Alexandre said readily.
So, on the evening of the following day, Julien was guest of Alexandre. After some salon, Alexandre, with the pretext of having him tour the mansion, took him to a kind of small studio on the second floor.
"Look, here is where I take refuge when I am with a real friend. Here nobody dares to disturb me. Do you like here?"
The room was small but furnished in a really modern style, with tapestries in light blue velvet with delicate silver embroideries. Near a window looking on a garden, there was a writing desk with two chairs and in front of the fireplace a lounge half covered by a fantastic Bruges lace draped on it astride. A cabinet and an English style showcase completed the furnishing of the little studio. The room was lit by four two branched candlesticks on the fireplace mantle, and by a six branched candelabrum on the desk.
"Did you notice the ceiling? It represents two couples of Grecian heroes, Achilles and Patroclos, and Eurialos and Nisus. If you lay on the lounge, you can admire them more easily, without making your neck numb..."
Julien guessed where the other was aiming and, even though with some hesitation, he lay on the lounge.
Alexandre sat near him and, pointing at the paintings on the ceiling, said, "Just admire how the bodies of the four heroes are executed with skill. It is said that the painter used real naked models. Are not they very beautiful? And yet, you dim their beauty, Julien..." and this said, Alexandre brushed with his fingertips his guest's face, and looked in his eyes with languid admiration.
Julien shuddered, embarrassed and excited at once, but didn't escape that light caress.
"They were lovers, Achilles and his Patroclos, as Eurialos and his Nisus, do you know? Oh, how much would I like to be your Achilles, your Nisus..." he said in a dreamlike tone and his fingers brushed the parted lips of his guest.
Julien felt like a chained, prisoner, but what tossed in his heart were not feelings of escape.
"Here, nobody will come to disturb us, neither servants nor family. Why do you not allow me to admire you, why do you not unveil me your hidden graces?"
That sudden request left Julien without breath. He closed his eyes and Alexander's hand at once went to caress him between his legs. As his young friend didn't move to that explicit caress, the host became more daring and started to undress his guest, kissing and caressing him on the parts of the body that little by little he uncovered. Julien let him do it, but in his fantasy these hands were his splendid squire Jaquot's hands.
Little by little their clothes fell on the floor and at last the two youths, naked, united. When Alexandre pushed his way in him, Julien confusedly thought that Jaquot was more skilled, more beautiful, more passionate, more pleasurable... even if this young man was no bad. And when it was Julien to enter Alexandre, he felt that only Jaquot was really welcoming him inside himself with full devotion or better, donation...
After more than one hour, finally both sated, while they were dressing, to the question if he had a male lover, Julien told him over time what was troubling him, grateful he could finally open his heart to somebody like him, able to understand him.
The encounter with Alexander did good for Julien. Not that the page could solve his problems, but just the fact he could open himself with somebody had been a relief. And another fact consoled him - to get to know from his companion that love between men was a rather spread fact in their times, like in ancient times.
And finally a reflection of Alexandre had impressed him: "No law can be valid when it is impossible to abide to it. If there was a law that all the fishes have to fly, it would simply be absurd. The law would be evil, for sure not the fishes that do not abide. I like men. They cannot order me to like women, not the King nor the Pope. An absurd order is not an order, it is just empty and meaningless words."
The two young men met again some times and made love, until Julien's father decided to go back to Jambville.
The journey back was to Julien less gloomy, even if he didn't solve all his dilemma. But what he terribly missed was Jaquot, his young, wild lover.