Back in the 1970s Charles Dorritt worked on a bibliographical survey of the alternative press. Thirty years later, recovering from a nervous breakdown by doing a creative-writing-as-therapy course, he announces that he is publishing his memoirs of torture and sex-slavery following recruitment by an intelligence agency. Various people are deeply concerned that the revelations should not appear. They hire Plant to have a word with Dorritt. A past era of magic mushrooms, free love, American friends, and an alternative newspaper of deep level inauthenticity begins to emerge, something no one but Plant is keen to see revealed.

Plant could see the whole distasteful scene. The filthy shed, the dirt floor, the cobwebs, the spiders, the filthy sleeping bag, the filthy Dorritt, deranged and dribbling, being screwed first by Rose and then by Angela.

Dorritt. He should be so lucky.

'Tell me about the torture,' he said.

'There wasn't any torture as such,' said Rose.

'Meaning?'

'Meaning there wasn't any.'

'As such.'

'As such.'

'What does as such mean?' Plant asked.

'It means we didn't set out to torture him.'

'But in the inevitable course of events you did.'

'No,' said Rose. 'We just asked him a few questions. Or they did. Huxter and Ollie. And he got freaked out.'

'At the questions?'

'At the questions.'

'Why was that?'

'I guess he couldn't answer them.'

'Or wouldn't,' suggested Plant.

'Or wouldn't,' she agreed.

'So what happened then?'

'They just asked them again.'

'And how long did this go on for?'

'I don't know. I wasn't there all the time. I left.'

'And when you came back?'

'That was ages later.'

'They were still asking them then?'

'Yes,' she said.

'It must have been exhausting,' said Plant.

'For everyone, darling,' said Angela.

'You were there too?'

'I just popped in.'

'And what was happening?'

'Like Rose said, they were asking questions.'

'Who were?'

'She told you. Huxter and Ollie.'

'And Sperrit?'

'I don't remember if he was there,’ said Rose, ‘or if he was asking questions.’

'Oh, he was there,' said Angela. 'But he didn't say much.'

'So what were Huxter and Ollie saying?'

'They were just asking Dorritt what he was doing and why was he doing it and who sent him.'

'Why would they care?'

'You might well ask, darling,' said Angela.

'I am asking.'

'Well, I don't fucking know.'

'We were alternative,' said Rose.

'Go on.'

'We were a challenge to the state.'

'You really think so?' Plant asked.

'That's what Huxter said. He said they'd try and stamp us out because we represented a challenge.'

'What sort of challenge?'

'Oh, obscenity, sex, drugs, the women's movement.'

'All the staples of the global media,' said Plant.

'Not then, they weren't,' said Angela.

'And you bought that?' said Plant.

'Bought what?'

'That you represented a challenge.'

'Of course,' said Rose. 'That was the whole point of doing the paper. To be a challenge. Why bother, otherwise?'

'So who did Huxter think Dorritt was working for?'

'He wasn't sure. That's what he was trying to establish. The CIA or ASIO or special branch or the drug squad.'

'Mossad, NSA, MI6, Savak,' said Angela.

'Why would they be interested?' asked Plant.

'Why would anyone be interested, darling?' said Angela.

'But Huxter believed this.'

'Possibly.'

'What do you mean, possibly?'

'Who knows what Huxter believed,' said Angela. 'Maybe he was just making sure. Maybe he'd done too many mushrooms. Maybe he'd read too many conspiracy books and just wanted to spice up his life. It can get pretty dull living out in the sticks, I can tell you. Maybe Dorritt was a godsend. Gave him something to do. Something else to worry about. Save him from having to get the paper out. Gave him a purpose in life.'

'Meanwhile, back on the farm, life went on as normal,' Plant said.

'Pretty much,' said Angela.

'It was pretty much all falling apart anyway,' said Rose.

'Which?' Plant asked.

'It was pretty much falling apart and it pretty much always had been so it was all pretty much as normal,' said Angela.

'Why was it falling apart?'

They sat on the couch facing him, Angela with a glass of wine, Rose with a joint. Somehow they'd ended up sitting together. He hadn't noticed. Too busy rolling joints, no doubt. No doubt about it, drugs contributed to attention deficit. That's what they were for. In large part. The parts that registered. Or didn't register. One or the other. Or both.

'That's the way it is,' said Angela. 'Dust to dust and ashes to ashes.'

'We'd been doing it a long time,' said Rose. 'It seemed like a long time. That's why we moved from the city. We were getting stale. But Huxter and Ollie weren't really back to nature people. They weren't really country boys.'

'Not much interest in country matters,' said Angela.

'So it was getting pretty boring,' said Rose. 'In terms of relationships.'

'Which was why you screwed Dorritt?'

'I guess it passed the time, darling,' said Angela. 'A sort of stop-gap, if that doesn't sound too indelicate.'

She put her arm round Rose.

'It kept us off the streets. For a while.'

'And Dorritt?'

'Kept him out of the gutter,' said Angela. 'He was fed and housed.'

'Drugged and locked up,' said Plant.

'What's the difference to someone like him?' Angela asked.

'And you visited him regularly?'

'He wasn't a great stud, darling. We didn't want to tax his reserves.'

'You found him attractive?'

They giggled, bunching up against each other, tactile and mirthful.

'What sort of question is that?' asked Rose.

'Do we hear the sounds of the male ego?' asked Angela. 'Competitive, envious, jealous?'

'So how did you work out the roster?'

'What roster?' asked Rose.

'How did you decide whose turn it was?'

'We were a collective,' said Rose.

'We didn't believe in authoritarian systems,' said Angela. 'No rules, no pack-drill.'

'Just come and get it,' said Rose.

'First through the door,' said Plant.

'And second, too,' said Rose. 'You really are competitive. I'd never have thought it. It must be very stressful.'

'He needs a course of relaxation therapy,' said Angela.

About the Author

Michael Wilding is the author of Wildest Dreams, The Phallic Forest, Academia Nuts and many, many other wicked works of fiction. His next publication, The Prisoner of Mount Warning, is being released through a unique publishing initiative: Press On. Press On is the initiative of a number of novelists, publishers & booksellers to intervene actively in the publication & promotion of new fiction in Australia.

Adopting the classic 18th & 19th century strategy of subscription publishing that worked for Henry Kendall & others, it needs just 200 subscribers to get the first three titles of this innovative, exciting program into print & onto the web.

Subscribe now for $50 ($80 overseas) and save a third off the recommended retail price on the first three titles.

Discover more about these new novels by: Peter Corris (Wishart’s Quest), Michael Wilding (The Prisoner of Mount Warning), Phillip Edmonds (Leaving Home with Henr), & Inez Baranay (With The Tiger) 

just press on www.press-on-publishing.net

The Prisoner of Mount Warning is forthcoming from Press On / Arcadia: ISBN 978-1-921509 56 8

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