SECRETS OF AN ODALISQUE - A Call to Belle

The day at the Lido was uneventful -- lots of starlets parading around for the paparazzi, flashing their tits in the camera. Cupp ran into Trisha Stonemarten with her live-in lover, a Frenchman at least 15 or maybe even 20 years her junior, dressed in the style minet, with exceedingly tight pants that drew attention to his protruding crotch. Well, Trisha could afford such luxuries on the 80 million he'd settled on her. The two of them had been holing up in London for a couple of years now, so it looked like Jean-Luc or whatever the fuck his name was had hit it lucky. Virginia O'Hara, another ex, he'd run into his first day in town. She too had a young stud, although Cupp did wonder what was going on, since every time Ginny got heavy into a sex thing, her bladder acted up and she had to have it cauterized. Cupp had always believed Ginny's bladder problems stemmed from her Irish Catholic guilt. She told him she was writing a novel.

Back at the hotel at last, Cupp was still turning the Odalisques over in his mind. Lying in bed unable to sleep, almost without realizing it, he began to tug at his penis. Pure nerves. What was the world coming to if he had to resort to jacking off? All of a sudden he found himself with a giant hard-on and no hole to shove it in. Christ almighty. It was the fucking Odalisques. But then, an inspiration dawned. Of course, why hadn't he thought of this before?

Cupp reached for the phone. "Operator? I'd like to make an overseas call -- to New York City -- Ms. Belle de Jour -- that's right, the United States of America -- area code 212 -- yes, I'll wait."

Cheerful, sixtyish, red-headed and buxom Georgia Belle Pokriss, alias Belle de Jour, proprietress of a booming slave-master emporium, the eponymous Belle de Jour on 9th Avenue at 10th Street, had been his great and good friend for nearly half a dozen years now, even though his sex proclivities didn't run to the fare offered at her highly successful establishment.

Looks-wise, Madame de Jour was definitely stuck in the 1940's, which had been her personal belle époque; she had never outgrown the pompadours and tits-pointing-straight-out look of a pin-up girl, even though she was well past her prime. Cupp thought of her as a sort of poor man's Vera Hruba Ralston or possibly Ann Dvorsak, starring in a Hollywood musical about the Klondike; it was also feasible she could be a saloon keeper in Dodge City. At any rate, she was given to blowzy, showy décolletage, Frederick's of Hollywood waist cinches and Merry Widows, textured hose, uplift padded bras, garter belts, pasties, and Lili St. Cyr undergarments. Much-peeled skin and a small nose made excessively so by rhinoplasty gone wrong completed the picture.

Even over transatlantic connection you could hear the action emanating from the Belle de Jour cubicles -- dominatrixes with whips yelling at cowering customers, nearly 85% of whom were involved in law enforcement – lawyers, police captains, judges, prison wardens, politicians and the like, all of whom gladly forked over one thousand dollars minimum per half hour without blinking, and who went absolutely apeshit being ordered around, insulted, spat upon, put down, pistol whipped, manacled, kicked, crapped on and otherwise tortured and abused by Belle's squadron of capable specialists.

"Mrs. Belle de Jour -- overseas operator from Italy -- ready now with your call to New York City, sir -- Ciao, Venezia, hello New York, Mrs. Belle de Jour. Go ahead, please, sir."

"Drink it, you asshole," Cupp heard somebody hollering in the background. "Drink your own filthy, rotten, smelly come or I'll rub your face in your poo poo."

"Hello, Belle? Belle? This is Gary -- "

"Gary Cupp! Honey, how y'all?" Belle's normal voice was pure Texas hog-call, although she boasted being a native of Plains, Georgia, and after the Carter women, the town's most famous female celebrity. "Where're y'all callin' from, Cupp honey?"

"Belle, what's going on? Didn't I just hear some guy screaming in the background?"

"Oh, that? That's Judge Bennett from the Southern District. He's got a big decision to hand down tomorrow. Came here for a little R & R. Where are you, Gary, honey?"

"I'm in Venice -- Venice, Italy, Belle, not California, not Florida. Wish you could be here too, Belle. The canals are beautiful."

"Oh, now don't I wish so too, Gary, and isn't that right sweet of y'all to say. How come you're callin' all this distance?"

"Belle, there's a reason. Listen, Belle." Cupp lowered his voice, in case somebody might be listening outside the door. He wished he'd brought his scrambler along for the trip. "Listen carefully, Belle."

Just then there was more agitation from Judge Bennett, and Cupp grew impatient. Finally the judge subsided, apparently having gotten his rocks off to satisfaction, so that Cupp could get down to basics. He told Belle what he could and asked her if she knew about a secret sex society of women called the Odalisques. She did not. Cupp was disappointed.

He asked her to keep her ear to the ground, just in case, and Belle said she would.

Feeling let down, Cupp said goodbye to Belle. Vaguely, he wondered about the decision Judge Bennett was handing down tomorrow, and then, still unable to sleep, opened the shutters. Lights and colors reflected in the rippling waters below, shapes dissolving in sweeping curves, melting images shifting into abstraction – Cupp thought once more about Gertrude Stein. God, it was terrible, but so totally telling of the 20th century. He was including it in his book, of course. He couldn't let that happen to him -- he had to find out, and he was ever more certain now that what Gertrude Stein hadn't known, Gaia Blumenthal for sure did.

He was taking her to lunch at the end of the week. In the meantime, he had another idea. It just might work.