In the evening, undressing in her therapy room, Gayle suspected that she was about to reach a crucial moment with Chet Hunter.

Up to now the intensive therapy he had requested had gone smoothly enough, at least on the surface. There had been no problem with nudity, and none with his ability to achieve and maintain an erection. During the shower, the back caress, the non-genital frontal caress, she had observed that his penis had become erect during each exercise. She reminded herself that, after all, unlike Demski, impotency was not his problem. But there was a problem. Although she had not been able to experience it yet, and knew it only from his case history, she was sure that his accounts of premature ejaculation were honest enough.

This belief, thought Gayle, was evident in his personality. He was sturdy and solid enough in every way, yet he was high-strung and impatient. He wanted to get everything over with fast and move on. He was not interested in touching or caressing or the feelings of any of his body parts. He was interested only in his penis, to the exclusion of everything else. He wanted to get to that fast and make it work in the right way. Hunter had what female surrogates termed, among themselves, a total prick mentality.

It would be difficult to overcome, this haste in him, and she wondered if it would be possible to slow him down. With premature ejaculators, this was a key to cure. Make haste slowly, very slowly.

As she watched him remove his shorts, she wondered about the degree of his premature ejaculations. That had not been defined yet.

"Chet," she said casually, "as I recall, you do have a regular girlfriend, don't you?"

"Yes, I do."

"Want to tell me anything about her?"

He was at once guarded. "What's to tell?"

"Well, do you love her?"

"Enough to want to marry her."

"This is the same girl you were telling Dr. Freeberg about? The one you've gone to bed with several times?"

"She's the one."

"But you couldn't make it with her?"

"I'm afraid not. That's why I'm here. I have no trouble getting it up, but I come too fast."

"How fast?"

Hunter snorted. "Nosy, aren't you? I'm just kidding. You're here to help me. How fast? Well, not in my pants, if that's what you mean. Naw, it happens when we're in go position. When I'm ready to enter her."

"Have you ever entered her?"

"No, dammit. I always start coming first."

"When your penis touches her on the outside?"

"Yes," he said, suddenly crestfallen. "I don't like it. I have to do something about it. I just have to."

"We are doing something about it," Gayle said.

"Are we? I can't tell yet."

"You'll see. You'll get over it. The main thing is to do all the exercises with me, no shortcuts, and be patient. Trust me, Chet."

He shrugged. "What else can I do?"

"For one thing, you can lie down on the mat here, on your back."

"Okay. And you?"

He settled down on his back on the spacious floor mat. "Tonight we're going to do genital pleasuring."

He appeared to brighten. "You mean you're going to hold me down there?"

Gayle knew this could be trouble. Until tonight, she had touched and caressed him everywhere except on the penis. She was concerned about his reaction and his degree of arousal.

Kneeling beside him, she gently rubbed oil the length of his penis. "To make this more realistic and get you to appreciate the vaginal environment. When we get to penetration, I'll be moist inside. So you might as well get used to it now."

"Sounds right." Hunter acknowledged.

Finished with the oiling, Gayle raised her hand to his abdomen and started to stroke it. She said, "When I hold your penis, it's not done to excite you. Remember, it's to give you non-demand pleasure. I'll be touching and caressing, with no strain on you to perform. You merely have to shut your eyes and do nothing. Simply enjoy it. Okay, your eyes closed, please."

He closed his eyes.

Reaching down, her fingertips arrived at the shaft of his penis. She applied her touch gently, then with firmness. "Is that about right?" she asked quietly. "Do you find it enjoyable?"

"You bet."

"It may not stimulate you too much, but-"

"You've got to be kidding."

She expected to give him several minutes to be fully erect. But almost immediately his penis had swollen, risen somewhat, and was rising further.

To continue might frustrate him too much. She had to slow him down, get his mind off his penis.

"All right, Chet. Enough of that. Now it's my turn." She reached for his arm, to make him sit up.

"Your turn?"

"Now you pleasure me in the same way."

"You mean between your legs?"

"Of course, Chet. Just to let me enjoy some unerotic fondling."

"Unerotic? I like that. It can never be unerotic."

"Try me. I'll show you."

Soon she was on her back, on the mat, with Hunter, raised on an elbow, beside her, touching her clitoris.

"A little lighter," she instructed him. She did not want to be brought to orgasm. "Lighter and more slowly."

He proceeded to do as he had been told. Her eyes closed., Gayle decided that he wasn't bad at it, not at all. Abruptly, the pressure on her clitoris became harder, faster.

"Honey," she heard him say.

She opened her eyes, saw him pointing down between his legs.

"Look at this."

He was pointing down at a complete erection, straight out and obviously hard.

She was at a loss for what to say. "Well, that's good . . ."

"It can be for both of us," he said urgently. "Let me, Gayle."

"Let you what?"

"Put it in. I'm ready. Why waste time?"

"No," she said. "You're not ready. We need more sessions."

He came to his knees beside her. "Honey, I've got to, I've just got to. I'm ready. I'll make it this time . . . I guarantee you."

"No, not yet-"

"Please, Gayle, while I can. It'll be great. Let me show you."

She considered his pleading. If only there were time to consult Dr. Freeberg. But as she knew, many of these decisions were left to the judgment of the surrogates. She considered further. What it came to was: just what was there to lose? If he truly could make it, he was on his way to a cure. If he couldn't, he would learn a lesson.

"All right, Chet," she said impulsively, "if you think you can complete penetration, that might be a good thing. Go ahead. I'll cooperate."

"You'll see, you'll see," he said breathlessly, hastily positioning himself between her widening legs. "Christ, you're something, you're great. We'll do it. I can make it this time."

She arched back, lifting her hips slightly as he guided his penis toward her vaginal opening. He was panting now, excited, so eager to make it.

She felt the head of his penis touch her down below, and she braced herself for his entry. But there was no entry. She raised her head. His features were contorted.

And then she felt the wetness of his semen outside her vagina.

"Oh, Jesus," he groaned as he finished his orgasm. "Jesus, I just couldn't hold it in. I'm sorry, I couldn't help it. I don't know-it just happened."

She put a kindly hand on his bare shoulder. "Don't worry, Chet. It's happened before. That's why we're together. But I promise you, if you do it my way, and have plenty of patience, I promise you one day soon you'll be fine."

"I don't know," he said helplessly. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to do it."

Later, dressed and bidding Gayle good night, Hunter had felt Gayle restrain him as he reached the front door.

He half listened to her as she said, "I'm confident enough to give you another piece of advice. I always give it when we get to this part of our program. At this point, when you see your girlfriend again, there is to be positively no sex. Take her to a movie or sit with her on a sofa and kind of repeat our exercises in a real-life way. I mean, hold and stroke her hand, her hair, her face. Touch her breasts, but over her clothes, not under them. Forget about your erections. Hold back. Get into your feelings and her own . . . and nothing more. Between slowing down with your girl, and with what we're doing, it'll work out soon enough."

Leaving her, Hunter was less optimistic. He trudged miserably to his car at the curb and pushed in behind the wheel.

He sat there in the darkness assessing his loss.

He had been certain he would make it tonight, and with penetration, he would have been on his way.

Christ, he thought, wait'll Ferguson and Scrafield and Hoyt Lewis learn about this. It could dynamite their whole game plan-and his future. If he couldn't make it with this dame, he could not go into a court of law and swear under oath he had done it to her, paid the little nympho for a real fuck, when he hadn't fucked her. And this Gayle dame would also be swearing under oath he hadn't gotten into her. He couldn't risk a lie.

Yes, once the truth was known, there was no case against Freeberg, no story, no job on the Chronicle.

Then, sitting there in the darkness behind his wheel, he realized that they didn't have to know. Ferguson, Scrafield, and Hoyt Lewis didn't have to know a thing about this night's failure. As far as they knew, he was in the middle of his therapy with a-a prostie. They had to know only when he'd made it and could honestly swear he'd made it.

That was the question.

Would he make it with her, ever?

Well, she said he wouldn't tonight, and she had been right. She said he would in the near future, she was confident. So she could be right about that, too, and then he'd come up roses. He'd have the spotlight as star witness during a winning trial. He'd have a job on the staff of the Chronicle. He'd have Suzy and have her for life.

If Gayle Miller were right, and he played his cards right, went along with her, he might have everything.

He inserted his key into the ignition and started the car.

Listening to the hum of the engine, he told himself he'd have to have more patience, will himself more patience, and go along with Gayle from now on. He promised himself he would do so. No more shortcuts. No more rushing it. He would do it her way. And maybe he'd get there yet.

Chapter VI.

Because Gayle's bedside alarm clock had gone off while she was still in the midst of her dream, the dream involving Paul Brandon and herself was momentarily vivid.

She supposed what had triggered the dream had been her thought last night, while preparing for bed, that she must telephone Paul for a date, as she'd promised, and that she wanted to call Paul then and there about seeing him. But she had been too exhausted to attempt the call and had fallen asleep immediately.

Now, in the morning, Paul Brandon was still on her mind. In the dream, she had been on something like a South Sea island, a remote part of Tahiti maybe, and she had been running through a tropical forest, and Paul had been chasing her. She suspected that she had not been running too fast.

Squinting at her clock, she knew she could not take the time to telephone him. She could not risk being late for the Miller Analogies Test that would complete her application to the UCLA graduate school. She had already taken her Graduate Record Examination Aptitude Test and the Advanced Test in Psychology and felt she had done well with both. That left the Miller Analogies Test, and she had better be at her best with no distractions.

Out of bed, she hastened into the shower, dried, dressed, made up her face, and rushed through breakfast. Then, briefcase in hand, she started for the door as her living room telephone rang.

She backtracked, snatching up the receiver, thinking it might be Dr. Freeberg, or even Adam Demski or Chet Hunter.

She recognized the voice at once. The caller was Paul Brandon.

"Hi, Gayle," Brandon was saying. "I've been sitting beside my phone day and night, almost. I've been waiting for the call you promised to make. My phone hasn't rung once. Have you been trying to tell me something?"

She would be barely on time for her exam, but she had to explain. "I'm sorry, Paul. The road to 'I'm sorry' is paved with good intentions. I've just been so busy I can hardly turn around. You know I have two patients now . . ."

"I know, but still."