And softly she opened the door.



X


Before us loomed what I can only describe as a mountain of red
female flesh. This flesh-mountain had once apparently been slightly
covered by embroidered silk lingerie, but this was now soaked in
moisture and reduced to the texture of wet tissue paper. The top of
the flesh-mountain ended in an amazing spectacle. It appeared as if
the head had no hair whatever; but starting from the bare scalp was
an extraordinary number of thin rods, six inches or so in length.
These rods stood out in every direction, and being of gleaming
metal, they gave to the head the aspect of some bright Phoebus
Apollo, known as the "far-darter;" or shall I say some fierce Maenad
with electric snakes having nickel-plated skins; or shall I say some
terrific modern war-god, pouring poison gases from a forest of
chemical tubes? Over the top of the flesh-mountain was a big metal
object, a shining concave dome with which all the tubes connected;
so that a stranger to the procedure could not have felt sure whether
the mountain was holding up the dome, or was dangling from it. A
piece of symbolism done by a maniac artist, whose meaning no one
could fathom!

From the dome there was given heat; so from the pores of the
flesh-mountain came perspiration. I could not say that I actually
saw perspiration flowing from any particular pore; it is my